9/21/2020

Hey everyone this week went great. A lot happened but at the same time not much. Me and Elder Lymke moved to Seguin which was probably one of the biggest things that happened and it's been really fun. We are now in a new district of missionaries and it's been really good to talk to different missionaries. Elder Beagly is my new District leader and he’s been in the mission 1 more transfer than me. So I've seen him around here and there. He’s really fun. We rearranged our apartment and cleaned it up a ton and now it looks super good. Me and Elder Lymke helped teach an English class on Saturday and that was super fun. Our mission created a page where we offer free English classes and it's been doing super good. We are doing really good in finding people and found another 5 people to teach. We will see how it all turns out. We did a blitz this week as well. And for those who don’t know what a blitz is, it's basically when the whole district focuses on one area to help find people to teach. We talked to a ton of people that day but not really many were interested. It was really good to sharpen our skills with talking to people and stuff. The other De Zavala Elders found a really good person to teach and they are super interested and everything. It was Elder Hoffman’s birthday on Tuesday and so we had a cake for him and we all sang happy birthday. This next week it's going to be a couple of more missionary’s birthdays including my companions so that's really exciting. 

 Sorry I don’t have a lot to write this week. I hope everyone is doing really good and that you all have a really good week!

 Elder Portlock. 

1. When we were on the Blitz, we saw this giant skeleton and so I got a picture of it for size comparison. 

2. Me, Elder Lemke, McCleary, Romney in our new Apartment. 

 

 

 

 9/14/2020

Hey everyone I hope your week was really good and you all had fun. This week went pretty fast here and it’s because we have been working really hard. We found 7 new people to teach and one of them really wants to come to church and learn the gospel and everything. She has a couple kids and is super awesome. We found her just as a referral for missionaries. Hopefully we can get her coming to church more and stuff. It just goes to show that there are always people out there who are ready to learn and are waiting for us to help. It’s kind of what I talked about last week or so, the elect. We have had lots of fun doing service this week as well. We did some more service at the Rockwell’s and helped them dig a hole for a tree they’re planting. We also helped them with some bikes and changing a tire and cleaning. We got our transfer news last night and Elder Lemke and I are both moving to Seguin TX. We still cover the same area of De Zavala but we are in a new district and apartment. Almost everyone in our mission is basically training now and so all the zone leaders are split and working together while they train. It's going to be really awesome with all these missionaries coming in. So now me and Elder Lemke have to pack up all over again. Today we went bowling and got haircuts so that was super fun. I'm super excited for this next transfer happening. I'll be hitting my year mark pretty soon so it's just really cool to look back see where I've been and who I'm becoming. I wish I had a longer email but I'll send some pictures.

I hope you all have a super good week!!!

 - Elder Portlock

 1. This is a Sign we saw and we totally had to get a picture with us in it haha. 

 2. The 4 of us all decided to go bowling and it was super fun.

 

 

