Week 29 - Ready for a Change

  This last weekend was very busy for all of us, so I wrote a long email updating Elder Schaff on all of the events. His sister, Sydney, was able to sit in the audience during the Face to Face youth event in Palmyra, NY with President Eyring and Elder Holland. It was a live worldwide broadcast for the youth of our church, and many of the youth in our ward and stake, that Hayden knows personally, were able to participate. His opening line this week is referring to this event. I also asked about his next possible transfer date since he has been serving in Echo for over five months now.

  "Wow, that must have been an incredible experience for those youth to go to that face to face event. The next transfer date is the 14th of March. We get the transfer call on Saturday night. I am honestly hoping for a change, as I am feeling a little burned out. This week was a tough week, it ended well, but Tues - Thurs were bitter and painful. Nonetheless, we helped some people progress, and by the end of the week we were alright. It seems that every week we have people that are looking good and then, something happens. Familia "L" are moving, so that's unfortunate. I counted it up, if things had gone better this transfer, we could have been set for 9 baptisms. But it's just been looking really good for the future, and faded further into the distance, repeat, repeat.

   I still have faith that we can work some magic here, but that pressing question of, when will the baptisms come, is the dilemma. I've learned a lot of spiritual lessons here, so maybe this is all a warm-up for the bigger show. President says I have great potential and just need to press forward. My prayer is that I live up to that potential! Unless we meet someone who has already gone to church twice this week and is living the commandments, we won't be baptizing in this area this transfer. So, all I can do is make it better. I've worked really hard on the area book....

  This letter seems a bit depressing, but fear not! I'm feeling very determined still! The Holy Ghost was teaching me this weekend!

--Elder Schaff 

 ( At this point, I wrote him a few lines of encouragement, and reminded him that his cousin had difficult times while serving in Brazil, but years later is still hearing about the people progressing that he taught at one time, to this, Hayden responded...)

  "I know, like I said, I just couldn't get the letter to turn out positive- ha ha. But I have seen this area progress significantly, so I believe I've done what I was supposed to do so far. This week, Azucena decided she is going to try to do everything she can to get a job that is Mon - Fri. That was another big shock because we thought she was just going to sit and give up because she had work on Sunday. I have in fact, remembered many times cousin David's words as I've made 50+ teaching records that have my name all over them. Most of them are now former investigators, but those are the footprints of my work. It's going to be a good week upcoming!

  We had a few investigators call us last week and say "Don't come back, you're wasting my time," so that was why it was challenging. But that's part of the experience. I wrote a lot in my journal about what I learned from it. I just don't have time to record it all here. I've got to write a letter to Maura now! I promised her."

--Elder Schaff

Photos from Russell M Nelson's Visit in January

  The California Fresno Mission was visited by Russell M. Nelson, the President of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles of the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and his wife in January 2017. Elder Cook and Elder Dorius, of the Quorum of the Seventy, and their wives, also spoke to the missionaries. These are some photos that President and Sister Clark shared on the mission blog.

Elder Schaff is standing in the second row down from the top, sixth in from the right.

President and Sister Clark hosted President and Sister Nelson, Elder Cook and Dorius and their wives for lunch in the Mission Home in January.

Russell M Nelson and Sister Bonnie Clark

Missionary Interviews, February 2017

  The mission presidents have been asked to interview their missionaries every 6 weeks instead of once per quarter, so President Clark set up interviews with each zone in February. This is a photo of Elder Schaff's district in the Fresno North Zone.

Elder Schaff is third from the left. Recently he got a bad haircut, a tight buzz cut that he dislikes, but it will grow out soon enough! He hasn't sent home any photos since the haircut, so I was glad to see this one. 

Here are the names of the other missionaries in the photo- Elder Del Carmen, Elder I. Lopez, Elder Schaff, Elder Wilson, Elder Medero, Elder Rushton, Elder Perkins, Elder Carnahan & Sister Clark

Week 28- Zone Conference and Service

  Monday, February 27th, 2017- It's week 28 for Elder Schaff and he had very little time to write home this week, after a service opportunity that took longer than scheduled, but that's okay. He is busy and happily serving in California and that is really all that this missionary momma needs to know.

  "Wow! Glad the last email came off well Mom, because I have a solid 13 minutes to write this one!

  A ward member called and wanted us to do service; Elder Lopez accepted. I said that we'd go for it, but sometimes that's a risky move! And the service took way too long because we needed to move things, but the ward member didn't have everything in order, so we just waited for an hour and then did the service for an hour. It was brutal. We got to emailing with 30 minutes remaining, I wrote my letter to President, said some quick three-liners to Joel (Elder Christopherson) and Nathaniel (Elder Burnard), and here I am!

