LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • October 10th, 2011

hey family,

so guess who got to go to the temple this week... woot woot oh man it was so awesome haha i have never learn more from a temple trip in my whole life it was absolutely awesome and i felt so stinkin good afterwards haha. so we went cuz my companion and me and like 8 other companionships got the goal of more than 10 investigators in the conference and the president was pumped and took us in his vans. oh man we went to the temple in ciudad juárez and it was sweet i hope i get to be there for a while but for now im super content with girasoles. life is just super good right now. and everything is going super amazingly awesome.

i really dont have much to say this week but i hope all is super well at home. oh amoray who is mrs. key? her name doesnt even sound familiar haha but dont tell her i said that. hows seminary going with ya´ll? it is starting to get cold her already and just the smell of chihuahua changes and now im starting to think more and more about when i started in delicias. it is super crazy to think about how much i have changed since then haha oh i thought of your homework assignment that i want ya to do haha since its cold here already the people are starting to make this food called tamales.... oh my gosh they are so stinkin good and so your homework is to learn how to make em so that when i get home you can teach me haha nah jk i just want you to eat the amazingly delicious food that we´ve got down here.

my body is super tired, straight up exhausted but for real my spirit just keeps me going and its super crazy to see the spirit do so much work. actually president had us study the talk by president eyring about how we gotta work more than when people would normally take a break. i liked that a lot and in dyc 84 in the juramento y convenio del sacerdocio se habla de cómo si nosotros magnificamos el llamamiento del sacerdocio y si somos fieles al convenio vamos a ser santificados por el espíritu para la renovación de nuestros cuerpos (DyC 84:33) sorry i had to write that in spanish i dont know how to express it in english haha but yeah i loved that part. christine i hope you get better!!!

Thanks for everything to everyone.

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • October 3rd, 2011

Subject: Re: Dad's Pregnant!!! (He thinks my "subjects" are stupid, so he told me to put that there!)

hey family,

you are soo right conference this weekend was super awesome

so the people i said were gonna go didnt all go but we did have 13 people who went !!! and in our district we had 56 and the members brought 14 people and in the zone we had 92 investigators in conference and members brought 29 in total!!! that was super awesome and all of ours that went loved it and said they will be waiting for us in the house haha cuz they wanna hear more. i think my absolute favorite talk was by the elder that talked about the need of the book of mormon haha wow that talk was so awesome for investigators.

oh so normally in the mission we have about 300 investigators in church every sunday but this weekend we had about 650 in conference!!!! so the president is super stoked and acutally he is getting all of us together today at 11 and he told us not to bring any books just a bag of sports clothes....... miracles do happen haha for real this is something suuuuper strange but im pumped.

oh at conference i saw a family from my first ward in the mission in delicias and it was way good to see them haha they actually told me of the nick name that the ward gave me that i didnt know about when i was there. they said they all called me Sonrisa Colgate haha which is colgate smile.. they called me that cuz they said i was always super quiet and when they would talk to me all i would do is smile haha (thats cuz i didnt understand much haha) but i was glad to know that i still smiled alot haha.

i had a list of 7 questions for this conference and every single one was answered. i loved the talk by barbara thompson and i am super stoked to read the liahona and study it up!! my life is so awesome and i am so extremely blessed. coming on the mission is the absolute best thing that i have or will ever do in my life. thanks to everyone who was an example to me and for grandmas and grandpas who stayed firm in the faith so that i could have this blessing in my life. i love this gospel so stinkin much and it is absolutely ridiculous that i have 11 months out here today.

haha i love you all so much and i hope you know i am better than ok here.

