Elder Collins

Hello Family,

   Well pretty sure this week was the longest week of my life. After talking to you guys it passed by slow. But i saw a clip about the Savior from elder Holland and he always knows how to but fire in your pants and illuminate the spirit in whatever moment. I felt like i needed the spirit way more in my life. Its easy to forget that this isnt my work.  This week ive been fighting to get some baptisms down. I was supposed to have three yesterday but only one worked out. They are all 18-23 year old boys and for me its kind of a headache to teach that age. Here its just too easy for a boy to drink or to fall with his girlfriend. It really is a miracle when a boy from the jungle leaves on a mission because the temptation is really hard for them here. Thats what happened with one of our investigators he drank over Christmas so wasnt able to be baptized. The night he was supposed to be baptized he called our house at 1 am drunk yelling i should have been baptized.. it kind of frustrated me, just showed me that he´s not ready to make this covenant right now. The other boy just never showed up, we went to pick him up at his house to go to the chapel together and he just never showed up. But apart from all that we baptized percy pizango. He is a friend of benji who we baptized last week and just has been really interested in the church. He asked us to set up a time with the bishop to make mission plans! pretty cool stuff. Well today is new years eve, we changed dinner to be able to eat as a zone in the night. Supposedly there is going to be a ton of fireworks hopefully the same as lima because that was so cool last year. Well i love you all and hope your doing well. Have a good week and ill talk to ya next year! love Elder "Baby" collins

 

 

Elder Crump

(Family and Friends,

Nick just recently got called as the Personal Secretary to his mission president.  His P-days will now be Thursdays.
Thanks to all of you for all your love and support.

Trish )

So family it was so great to talk to you guys!  Seriously made my whole Christmas!!  You guys all looked so good!  So first off to everyone...MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WOW can you believe how fast this past year has gone by!  I remember that last year we were in the CCM! WOW how time realy does fly!  

 

So being here in the office is very different.  I was sad to leave the jungle when I had finally got there, but i know that I'm needed where I am now.  It's a different mission, but with the same purpose! We don't have to much time to work in the field because we are in the office all day until like 6pm.  Its hard to make the change, but the work that we do will help other missionaries to have success.  But the good news is, is that it wont stop us from baptizing people!!  haha So family and friends, i just wanted to write a quick message, and send some pictures! I love you all so much! Take care, and Merry Christmas, and  a Happy New Year!!!!!!!

 

All my Love,

ELDER NICOLAS COLLINS CRUMP

 

1. In the mission home with Pres and his wife.

2. The elders in the offices.

3.We had to wash the dishes after!

Elder Collins

Hey family. Well we went to internet this morning and i was there for 45 min and couldnt load anything so thats why this email is late. I got permission to come back since i didnt write president either. Well here is a little about this week. We found like 2 new familys to teach so thats good. I have 7 baptism dates right now that we are working on getting them in the water. One family a mom and her two kids (Lejia Almendra and jefry) and also 4teens of 17, 18,21 and 23 years old who baptisms are before the end of this month. Me and my companion are great, its weird to think that he was already in the mission 4 years before. We get a long great but the truth is even though he´s turning 27 in jan. he is a little immature but in a little kid-old man way. I dont how to explain it well ill be able to tell you more tonight im going to do my pre call. What time should i call? Everything is great here except that all the elders are starting to get trunky because of Christmas haha. I love you all and am going to call in the night.

Elder Crump

Family, Friends, Hows it going?  I hope amazing as usual!!   So  your week last week sounded crazy! Your had like a party every night!  Im glad Alex finally got married as well! haha  Im glad mom didn't freak out about the story about the knife, but look what came out of it!  So can you believe it almost Chritmas!  It still blows my mind! 

