Chapter 19: Posterity
- Amber Prior
- Jul 28
- 8 min read
Updated: Aug 6
July 28, 2025
Weeks in the mission: 23 Companion: Elder Garcia Area: Riverside Ward: Mission
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Hello everyone! Welcome to chapter 19. These past several days have been incredible. Transfers happened, and I finally got to meet my new trainee, and his name is Elder Garcia! He's awesome. He's from Peru and has a very strong desire to work hard. Being able to instruct him has been a joy, and I can't wait to see how far he goes. He's such a natural missionary.
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🌟 Miracle Highlight 🌟 The miracle this week was absolutely insane. Me and Elder Garcia went by a friend we have by the name of Maria Tapia in the evening because she told us we could come over at that time.
We mistook her house for the one next door, and thought that she wasn't going to answer, so we were about to leave. But then at the last moment, we saw Maria and her son walk onto their driveway next door, so we went right up to them.
Maria had a big smile on her face and was so sweet. She said that her dad was really excited to speak with us and invited us to come into her backyard to speak with him.
We went through the gate and turned the corner and discovered a HUGE family party going on. At least 30 heads turned and looked at us. It was quite intimidating. But we proceeded on and got talking with a few of them. They were so friendly and nice to us! They even cooked us these delicious street tacos for us.
We made our way to Maria's dad. He was the oldest one there. We gave him the whole restoration and gave him a Book of Mormon. He is a very smart soul, and very open to our message. He said he was going to read it and we would be in touch.
As we were on our way out, we spoke with Maria again and invited her to church. She said she'd love to come, but couldn't this week. We're very excited to see where this all goes with the family.
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🙏 Prayer request 🙏 Will you please include the following friends of ours in your prayers? You have no idea how much it helps and how many miracles we see out here.
Mateo Nicolas. He is still working hard! He has accepted my invitation to him to read from the Book of Mormon every day, and I showed him the Book of Mormon videos so it's easier for him to understand the stories and everything that's going on. The more he reads the book, the more the Spirit will touch his heart.
Jonathan Layva. We have a plan for him to be baptized on August 10th. He's so amazing and receptive to the restored truths! He wants to be baptized but didn't come to church this Sunday, and we haven't been able to contact him. We hope to find out why soon.
Roosevelt Cruz. He is doing amazing, as a matter of fact! He was telling us about a spiritual experience he had earlier this week, and we were so happy for him! Ever since his baptism, we've been trying to get his mom to take a lesson with us or come to church, but we haven't been able to see her at all. We're praying that she'll have the courage to take these steps in her life.
Rudy Lopez. We met him earlier this week and gave him a priesthood blessing on the side of the road. Ever since then, he's been doing much better with his addiction and hasn't relapsed since! Priesthood power is real. We hope to get him to church so he can see the blessings of the restored gospel.
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📅 Daily Events 📅
🔸️ Monday The last P-day of this transfer. Tomorrow is transfer day. I received news this morning that I'll be staying here in Riverside for another 6 weeks! Elder Watson is leaving my area, but still staying in the apartment. We are 100% certain that Elder Browne and Elder Watson will be companions next transfer haha, that's going to be wild! I was also informed that I'm going to be a trainer! That's crazy!! It's my 3rd transfer and I've just come out of training. Now I get to turn around and introduce someone else into missionary work! I'm very excited and honored. Today overall was pretty great. Wrote my email, played pool with the APs, practiced piano with Elijah, called my family, did some finding, and then held sports night for the rest of the night. Elder Watson set up a teaching appointment with a new friend named Jack. He's awesome.
🔸️ Tuesday Transfer day! It was awesome. I got to see so many elders I've met and become friends with. I saw Elder Pitcher and Elder Winter! It looks like Elder Winter is training somebody else again, which means I'm going to have a younger brother haha! And I got to see Elder Bonham again. He came back to the mission as a non-missionary to see everyone and go home with his crowd. I was so happy to see him. Long story short, I ended up buying his bike. Because Elder Garcia is coming in tomorrow, I got to trio up with Elder Watson and Elder Browne for today. We found Kevin and Victor today. Kevin is super prepared and is willing to meet with us often.