  This week we had a fantastic zone conference! President Clark, the assistants, and our zone leaders all trained us in making sacrifices to become greater and more effective missionaries. So, I'll count that service as one of our sacrifices. I'm smiling through this because I know I can have a blessed week if I want it to be, and it all starts here.

  President Clark's summary of Zone Conference- (no time to edit!)

It was such a great pleasure to be with you in Zone Conference this last week and I again express my gratitude for your great preparation allowing you to receive revelation and Press Forward in greater faith, diligence, obedience, and sacrifice. I am grateful to all who taught and instructed as well as the great input and questions from so many of you. We are all in this together and I am glad we are all together in this! I see you as "Big Jars" (meant in the nicest and 'Complete Missionary' complimentary way)! Work to add as many "Complete Missionary" components (rocks) as you can. You'll need to Sacrifice in order to do this in a meaningful way and time period. 

I've been around and involved in a little bit of construction throughout my days. One thing I have observed from experiences I have in construction is that you can't do anything until you have the footings and foundation in and if you don't do this right, according to plan, and with great quality, the rest of the project will struggle. Another observation is that until this is done, you really can only have the footings and foundation contractor on site. Once done however, you can start to have multiple contractors on site and start to make some real progress. But you can't shortcut, leap frog, or minimize the footings and foundation of a building. They are paramount to a great building and yet, often go unnoticed since about as soon as they are complete, they are backfilled and it is the building that everyone notices, not the foundation. But make no mistake, without a great footing and foundation, no building will ever stand the test of time. As Christ admonished, we must build the construct of our service to Him by "[digging] deep, and [laying] the foundation on a rock" - Him. And our footings and foundation to a Christ Centered life is Exact Obedience!

Exact Obedience is also the footings and foundation to a successful, productive mission. It has to be done right and has to be done first or you really can't progress to a higher level, such as sacrifice. If you spend too much of your time building this foundation, you'll note the neighbors' projects are soaring and looking really nice while you are still "stuck in the mud" of foundation building. It is only upon the bedrock foundation of Exact Obedience that a Missionary and a Mission can move forward to Sacrifice. 

When each of you arrived in this mission you had a short interview with me. One of the main things I asked you is if you would be exactly obedient. All of you said "Yes"! I then admonished you to follow the Savior's beckon call to "lose yourself for [His] sake" with His promise that "you will find yourself." To this I then added and do again here; "you will really like who you find." And further, in the words of Elder D Todd Christofferson, "The more we serve our fellow men in appropriate ways, the more substance there is to our souls. We become more substantive as we serve others, indeed, it is easier to find ourselves because there's so much more of us to find."

I believe this mission is on fire in the way Missionaries live their Missionary Purpose. I believe you have put in the bedrock foundation of Exact Obedience and are uniquely suited to build upon this with your Sacrifice. This comes at a perfect time when the Brethren are asking you to be Agents unto Yourselves and better manage your time to be more productive, more effective, and more faithful in living your Purpose. I am so well pleased with each of you and the mission as a whole. Remember, the foundation never goes away. It may not be as noticed but it must be there, fully in place and built to last. But now you get to enjoy the fruits of those labors and Press Forward to build a magnificent mansion based on Sacrifice of self - truly losing yourself for His sake. As you do, I promise you will like who you find!

  OK, so we're building off our foundation of exact obedience! Now we've been invited to make sacrifices to improve even further if we are able to maintain exact obedience, it's a hefty call!

  This week Familia "L" kinda flaked out on us. We visited and as we taught the commandments discovered that they are not married, and Liz filled out a Visa as unmarried, that won't come in for 3 years, so she doesn't want to get married until then! They are still interested and listening to our message, but I went out the door that night with a few bitter tears, knowing that without a miracle, they will not receive the gospel fully in my time here. We're still going to teach them with all we've got to pass a good baton to other missionaries.

  We had a drought of a week. Few lessons with investigators, picked up a sea of potential investigators, (I think we have like 30 people that said "yeah, another day") but a lot of good less-active work. We've almost successfully reactivated "R". He has come to church these last few weeks and has almost quit smoking. He is paying tithing and doing everything he can to straighten up his life and get to the Temple. His son is listening to the other Echo Elders. So although I'm not getting pneumonia from baptizing non-stop, I'm rescuing the lost sheep.

