Elder Matthew Kenison's Mission To Chile: June 13 update

Elder Kenison has been serving for 15 months on his mission! Time continues to fly... Hard to believe there are only 9 months to go until he returns!! He continues to feel great joy in his service, and desires to grow and improve in his missionary duties.

We shared with Matt some of our experiences during this past week which were a bit challenging (a large stake youth activity in Wyoming that encountered some weather problems) but had a great final outcome. He responded with this reflection:

that's awesome! even though it was a hard trip I'm sure i would say it was a great success. i remember in the MTC when my companions and i taught a lesson and we thought it was HORRIBLE! (especially when it was given in Spanish) we were So disappointed. but then our teacher would ask us "how did this person come unto Christ" and then we would think about it and find some ways. so... applying that to the trip. i think that it was a success. because there may not have been the firesides and everything but there was still a lot of learning going on. and they still learned a lot. i'm sure almost all of the youth that went on the trek have much more respect for the Pioneers than they did before :D SWEET!!!

His best news of the week:

we have a fetcha with Ayram for her baptism!!! i mean AYRAM HAS A BAPTISMAL DATE :D HAHA

We also asked a little about the senior/junior companion situation, which Matt has been downplaying. He clarified the mission's approach, and his personal attitude — we loved this comment:

yeah our mission does [have the concept of a senior companion]. but elder balling and i kinda don't. really if there is a problem or opinion needed we BOTH work to fix it. but if a leader is correcting us for doing something (like... getting in late or something) then i would be responsable for it. but as for like teaching and deciding what to do with investigators. we work together. :D

As for whether he likes having a "gringo" as a companion for the first time in a long time, he commented:

yes and no. we try speaking mostly Spanish. but elder Balling is in that stage where he doesn't understand everything. but he's understanding more and more. so it's kind of hard to talk to him in spanish. but he's been a Baller and he's been really patient and trying to understand. haha he's a stud.

And do they speak Spanish or English when they're alone?

probably english because we're always telling each other stories about stuff. Elder Balling knows A LOT! about like chemistry and mathamatics. haha so i've just been asking random things. haha like "how does a bomb work?" haha

Bombs??? That's important for missionary work, right???

We didn't get any photos from Matt this week, but here are a couple that came recently that I never posted.

'dancing' with a dog. haha aquiles he likes to jump on you so i grabed his paws haha and as a joke started 'dancing' (you know i can't dance) and elder Tucto took a picture haha