Elder Nunley

colgate sonrisa

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • September 19th, 2011

wow i love giving you all homework cuz you guys teach me so much every week. thanks for all your advice. this week my letter is super short cuz i had to mail an email to like 30 members and it took a while to enter in all their email addresses. but im mailing you the invitation that we are mailing out to all the members and the members are gonna email them or print them out and send them to their friends or something but yeah i am so oooberly stoked for this conference something big is gonna happen.. oh yeah your homework this week haha read what president uchtdorf told us to do in this liahona about preparing ourselves for conference haha. i love you guys.. oh mom if you could send me my black dress shoes that i had before the mission and my english hymn book (the small one) that would be awesome..

i love you THIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIISSS much :)

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • September 12th, 2011

hey family, wow thank you so much for sharing your experiences with luke 15 that really meant a lot to me. its amazing cuz i was totally expecting different answers and the ones that you guys gave me are the answers that i really needed to hear.

so i have been reading alot in the bible and something that has really gotten to me are the fariseos (haha i dont remember how to spell it in english) the orthodox jews that always tried prooving Jesus wrong. for example healing on the sabbath or just about any other little thing. They did know the teachings of the gospel very well, they did have all the rules down, they memorized just about everything but they were missing something.. they didnt apply it in their lives, they didnt understand the reasoning behind all of it. for example ¿why do we have the sabbath day? obviously to worship the Lord, do good for others, renew our covenants all that stuff. but when Jesus healed a man who had a limp hand on the sabbath they all freaked out. but why?

something else i love in the bible is chapter 22 of matthew when Christ talks about the Great Commandment. Elder Wirthlin gave an awesome talk about that in october 2007 that one of my ex companions gave me and i read it this week and absolutely loved it. i´m really really striving to apply that and Moroni 7:45 in my life as a missionary. its not easy but for real its so much better. im finally starting to think before saying things haha and i think ¿how am i showing charity for this person? haha its not easy and to be honest sometimes i feel like a goon trying to be overly nice haha but just in this week i`ve seen a change in my life haha. and since you guys loved the homework i gave you last week haha im gonna give you some more. in the last conference there was a 70 that gave a talk about ¿what type of men and women should we be? I say unto you even as I am. i think his name is elder Robin but his talk is absolutely awesome and talks about how we Being and Doing. so i want you to read it and then help me understand what i should do as a missionary. I really really want to be obedient in everything but i dont want to be a fariseo telling everyone else what is it that they are doing wrong haha i hope you understand that. so please give me some tips.

oh so this week one of rey davids friends saw us in the street and came running up to us (he was drunk too so it was pretty funny seeing him run haha) but yeah he came up to us and wanted to talk to us. he saw the huge change that Rey david made in his life and he wants to change too but he had lost hope a long time ago cuz of all the problems he has had. but after he saw everything that david did he has faith again and wants us to help him!!! how awesome!! and he says that his mom and sister and aunt and cousins wanna learn too haha so im super pumped about all that.

but yeah i love yall so much. cuìdense mucho, les amo

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • September 5th, 2011

hey family.. i love you guys a bunch.

so this week has been super crazy. i didnt feel like eating tuesday night and i wanted to do a little bit of soul searching and so after planning with elder hernandez and reading a talk from the conference i went outside and just started thinking about everything that the Lord has done for me in so little time it was way cool i had i think about 4 minutes of just thinking and then i got a call from the zone leaders and they told me that my companion and i had transfers...but we both werent going anywhere haha i just laughed and asked him what he needed but he was like no for real. so now there are 4 missionaries here in girasoles(thats my ward) and my new/old companion from the offices(elder quintero) and i are now the zone leaders.. our zone is huge and it includes the missionaries that are all the way out in the mountains but so far its been sweet and we had a conference with the president thursday from 9am to 8pm haha him and all the zone liders haha but yeah so thats new

and today for the first time i played a sport here in mexico..cuz the president has our p days super short but we played basketball and it felt SOOOOOOOO good to run and all that stuff oh my gosh my body just feels so dang good right now haha

but the baptism for rey david was amazing. so so so spiritual. he let me do the honor of baptizing him and i still say that hearing the testimonies of my investigators after their baptism is the absolute best part of the mission. he is such a huge example for me and i know with out a doubt he wil stay strong in the church his whole life.. we still dont have a bishop but our old bishop saw david sunday and came up to us and was congratulated us with our success with him because the bishop knew everything about his life beforehand but yeah an awesome baptism.

so in the scriptures i am studying a ton in mosiah 1 - 5 cuz it talks all about the atonement of Christ. i really want to be able to understand it better. and today i learned alot about the change of heart that we have to have to be able to be called His sons and daughters. i found some awesome scriptures in the book of mormon and in the bible that i liked a lot helaman 14 30 and Ezekiel 11 19 i think but helaman 14 30 is way cool because it is so clear and the Lord straight up tells us I gave you My Son, He suffered for Your sins and if you want to live with Me again Choose the Right!!! haha it doesnt say it like that but when i read that verse thats what i imagine Heavenly Father saying.