   And that's Echo 2 this week. We'll see what happens next week! Like and subscribe! (haha! XD)

With much love,

--Elder Schaff

Week 27- Six Months and Going Strong

  In New York, our school district takes a winter break the week of President's Day. It is a good time to take a trip and escape the winter weather, so we planned a vacation to Florida with our girls. This was the first trip that we took as a family without Elder Schaff and it was strange. I won't lie, I felt a little guilty. He has joined us on several winter break trips in the past though, and didn't comment much about us traveling and was able to keep his focus on the mission, which was good. This is what he wrote home on Monday, February 20th.

  Also, since Elder Schaff entered the Provo MTC on August 17th, he has now reached his 6 month mark of service!! It is hard to believe that 25% of his mission has already passed by. I am so happy that he is doing well and working hard in Fresno.

  "Hello family!  All is well this week. It was a bit difficult in the beginning, because all we were doing was finding potentials, and appointments were crashing again, but I felt confident that we were doing good in trying to serve. As Preach My Gospel states, a successful missionary is measured by his commitment to find, teach, baptize, and confirm people so that they can become active members for the rest of their life. Regardless of results, missionary success is measured by action.

  Nonetheless this week was fantastic for Elder Lopez and I, it was full of lots of challenges but ended with a blessed Sabbath Day. I prayed and served with all my might the first few days of the week and just started anew. The troubles of last week faded away. To be honest, not much happened until Sunday. We had interviews with President Clark on Friday, and it was a good boost for everyone, because he did a mini-training as well. During the interview he told me that he was proud of me for being a diligent and determined missionary, and he knew that I was a missionary he could trust. He told me he expected great things would accompany my service as I proceed.

  On Sunday we had Stake Conference. Familia "L" didn't make it, but "Ana" said she wanted to come. She didn't have gas money, so we ended up meeting at her apartment and walking with her and her five kids to Stake Conference. Then, their was a baptism of Y. Castillo, taught by the Echo 3 Sisters. She is a 9-year-old that wasn't baptized yet. It was a nice baptism. We invited "Ana" to come to the baptism, and her husband "J" had just gotten back from work, so he came and all 5 kids came (ages 10,9,7,6,1). At the end of it, the kids came to us and asked if they could be baptized next week. "Ana" asked what she needed to do to be baptized and we explained that they need to continue to go to church and hear the rest of the lessons, "J" would need to stop drinking (alcohol). Everyone but "J" is very determined to be baptized now, so hopefully the family working together will bless them in progressing. It was fantastic for them to have that kind of interest!

  The problem is they can't pay their rent, and are being kicked out of their apartment. That will be an adventure....We've had bad luck with people moving, so we pray they stay in our boundaries. A less-active we are teaching and her spouse, a non-member, moved out of our boundaries this week. Gloria had something happen in her house, and has decided to move to Selma. So that was sad... but we continue on, finding people to teach. Hopefully Gloria can listen to the missionaries in Selma once she actually moves. We have our supposed last lesson next Saturday.

  We found a great investigator last night, M. Alvarez. She was a referral, and had a lot of questions that could be solved by the gospel. She was very interested in the message and was anxious to have us come back and help answer more questions. We taught the Restoration and promised her that her life would change if she would read the Book of Mormon and pray about it to know that it is true.

  Familia "L" had accepted a date for March 5th, and were super excited to get baptized, but as I said, they need to have consistent church attendance. They really, sincerely want it. I'm certain they'll be baptized once they can get to church. Hopefully soon, so that date for baptism can be before I transfer.

  Sister Windham has finished her mission! She told us on Wednesday that her mission would conclude Friday. All of Echo was surprised! So Sister Malpica went off to Ventura for 3 days and is then going to Lemoore. Echo 3 will be dissolved. So just Elders in Echo now. We got all of the Echo 3 investigators and recent converts. Here we go!!! 

  

  Non-gospel news: Spring is beginning it's rise here in Fresno. Everyone's favorite, ha ha, the white-blossom-dead-fish-smelling trees are in full bloom. Someone unwisely planted 5 of these trees in front of the Echo church building, so I found out what those trees have been this whole time. The smell of dead fish or whatever the flower is hits you as soon as you step out of the car. (Note- we had trees like this in the parkway of our Utah home, beautiful spring blossoms, but horrible smell on the flowering pear trees)

  This is old news, but I ate "Agua Chile" a while ago, and I've decided that they are the worst thing I've been served here. I couldn't make that decision until this week because I found out exactly what it was this week. "Agua Chile" is a shrimp that the Hispanic people like to use. "M" served it to me, it was a plate of the Agua Chiles, onions, and peppers. Everything was in a foggy-water. Soggy food is a struggle for me. But I found out that the real problem is hispanos always serve Agua Chile raw. I was eating raw shrimp, and it was so watery and juicy, I didn't like it. It's weeeeird. Cook your food! 

