Week 101

Well it has been a great week! The family of 3 were able to go to church, and we were able to have Alfredo in church as well. Alfredo was not baptized, because he still wants to recieve his answer, but he is doing good. He prayed the other, day and with how good his prayer was, I could tell that he is ready. The family of 3, the Salazar family is doing good. They should be baptized this Saturday if everything goes well. It is too bad that, it could not be last week that they were baptized. I am in the office for my last week. Tommorrow, we have interviews, and then on Wednesday lunch with president, and we get to visit converts, on Thursday we get to go to the temple, then have some trainings, and on Friday I leave. It will be a week that is a little different, but it should befun. It is crazy how fast these 2 years have gone by. I have really enjoyed them, and it is crazy to see how many lives have been changed thanks to the gospel. I hope that everyone has a great week!!!!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

***Thanks to Rocio for sending us pictures and taking such good care of Elder Sorensen***

Week 100

Well what a week! It has been a really crazy week. We worked super hard and we had the family of 3 at church again, so that was great!! I was just super excited to see them at church. We also had the baptism of Cesar,so that was great. 

Cesar´s baptism was really special because his family has tried for 15 years now to get him baptized with no luck... He used to hate the misisonaries. He hated that is family had gone from Catholic to Mormon, and so he thought it was the missionaries fault, so he was always bitter towards us. He would always go to church with his family, because he could not be home alone, and little by little he began to change. Then this week was his baptism, but it was not an easy baptism to have. On Thursday we had everything ready, the font filled and everything looked great. A whole bunch of members showed up, and we were just waiting for Cesar and his family. Well it turns out that his wife was a little sick, and so he didnt get baptized Thursday.... It was terrible to have to tell all the members that had gone that, he was not going to be baptized. They luckily understood, but we were pretty bummed. We did not know what to do. On friday we did not have time to visit Cesar, but at like 850 we got a call saying from his daughter telling us that he would be baptized the next morning at 11. So, Saturday morning we got everything ready, and he was baptized! It was a cool baptism, because the whole ward had been working for 15 years to get him baptized. The next goal for the family is to be sealed in the temple in 1 year!! I cant wait to hear the news when they get sealed!

The Salazar family is doing really good. They now have 2 attendences at the church. They just have to go 1 more time and can be baptized. Hopefully they get baptized Sunday after church, so that I can see it!!! 

The Doctor told Alfredo that he cant go out in public because he can still give chicken pox to everyone, so hopefully this week can be his baptism! He is really excited to get baptized still. 

Well that is about all for this week. This week is my last week working, because next week we have a bunch of trainings and we get to go to the temple. 

Well I hope that everyone has a great week!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 99

Well this was a great week I gotta say! Everything went really well. It was expecially good because we were able to have 7 people going to church and 6 of them have baptisimal dates now. I will talk a Little about everyone of them.

The first 3 are the Salazar family that we found a couple of weeks ago. They liked the church a lot and are really excited to go to church this week . They are the aunt and cousins of our converts here. They are doing really well and will be baptized the 9th of July.

There is another family that is  doing really well. I am excited for them because it is a family that we found on Friday. We talked to the Dad and he is having a tough time right now. He does not have a very good job right now, and has 3 little kids. We invited him to church and he told us that he would be there with his wife and 3 kids. They all got there! It was pretty crazy!!! They live far away from the church They had to leave at 7 just to get there at 9. They did a lot because the 3 little kids are 3, 6 and a year and a half. It was so amazing to see them there!!!

The last is Cesar that will be baptized this week. He is 87, but is doing good. His family is really excited for him to get baptized.

Alfredo should be baptized this week aswell if he can get feeling better with his Chicken Pox. It was too bad, because he still has red spots all over his body, but he is doing better. His birthday is this Sunday so he will be baptized on his Birthday!! That is pretty cool. 