So the president has been doing and changing a lot of things so that we can have 100% concentration in the mission and now we have a schedule for that and haha it is definately a schedule that makes us concentrate haha there is hardly anytime for anything else it is so awesome im gonna come back home a complete ñoño (nerd) haha im reading so much and i am totally gonna keep that habit up when i go home.

so i read luke 15 this week and if you all could for family night or something i`d like hear your thoughts about those parables becuase i learned some great principles from them. but i wanna read your comments this next week.

I love you guys so much,

Elder Nunley

oh i got your package THANKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • August 29th, 2011

hey family hows it going??? everything is so dang good here in chihuahua!!!

we had stake conference this week and our bishop is now the 2nd counseler of the President and my district had 26 investigators in the sunday morning meeting!!!!! that was super cool and we talked to all the investigators after and they all talked about how when President angulo talked he has a voice that you just straight up cant ignore haha i told them that i had many opportunities to get chewed out by him when i was in the offices haha jk but yeah President talked about the definition of condemnation and in the scriptures it talks about how its a state of no progress. i liked that a lot and he talked about how if we are not progressing or preparing ourselves everyday...which is our purpose in life, alma 34:32....we are in the state of condemnation. How direct? there are so many things that we NEED to do everyday to help us prepare for the eternal life. for example reading the scriptures daily or praying, family prayers and personal. soo soo soo many things, little things but escencial that we have to do.

its amazing to see how much the gospel has changed my life here in the mission. haha i lucked out so much to come here to chihuahua. this gospel can do that for absolutely anyone too. and actually this week we are gonna have a baptism for someone that is proof of that.. his name is rey david (king david haha) and he used to live in arizona and was a cholo (thug) he dealed with all that kinda stuff and got sent back here to mexico. he continued living his life like that for a while here and his wife is a member less active. one day he just decided to change completely... we got a call from his wife and we went to go talk to him... something suupper crazy happened that week but i´ll have to wait til after the mission to tell you about that haha but yeah now he is soo soo active in the church. he doesnt have work right now and so we taught him about fasting and he was like yeah man lets do it haha he still has the cholo accent haha but he has such a strong testimony. he is one of the biggest examples of faith that i have in my life. he believes 110 percent that if he puts the things of the Lord first in his life the Lord will bless him. he is doing absolutely everything that we ask him and we actually had a miracle and one of our other investigators said in his work they need some more people but we are gonna find out today if David got it or not.

hahah dayton i think you´ve gotten funnier and i loved your letter you sent this week i laughed so hard. haha i hope everything is going super duper well !! can you believe that general conference is in like 5 weeks???!!!??? how awesome. but yeah so we are gonna baptize david this week and we are super pumped i´ll send a picture of him to you after the baptism he is so awesome.

Love you so much,

Elder Nunley

PICTURES: Elder Nunley

This picture is of a dog that one day just showed up at our house to protect us. at night she barks at everyone that passes...in the day too. haha her name is abish and she wont leave haha she jsut stays there and waits for us to come home and leave but its pretty comforting to have a dog i actually like it a lot haha.

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • August 22nd, 2011

hey family!!! hows it going? sounds like i missed out on the family reunions, sounds like they were way fun.

oh man this week has been awesome. oh so that picture of the baptism that we had, her name is anabell. and her kids are so funny especially the smallest one haha oh man his name is manuel and is a hoot haha. just a couple things to share about him. he always is walking around naked and he thinks my name is Mormón Loco haha and he says it the whole time we are at their house haha. we actually went over to their house right before coming here to take a video of it and i was gonna send it to you but they weren{t home haha al mejor next week. haha oh yeah so one day we were teaching anabell and her husband and manuelito, the little kid that goes around naked, came over to the table and climbed up on the chair next to his mom and just started peeing on her haha oh man that was funny.

