June 8th, 2015

So this week we hardly had any time to work.... I got my companion wednesday. His name is Elder Alvarado hes from Lima. We spent the day in the presidents house, that was my first time going there, its was sweet. Obviously he talked about the basics of teaching and missionary work and whatnot for the new missionaries, but I learned a lot, We stayed quite a while after cause the sister Riggins was worried about some crap that i showed her sprouting out of my face. So we got back really late wednesday, we worked all of thursday but friday we had to go back to Guayaquil for this ugly stuff thats growing on my face. It turns out that i have Folliculitis its pretty nasty and now i cant shave till it all goes away. All the members yesterday were calling me "Castaway" and saying wilson! cause I havent shaven since wednesday haha. But despite the lack of time we had to work, we had help from the fast we had, an investigator we just barely talked to saturday in the night, his names gonzalo, came to church, he wants to get baptized so were gonna help him get married, and start teaching to his girlfriend. it was definitely an answer from god.

I had just been reading a talk from this last general conference, the magazine finally got to us, and i was reading a talk from Neil l ANderson in his talk "Thy Kingdom Come" who tells something that Pres monsons told him.

Eighteen years ago while traveling on a train in Switzerland with President Monson, I asked him about his heavy responsibilities. His response strengthened my faith. “In the First Presidency,” he said, “we do everything we can to move this work forward. But this is the Lord’s work, and He directs it. He is at the helm. We marvel as we watch Him open doors we cannot open and perform miracles we can scarcely imagine.”

Thats way true and i have definitely seen that here in the mission. Sometimes we dont involve God in the work, in our decisions or when we need help. We just kind of do it how we want it. But ive definitely seen that we Hes the one guiding us, stuff like what happened saturday with Gonzalo happens, doors open and we get a bunch of help. I think thats a super powerful quote and its definitely true. 

Shoutsout to ben for graduating what a champ, im pumped to hear his call, Shoutsout to the corolla too. good buy. Ya so have a good week.


Love, Elder Crisp


an adorable little jungle looking river tree deal. thats nature baby.
4 missionarys of bellavista

June 1st, 2015

Hey how goes it everyone. Im doing good. Elder Camacho finished his mission so Im in guayaquil right now with the homie Elder Lizana and ill be here the next couple of days cause my companions getting here wednesday. We met quite a few new people this week, we tried to give it a little more to finish off his last week on a good note. We met this lady feliza who just lost her son, this other dude osualdo who always is cleaning his table right outside his house and has some interesting chest hair and has been married for 25 years. And weve been fighting with the Barreiros to get an answer from God if the church is true....we found out the problem is theyre kinda scared to get the answer.....theyre scared to have to act on that answer and so theyre hesitant to pray sincerely and actually listen. But we got them over that, and we talked about fasting and praying and they want to do a fast, were gonna fast with them this week. They liked the scripture from Alma 5:46 that says that he prayed and fasted MANY days to be able to know the truth of what he is teaching. 

This week we saw a huge miracle with a less active member who gave birth...shes like 44 and there was supposed to be huge birth defects and problems with her own health, but everything came out (literally) perfectly fine thanks to her faith and a priesthood blessing. It was a huge testimony that God knows us, he answers prayers, and that the preisthoods real. Ya so everythings good, Im kind of a little bit safe here in guayaquil even though today we took a taxi with some dude from lebanon and he started talking about how much he knows about explosive weapons, and that everyone in his country comes out of the womb hating north americans.... I made it out of that taxi alive. haha. Well I love you all, find joy in everything you do. Thats the key.

Elder Crisp

May 18th, 2015

Everythings going well, we still havent been working with many new people, but we found a bunch of less actives this last week by going out in splits. There are a bunch of people in this ward here, 600 odd people I think, way too many of those are inactive so we want to find a bunch of them. Its kinda funny, quite a few times weve contacted people who by the end of the converstaion remember that "Oh ya, i was baptized like 30 years ago". Theyre everywhere here. So ya we are battleing to find investigators and less actives. The family who weve been more focused in the barreiros, were sick all this last week but it really kind of seems like theyre not as excited as before to listen to us....were trying not to get bummed from that, we hopt that theyll keep moving on, all were trying to focus on with them is the temple, that they can be sealed as a family FOREVER in 1 year if they just "se ponen pilas"