   

  A few weeks ago I had read a quote from President Hinckley along the lines of: A foundation built of cynicism and pessimism will do nothing for progress. We must build upon positivity!

   Our ward mission leader quoted this: "All you've got to do is endure to the end." -so when the day is hard just remember eternal life is at stake if you endure.

  Finally, "His grace is sufficient if we'll just humble ourselves" (to accept His Atonement and repent.) I'm feeling very determined to serve this week, it was an ecstatic Sunday!

  Last of all, I was talking with the assistants about doing a Buffalo Wild Wings challenge and they said "why not today?" So we did. Some Elders came and were going to do it, but they decided they didn't want to this time. So I did it with everyone watching and cleared it in 5 minutes 10 seconds. I didn't break a sweat, didn't cry, just got really messy. Everybody was going nuts watching me take it with no suffering. I left and everybody is calling me a legend, it was funny.

  I'm pumped to serve! People are ready to progress, and Elder and Lopez and I are ready to help them! It's been a spiritual week, and I really can't describe it without clichés. Let's do this thing! I'm building a legacy!!!! Even when things are hard in the mission they kick right back up. I'm loving life!

PS family: I can't believe Alexandra Hughlett got engaged!

PPS: Elder Mendez was at the baptism, because "Y" wanted him to baptize her. He taught her before. He pulled me aside before it started, and said that he was as hard as he could possibly be on me during my training because he wanted me to be strong, and was sure I would be. That made all the difference to me. I felt peaceful after all those trials I had had with him. I really couldn't believe it. It was crazy. I am feeling unbelievably great!

--Elder Schaff

Week 26 - A Little Down, but Not Out

  Well, unfortunately, Elder Schaff had a rough week and was feeling down when he emailed home yesterday. Nothing serious, just little frustrations here and there that all added up to a difficult week. Such is life though. There will always be ups and downs, especially as a missionary. It's hard to find people to teach, difficult to keep lessons going and on schedule, hard to teach around work schedules and family commitments, etc. I had no idea that Hayden was feeling so down, but I spent a long time Monday morning typing to him and I ended up sharing a lot of the lesson I had had at church on optimism and staying positive, so that was inspired. He said he really needed to hear everything that I shared and had already printed it out to study further, so that was fortunate. Hopefully, this week will be a little easier for him. This is what he had to share-
 
  "Hello family!  I don't know what to write about this week. I was struggling a bit, but Joel and Nathaniel's emails cheered me up, so it's good to have friends!

  This week A LOT of appointments didn't happen, so we spent several hours on the pavement finding people. We've got a planner full of potentials and 6 new investigators this week, but not many lessons. My studies just feel slacking and lesser than before. I've been very happy when working, but I'm just not feeling the in the mood when when we're doing other things. It's just the moment, I'll shake it off. But being honest, not the greatest week. What is good is that our companionship studies have been real effective recently and we've been improving our teaching skills. 

  Here is an update on the baptism I mentioned before- Maria H. was baptized last week in Echo 3, she was taught by the sister missionaries. She had the majority of her family attend. The service was held in Spanish, but some family members only spoke English, as well as some attendants. Our Zone Leaders even came with an investigator, and although they didn't understand, they all testified of the language of the Spirit and that they felt a witness of the truth though! President Clark actually attended the baptism as well. Elder Lopez and I were put in charge of teaching something while the people were changing into dry clothes. We elected to teach the gospel of Jesus Christ and focus on repentance through His Atonement. We weren't confident in how effective our teaching was, but at the end of the service, everyone was telling us how they felt the Spirit testify so strongly to them that our words were true. Even President said we had done a nice job. So that was a good day. Maria paid her tithing the next day, the moment sacrament meeting ended. Investigators don't get more solid than that. So kudos to the sisters.

   The family we have been teaching accepted baptism, but we only had one visit with them last week, the schedules just didn't work out. They accepted baptism with the lesson we taught them, but did not make it to church. Maybe next week! 

