Spiritual Gym......... ONE YEAR

Well this week was so bomb! I was able to hear the words of the Prophet! It was so great and I learned so much. Wow what a spiritual hunger I had! I was so active in the conference, I was writing everything down that called my attention! I would have to say that Holland just called my attention the most with fasting and fast offerings. I love it! I was listining so closely! I hope each and everyone of you guys paid close attention to everything that they said to us. Wow I love conference I was thinking........  its our spiritual gym. We have to get strong and we have to get ready for the game and be ready for those 6 months to fight against Satan! So I hope we worked out hard!Other than that we had found more familes this week and we have been trying to meet our goals and have most of our lessons with members. It was so great! Its a little hard though to take the members with us because we have so many mountains to climb hahah by the end of the day the members are so tired! We had a blast this week! We are always having fun! My comp is a beast he always gives me "animo" (encourages me) I love him hes such a good example to me! We are contacting a lot and we had so many good experiences of finding people. We love our area! There are so many people that are poor! Its great, because they are a little easier to teach them I love these people! Also...... I have officiallly completed one year! Yep now I am old in the mission haha but wow how weird! 1 year ago I left my life to serve My loving God! I love my duty as an Elder! I know Christ lives and I am so happy to be here do something really important! I know the gospel is true! love you all! - Elder Santacuz

One year tradition.... Burn a Shirt!

ONE YEAR!

High on a mountain top

Excited for Conference!

Wow! I would like to start out with the coolest thing that happened this week. First we set a baptismal date with a family. It is in November! It was so cool that they accepted the baptismal date! It was so dope! The problem is that they are not married but we are gonna help them get married! So we are so excited for them to get married so that they can be baptized. They are just a little sketchy about the marriage still so we asked them to pray about it so that they can receive an answer! But wow we have a family with a baptismal date! DOPE! The father is so cool! He told us that he knows the church is true because he had felt something in one of the lessons. He said his heart just felt warm and he feels something every time we talk to him!! That's really cool, they went to church for the first time last Sunday! YEAH!

Something else cool about our week is that we had members leave with us everyday this week! It was so cool! No there is not a lot of members in the branch but we managed to have a member with us everyday! We know that this branch is gonna grow so fast! I am so HAPPY to be here because there is so much WORK! There is a lady named Hermana Reyes wow, her testimony is so strong! She loves to help us whenever. The funny thing is that our area  has so many hills like mountain hills and she still climbs without complaining or anything. She is such a good member of the church. She shared her testimony with some of our investigators and some had said, wow what a testimony! It was great being with her! 

My comp and I have been working so hard that everyday we come home, I am so dead that I have fallen a sleep twice in my night prayer hahah oops!
Oh and can you believe that conference is this week! wow I am SOOOOOO PUMPED to hear the words of the prophet! My comp and I have planned to fast the day before just to feel the spirit even more! I am so GREAT! Can't be any happier! 

Love you all guys! Miss you!

9 year old girl with baptismal date set

Hermana Reyes. Lights went out so family night with candles it is!

SERVICE!

Working Hands

All the zones in Santiago 

Professional Chef

Hard and Great

Hello from the DR!!!! This week! was a lit bit of both! Hard and Great!

To start out with the good! We worked so hard everyday that we have had so much success!! We have found so many more people to teach! We have seen so many miracles! W have felt the spirit in literally every lesson! The way we work together is great! We are just two missionaries that are just focused on the work with nothing distracting us and we push each other to be better! He pushes to do more and with that we get home every night SOOOO tired! Wow! 

Also! Elder Cornish came to Santiago to talk all to the missionaries! He is the President of the Caribbean! He was so great! He helped us so much to give us more energy to work harder! He said that we needed to be more organized to work with the members a lot more! 

This week there was some bad news! We had two investigators that had baptismal date set and they dropped us. They don't want continue with the lessons it was hard but we know that the Lord is helping us to focus on the right people! This week was definitely funny,crazy, short, HOT, a lot of rain everything!
Love you all! Have a good week! 

Elder Santacruz

My Awesome Companion

What More Can I Ask For?

Hey everyone how goes it!? This week was so great but wow I am really tired! Haha we worked our butts off this week! We have so much work to do though! There are only 35 members in the branch! Can you guys imagine being in a house and sitting with only 35 members around you makes you feel like the old time when they just started the church! Wow my comp is so cool he is from here in the DR and he is such a humble guy. He is so nice and loves the people! What more can I ask for!?