President has been having us try to focus more on the atonement,like putting it at the base of all our teaching and applying it to us ourselves. He said in a training this last week, The most important moment in all the scritpures, the most important thing thats ever been said is the moment when Christ stepped up and accepted Gods plan, saying Thy will be done, and the glory be thine forever (Moses 4;1-3). Pres. explained how good it must have felt for each of us to hear that, that wed have not only agency but an atonement, not only life but life eternal. Everybody who has lived and will live was aware of that fact and the plan at that moment, its pretty cool thats not anything new for anybody, nieither is His restored gospel and Gods plan of salvation. Honestly itd be pretty sweet to be able to go back and see that conversation again when God denied Satans offer and put Christ in as our Savior.

I was studying fromromans, and paul talks a lot about grace, how not just having the law, or keeping the commandments is enough, but also the grace of Christ....the atonement. His redeeming power. I really like in 8 it talks about how we as carnal beings are enemies to God, but we dont need to live "after the flesh" like the natural man, but after the spirit. Thats another huge lesson President had us thinking about, is how to kill the natural man inside of us, and being sanctified by christ. Paul explains that if we can learn to do that were called Gods sons. And if we dont we shall die.

This week should be interesting, our ward just got 2 missionaries (were 4 now instead of 2) so well be working with them a bunch, and we have a conference in guayaquil about Family History from "somebody from Salt lake" (i dont know if its a general authority) and we also have zone conference and interviews so there wont be much time to work. BUt anyway I hope all have a good one too.


Elder Crisp

April 27th, 2015

Basically the people we have progressing right now are the Family Barreiro, and its going really well. Its funny the wife Veronica is super super excited about everything we teach her. She listened to the same lesson that you taught Mom last week about the Restoration and came to us with a bunch of questions and was really curious about everything. We watched the Restoration video with them this week, afterwards she was like I totally get it, now I know more for the Relief society class for Sunday! Shes way pumped up, but she couldnt come to church, the husband Geovani came alone with their older son and daughter who are 11 and 6....the mom and the other son were sick. But still they seem really really happy to listen and are understanding everything, I havent been so excited to teach people in a quite a while. I really feel like this family is in the perfect moment for the gospel and that they moved here for a reason, I really hope they can keep progressing.

Im really running out of interesting things to say in these letters. Haha. Were looking for people to teach, were teaching. Were walking and discovering new parts of our area cause its huge. were trying to help less actives and converts that are still week. We tried to turn our freezer into an air conditioner in our room last night and it didnt work we were still hot. Im teaching myself how to cook fancy things and it kinda turns out. Im progressing a lot as a person here ha. Have a good one yal. Happy birthday to my two favoritst people ever! Mom and Ben!


Elder Crisp

April 20th, 2015

We had a good week, during the week we didn't have too many people to teach, quite a few of our investigators were out of town, but we had the family Barreiro who we met last week that was moving here to Quevedo in church, and the brother of a less active who we barely met saturday came as well. We havent taught them yet or got to know them that well but I have a lot of faith that the family Barreiro that came are gonna be super receptive to the gospel and will progress. We normally have the challenge that we teach and teach and teach people but they never want to wake up to go to church, but here its been the opposite, people are coming when we just barely meet them, its a lot easier that way, so we got a lot of people to teach this week.
Something that President has had us start to do is look for Gods hand in everything we do....look for how he has blessed us , and find joy in everything we do. Its been cool looking for the Lords hand in everything, really there has been a lot this week. I find joy in that my shoes still haven't broken even a little so far. I find joy in old spice champion cause i sweat a lot but I dont smell that bad nor have stain in my clothes. I find joy in how much the Spirit helps us to teach and also in those magical words I testify. I find joy in members who get super excited when we ask them if they have somebody they want us to teach and they do. I find joy in the dude that gave me a sweet poncho. Its really easy to not think about the sweetness that is life, or the mission, but then again its super easy to realize all the little things and be super happy.

Elder Crisp

mi nuevo poncho bacan

April 13th, 2015

Were in the super fun season of ecuador they call winter where its stupid hot during the days and then it dumps rain at night...when its not raining all the water is being evaporated all around our faces and its like being in a sauna or a duck oven and it makes walking around be really enjoyable. and then while we sleep the rain makes this magical effect when it hits on the roof where its like im back in the womb being lullabied like one of those snakes in india... thats honestly the best way to sleep. All i know is that with all this sun and rain i have gained a huge testimony of the water cycle. I know its true.