Well that is about it for this week! Everyone is doing great, and it was awesome to see how everyone got to church. Hopefully they can go this next week aswell. Have a great week everyone!!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 98

Well another great week here in Ecuador. It was even better because Elder Rasband gave a really great talk to the missionaries. He talked about the spirit and talked on how we need to follow our first impressions not only in the mission, but in life as well. He also talked about our smiles. He said that we always have to smile. He said that people that aren't members notice that we smile, and that we are happy. This is something that I liked a lot. The world is full of problems and afflictions, but we need to smile to help the people that don't have the happiness that we have. They will see the happiness and ask why we are so happy. Elder Montoya, also talked about smiling, so it must be something, that we need to do better as members of the church. :) 

Well Alfredo could not get baptized this week because he got sick... He is sick with Chicken Pox right now, so we can't even go and teach him right now. It has been pretty tough. We teach him through phone calls right now. Hopefully he will get better this week and be able to get baptized next week. We will be having the baptism of Cesar next week too, so that is exciting!

Everything else is going great. The family that we are teaching couldn't  go to church this week, but they say that they will be there this next week. Hopefully they will be able to go.

Pilar went to church this last week, so if she goes this Sunday she can be baptized this 25th aswell!

Well I hope everyone has a great week. Dont forget to smile!!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 97

Well this week was awesome!!!! Alfredo is doing really good. He should be baptized this Sunday. He was at church again, and the members are doing a really good job at being his friend. Last Monday night he went to a family home evening at the stake patriarch's house, and tonight he will be going to another family home evening at our bishop's house. He played Ping Pong all day with us again. He is progressing a lot and it is crazy how fast he is learning. His prayers are getting really good. I am pretty excited for this family home evening, because we will be eating some cinnemon rolls! :) they should be really good. 

We also found a new family to teach yesterday. It was the mom (she is a member) of our one ofour converts. It was her birthday yesterday, and so we went to their house to celebrate. She had been telling her sister how amazing the church was and her sister told her that she wanted to go to church this next week. We got there just in time and she introduced her sister to us. We taught a great lesson 3 (The gospel of Jesus  Christ) to her and her 2 sons. They felt the spirit and, they are being prepared to be baptized July 2nd! (my last saturday on the mission). They are a really cool family, and the mom Mariana has a real desire to learn and to go to church. It was a big blessing to find them!! 

We have 1 more person we are teaching it is Cesar. He is 82. He will be baptized the 25th of June. He is doing really good. He didnt go to church this week, because he was a little sick. Hopefully he gets feeling better this week!

 I hope that everyone has an amazing week as well. Elder Rasband will be visiting us this Friday or Saturday, so that should be really awesome!!! I am pretty excited!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 96

Well this was a really good week that just passed by! Well... Sunday was really nice, but every other day was actually really tough. We walked a lot!! On thursday and friday they had some sort of holiday and so everyone left on vacation. It was pretty crazy because on Friday we literally walked the entire day, without teaching very many people. Everyone turned us down, but we kept on working. Sunday was awesome. Alfredo and Cesar are doing really well. They are 2 of our investigators that are progressing really fast. Alfredo is 21 and we have pretty much played Ping Pong with him the entire day today. He is pretty good.  Cesar is 84. In his family all of them are members. His wife was Relief society president, and his daughters are return missionaries. He just never wanted to get baptized until now. He will be baptized the 25th of June. 

      We also had a really cool experience yesterday after church. We went to a house of a reference that we recieved. We had went like 5  times and everytime they had told us that we couldn't enter because they were busy and then shut the door on us. Well this time before we knocked on the door we decided to say a prayer and in the prayer we asked God to let us into their house to teach them. We then knocked on the door and they immediatly opened the door and let us in. We taught the 2 parents. (the mom and the dad). The mom said that she did not believe much in God because there are many bad things that happen in the world and if he wouldnt let these things happen if he lives. We immediately invited her to pray and ask God if he is there. She prayed and during her prayer she started to cry. We asked her how she felt after, and she said that she couldn't explain how it felt, but that she had recieved her answer. It was really cool to see how fast her prayer was answered. Hopefully they will continue to let us visit them, and we will see what happens with them. 