 

SO to answer some of moms many, many  questions,  there still is no snow... haha obvious its like 100 degrees here, but Peru is getting into the christmas spirit! There is a big tree in the center of the jungle where there is Lights, and all that great stuff!  Plus there is a Peruvian nativity scene! haha its so funny there all Peruvians! There are llamas, Baby jesus is wearing Peruvian poncho, and a funny hat! haha classic!  plus remember the moto taxis here, well a few are decorated like santa's sleigh, and the guys are dressed up like santa! haha its awesome! I'll try to send pictures!  The stores now are all filled with toys, and candy! Its awesome! But it cracks me up because here people think its so cool to write in english, so there are many signs that say  Mery Crismas,  Meri Khristmas!  Hahah its the best!

 

Mom yes i got my packages!  Except for one... president didnt have room in his bag, so i still have one waiting for me in Lima.  How do i tell which one if for my comp?  Write back and let me know!

So I have a big suprise for you guys!  But you'll find out at 4 pm my time!  So be ready, and have your cell charged, because i get to do a pre call today to plan for Christmas!!!!  So be ready! Mom I'm gonna call you!  And yes i have some news to tell you... but you will have to wait! 

 

So anyway holy cow all of the girls are leaving on missions!! That is so great, but so sad for my future...haha no its going to be awesome! Thats crazy about Shaunie, and Kasandra, who else! I need names! haha so family you should be getting my package the 21st or the 23rd.  But keep a look out.  I sent it on the 11th, and she told me 10 to 12 days!  I hope you get it before Christmas!!  Mom there is something for everyone! I hope you enjoy! Plus there is a little something extra for the girls, letters for everyone, and of course a little something extra for mom!!  haha

 

So this week has been so great!  Things are going great with our investigators!  Davis and Inith were going to do their wedding and Baptism in January, just because we just don't have too much time, as well as Washington!  But were going to baptize two of the 4 girls that were references!  They both came to church, and are excited, and the other 2 need to attend church more, so they will be for January as well!  Things are going great! Seriously, we had like 6 investigators come to chruch today, with a new family, as well as another family of 4 who has been coming to church for 3 weeks now, wants to take the lessons to be baptized! So seriously for January we will have like 10 baptisms with 3 families! Its gonna be awesome!

 

So this past week we had our Christmas party with president Blunck, and his wife! It was awesome!  First off he came to our District Meeting to see how we did it. And we rocked it! Everything went so good! We did tons of practices, and we had an awesome training!  President was so happy with our zone!  Plus he presented my comp and I with our Certificate of 8/4/2!  And the ex comp of Elder Collins was there with us, and he got his too, because him and reg got 8/4/2 as well!  Then after in the night, we had a Christmas devotional, where we played games, we all had santa hats, President Blunck bought us all gifts, and hma blunck made us home made cookies, and banana bread!  it was so awesome!  Then the next day, we had another training with Pres Blunck, then we all went to this way fancy resturant for lunch!  It was an awesome christmas celebration!!

 

Family Friends, I do love you guys so much! I am so grateful for your love and support!  I know mom you say you dont quite feel like your in that Christmas spirit yet, but i promise you when you place baby Jesus in his manger on Christmas eve, it will hit you!  That is what this time of year is all about.  Our Savior, Christ.  As we do the shopping, play in the snow, drink hot chocolate, and watch every christmas movie, we must always keep in our hearts why we celebrate this day.  I wish you all the Merriest Christmas!  I Cannot wait to talk, and hopefully see your faces this christmas!  You guys truly are so wonderful, and i love you all so much!

 

All my Love,

ELDER NICOLAS COLLINS CRUMP

Elder Crump

MY dearest family and Friends!!  Wow we are getting close to Christmas!!!  I cant believe its already the tenth!!  Time isnt even real anymore!  So drum roll please..... daddaddadadadaddaddadadaddadaddadadaddadadaddadadaddadadadd   DIOGO GOT BAPTIZED!!!  Haha finally!! haha boy its been a strugle with him, but all went good!  He was so happy to get baptized!  And his girlfriend even showed up, which made him happy! 