🔸️ Wednesday I met my trainee today, Elder Garcia. I went over to the Grand to wait to receive him, along with all the other trainers there. Soon enough, the greenies came flooding in, and I spotted Elder Garcia looking around looking a little lost haha. We got talking and I found out that his family also lives in my hometown, Spanish Fork!! It was fun to take him to knock doors for the first time after the training meeting. He was a bit nervous, naturally, but he did so well with talking to people. I made him go up to some guys in the middle of their work shift and talk to them. They were very receptive and actually wanted to hear our message when they were less busy. It caught Elder Garcia by much surprise. I loved his reaction as we biked away after getting their numbers and addresses. He has so much potential. I'm gonna do all I can to help him flourish as a missionary.
🔸️ Thursday Elder Garcia has been in the field for 24 hours now. He's already such a great missionary. He holds a great love for anyone he speaks to and they can feel it. We had tons of success finding people today. We met Jesse and Angel, taught Kevin, Christian, Norwing, and Daniel, met Valery, and several others. We worked hard in the vineyard today. I should also mention that I've hit 5 months as a missionary today!! It's crazy I've been out here for that long already. I'm already almost halfway to my year mark, woah.
🔸️ Friday I thank God for giving me all the hope and strength that He has over these past months. What a great day. I honestly still can't believe that I'm actually TRAINING somebody. But at the same time, I can also look back and see how far I've come. I've already grown a lot. In the morning, after our studies, me and Elder Garcia did our weekly planning. I taught him how to navigate the PMG app more and how to make plans for our friends. Then we sat down together and prayerfully set goals for what we want to accomplish for the Lord this transfer. We want to help 3 of His children enter the waters of baptism this transfer. He'll magnify our efforts, we know it. Elder Garcia is very smart and is fully committed to serving the Lord. He has a lot of talents and skills that will serve him well. The entire day was SUPER busy. We had lessons with Juan, Cruz, and Mateo. Not to mention daily contacts, incoming interviews with President Hendrickson, English class, and a member meal.
🔸️ Saturday SO MUCH happened today. We did so much for the Lord. I'm just gonna list them off. We saw a member from my first transfer in Corona, played basketball at a park with 2 guys our age and got their numbers, taught Jonathan, dropped off a Bible to someone outside of our area, met a SUPER prepared lady while she was raking her leaves, met another sweet lady and gave her a Book of Mormon, taught Rudy the Plan of Salvation, met Kevin Tims and prayed for his son, talked to a guy on the sidewalk about baptism, invited Kevin to church, and then experienced a CRAZY miracle with Maria Tapia.
🔸️ Sunday A good Sunday. None of our friends came to church like they said they would, but good ol' Cruz pulled through, just like always! He hasn't missed a single Sunday since the first time we've met him. He got ordained to the Aaronic priesthood today, meaning he now holds the authority to baptize, bless the sacrament, and perform other ordinances. This also means he can now enter into the temple! We're going to go with him as soon as we can. I biked through a bunch of stickers today, which put a bunch of holes in my tires, which caused us to miss a lesson. However, God gave us a miracle and all the slime in the bike was able to seal all the holes, so we were good to go after dinner and pumping up the tires a little bit. My favorite part of the day is when we went park finding in the evening. We talked to quite a few people and made a solid new friend named Floriel Contreras! She is super sweet and felt the Spirit as we taught her the Restoration on the spot. I understand now why trainers call their trainees their "sons." It's because your trainee watches you and starts doing what you do and saying what you say to people. It's a funny fatherly feeling that you get.
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☀️ Spiritual Thought ☀️ I was reading in Mosiah chapter 24 this morning. I'm sure many of you are familiar with verse 14. This is when the people of Alma the older were under subjection to the Lamanites, and heavy burdens were placed upon their backs. They cried unto the Lord, and this is the promise they received:
“And I will also ease the burdens which are put upon your shoulders, that even you cannot feel them upon your backs, even while you are in bondage; and this will I do that ye may stand as witnesses for me hereafter, and that ye may know of a surety that I, the Lord God, do visit my people in their afflictions.” — Mosiah 24:14
This verse was given to me while in the MTC while I was going through a rough time. I love it because it shows when we rely on the Lord, He lifts our burdens and strengthens us. He gives us courage to carry on. I've experienced this.
God has been transforming me over the course of my mission, line upon line, day by day. I promise all of you that when you take your struggles to God in prayer, He will hear you and will support you in your afflictions.
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