This week coming up we could be having a baptism. There is somebody in our ward that has gone to church his whole life, but never wanted to get baptized. He told us yesterday that he would like to be baptized, so we have an appointment with him today to see what happens. 

Well I hope that everyone has a great week!!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 95

Another great week in Guayaquil! We are currently teaching 2 people that are progressing really well. Alfredo and Pilar. They are reading the Book of Mormon and praying alot, so that is really great! They have not recieved their answer yet, but I am sure that they will recieve their answer soon. We had a multi stake conference this week as well. It was for Ecuador,Colombia, and Venezuela. It got cancelled because of the Earthquake so the rescheduled it for yesterday. It was great. Elder Oaks, and Elder Hales gave really great talks. They talked about tithing alot, because that is what these 3 countries need right now. We also ate a good lunch Sunday. The sister gave us a big bowl of Albacore (tuna) with Shrimp. I dont think I have ever been so full in my life. I finished the first bowl really fast, so she gave me another haha.  That is about it for this week! It was a great one! I hope everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Pictures from the baptisms last week!

Week 94

Well another great week here in Guayaquil!! It was a great one because it was Stake Conference and a member of the 70 came. He gave a really great talk about keeping the commandments. The temple president from Eduador gave a great talk about family history. He shared a lot of his family's history and it was pretty good. President Torres was there and he gave a great talk about miracles and he invited all of the young men to go on a mission. We had 3 baptisms this week so that is always great. It was a special baptism because the 3 were so excited for their baptisms. The all were at church this Sunday  We have another person that should be baptized in the next couple of weeks. Her name is Pilar. She lives with her 2 sons, and she is really cool. She is reading the Book of Mormon  and she liked Stake Conference a lot. She even got to talk to President Torres,  so that was great. It was fun because I got to see all of my converts from my first sector. Yanina is the Young Woman's President in the ward 25 de Julio right now. Well that is about all for this week I hope that everyone has a great week!!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 93

Well another great week here in Ecuador. It was a great one and of course -it was awesome to talk to my family yesterday! :) My companion had transfers and my new companion is Elder Zarate from Bolivia. He has 1 year in the mission. The Ortega family is doing really well. The are really smart and really excited for thier baptism this Friday at 7:00. They will be happy because they have been going to church for 5 years and now will be able to be baptized, so it will be a special day. We are also teaching some other people, but they were out of town for Mother's Day, and they were not able to go to church, so hopefully they can go this week. The ward is really excited to get to work, and they are all really great people. I hope that everyone has a great week! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 92

It was another great week here in Guayaquil! Well the entire weeek was actaully really good. We worked hard and found alot of people to teach. It was great until Sunday..... We went early in the morning to pick up the investigators and nobody could go... They all made up excuses. We were bummed but we put on good faces and went to church.  During church I was praying the entire time that we could find somebody to teach. Well at the end of church a member came up and told us, "My 3 kids are not baptized and I want them to be baptized". They  have been going to church for 5 years, but none of the 3 were baptized. It was a miracle to hear that. So we might be having some baptizms coming up.  I think this week or the next week we will have the 3. I am excited to see it!!! Well not much more has happened. We played ping pong all day today so that was pretty fun. I won of course haha. Im joking! I won a couple. Well I hope everyone has a great weeek!!! 

Love, Elder sorensen

Week 91

Well another week has gone by. This week was a pretty crazy one because the aftershocks were still happening here in Ecuador. On Wednesday and Thursday we felt like 4 of them that were actaully pretty strong. All of the investigators are doing alright. Everyone is safe and most of the people are back in Guayaquil again, so that is great! The members are all doing really well also. We had a family home evening that was great last night with the Bishop. It was a lot of fun and we ate some great food. This week we ate a encebollado that was really good. It is one of the best things I have eaten here in Ecuador.

