McClain Mission

Week 56 Mon, Sep 20, 2021, 3:01 PM Hope you all had an awesome week! Things were awesome here in Delano. On Wednesday I had an exchange with my good buddy elder Szmyanscki, and we got to stay here in Delano while elder Martinez headed down to McFarland. That was an awesome day. We had a lesson in the afternoon with a family we had taken food to in the past as a donation, and they weren't interested at all, but this time we went and things were different. We made it clear we aren't the church of Mormon, but the same church of Jesus Christ, and they loved our message so we started teaching them! Then after that, we hustled off to earlimart and had a lesson with our buddy angel. He is 17, and recently lost most of his hand in a firework accident, and is really a humble kid. We had a great lesson and invited him to be baptized on October 9th! Super excited for him. Then on Thursday, Elder Martinez and I were put back into a trio, and our new comp Elder Bishop is a beast. We ...

Week 55 Inbox McClain Easton Attachments Mon, Sep 13, 2021, 2:49 PM to me This was an awesome week! The work is continually picking up here in Delano, and we couldn't be more grateful. This week we taught my all time high for lessons, almost 20 to our friends, so we were do busy! Some of the highlights: Our friend Jonathan passed his baptismal interview and will be getting baptized this week on Saturday. We have been working.with him for about a monthnow, and he is a really a special kid. He is a senior in high school, and has shown such a sincere desire to become a better person. He doesnt come from much, so it has been a humbling and eye opening experience to share the blessings of the Gospel with him. We also began teaching a senior at a differenthigh school, named Angel, and we think he will progress super quickly. He came with us to church yesterday and had a wonderful experience. Similar background to Jonathan, and has already taught me so much about simply having a goo...

Week 54 Inbox McClain Easton Mon, Sep 6, 2021, 4:42 PM to me Hey everybody! We had such an awesome time this week! Early last week we picked up elder smith from the mission office, and he is in his first week so elder Martinez and I have had a great time training him this week. We were really grateful he was so willing to jump right into the work, because we were super busy. First night he was here on tuesday, we headed out to Alpaugh looking to teach a friend named juan carlos. He feeds horses, and wasnt home, and considering there is virtually nothing in Alpaugh we figured we could find the horses. And we did! However. The horses were very protected by a lot of sleeping dogs. So we decided to be extra quite and go knock the door of the house next to the horse pen, and one small little dog came out barking, and you know that means?? Big dogs woke up, so we got chased away from the houses by some pretty vicious shepherding dogs. Probably one of the scarier moments of my life and ...

Week 53 Inbox McClain Mission McClain Easton Attachments Mon, Aug 30, 2021, 9:33 AM to me What an incredible week out here! We finished off the transfer with some incredible news out here in Delano and some big miracles. To start off, Johnathan accepted a baptismal invitation for September 18th, so right before I leave this mission! He is a high school boy who reached out to us about a month ago and has such a strong, sincere desire to come closer to his heavenly father and savior Jesus Christ, and it has been such a honor to help him come closer to what matters most. We had a few lessons with him this week, we usually teach him at a park by his house that is a short walk away. On the way there a couple little houses with tarps connecting them, and this week there were a ton of chickens and dogs running around outside one of them. Always odd things going on here in Delano haha. This week we also had a wars fireside, a sunday night program with a few speakers to talk about the te...

week 52 Inbox McClain Mission Notes McClain Easton Mon, Aug 23, 2021, 12:33 PM to me Rookie year baby. I was thinking today. Very few players have gone straight from highschool to the league. Most go to college first. I stand with the elite company of Kobe and LeBron right now. Even Michael Jordan went to college first. So I don't want to get ahead of myself, but... Well I guess it's not the same haha. I was set apart as a full time missionary for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a year ago today! A lot of crazy things have happened since then. I have spent 1 month in the home MTC, 6 Months in Santa Clarita, and 5 in Delano. When I opened my call last May, I never would have imagined myself here. And I can honestly say, I would not trade this experience for the world. It may not be the beaches of Costa Rica, and honestly Bakersfield might fall pretty low on a list of destinations in the US, but it has a piece of my heart. This week was definitely interest...

Week 51 McClain Mission Mon, Aug 16, 2021, 9:25 AM to me Hey everybody!! Just finished up with a wild week, some great stuff and some crazy stuff to report. On thursday this week had exchanges with elder Szymanski from McFarland, but for what feels like the first time I actually got to stay in the area for exchanges. We taught a bunch of good lessons early in the week, and we are seeing a bunch of our friends progressing and enjoying reading the Book of Mormon. Our area has been seeing some awesome success! This week we found a few new families to start teaching, which was such a big blessing. Then onFriday, we headed down to Bakersfield for a mission wide conference with Elder Renlund from the quorum of the 12 apostles. It was an incredible experience to learn from him, shake his hand, and feel of the spirit. So special to think he has the same job as Peter, James, John, and ancient apostles to lead the church, and most of all, to be a special witness of the Savior Jesus Christ....