but yeah this week we have had a couple miracles its amazing we are having so much success with the members they are helping us out so much. and my district is doing way good we all improved a lot in our numbers this week which is way good. i would love to describe to you all of the miracles that happen here on the mission but it would take forever to do that.

but yeah mexico is so awesome and i absolutely love spanish its the best.... SOOOOO much better than english haha.

but yeah this week i´d say my testimony grew the most through the scriptures. DyC 121 and Moroni 7 y 8. i learned a ton of things and i finished the book of mormon finally for only the second time in the mission. but now im starting to read a little bit more in the bible and im learning a ton too.

oh the picture that im sending is a dog that one day just showed up at our house to protect us. at night she barks at everyone that passes...in the day too. haha her name is abish and she wont leave haha she jsut stays there and waits for us to come home and leave but its pretty comforting to have a dog i actually like it a lot haha.

yesterday we had a baptismal interview for an investigator but the president had to do it and it went super well. i learn so stinkin much from him!!!!!

but i love the plan of salvation its so awesome to know that i´ll be with you guys for forever if we do our part and im so glad to know this is the church that helps us do our very best to achieve that.

I love you all so much!!!

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • August 15th, 2011

*answering some questions for the Nunley family reunion*

What do you want to be when you grow up?

still dont know what i want to be when i grow up

What was the craziest rule you broke in school?

haha my senior year 86 absences... woot woot!!!!

What is your favorite drink? Favorite food?

here in mexico GATORADE, Mexican food

What is your favorite hymn or primary song?

Kolob, come thou fount

What is your favorite scripture or story in the scriptures?

haha oh man the whole book of mormon

Who?s your favorite super hero? If you could have any super power what would it be?

batman cuz he doesnt need superpowers he´s just that cool. the powers of spider man to climb walls and stuff

What is one of your favorite childhood memories?

haha one more time thats all

What is your greatest accomplishment so far and what do you hope to accomplish?

making the decision to serve a mission, to serve my mission the whole rest of my life. Im never gonna stop feeding His sheep

What is the most daring thing you have ever done?

haha everyday when i leave the house here in mexico ( haha just kidding mom it is SOOOOOOOOOOO safe here!!!)

--------------

hhaah well theres my answers and now mom that super long letter i promised wont be coming this week becuase i had to answer all those oober hard questions haha.

so my bday we had a zone conference in a place called cuauhtemoc and it is so beautiful there!! there is actually green life there haha here in chihuahua its all brown haha. but yeah so i got the package on my birthday which was pretty cool. thank you soo osoo much!! oh man i miss gewey chews so much haha thanks ma.

this week was super good. we had an amazing baptism. her name is anabell and is such an amazing convert and wanted to be baptized this week and then later her husband and son are gonna be baptized...hopefully. but yeah she is so good and the bishop is loving our work here. he invited us to the ward council i think its called.not sure but it was the first time he´s invited the missionaries...woot woot!!! he gave us some less active members he wants us to visit and yeah everything is going really really well here. oh so in my district we have the assistants to teh president the zone leaders us and two other areas that are super good.

this week we had 6 investigators in the church and we did a family home evening with some investigadors in teh house of new converts and it was so amazingly spiritual!!!! the mom has been coming to church and we are teaching her regularly and the husband and kids just dont want to listen but the daughter went to this fhe and then el domingo went to church!!!! oh my gosh we have so many amazing experiences every day its hard to tell you all of them and dem to answer your question the absolute best part (most spiritual) of the mission is hearing my investigators bear their testimony after their baptism. its like in dyc 18 :15-16 i think. my joy is so much more when i can share it with others and when they truely feel it.

Derek thanks for writing me. and congratulations on your wedding and everything else in you life haha!!!!

love you all

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • August 8th, 2011

Hey family, muchísimas gracias for you letters!! I stinkin love

hearing from you guys.

This week was really really good. We are having so much success here and i am finally beginning to understand how the Lord blesses us with that success according to our faith!!! Haha it is so amazing.