 I guess that where the Earthquake happened is still a pretty ugly scene. The keep on finding more people that have died, but they continue to save people aswell. 

I bought a pretty big Ecuadorian flag this week, so I thought I would take some pictures of it, and I also won in Monopoly today, so I took a picture haha. Well I hope that everyone has a great week! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 90

Well what a week!! I think this may have been one of the craziest weeks of the mission! Well there was a pretty big earthquake here in Ecuador on Saturday at like 7:20 at night. We were on the street at like 7:00 and we felt like we had to get to a house to teach a family and we had to get there fast. So we got to the nearest families house and started to teach them. They had just given us a cup of water when the earthquake started. It started pretty soft, but started to shake hard at the end. The family was really scared. They all started screaming and everything. Well after a while it stopped and everything got calm. We thought that it shook pretty good, but I never thought that it was strong enough to make buildings fall. Closer to where the center of the earthquake was, many buildings fell, and many people died. Here in Guayaquil only a couple of bridges fell down. The good thing is that all of the missionaries are doing good. We were in the house the entire day Sunday, and they canceled church. (the first time in the 2 years I haven't gone to church now) Well that was the big news. I am doing well. Luckily Guayaquil was not affected too much. Our investigators are doing good. Hopefully we will have some baptisms coming up. Have a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 89

Hey! Well I got transfered... Haha I am  now in Guayaquil again and it is very hot! It is like 100 degrees during the day and at night it cools off to be 90 degrees. I cant escape the heat!! I dont understand why they dont have air condicioners here in Guayaquil haha. The members are pretty awesome here. I am in the same Stake where I started my mission in the Stake Pradera. On Sunday I actually got to see some people from my first ward and they still remembered me. That was pretty cool. We are teaching a lot of people. We are mostly just teaching less active members and helping them get back to church.

 I also got to do a temple session on Tuesday so that was great. I could feel the spirit pretty strong. My new companion is Elder Cutipa. He is from Bolivia and has 7 months on the mission. He has a bunch of time in the sector, so I am pretty sure that he will have transfers soon, so I gotta learn the sector super fast. On Saturday, President Torres came to our meeting, and he seems really excited for his new calling as a member of the 70.  He will finish the mission and then go to his new calling. That is about it for this week. I am ready to work here in Guayaquil again. Afterall this is the city were they baptize a lot! :)

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 88

Hey!! Well it has been a great week of conferencia!!! The were some awesome talks and I was able to learn a bunch, but by far the best part was the baptisms of the Soto family. They were all super excited for their baptisms and they after they shared their testimonies and it was really cool. There were like 100 members there for their baptism and they all helped them alot. The branch was super happy to see a family getting baptized, so they brought food and everything for the baptism. I baptized two and some my companion the other 2.

 I think that President Uchtdorf's talk from preisthood was my favorite. He always seems to give really good talks. Well I don't have much more to say. I forgot my camera so I dont have the pictures of the baptisms but I will send them next week. But the 4 of them did get baptized!!! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 87

Well this week has been a really great one!!! It was a lot of fun because we had a bunch of success!! haha Well I will start with the story because it was really a miracle what happened this week.

 Well a lady was praying to find the missionaries so that she could find somebody to help her. She felt lost and did not know what to do. She had just finished her prayer and saw my compainion and I and one of her old friends passing by ( the member was visiting people with us). She called her friend over and we went aswell and we started to talk just a bit. We got a appointment for the next day, and then left. We were excited but she did not tell us that she was looking for help. Well we went back the next day and WOW! It was an amazing lesson. And one point her and her 3 kids all started to cry and they told us that, this is what they were looking for. We taught them a little about baptism, and immediatly they asked us ¨And When will you guys be baptizing us?¨ We got super excited at that point. Well we ended up inviting them for the womans session for conference and they went and liked it a bunch. They also were at church on Sunday and loved church! They will be getting baptized this Sunday if everything goes well. They are super excited! There is the mom and her 3 kids. Xiamara she is 16. Marco he just turned 13 and Jennifer she is 9. Well that is all for today and this week. I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 86

