Week 75...
Week 76 - Feb 13, 2012
Hello family well I am leaving the high desert probably for good now. And its been a good but long run up here and I am sad to leave and go back down the hill for the remaining 6 months of my mission. I will probably go to the Upland, Rancho Cucamonga area and look forward to helping out some other wards in their missionary work and efforts.
Its not easy leaving this area and the past four areas (8 transfers) as all I can say is I have been glad that I can help improve the ward and their missionary efforts. Its been a good run though and we got some pretty golden investigators this past week, and I am still continuing in my missionary pattern of sowing and getting the ground fertile then leaving suddenly afterword being unable to immediately see the effects of the work that I have done.
But the work must go on and it won't be frustrated.
I can't believe I have only 6 months left and I will try to make it as positive and effective as possible. Avoiding the other missionary trend.
What is common - Bump(6months), (Hump 12), (Slump 18), (Dump 24) - Dump where you are trunky and just want to go home.
What you should and I am trying to aim for ( Bump 6), (Hump 12), (Pump 18) and (Jump 24) Ending the mission on a very positive note, so far on my mission I have become much more independent and committed to the gospel then I was before, I have been able to learn how to follow the impressions of the spirit to a degree I heard stories about but never experienced until now.
I will be frank, I haven't woken up on time every day of my mission, I haven't been this leader to everyone else, but I have grown in my own capacity and look forward to a time where all of these little things I have learned can be applied to the real world and I can share the gospel with friends.
But I have grown and learned a lot on my mission, every day is a growing and learning opportunity that I hope to increase in the future and I can't believe the end is coming so soon.
But I will keep my head high and endure to the end of the mission.
Elder John Bolliger
Week 77 Feb 20, 2012
Hello family from Upland California 5th ward.
Well I was just transferred from the Hesperia Maple ward down here to Upland 5th, its quite a change from the High Desert of California. I was also put with a new companion, Elder Jackson who has been out for 22 1/2 months and I will be killing him off ( mission lingo ), but the transfer is going good and we are getting some work done even though its his last transfer. But last night I had dinner with the Hiatt family whose son went to the TX San Antonio Mission, and was an AP there, he knows Elder Murphy and he served in the vista ridge carriage hills district that included the McNeil ward and went on exchanges there, funnily enough we reminisced about Rudys, Papasitos and Round Rock Doughnuts, good times with those.
I am just beginning to learn the members here and we are moving ahead with some of the investigators that have baptismal dates and I am excited because in this zone, baptisms are hard to come by and I am excited to move forward with it.
Also I got into a bike wreck but thankfully I have only a scratched knee and elbow from it, all other parts are just fine and I am completely fine now.
But hopefully this next week I have much better news from this ward as now I am getting to know the ward and the people here in the upland 5th ward, a couple that used to live in the ward, Jordan and Lindsey S, her mom lives in this ward, its a small, small world.
Elder Bolliger