 9/7/2020

Hey Friends and family! Happy Labor Day! I hope you are all doing súper good and having fun. This week has been pretty interesting. Our mission president gave us permission to be able to eat in members houses again which is super awesome. It's been so long I feel since we have. We just have to let our district leader know that we are doing it so he can keep track of who has been. It's been super fun because now we can get some better food. I mean like home cooked food and not mostly fast food. On Sunday we all ate at the Rockwell’s and they made us a really good Mexican soup and then we had empanadas. We ate until we were so stuffed and it was soo good. We also earlier in the week ate tostadas and those are super delicious. I feel sometimes like I can handle eating more food than I could before my mission haha. I just love eating. This Last Sunday we started up Church again and that was really cool. Our branch is pretty small at the moment so there wasn’t a ton of people there. Elder Lymke and I blessed the sacrament for everyone and the other elders passed the sacrament. Our branch president is so nice. He told me and Elder Hoffman, which we are both the senior companions of our companionships, to come and grab a random grocery bag that he had. He gave us both 2 containers of protein shake mix. I got cookies and cream and pina colada. He loves getting us stuff and helping us out. Also this week we FINALLY GOT OUR STUDY DESKS!!!. It’s so nice having a study desk and being able to set down your stuff and not have to study out in the kitchen or on the ground. I decorated pretty good with all my study things. When the moving elders dropped off our study desks they also gave me a hard copy of missionary manual. I have been waiting for that manual forever it feels like haha. It came out when I just barely got out of the CCM. So this week has been pretty good, it kinda felt like a mini Christmas haha. We did some more service for Sister Packer this week. We helped water her plants in her yard and did some de-vining. I also showed our district how to play Big Buddah this week which is a super fun game I learned from scouts. I got to call home on Friday and do “Come Follow Me” with my family which was really cool. We talked about Helaman chapters 12 through 16. One of my favorite parts of “Come Follow Me” was that Samuel the Lamanite had faith in Heavenly Father to go back and preach unto the people again even though they hated him and would even try to kill him. He had faith and was filled with the power of God. He was protected from all the rocks and arrows that were thrown at him. I know that if we have faith like Samuel the Lamanite did, we can personally be ready for all the fiery darts and rocks that come our way in life. Finding and teaching the gospel has been really good as well as challenging this week. We found a new person named Armando and he is pretty interested. He has 2 copies of the Book of Mormon and I guess he has talked to missionaries in the past. He was a referral for a request of a missionary visit. When we called him, we just talked for out 30 minutes and got to know him pretty well. He lives in New Braunfels not too far from us. We set up lessons for the next week and he told us he really wants to learn and stuff so we are super excited. We have been struggling finding people as well. A lot of the people we are teaching haven’t been answering us or are so busy that we aren’t able to meet with them. It can be hard at times but I know that if we have faith we can find those who are ready and can get through any challenge that comes our way. 

 

That's about it for me this week. I hope you all have super amazing week and keep being awesome!!!!

 

-Elder Portlock 

 

 

 8/31/20

Hi family and friends! I hope your week was super good. This week actually went super fast and it's crazy that its Monday again. It's weird to think that school has started up again and everyone is going back to school and college. For exercise in the mornings we go to a school track and go running as well as play tennis. We have to go a little early so we aren’t in the way of the school’s gym classes haha. 

 

On Tuesday we had our zone conference on Zoom and an area seventy came. Elder Pieper and his wife spoke to us and they are so awesome. They gave us some really good information and tips on how we can better teach and ask questions and what we can do to be more in tune to the spirit when we daily plan. One of my favorite things he said was “We are here to find the elect". The elect are those who are out there ready to hear the message. He shared a really good scripture that it talks about the elect in D&C 29:7. On Wednesday we got to go to zone conference in person for a couple hours which was super awesome. We were able to see other missionaries and I got to see my old Companion Elder Corry which was super awesome. We did a lot of role playing and practice teaching in different situations that could happen when we are teaching and it was super helpful and good to learn. On Friday we had our last session of zone conference on Zoom again. We reviewed what we had learned and done and Elder Pieper was there. 

 

On Thursday we were at the church doing some planning and we started hearing tons of car horns honking. We decided to go outside and look and we saw a super big Trump Train. Basically tons of cars with Trump flags honking their horns in a line all around the neighborhood. It was super funny and we took a couple pictures. I guess that Texas really likes Trump haha. 

 

On Sunday we didn’t have church but next week we are starting church again in Seguin TX. We are so excited and can’t wait to invite all the people we’re teaching to come. On Sunday night we decided to go to Landa Park to go street contacting with the De Zavala Elders. While we were walking around, there were some people who were playing volleyball and they yelled to us to come play with them. So we decided to play volleyball for a second and it was super fun. We were in our proseliting clothes so we got a tiny dirty. Actually Elder Lymke got totally dirty cause he kept on diving for the ball and crashing into the sand. It was hilarious. We met a guy named Alan and he teaches Bible classes to super young kids. We gave him a couple tips about teaching the 10 commandments. We got his number and he invited us to come again next week so maybe we might haha. 

 

That was about it for me this week. The work is moving and pressing on. I hope that you all have a super great week and I'll talk to y’all again next week!

 

-Elder Portlock.

 1. The first picture is a message from one of the members in our branch who gave us breakfast tacos.

 2. The second picture is just me and Elder Lymke with a picture of Jesus.