We discovered a fruit that makes boooomb shakes its called "borojó", its a nasty looking and smelling and feeling fruit but you mix it with milk and sugar and its super bomb it tastes like yogurt from a natural flowing mountain stream in the alps or something. We tried it with a member then we bought one and started making our own and then we found out that its got some chemical thats supposed to make you more romantic haha. So we might stop drinking it or well turn into one of those old THIS IS BOB commercials.

So we hadnt had much luck finding the people we had been teaching before, who had come to churhc and started preparing to be baptized. But we got a lot of help from above yesterday, out of nowhere came 3 investigators to church who are family of Edgar a member who we got going to church after a few years of inactivity (he gave me a sweet tie yesterday that i complemented him on last week), and then in the afternoon after ward council we saw the recently released ward mission leader Tito (hes a champ) touring his non member brother and family around the church, turns out theyre moving here from guayaquil this week and theyre married and interested so yesterday was a super good day.

I read and liked the miracle that Christ performed on the blind man Barmaeus in mark 10:48-52. Ive been thinking a lot about why its important to know how Christ was because part of his mission is to know who the Father is. And in this story the blind dude says "have mercy on me Lord". And Christ responds "what do you want". Not that Christ didnt know exactly what the blind man crying to him wanted, obviously his sight. But He didnt heal barmaeus until he asked exactly what he wanted- "Lord, that I might recieve my sight". I think its the same with God....were talking to Him, we cant just ask for "blessings" or "help with that thing". If we need an answer, or something, we got to get off our butt like Barmaeus and ask specifically. Then our faith can make us whole.


Keep it one hunnid out there folks. Shout out to Elder taylors mom


Elder Crisp´


borojo and brownies we made, it all looks disgusting but it was bomb.

April 6th, 2015

The week was super sweet Im feeling super pumped right now after being able to go the the temple this week and listen to the conference talks all weekend long. It was especially super sweet cause we had 6 investigators come to conference and I know that left an impact on them, to hear the men called of God to be his special witnesses testify of His Son, on the day he saved the world from death. I noticed a lot of theme to be marriage, like family life and finding a spouse cough cough Ethan cough cough Amy. And about the plan of salvation, our divine potencial and how we need to fulfill. I loved Elder Bednars talk about godly fear, I think that is the best way to apply everything we learn. He teaches that godly fear is deep respect and love for the lord, trusting him and realizing that we have to respond before him...in the end there will be no excuse at judgement for what we do, and unless we press forward in christ, and fear god in this life, that will be a fearful day.
Some quotes i liked its never to late to make the choice weve already made. to follow Gods plan
God cant obligate us to believe...Dont give up keep believing.
A saint is a sinner who keeps on trying
Dont pretend to be in a car show when really your in the mechanic shop

Christ, The most accomplished man who has ever lived, was also the most humble

Serve not from assignment, but from geniune love for god and his children

President Monsons firm invitation to go to the temple and remember our covenants


All the super devout people hear dont eat meat and chicken during the week or something like that for the holy week (but then spend the weekend wasted), and so instead they have a "special" dish to eat for the week called fanesca. Its every type of bean and grain you can imagine in a soup with tuna and fish and sardine. Look up a picture of it it will make you want to eat it ha. I dont understand why they have that tradition but ya thats what i got to eat to celebrate easter haha. I missed ham and easter egg hunts but instead I (we) learned a ton about the atonement and the ressurrection of Christ, and what an impact that is....Our lives changed at that moment like Uchtdorf said. The atonement and resurrection is the gift of victory over the fall...well all be at that sandy ledge about to fall and there is only one person, the son of god who will be able to reach out for us.

Im really happy to be here Bellavista of Quevedo Ecuador, I know the work im doing is the same work that Christ called his disciples to do in matthew 28: 19, and that He lives, and directs His church by prophets, seers, and revelators, who are the First presidency and the 12 apostles. The Bible is true and the Book of Mormon is true and they together are a perfect testimony of Christ. Im happy to know and share these things with wild fanesca eating Ecuatorians.

Elder Crisp



the gringo room at conference. we got to watch 3 sessions in english