Date: Mon, Jul 12, 2021 at 9:05 AM Subject: Week 38 This week was absolutely, indescribably incredible. On Monday night, I had a little talk with my companions about how we needed to be working harder. Being a missionary companionship is very much a team effort, so though I was doing what I could, we needed to step it up as a team to do more. At first, their reactions to me wanting to do more were pretty mixed, but eventually they settled in, and we got way more done this week than we have been doing before. This week we found 7 new people to teach! We got a call on Thursday at lunch from a former investigator who we had knocked about 5 times last transfer (about 2 months ago) asking us to come over and teach her and her boyfriend, and they want to progress to become baptized members of the church. Then yesterday at church, we had a handful of our friends there, and towards the end of the meeting someone walked in, and handed me a little pass along handout card. It had the ch...

Mon, Jul 5, 2021, 9:01 AM to me I realized this week, I was always so sad growing up when July 1st hit because it feels like school is suddenly just so close, but that definitely something to celebrate out here on the mission that I don't have to worry about that this year haha! We had a great week this week, super busy teaching lessons all over the place. On Thursday we had a Lesson with the meza Castro family, a couple that are our strongest friends, closest to joining the church, and we brought the morales family along. After the lesson they picked about a hundred apricots off the tree in their front yard. Dont remember ever trying apricots besides the dried ones, and they were awesome, so that was a big score. For dinner on saturday, the member that fed us made a Costa Rican meal after I told her about my original assignments, and I was pumped to see some fried plantains. Looking forward to more of that! We had some fun service opportunities this week as well. with the fou...

Mon, Jun 28, 2021, 9:01 AM to me Crazy week up here in Delano! Had the chance to go on two exchanges and both were out of the area, so I spent all of Tuesday down in McFarland and then all of Wednesday in Wasco. On Tuesday I was with elder Robison, and we had a Lesson with their friend Alejandro, who speaks some wild spanish so elder Robison was excited to bring me along for that, he said he usually ends up teaching by himself but was excited to have someone that can speak Spanish with him! He told us his whole life story even though I had just barely met him, and long story short he is working so hard to come closer to God, learn more about the book of Mormon, and give his attention to the missionaries because we are working to give our time to God. He had such a pure desire to become better. And we got some El Haurache Loco Fish tacos, absolutely the best. Finished the night off getting a picture next to the store from the movie! Then Wednesday I headed down to Wasco with the z...

Mon, Jun 21, 2021, 6:04 PM to me Hey everyone! Shorter email this week, just wanted to share a thought. Yesterday we sung Lord I would follow thee in our English program, a hymn, and then in Spanish we sang señor te sequiré which has a slightly different meaning. It directly translates to Lord, I will follow thee. Growing up singing this hymn, I always wondered why we say would. We say would because we are presented with various opportunities throughout our life to choose to follow him, but those opportunities are in the future and unknown, hence "would follow thee." However the Spanish version really stuck home with me. We know these opportunities to choose to follow the Lord will come, and we can choose know that we will follow him. So ask yourself, "would I?" Or "will I?" Yesterday we also shared a special musical number - families can be together forever. What an incredible truth. Brought me so much joy! Mission life was a blast this week! Had ...

Mon, Jun 14, 2021, 9:01 AM to me Hey everybody! We had an awesome week to start off the transfer out here in Delano. We also went to some crazy places. Have you ever heard of Alpaugh, California? Neither has anybody else haha. Smallest town I have ever been too. Our area was combined with the Earlimart area last week as missionaries are heading to original assignments and home, so we have about double the area to cover. Earlimart is a super small town in the middle of the fields, and has a few small suburbs that we had to head out to this week, so we got to see a bunch of new things. We went to one lady who had at least 10 dogs, goats, cows, an emu, and a bunch of other animals in her front yard, and that seemed to be on the pretty normal side for Alpaugh. We got a new companion, so elder Shoemake and I are now a trio, with elder Martinez! He is a native spanish speaker which has already been awesome for our learning and for teaching, and has been helping us to have a lot fun out h...

Mon, Jun 7, 2021, 12:35 PM Happy Monday! We had a great last week of the transfer out her in Delano and had a bunch of fun celebrating everything. Some highlights from the week: -went to get tacos as a district after district council on Friday. Still can't eat in restaurants or together, but close enough haha, so we took the tacos back to the apartment. -friday afternoon a member from the ward invited us over and gave us a Spanish rice cooking tutorial. Shared some crazy stories as well and sent us home with enough rice to feed us for a month. -We were walking around one afternoon, and I saw a bunch of people in their garage talking, so from the sidewalk I just said how's it going? And then my comp nudged me and we realized they were having a funeral. Oops -the sister missionaries had a baptism Saturday, so we all got to go to that! Baptisms are the best! -on Saturday night, to celebrate elder braithwaite going home on Wednesday, we all went to a Chinese buffet. Expectati...

