The Gospel is Sweet

Hey Yall! This was yet another fantastic week here in the great city of Chicago (even though I'm still in the burbs it's awesome)

But to start, we have been working on this new fangled idea of Daily Contacting which means that we try to pass by the people we are teaching at least every day and if not as often as possible. And it's been awesome! We have been working really hard and talking tk everyone! There's this one trailer park that we are teaching some people in and we like tripped the amount of people we are teaching in there! We went from like 4 people to almost 10 in three days! And we were only there just talking to people who are out and about! We also found some youth who are pretty interested in learning more about the Book of Mormon and how it can help them feel peace in their lives! It's awesome!

This week we also got to go on exchanged again! Elder English came over here again with me in Arlington Heights and we had a blast! We had an awesome district meeting and then we came home and ended up having a phenomenal Companionship Study and we went and talked to everyone and it was super fun! One of the people we are teaching, Edgar, he has this giant knife he left me hold and we actually really excited to show me haha great guy. But Elder English is an awesome Zone Leader and he taught me a lot of great things!

So talking again about finding people, we went to go find one of our friends we are teaching out here and he was talking to his neighbors and we felt a little awkward just going up and talking tk them all but why not? We get talking and they eventually ask us why we are here and we describe our purpose and that we share messages about Jesus Christ with others. And they seemed a little hesitant but they agreed to let us come back in like 20 minutes. So we went and then came back and we sat down and they had so many questions for us. It was fun! We shared the Book of mormon and the parents were not having that idea, but thier daughters were instantly defending the book and what it is. We showed them the additional commentary of Christ's Baptism in 2 Nephi 31 and also in Matthew 3. Then the dad pulls out his bible and tries to shut us down, but then I ask to see his bible and I just kept pulling out scripture, after scripture on this guy, saying the otherwise. And eventually he seemed pretty convinced that we knew what we were talking about and they told us to come back tonight so we are gonna go back and see what happens! (I really like using the scriptures and I also love reading them all)

Thanks you all for reading this far, (if you have and you still read my emails yall are the homies) I hope you enjoined it a little! This week here is the last week fo the transfer and so next week I'll be telling you all where I'll be headed off to next! I think I'll stay but who knows? But I love you all and I love the gospel of Jesus Christ and all that He does for us! He lives!

As always,

Elder Tracy

PHOTOS
We ate this really hot salsa and we survived (ft. German and Maya)
The big knife
Elder English and I after exchanges
Elder Fry and I in the car!
The gospel is Sweet!!!

Biking and blessings

Hello one and all!

This week was good! We had a lot of great things happen to us!

To start, we were over IN Des Plaines and we decided to stop by this one member randomly and see how he was doing. It turns out that's he was this less active guy wanting to come back to chruch! His mname is Wilbur and he's from El Salvador! And we get talking with him and his brother in law for a while and we had some really good conversations about life and about the gospel and ti was a great time! We also told them that we learned how to make papusas (which are from el Salvador) and they didn't believe us so we told them we'd make some for them and bring them on Thursday. So ion Thursday, we made some papusas and man, they were bad hahahahah it was really fun though! So we brought them to these papusas and they ate them gladly so that was good. So we are working on them haha

We also were walking yesterday through this trailer park and there was about a billion families having food and like parties outside and so we were walking past one and they called us over to eat (I love Mexicans) and we ate some good tacos and we had some good talking with some of the people there! We shared a video about Jesus Christ and they all really liked it!

Also yesterday was stake conference and so we were driving down to Schaumburg and as we are driving we pull alongside our mission president! And so we waved to him and his family and then we smoked him off the line and we kinda ran a sketchy yellow light in front of him. But he caught up to us and gave us a thumbs up so it was all good hahaha we also got interviewed by him before conference and I was worried the whole time that he was gonna call me out on it but he didn't so I dodged a bullet. But Elder S. GIFFORD NIELSON OF THE 7P CAME TO VISIT US HERE IN ILLINOIS. Hes from Houston and so afterward I went to say hi and that I'm from Houston! It was awesome!

Also this week for District meeting was awesome! We had a really good discussion about how everything is going and we also played a game! It's called "Read a bunch of Scripture References and see what they Have In Common" it was a game of my creation and it went well. It was about contention and how we can avoid It as missionaries: between our companions, other missionaries, our leaders, whatever it may be. It was good especially because we've been fighting it for a while now... But things are all better now! I'm loving being District Leader!

BUT the other day we decided to ride bikes around our local area to try and save miles (because as missionaries we are only allotted a certain amount of miles) and it was AWESOME it was great to be back in my bike I was just smiling the whole time! I was just pumped I like even jumped at one time! It was just words can describe it haha!

But things here are awesome! We have things really going for us! I love yall and we will be in contact here soon!

As always,

Elder Tracy

PHOTOS
District Meeting with the Homies
Elder English and I haha
Zone Conference from last week! Try to find me!
We forgot to take pictures biking so we grabbed one today!
I found a street named after me!
Papusa making!!!

PABLO AND PAPUSAS

Hello Everyone! How are you all doing?