 

Haha so seriouly this past month has been so great, for the past 4 weeks ever saturday we have had a baptism!  Its been so great!  I love the jungle!  haha but i am sad to say that for this next week we dont have a baptism, but for the end of this month we should have a few more!  We are preparing 2 more families, one needs to get married, they are the friends of Mariela and Jack.  But the problem is they can't attend church until january because he works in the mornings!  They are named Davis and Inith.  They want to be baptized. He asked for permission to change his work schedule, but they said he has to wait till the new year...  Also, they have a friend named Washington, we are preparing for this month.  Hopefully he will be able to come to church!  Then the other family is where the wife is a member, but her husband isn't.  They were about to separate, but we jumped right in, and he wants to change everything and become a member... but he is a police officer so its hard for him to attend church!  Oh yeah and last night we received an awesome reference from one of the ladies in our ward!  She has four ladies living in her house and they all came to church.  They want to learn more, and tomorrow we are going to invite them to be baptized for this month!  So if all goes well and people come to church, we can baptize like 5 or 6 people!! Please pray for them!

 

So Awesome news... I got a letter from the ward Tahuantinsuyo, and 4 of my investigators i had there and invited them to be baptized, followed through, and got baptized!  But the best of all was Hmo Martin!!!  The Husband of Hma Diana, my Peruvian Mom!  She was the lady who threw the birthday party for me, with the cake!  So anyway, here is the story of Martin.  He has known about the church for 15 years...  He has talked with many missionaries, but never wanted to change his life!  He always drank, fought with other men in the street, and was straight up just a mean guy!  He always just called me a gringo...  so his life with Hma Diana was pretty sad.  She didn't want anything to do with him, and neither did his kids.  She slept in a different room than him, and for months we asked why are you still together?  But she always said for her kids, and she knows that one day he can change.  So for months, seriously i didnt like that man! He was so rude to us, but still i was always so nice to him, and said hello.  But all of that changed one night.  So this happened about in august, sorry i didnt tell you about it but i thought you might worry... haha so anyway my comp and went to hma Dianas house to thank her for her help with Doyla, our baptism that we had.  So when we knocked on her door,  Martin answered.  I could tell he was a little drunk, so politley we asked if Hma Diana was there, and hr just said come in, and turned away into the kitchen.  We stood there, not wanting to go in.  Then from kitchen, he yelled come in again.  Then he came out of the kitchen with a Knife.  He said he is going to kill someone.  You can imagine at this point we were kind of freaking out, but for some reason i was like who? Who do you want to kill!  He said that stupid dog up the street, he bit me!  And then he lifted up his pant leg, and he was gushing out blood.  Seriously it was terrible, and he was going white.  So i went inside and said Martin, drop the Knife your not going to kill the dog.  Then he started to cry and said i need to!   Then i yelled at him and said, Martin dont make me come take the knife from you.  It was so powerful, but dont worry i was still at my distance from him. I then said Martin we need to take you to the hospital.  He started crying hard and dropped the knife, so then i ran over and kicked it away and grabbed him. Me and my comp carried him to my penisonista's house where we cleaned out his wound, and then her husband drove him to the hospital.  So that was the first part.  The second part was when we saw him the next day.  He looked terrible, but he thankedd me.  It was the first time he said my actual name, Elder Crump.  So then later that night at about 1 in the morning he knocked on our door crying.  I opened the window, and he told me that he just had a big fight with his wife. He said, im drunk , but i want to change... i need to change..  help me!  I want to listen to the lessons!  So as you can imagine, i was like what the!  So i told him ok lets meet tomorrow, and we'll talk.  So the next day, we met at a members house.  I talked very direct with him, and told him Martin we can help you, but only if you do what we say! You need to stop drinking right now.  You need to be nice to your wife, as well as your kids.  When we give you something to read, you need to read, you need to attend church, and pray to God.  I told him if he really wants to change, he need to do that.  God can forgive you, but first you need to forgive yourself.  And the next day we invited him to be baptized in november, near the end the 24th, because he had some problems with some stuff.  And as you know i got my change, but just this morning i received an email from him with pictures of his baptism! He did it! He changed, gave up drinking, read the book of mormon, and is now a member!!!  After so many years he finally changed, and now his family is so much better.  They are happy, and are all members.  God really had plan for him.  I know that we were meant to knock on his door that night,  which changed everything!  Wow, im just so happy that he did it!  So mom, sorry if that story kind of scared you but dont worry we were protected, and look what came out of it!