Mon, May 31, 2021, 9:00 AM Hey everybody! Happy memorial day! I didn't find out that is was memorial day weekend until Saturday, I had completely forgotten and thats just how it is as a missionary, but we decided we would all take the day off from 8-6 to have a good holiday. That is the exact same time we take off every week on Mondays, but today it will feel a little extra special. Had a really funny experience this week. We recieved a referral for somebody that wanted to learn more that lives way out in the fields, so we drove out and found a small lot with some scrap wood, a largish building in the middle, and a small mobile home in the corner. We knocked the mobile home, and nobody answered, so we went to the building in the middle. It seemed like an office building of sorts, but it had the same address as the house, so we figured we'd knock it as well. We went on the side and found a door, and I knocked, and it came open a little bit, so we yelled out to see if anybody...

Mon, May 17, 2021, 9:01 AM What a week! Skyler was baptized yesterday! Such a great day. I have gotten to know him over the last month or so since I have been in Delano, and it was truly remarkable to see how ready he has been from start to finish to apply the gospel into his life. For him it was just a matter of finding the gospel and learning more. Yesterday we held his baptismal service at the chapel here in Delano, and it was an incredible experience. Elder Shoemake and I made the programs and planned out the whole service, and on top of that each of us gave a talk, Elder Shoemake baptized him, and I confirmed him a member of the church, so we had a lot to do. It was a little bit stressful knowing how much things depended on us, and just hoping everything would run smoothly and ward members would show up, but once things got going we started to relax a little bit. The best part of the service was seeing how excited Skyler was to make the next big step in his life. The spiri...

McClain Easton Attachments Mon, Apr 26, 2021, 12:18 PM to me Hey from Delano! This week I got up to my new area, and it has been awesome so far. For anybody who has seen McFarland USA, the Disney movie, we are about 5 minutes North of that, and it looks exactly the same up here. We live right next to an enormous almond field, and there are massive grape and cutie fields nearby as well. It is a really humbling experience to see where all the food I have been eating my whole life is grown, and a really unique view. I do definitely kind of miss the hills from Santa Clarita, that was like a little piece of home! We are working with a man named Skyler, who is really progressing towards baptism and an absolute stud. He coaches football at McFarland, and said he sees a bunch of the guys from the movie all the time. Other than him, we have our work cut out for us in this area, which makes it a really exciting challenge. I am also now in a ward, rather than a branch, meaning the group of m...

Hey everybody! This week we had a blast! We were super blessed to find 3 new friends to start teaching and working with! One of them, named Daniel, was a man we met on the side of the road, and then we were able share a short message and made plans to come back again this week. That was a little miracle for us this week. This week I was studying on what it means to be charitable, and one of the aspects of charity is "suffereth long." Something I read that stood out the most is that suffering long means to endure well long trials, but more than anything to have patience with the everyday trials and challenges. And Jesus Christ is our perfect example of this! "9 And the world, because of their iniquity, shall judge him to be a thing of naught; wherefore they scourge him, and he suffereth it; and they smite him, and he suffereth it. Yea, they spit upon him, and he suffereth it, because of his loving kindness and his long-suffering towards the children of men." This...

Hey everybody! So sorry I didn't write last week, I completelt ran out of time on monday, so today I have some extra highlights to fill you all in on. And some exciting stuff for sure! To start, I have finally gotten some more info about Costa Rica! The church is beginning to send missionaries back to latin America, and I talked with my mission president this week and he said he was working on my papers, so I am thinking that I will end up down there by the end of May! More good news, he said I will most likely get to stay in Santa Clarita until I leave, which was another thing to be excited about. Our area is really moving along, and I am enjoying life down here, so hopefully I don't have to move before I leave the country! This week during service the radio was playing, but our service coordinator picked a different station, and we heard my favorite song in the world. The lumineers have never sounded so good. You are a real one if you know what song I am talking about. Def...

Hi McClain, I have been thinking so much about your letter, I loved it! I loved that you have been studying your patriarchal blessing. What a special time in your life to be able to focus on such important and amazing things! I remember when you had your blessing and thinking that Heavenly Father truly has amazing things in store for you. I have been looking for my blessing and can't seem to find it at the moment. But I remember that in mine it states that my children will be stalwart examples of the Gospel. I have remembered that my entire life as I have raised all of you. I have known that you would each have a special witness and testimony of your Savior and Father in Heaven. I have always felt that part of my mission on this earth was to share my testimony with you kids. I love that you were able to feel such a strong spirit at the Baptism you went to. I have always loved to attend Primary Baptisms or any Baptism for that matter. The spirit is always so strong. ...

McClain Easton Mar 22, 2021, 3:28 PM to me, Michael Hey! It has been about a month since I have sent an email to the two of you, and have been thinking a lot this week that I would really like to, and share what made this week so good. Every day in personal study this week, I took about 20 minutes to study my patriarchal blessing, and to find scriptures to cross reference and looked up several of the topics in the topical guide. I was particularly impressed by some of the following things: It mentions several times one of my greatesg purposes here is to develop my own witness, thru experience, of the power of the gospel, and to share that to bring about the gathering of Israel. Prayer and my personal relationship with heavenly father are consistently highlighted. It outlines that I will have charity as I seek to pray and put my energy into it. This week, I found that charity for the people we serve motivates me to work. I am growing to love our branch, and Jose, and because of ...