Well this week was a pretty good one! We were able to work alot more with the members and received a lot more references. Everything is going great in Loja and it is nice because it is getting colder and colder every day. It now rains every single day, so that gets a little old, but it is not raining too hard. We found a couple of families that could be pretty promising, so i am excited about that! We also made a bunch of empanadas yesterday. After church we went to our mamitas house and made like 150 empanadas. They were really good. Hopefully I can get the recipe down really well for after the mission. I also was able to see a bunch of rainbows this week so that was pretty cool. Loja is a really cool city. That is about for this week. I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 85

Well another great week in the city of Loja. We were able to baptize Robert, so that was pretty cool. He was excited for his baptism and there was a lot of support from the branch members. The primary sang a song for the baptism, and they did really great. We also had the branch conference this week, so the District President was there to give a talk. He talked a lot about how the members need to support their leaders and not talk bad about them. We had 105 members at church, so that is pretty good. It is the biggest I have seen in my time here in Loja. Well Elder Larrea had tansfers aswell, so that was kind of a bummer he was a really cool guy. My new companion is Elder Perez. He was my companion like 8 months ago in Guayaquil, and now he is my companion again. We also had a leadership meeting in Guayaquil, so I had 20 hours of bus rides again, so that was great haha!  Well that is about all for this week! The time keeps on flying by! Have a great week everyone!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 84

Well another great week has flown on by. This week was a pretty good one for the zone. We were able to find a bunch of new people to teach and my companion and I were able to get baptized. T hey got baptized saturday so that was cool! They decided on Saturday that they wanted to be baptized that same day in 2 hours! That was a big suprise, so we ran to the church and started to fill up the baptismal font, and they got baptized, so that was cool. We also found Robert that had been going to church a long time, but was not a member. We did not know that he wasn't a member, but he came up to us yesterday and said that he wanted to be baptized this Saturday. So that was a pretty cool suprise!!! He will be baptized this saturday, so we have a baptism this week! haha WAhoo.

 My companion had his birthday this week, and it was pretty cool because some other people that we are teaching celebrated his birthday with us. They bought a cake and made a big meal for him. Saturday was a really great day! Sunday was not too great because Richard's family had another emergency and were not able to get to church this week, but they promised us that this week they will be at church. So this Saturday should be really awesome. That is all for this week! I hope everyone has a great week.

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 83

Hey!! Well this week was another great one! We continue to baptize people in the zone. This week we had a pretty cool activity in the branch.  Our job as the missionaries was to fill up a room with balloons which was the celestial kingdom, so we bought 300 balloons and filled it up! haha It was pretty fun to play in this room. I think it was just like the celestial kingdom for all the little kids. A room with 300 balloons was pretty awesome for all of them, a bunch of kids were running around throwing the balloons around. It was pretty crazy, but in the end it was a great activity and they all had a great time. 

Richard has been great. He conintues to go to church and he is sharing the gospel with everyone. Some listen to him and other don't, but he is doing good. His family could not make it to church, but we are still teaching them. One day they will get to church. 

Right outside of Loja are some pretty cool hills and  mountains, so I took a picture of them thinking that they were pretty cool. Oh and the other picture is with a elder in my zone. He is probably the smallest elder here. Well there is not much more to say. Everything is going well here in Loja. I hope everyone has a great week!