 

Family, i love you guys so much!  Being out here far away from you guys, truly has showm me how much i miss and love you guys.  You all mean so much to me, and i only want the best for you guys!  This month is going to be so wonderful!  Enjoy this CHRISTmas season! Remember what its all about. 

 

Wow, that is so sad to hear about Danielle's dad.  I cant believe it, he was so young! How is the family doing!  Tell her im sorry, and give her a hug for me!

 

Im glad you guys are getting into the Christmas spirit, and wow talk about a lot of parties!! haha i love it!  Im still waiting on the packages, but this week ill get them!!  And keep a look out for mine! I hope it gets there before Christmas!!!

Well, this turned out to be a long letter! haha i love you guys so much! Stay safe, and know that i love you all!

 

Elder Crump

 

Elder Collins

Familia!

Well this week went by fast. Maybe its because we had pday tuesday? We have been working with a single dad for the last month. His only problem has been that he smoked. We have helped him and he hasnt smoked for 3 weeks so his baptism was supposed to be yesterday. So we go to pick him up for his baptism and hes drunk! He never drinks so we dont know what happened. I was a little upset but i have learned to get over these problems a lot faster now. Luckily we ended up having 10 investigators attend church. We went to pick up two guys who are 18 and 20 and they invited their friends to come too. That helped out a lot. Im still looking for familys though. My comp has a thing that if he sees a kid of the age of 15 to 20 he contacts them immediately. Its not a bad thing but im always trying to remind him that "you get what you look for" elder packer. I want familys so thats what im always looking for. Its a little funny too because he freaks them out the first lesson saying "and after you get baptized you can leave your family for two years and serve the lord!" haha you should see the look on their faces. WOW! the poblete family is awesome. the dad has a strict security job and a strict boss. Every two weeks he works day shifts and every two weeks night shifts so two weeks he cant attend church. But yesterday he told his boss that its important to attend church to be with his family and keep a commandment. Now he has permission to leave work every sunday to go to church. They are working towards the temple right now! He recieved the priesthood last week.Yes, im in the famous club now of  842! bout time. I worked hard to make it to that! Well not much more to say. I want to send you guys a package but i cant promise it will get there for christmas. Im sending a letter for sure though! I love you have a great week! love reg
 P.S. Thank You Miller Family I just got your Halloween Package, not sure where its been?

Elder Collins

Hey Family! Well first of all i want to say sorry that this is a day late. We had a conference and christmas devotional with president yesterday so they changed p day to today without telling us! Well this week i got my new companion.His name is Elder TTito from Araquipa peru. Hes really nice and a good guy. Yes im training him. He actually was in the mission in 2008 for a little bit but went home because he got really sick. Its a little awkward that im his trainer because im only 20 and he´s turning 27 in january! haha. But i still call him my son. He has a lot of excitement to contact. He will contact while we are contacting someone else. The other day we were contacting someone and he saw a young teen and quickly turned around, stopped him and started talking to him alone! Yesterday was pretty great we had a training conference first then after we did stuff for Chirstmas. We all went to a restaurant with pres then played jepordy and watched the christmas mission video. It was a good time, a little wierd because its only december 3 but hey its still great. I got some packages yesterday and everyone was laughing at me because i had so many packages Haha well no one has ever seen scented pinecones before, everyone thought it was food! I wont lie i gave the nativity set to Hno sesisnio because i am in his house more than mine and he was super grateful and said thanks! haha. Im not really sure what stuff is for who? there is like 4 stockings?! But hey thanks! well much loves for all love reg!