  This week we had a lot of appointments cancel. We had a great day on Thursday that was loaded with lessons and that was definitely the highlight of the week. Other days we had a whole lot of nothing to get done when it came to visits, so we hit the pavement and talked with people whenever we could. This resulted in 6 new investigators, which was especially impressive, considering last week we had 9, but 6 of those were from a single family. We have thus planted many seeds and are teaching many people. We have over 25 investigators, but most of these people can only visit once or twice a week. So, this area of Echo 2 has come a long way from the 4 investigators we had when I started here in September. Essentially, we have a giant teaching pool now, but we need people to progress!

    (A) and (J) and their 5 kids did come to church yesterday, but had to leave after sacrament meeting because their 1-year-old was screaming with all of her might. It was an important step for them though.

  I've run out of time...hopefully that covers it!!! More next week!

--Elder Schaff 

Week 25 - A Bad Haircut

  This was kind of a quiet week, as far as news from Elder Schaff goes. He and Elder Lopez continue to teach and are working hard. One of his main concerns this week was a bad haircut, which brought up memories of many years ago. When Hayden was just a toddler, we cut his hair short, a true buzz cut. His dad and I did not like the look on him and after that we made sure to keep his hair longer. Unfortunately, there was a miscommunication and Elder Schaff got another bad haircut this past week, but thankfully, hair grows. All will be well, it will just take some time. Another downer was that computer viruses have not been cleared up and he still cannot upload photos, it has been 6 weeks since he has sent photos home and that is very aggravating! I also mailed him a 6 page letter on Saturday, January 21st and it has never arrived, although a package that I mailed to him flew through in just 3 days. So, lots of small frustrations lately, but such is life.

  Here is his weekly email-

  "Hello world! Elder Schaff here, giving the details of the week. So we had trainer exchanges because we were housing Elder Kauai and Elder Flores, who began training Thursday. On Wednesday we found a family and on Thursday we had exchanges with Echo 1, and actually taught the family about the Restoration of the gospel of Jesus Christ here on the earth. It was a fantastic lesson, all of the kids participated (It's a family of 6! 4 kids!) and the head of the household, Antonio, prayed. Hoping they will stay interested and receive the blessings of the gospel, because they had a lot of questions that the gospel will answer for them! 

  (A) isn't sure about coming to church with her work schedule, so we're going to have to put on our problem solving caps for that one because that is going to be a big hindrance to baptism. One does not simply get baptized and not go to church.....it's an important blessing to apply in life as a requirement! Sabbath day observance gives us the strength that we need to go another week in this crazy world! She knows that too, but with work it's always hard. The Spanish people never stop working! <<Son Trabajadores!!!>>>  Also (G) still doesn't have that answer, and might have to move! Ay yi yi!

   So that's my summary. Matilde isn't doing particularly great either, but I'm not giving up on her! There's something we need to teach her better to make the purpose of the church clear to her, because right now she doesn't feel the need to act, but action is everything! We need to act to improve our lives, or even to enjoy it; nothing is literally the fruit of idleness.

   The devastation and disappointments of a mission are trying, but the successes are so much more sweeter, and filled with great spiritual joy. Right now we're focusing on helping that family, finding prepared people that are in need of the gospel of Jesus Christ, and building up the ward. Our ward struggles a bit because there are a lot of secret contentions among the members because someone offended someone else 12 years ago or whatever. So the missionaries of Echo and Hermano Saldivar, the faithful 1st counselor, are out and about seeking to build up the ward and gather the lost sheep. 

   As for the exchange with Elder Flores, it helped me improve my finding. He was willing to talk to literally anyone in our path. I tried to apply it the next day, and that's actually how we found the family, we were going to walk by them! I opened my mouth and saved the day! I didn't get to go with Elder Kauai, which was a bummer, because he was in the MTC with me and we both like to sing, so we were totally going to rock Echo with some spiritual serenades from the Spanish Hymn book; unfortunately Elder Flores's area was right next to ours, so he really didn't need to be housed near the mission office (which is the purpose of housing trainers, Echo is the closest area to the office, other than his area). As a result, he got permission to take Elder Kauai to his area after the first day of the 2-day exchange. So that was that.

   I'll be on the look out for some more teaching moments to share with all of you reading next week. I'll have you know that I got a bad haircut and it's now really short and probably going to be against missionary standards, so I hope it grows quick and isn't a distraction. If my haircut distracts any of our investigators from receiving the gospel I'm going to be devastated! That's the Echo 2 lowdown! (All of the Echo missionaries stayed, except we got a new sister missionary in Echo 3. She's about to go home, but Echo 3 had one of their best weeks this week!)

   Oh shoot! I forgot Echo 3 baptized (M) Hernandez this Saturday and it was an awesome experience! Unfortunately I'm out of time...whoops!

--Elder Schaff