This week we invited 3 people to be baptized. We talked with everyone its so crazy! I love my AREA but wow there are literally mountains its crazy!!!!!!!!!!!! My legs are gonna be hulk legs by the time I get out of here! 

As for now we are starting to give out a lot of invitations to be baptized. We have to help the President of the branch to build up the branch! We want to bring less actives back to church so we can have a better assistance! Well guys there is not much to say only that I am so happy to have so much work and that we are gonna see so many miracles here in the La Herradura! Love you all and miss you!

love,

Elder Santacruz

New Companions

Our roommates

Church

Inside Church

Elder Hollingsworth

We are cool!

This is how Haitians sell stuff

La Herradura

HEllO everyone how is everything this week? This was my last week in San Francisco. They sent me to a different area!!!!! La Herradura! in Santiago!!!!! I guess they want me back there to work!! I am super excited! My companion is Dominican he is such a good missionary. Everyone tells me he is a hard worker and that he is super spiritual! La Erradura is a branch and its not a chapel its a house hahah. Its crazy, there is only 35 members that assist weekly so we will see how it goes. I am super excited to be in an area that has a lot of problems because I know the Lord trusts me with his work and I know I can doing anything If I just have the faith!

All is great! I am so happy and I cant wait to start working! I love you all and miss you tons! Ill send pics next week! but I love you! Have a great week! 

I know this gospel is true with all my heart! 

In the name of Christ AMEN!

Elder SANTACRUZ

Hello to All

Hello everyone! This week started out with my talk on Sunday! I gave a talk on la obra misional! misionary work! It was so great! Mom I talked about you, how you are such a good example because you found the gospel and how you still want to be a better member everyday!!!!  Wow the Lord helped me so much to have the spirit. The spirit was there with everyone! I enjoyed it so much! After sacrament, the whole ward came to me and said that they felt the spirit so strong, that my testimony helped them so much!

Also we had an activity!!! We planned it really well! We called it viaje al cielo! Trip to Heaven! It was so cool. We had different rooms the celestial room, terrestrial, telestial, paradise, and prision. We put an explanation in each room, it was so cool. Each missionary was in a room talking about the kingdom and it was awesome because a lot of people showed up to the activity and the members brought their friends! My week was super awesome!

Also this week an inactive family that we have been teaching for a while is now officially reactivated! They told us before we started teaching them that they hadn't gone to church for 8 years!!!! How awesome is that?! Well that is my week! I hope you liked it because I sure did! 

Me encanto La mision! Es algo muy especial para mi! Se que este evangelio es verdadero! Se sin una duda! Vamos a disfrutar la bendicion que tenemos! Les quiero!!!!! MUCHO!!! Me encanto siendo un misionero!!

Activity with the Zone

One of our rooms

Another room

Los Frutos de la Mision

Hello family! Wow this week was just so amazing! Do you guys remember the first week that Elder Centeno arrived that we found a prophet! We found a guy that saw Jesus Christ in a vision and that he told him that Christ would restore the gospel through a prophet. We gave him a pamphlet of the restoration and yeah that's it... and we never returned cause he lives really far! This week we were contacting and we found a little path that led to this little village that he lives in and we passed by his house and he was there! We talked with him for an hour and he was so happy to see us! He had a couple of questions about the pamphlet which he read the whole thing! He asked if the church still has the authority from God and if we were still in the apostasy! We told him everything and told him about Joseph Smith and that he saw a vision and after we had asked him if he had any complaints or comments he said that he had been praying about these things and he said that this church has everything that Jesus had we he started his church. Really this is such a good sentence to hear!!! We had asked him to be baptized and he accepted and he accepted the book of Mormon and he said he would read it!!! That visit with him was really so uplifting for me especially in this area that has been pretty hard to find people! He gave the closing prayer and it was so beautiful I felt the spirit, my heart was pounding so hard, I could just feel the love and help from the Lord! WOW! Just gives me goose bumps typing these words! Im freaking happy!!!!! WELL this is my crazy week story and I love each and everyone of you guys! Miss you!

I know this gospel is true and that I could never doubt it! I have the truth in my life! This mission is for me! I love being a missionary! God loves all!
Love your Elder SANTACRUZ

My Amazing Mission President

My district after playing soccer