Elder Crump

Family!!!  How is it going?  I hope all is just so great!!!  So mom, you will be glad to know that i got 2 of my packages.  The offices have the other 6!  Rude huh!  They are going to be bringing them to us, because this month we dont have the zone leader conference because of Christmas.  So president is coming to tarapoto to have a christmas bash with us! haha  But he sent me a letter about the packages... ill forward it to you guys!  I guess when we send a bunch of packages, the Peru government opens them up and checks them, and then makes the church pay for them.  Its kind of dumb, but in the letter it explains more! But still im excited to get my packages, i hope ill get them soon!

 

So we had another baptism this week!  For Alex!!!  It was awesome! His very active catholic parents came, and they loved the baptism.  His dad is in the police, and is very serious.  He always just puts his hand out to shake, never a hug, even to his own family.  But during the baptism, he was getting a little teary eyed, and after he gave his son a big hug!!!  Seriously, the spirit can change your heart!  They are still very catholic, but little by little they want to learn more!  We didnt baptize Diogo.... his mom had a little freak out, but he talked with her and she finally agreed he could.  So, its for this next saturday!  Im sorry I have so many pictures i need to send you, but my memory has a virus.  Every time i try to load and send a picture my computer turns off!! Its so frustrating!! So when i Can I will send pictures of the wedding, and of all the baptisms!!!

 

Wow, really this past month has flown by!  We have been so busy.  I realized yesterday that we are in december!  Seriously, what an amazing month! We finished as a zone with 14 baptisms!!  Its great, but we had the goal of 17!  We were sad, because this month we had the chance to go above the goal!  But, we had like 8 baptisms fall through!  It's ok, hopefully for december we will be able to make up those baptisms!  So this month was really cool for my companion and me, because we completed with the goal of the mission.  The goal of excellence! 8/4/2  Its when you have 8 people progressing, (4 families, and 4 other people), you baptize 4 people, and baptize 2 families.  It was awesome, because here in Tarapoto no one has ever done it!  In Iquitos, and Pucallpa its a lot more common, because the people are a lot more accepting and awesome, but here its kind of like the Lima of the Jungle.  But it didnt stop us, we wanted to get it, and set the example for the zone and we did it!  We baptized 3 families!!!  it was such a powerful and amazing experience!!

 

As a zone, we want to end this year with a bang, and if all goes well, and the dates dont fall through, we are going to have about 28 baptisms for december!!!  Tarapoto has never had more than 17 in one month!!  But were gonna do it! As long as we get past 20 we will be happy, but were still going for 28!

 

So keep a look out because in these next couple of weeks you will be getting a package from me!!  And tell trev and kenz sorry i need to know that day!  haha I hope they`ll still like it! 

 

Family how crazy is it that we are in the month of the christmas season!  I love it!   Its wierd being away, but what I am doing is what christmas is all about!  Of course i miss the Lights, the snow, the time with the family, but everyday that i get to put on my name tag and walk out the door as a representative of Jesus Christ, Its like christmas!  Family, take the time this year to remember what this season is about!  All of you have your own little families, and how great is that!  Cherish those moments together, and create family traditions that will last a life time!  I love you guys so much!  I miss you like crazy, and i cant wait to talk to you guys this christmas!!  Congrats Bren on your JOB!!!!!!!!!!!  Corinne and your school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  Thats so great!!!!!!!  Im so proud of all of you and what you guys are doing!!!

 

Keep us in your prayers! Pray that we will be able to meet our goals, not only to have better numbers, but to help us improve as missionaries, but most importantly help us to bring MANY people unto our Savior, Jesus Christ!!

 

All my Love,

ELDER NICOLAS COLLINS CRUMP