This was a good week for us! We saw a lot of success and some miracles tk go along with it!

So to start, we had Zone Conference this week! And since this is my first car area, we have to clean out our cars, and make sure they are vacuumed and clean! So we kinda forgot about it until the last minute and very hurriedly and effectively cleaned out our car and we found this 3 dollar car wash on the way to the church so we got blessed and out car looked good! But Zone Conference was intense! We learned a lot of things. We learned about how we can just be better missionaries and also what we can do to be better! President Bingham is a straight Wizard I'm telling you all: we are sitting there and he just says, do you want to know what's been holdijg you all back? We all said yes, and he said that he had been pondering it for some time and we went to the Lord in prayer and he told him exactly what we needed. And then President layer out this list of things and it was intense because it like really revelation directly from God for our specific group! It was wild!

We were out one night at about 8 o clock and we had had a rougher day, a bunch of appointments had fallen through so we were kinda upset, but it was later and darker so we decided to go to do some stop bys of some people in our area. We talked to some guys but no one was really having it. We decided tk hit one more house and we ring the doorbell and no one answers, so we decide to call the number of this guy in there from months ago. And we we call him, the door opens and this dude leaves and his phone is ringing! So we are like hey are you Pablo? It was Pablo! So we get talking with him and he's had a rough life but we have been telling him about how we can find peace in Christ and stuff and it's been an amazing experience trying to teach him! It's been wild honestly.

But we also have this one couple who are trying to get ready for baptism here soon! German and Lorena are awesome! They feed us every Wednesday and Saturday and they are so ready, they just need to be officially married in order for everything to work out and they can keep going in their eternal progression! We are really excited!

This Sunday we went to this members house and they taught us how to make papusas!!! It's this food from El Salvador and it's the best and it's pretty easy to make. But it was really fun and we are now super tight with this family! The Padilla Familia are the homies. I'll attach pictures.

Sorry this week wasn't super interesting for a weekly letter! We also don't have very many pictures this week, so sorry! But it's been awesome! If you all have any questions for me abitu anything at all, let me know at seth.tracy@myldsmail.net and we can talk!

As always,

Elder Tracy

PHOTOS
Elder Fry and I forgot to take pictures this week so we took a selfie to make up for it
The Papusas! Sorry I look so weird in one I didn't know he was taking pictures haha

7 people and the Neverending Tale of Blanca

Hello everyone! This was another AH-MAZING week for us out here in Arlington Heights!

To start we had exchanges which are always awesome! But it was with Elder English! My homie! We switched Tuesday night and I got to bool the whole day with Elder English Wednesday! We had a grand time and we also got to I d some cool lady outside her house who was really interested in the gospel and she's cool her name is Blanca.

Oh BTW last p day was awesome! We went mini golfing and it was super lit we had a blast they have this special deal on Mondays where we went and you get two for one. So as a companionship we paid 6 dollars and it was awesome. And Elder Tracy (me) won so they all owe me three dollars haha and with the two hole in one's I got, it's pretty hard to beat me!

So but we stopped by Blanca a few days later and it turns out that she straight up left her family. Like they don't know where she is and she won't answer their calls or anything. But her son, Marco, opened the door and opened up to us and we just were talking tk him for a while and he said he wants to change and become better and draw closer to christ because he need some more support. So its a sad situation but we know the gospel certainly helps people.

We also have been slaving away trying to get people to come to chruch  and we got some people this week to come! 7 to be exact! It was amazing! I had never felt so accomplished! Even one of our investigators got up and bore her testimony in Sacrament! It was awesome! Ive also started playing the piano in Sacrament because there's no one else so it's been fun haha but now everyone needs me to help in primary and choirs and stuff so it's a little stressful but I like it so it's okay.

Sorry this is a really long email, but one more thing! The story of Blancas Familia continues! We were on splits yesterday, I was with Elder Yount for some leadership meeting and Elder Bridge and Elder Fry (our companions) went and worker our area for a little bit. They decided to stop by Marco and they found his Dad! He opened up to these elders and they just talked about it all and how he's struggling and he really was in a low place but he thinks the gospel can help him and we know so too! It's going to be awesome to teach them all tonight!

Sorry this was a longer one but so many wonderful things are happenjng in our area and I'm so excited about it all! Just a thought for you all, some people are asking me how I can still be so happy facing rejection, or difficult times, or whatever it may be. And I don't have a great answer for it. But I just know how much the Savior loves me, and if he loves me, what else matters? Every door slammed, rude comment, or flat out rejection makes me happier for some reason! The love of God extends to us all! It helps me be happy and it can help you too! See Romans 8:35-39 if you're curious. Actually do it! It's a great one.

If you all have questions, hit me up at seth.tracy@myldsmail.net or letters to
Elder Seth Tracy
1803 W Golf Rd apt #96
Mount Prospect, IL 60056

As always,

Elder Tracy

PHOTOS
Exchanges with the boy
We took a selfie with some ducks but it was really bright haha
I relate to this truck on a spiritual level
We found some awesome graffiti and had tk stop haha