 Love, Elder Sorensen 

Week 82

Well I guess I have 2 weeks of writing to do... haha. Well this week was actually a pretty fast one. With 20 hours of traveling the week flew on by. There was not much other than that has gone on.  We have been teaching Richards family, but every Sunday there is an emergency and they cant get to church. The good news is that Richard´s mom promised us that this Sunday they will all be there! The two kids that we were teaching english to sadly moved away from Loja, so we can no longer teach them. Everyone in my zone is doing pretty good.We are baptizing a lot more than the normal in Loja. On Saturday we made some killer Empanadas. I starting eating them and didnt stop. I think I ate like 10 of them. It was a good thing that we made like 50. Last night we went over to the house of a guy in our branch that is from the United States and ate some Spaghetti. It was pretty good. (Not as good as my dads though) haha. The meeting with President Torres was great. A member of the 70 who is from Austraila came and talked to us too, and it was cool to hear his accent. He didnt know spanish so it was all in english, so that was great to haha. That is about it from Ecuador. I am doing great, and the time keeps on passing by! I hope everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 81

This is all we got this week....

Hey mom if I dont write this week it is because we have a leadership meeting in guayaquil. So dont worry everything is good! hahah Love ya!

Week 80

Well this week was a great one! 

This week was carnaval and so everyone is throwing buckets of water at people, so we got pretty wet this week haha. We were leaving our mamitas house on Thursday after lunch, and as we got onto the street and we got showered with water balloons and buckets of water. We got soaking wet, and had to change out of the wet clothes. On Saturday and Sunday we were inside just about the entire day. Today and tommorrow we will be indoors aswell. It is a pretty crazy celebration here. We were able to find and commit 4 new baptismal dates this week so that was great. 

Richard was baptized yesterday and his mom and sister accepted baptismal dates. He wanted to be baptized in a river. so we found this pond that looked pretty cool and we did the baptism there. The water was freezing cold, but it was a neat experience. Yesterday I was able to confirm him. Yesterday he also recieved the Aaronic Priesthood, so it was a very eventful day for Richard. This week was really great and it was neat to see the many miracles that happened for Richard to be baptized. I hope that every week can be as great as this week. Oh and the Broncos won, so that makes it even greater!!! haha.

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 79

Well this has been a very good week. We were able to help Richard a lot, to get ready for his baptism this week. He is pretty excited! He was at church this Sunday and he really liked it and that helped him to get even more excited for his baptism. Today we ate at a restaurant called London Chips - they sell cutting boards full of food. We bought one for the 4 of us and it was really good. The other picture is of my companion and I taking a bunch of photos at the house of a member- haha. We were waiting for his daughter to get there to teach her, and we started to take a bunch of photos. Everything here in Loja is going really well.  We should be having a 3 baptisms in our zone this week. Well that is all for this week. It is crazy how fast the time is going by. I hope that everyone has a great week! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 78

Well it has been a great week here in Loja. Elder Kwak had transfers on Wednesday, so I am now with Elder Larrea from Lima Peru. He has 21 months on the mission,  So he now is entering his last 3 months of the mission. We had a great week talking to a lot of people. We were not able to find a lot of people to teach,  but really soon we will be finding more to teach. We just have to be patient. The people in Loja are a little bit tougher, because they are all super catholic here, but its ok! We will just have to convert some catholics. The zone is going up and we are getting better and better every week. Really everything is going good here in Loja. Elder Larrea is really cool, and a really good companion. We are going to have a bunch of success here. Well I hope that everyone has a great week! Oh and today for P day we ate some pretty good pizza! haha And here is a picture of Loja in the night time.

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 77

Well it has been a very fast week. This week was a little better for the zone. We were able to have more people to go to church and we had a baptism. Richard was not able to be baptized because we was sick. His throat swelled up a lot and he couldnt breath well so he spent the weekend in the hospital. He was a little bummed, but he is excited for his baptism this week. We were able to find a couple of other people to teach aswell. We found an older guy Carlos that recently has lost everything.  He really feels bad and he is willing to do everything to follow Christ right now. We also found an older lady Pilar.  She is a really nice lady, and really likes our lessons. She told us yesterday that we explain things a lot better than the leaders in the Catholic Church.  I thought that was pretty funny. The city of Loja I believe was built for super short people. Our bathroom door is very small and I have to duck to go in every day, but in the morning I always seems to forget and slam my head on the door haha. I think I have done it like 30 times in these two weeks haha. Everything else is going really well. It has been pretty hot here, but I think it is about to change because it has rained that last 2 days. I am pretty excited to work here in Loja and change the peoples lives here. I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 76