So things with the bishop are going super well and we actually ate lunch with his family this week and i asked his wife what else she would like to see from us. Haha she absolutely loved that haha. But she told us that we are doing really good she loves seeing us work with the members in the ward and she sees the service that we are doing. Its awesome!!!

this week we are gonna have 2 for sure baptisms and probably 2 more.

sorry i dont have a lot to write thisweek haha and the computer that im using is super slow so my half hour is almost up already.

thanks for everything you guys are doing over there. i love that you are all serving too. (i promise i´ll write more next week) haha

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • August 1st, 2011

oh my gosh that is so awesome that Elder Howell is already on the mission!!! haha for real i am so happy for him. and what about ammon and john bahr? oh so this week im gonna do something a little different im gonna send the letter that i send to the President to you guys too. He told us that we should update our families on all the work here just as much as we update him. so im gonna write you my normal letter and then afterwards i`ll paste it to the end of this letter. oh im gonna send some fotos today too from the baptism that we had.

so on thursday the bishop called me and asked me to speak on sunday and i was super pumped because our bishop isnt all to enthusiastic about the missionaries. i think there was a missionary who was here before me and they butted heads haha but yeah ever since i got here we`ve been trying to animate (the verb animar in spanish is what i want to say and its different from animate haha but because my spanish is better than my english now im just gonna use animate, but it means like get excited...kinda haha i dunno how to explain it but yeah) so yeah we`ve been trying to animate him a bunch and so the other sunday i asked him if we could have just one minute in sacrament meeting to announce something and he was like sure go for it. and so we told the ward that we appreciate all their help and the food especially haha and how truely truely we want to serve them. so we told them if they need help with any little thing they should call us. and the bishop lightened up a bit... just a bit haha. and so we have done some way cool service projects for members this week and so when he asked me to speak i was super stoked. he asked me to talk about obedience and i talked about the 2000 strippling warriors and alma 57:20 y 21 and how their moms taught them about obedience and having faith that the Lord will ALWAYS follow through in His promises. then i shared about how small and safe north dakota is and how when i opened my call to Chihuahua we were all super stoked and then how mom found out about how dangerous it is here haha. i told them about how mommy told me to be obedient and how Her faith in My obediece really helped me. Thank you so much mom and dad for your examples all throughout my entire life. it was honestly the best talk i`d ever given because i testified and i could feel the spirit testify of much of what i said. the life of a missionary is absoulutely the best life ever. i have never felt so much guidance from Heavenly Father Himself in my life and the mission has helped me so much to humble myself to recognize it.

that is so cool about how the berogans went to the temple!!! i havent gone to the temple since the mtc and i bet i will maybe go 2 ò 3 times on the mission. i miss it so much. thank you mom for sharing that advice and when i go i will for sure do that. dad that is way cool that you are turning green chile around. if you want when i get back id be more than happy to help you out with all that stuff and help you learn some espanish haha haha that is way funny what they all call you haha i laughed pretty hard.... oh so the video im sending is a re-enactment of something that i used to do haha let me know next week what you think haha

ok so her is the letter to the president

Hola Presidente,

muy buenos dìas. Me gustò mucho esta semana. mi compañero y yo hemos mejorado mucho con nuestro unidad. Estamos buscando las cosas que tenemos que mejorar para poder lograr la unidad que se trata en Predicad Mi Evangelio. Algo que me encanta de mi compañero es que èl es muy humilde. Elder Hernandez està aquì para ser un misionero y està dispuesto para obedecer todo para poder ser digno de la ayuda del Señor en todo momento. Me alegra mucho. Esta semana he estudiado mucho en Predicad de la secciòn que se encuentra en Capìtulo 9 que se llama "Hable con Todos" algo que el Elder de Hoyos dijo cuando estaba aquì es que no sabemos por què no hablamos con todas las personas en la calle. Quien sabe si sea miedo o vergüenza o que pero no lo hacemos como misioneros. Yo sè que yo puedo hablar con màs personas y sè que Dios les està poniendo en mi camino para poder enseñarles de èste evangelio que Necesitan....y ¿¿Por què NO lo hago?? hay una escritura que està en 2 Timoteo 1:7 que dice "Porque no nos ha dado Dios espìritu de COBARDÌA, sino de PODER,de AMOR, y de DOMINIO PROPIO." Un misionero debe ser alguien que tiene ese poder, amor, y dominio propio...no de cobardìa. Me ayuda mucho esta escritura y cada dìa estoy hablando con màs y màs personas. Muchos dicen que no quieren nada pero como dice en Predicad yo nunce debo desanimarme y siempre debo seguir adelante con el conocimiento de lo que Yo Soy y el Porque yo estoy aquì.