Well I have been transfered to Loja. It is the farthest zone away from Guayaquil. On Tuesday I had a 10 hour bus ride to get here haha. It was a VERY long day. My new companion is actually the first companion I had in the mission. Elder Kwak!!!! haha We are back together. I am now a zone leader, so on Tuesday we had the Mission leader meeting with President. That was pretty cool. The spirit was super strong and we learned some pretty cool things. My new area is really cool because it is in the mountains again! I have escaped the heat! In Guayaquil and the coast right now it is super hot so I am happy to have left the coast. I am now that leader of 12 missionaries here in Loja. This city is a lot like Cuenca were I was before, but just smaller. There are a lot of people from the US here aswell. Our neighbor is actually from Utah haha. He is a member, but does not go to church very often. I don't have much more to say. Our key broke inside our door this week so for 2 hours we worked to get the part of the key out of the door. That was a lot of fun haha. I hope that everyone has a great week! 

Love, Elder Sorensen 

 

     

       

Week 73

Well  this week has been a really good one!  We have 4 people progressing and 5 at church. It was really good because I got transferred back to Cuenca in the cold again!!! haha. It is nice because in Arenillas it was super hot and even fans blew out hot air, so it is nice to be in the cold. My Companion is  Elder Paim. He is from Brazil. we Have some pretty cool investigators right now. We have 2 baptisms for this 26th (this Saturday) It should make for a really good day. The baptisms are Luis and Agñesca. They are pretty excited for Saturday and are really cool people. I am in the ward Alamos and the members seem to be really cool and really like the missionaries.  We have 2 other people that will be getting baptized the 2nd of January. Mariah and her husband Angel. They are pretty excited aswell for the baptisms. It is nice to be back! There is not much more to say but I hope that everyone has a great Christmas!!! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 75

Well I am getting transferred again haha. I recently got the call that I have to be in Guayaquil in 5 hours, so I only have a little bit of time to write. This week was a great one. We were able to baptize Maria. It was a very cool. She was super excited, and after she shared her testimony with us after the baptism and it was cool to hear how firm her testimony was. This next week there will be 2 more baptisms here in  Alamos, but I have changes so I won't get  to see them... :(  I was only here for 3 weeks. I dont know what else to say I will write everyone next week, because there is not any time. I hope everyone has a great week!  

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 74

Well another week has gone by, but it was a great week! It was fun to talk with the family, even though the hour zoomed by. My companion and I have beeen having a great time in Cuenca. We were able to have a baptism the 26th of December, so that was a great way to celebrate Christmas. It was a great one because we worked hard just to have the baptism happen. It seemed like everything went wrong as we were setting up for the baptism. First, the font was super dirty so we had to clean it, then we had no gas, so the water was super cold. We had to run with the heavy gas tank 5 blocks and buy a new one and then return with the full one (which was heavier). haha Then, the water heater wouldn't work. Once it started to work the water did not want to come out and with 1 hour until the baptism, the font was only a tenth of the way full. We decided to say a prayer that everything would go well and that it would fill up by the time of the baptism. We then left the church to go and get the clothes for the baptism, and when we got back the font was filled. After that I thought WOW that was a lot of work and nothing more could go wrong... I was wrong haha. The clothes did not end up fitting her so we ran back to the house for more clothes, and then the bishop still had not gotten there. We started the baptism without him and he got there just in time to confirm her. It was a TON of work  but a great baptism that we could see a lot of miracles happen. On Sunday we were able to have Mariah and Angel go to church, and they will be getting baptized on Saturday if everything goes well.  I am  excited to be here  in Cuenca and the work is going great. I hope that everyone has a great new years day!

Love, Elder Sorensen