Esta semana tuvimos solomente 2 en la capilla pero Elder Hernandez y yo sabemos que esta semana vamos a tener tres. No vamos a aceptar menos que 3 en la capilla. vamos a echarle màs ganas cada dìa. Estamos viendo los frutos de nuestro ànimo aquì. El obispo està animàndose poco a poco y nos està confiando màs y màs. Esta semana me pidiò a dar un discurso de la obediencia y despues me dio gracias y espero ahora que èl sienta màs confianza a pedir cosas de nosotros.

Esta semana en mi distrito vimos cambios. Pero los elderes en villa Juarez estàn muy muy animados y nosotros tambièn. Presidente estoy muy agradecido por la oportunidad que tengo para estar aquì en Chihuahua y poder escuchar sus consejos cada semana. Muchas Gracias por todo lo que hace. Yo sè que Usted es llamado por Dios para dirigir esta mision y seguir aceleràndola. Cuìdese mucho.

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • July 25th, 2011

hey family!!!

oh man sorry i didnt write last week i was so stinkin sick!!! for real im not even gonna try to explain what i had but the good thing is the day after it was all gone. just an oober bad infection in the stomach.

so i only read the letter from you guys for this week but im gonna print the other one off just incase there was something important that i need to know haha. but yeah so i am no longer in saucillo. im in chihuahua again and im disrict leader and my area is super freaking awesome. its huge too. its the second biggest one in chihuahua. all the members are absolutely awesome here and we are have baptisms left and right for august we should have a baptism every weekend!!!!! how awesome!!! the Lord is really preparing the people here and it is so nice to be in a big town. i loved saucillo but i felt like every time i passed someone in the street it was someone i had already taught and didnt want to hear more haha and that was just with three months down there.

so ive been reading the talk from President Uchtdorf from the confrence in october about Pride and i love it. and im just starting 3 nefi in the book of mormon and in chapter 6 verses 13 to 18 (i think) talk about how all satan needs to start working in us is pride. and President Uchtdorf talked about how every single sin stems from Pride.

hahaha mom you would not believe how much patience i have learned on the mission and the funny thing is, is that im still super impacient!!!! that just goes to prove that the Lord does give us weaknesses so that we depend on Him because being impacient in the mission doesnt work very well.

My companion is another mexcian his name is Elder Hernandez Rìos and he is way cool. we are workin together really well already. he is super short and pretty dang funny haha

but yeah i`ve already got to go but i just hope you guys know i absolutely love the mission and The Lord definately is watching over me at all times.( that reminds me i have a super crazy story for you guys after the mission cuz i cant tell you it over internet...Mom would freak out haha) I love you guys so much and dont worry about a thing.

Con mucho amor,

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • July 11th, 2011

hey family.

that is way cool that you are all helping out with all the floodings and stuff. there was a talk in this last conference about a family whose city flooded and even before going to their house they went and helped others.... and then when they went to their own house it wasnt even there and so they went straight to the bishop to ask for other members who needed help. i think the story is something like that but that is so cool that you are all helping out so much.

amoray... the fruit here is absolutely declicious... and cheap you can buy a watermelon for less than a buck and you can buy 5 cantelopes for just a little bit more than 2 bucks!!!!

haha so i havent really told you any of the stories that i have had with dogs yet but this week i almost died haha so i figured i´d tell you a little about this experiece haha. so most of the time the dogs chase us on the bikes and stuff but i realized they just chase us for fun they aren´t out to kill haha and so there is a street that we pass everyday that we have to take to get to the house and there is a big black dog that chases us every stinkin day haha but never does anything so we passed this street about 2 days ago and this dog had a friend who was out to kill haha (i dont know what it is about me but the dogs love chasing me over my companions haha i think it might be the sweet paisley ties that i have though haha) so the big black one came running at us from 9 oclock and i wasnt to worried about it But i wasnt focusing, i had to much confidence and took my eyes off of what was in front of me haha and this devil dog came running at me from 11 oclock and literaly jumped waist high to take me down!!!!! haha i was so stinking scared!!! two inches from death for sure!!!! haha well that is the story about my dog chasings and i hope you can give it more justice than i did.

but this week has been absolutley awesome. that study that i told you about last week helped me out so stinking much and my faith increased so much and when my faith increased everything went better. we had so many more lessons more people in church more help from the members and well yeah everything just is so much better when you apply your faith and the prayer. i feel like when i work with alot more faith i work with a lot more heart. i think that Diligence is more than 100% effort, i believe its 100% effort with 100% heart as well. I love how much space the Lord leaves for improvement in every single one of us. the Lord has blessed me so dang much in the mission and i absolutely love something that President told us. he said that the mission is what is going to prepare me for life. To actually realize how much He can do for me. and then when i leave the mission if i stop depending on Him or stop serving Him as much i have let Him down. He is giving me all of these amazing experiences to show me how much He wants to help me and how much He can help me.. haha for real look at what he as done with my life in just 2 short years and even in this last 8 months.

I am so grateful for my Heavenly Father and for the love the He demonstrates every single day for me. King Benjamin in the Book of Mormon wrote that he desires that all of us ask Him to help us realize His Greatness, His Misericordia (i dont know what that word is in english haha sorry) and His patience with us in our prayers. I loved that part and i try to always pray and ask for that and He helps me realize it more and more.

Thank you for all of your examples and all ofyour help. I stinkin love the mission!!

Elder Noonlay (thats how they pronounce it here haha)

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • July 4th, 2011

hey family,

sounds like everyone is doin way good haha i love reading all your letters every monday to answer some of your questions. Mario is doing awesome he was the first person i baptized and i already sent you the picture of that and he is still 100 percent sober and actually last week he went to 7 lessons with us!!!!! that was so cool we had ten lessons with members last week.

on p days there is not time for anything,, haha and thats how the president likes it. here in Saucillo the last time i saw other missionarys was the big conference we had last week but other than that the whole month of June we didnt leave haha.

this week was a little rough and i know you asked to hear about the rough times on the mission but i`d rather wait to tell you the bad stuff after the mission.

two things from the bible that helped me a ton this week is the story about the young man who had a ton of money and was doing all the things Jesus said and then when this young man asked what else he could do Jesus told him to give all his money to the poor then He said.... Come, Follow me. . and then the young man got sad and well yeah. so i thought about that a lot and questioned myself what am i NOT willing to give to the Savior (be it a rule that the president has, or any little thing that might take me just a little bit away from the Savior) so i have been working on that this week on making sure that there isnt anything that i am not willing to do for the Savior. I thought about that a lot and there are things that i want to change thati know will bring me closer to Him. Also the story of Peter walking on the water and how when he began to doubt, after doubting he sank and then and i love how it says it in the Bible. Jesus IMMEDIATLY extended His hand to help Peter. I loved that and it gives me a ton of confidence to know that.

Ok so this week i got super sick from the heat haha one of the days we went with mario guardiola he took one bike and then me and elder zuvire had the other and we have got pegs so i was on back. so i got super sick and went to the bathroom 4 times that morning and then well yeah i didnt feel good haha but we kept on teaching and at like 4 when the sun is really just doin work we taught a lesson (and by that time the sun had really given it to me haha) so we taught the lesson and to keep myself awake i had to slap myself in the face with my hymn book haha i was so out of it though that it just seemed normal haha but Mario just busted up laughing haha it was great. mario is like 36 years old and when we teach with him or whatever he is just like an awesome friend that i have. (actually let me look up the scripture that reminds me of him after i finish this story) but yeah so we taught the lesson and then after the lesson i was on the pegs of the bike and i fell asleep!!!!! haha oh my gosh it was so ridiculous but yeah so i called the Hermana Angulo and told me to stay home for the rest of the day haha but yaeh she is so awesome and she absolutely loves me too haha. she was like call me for any little thing that you need, even if it is just to talk haha she is way cool.

but yeah OHHH YEAHHHH haha i just remembered so they cut our electricity this week and we didnt have power for 3 days haha that was an experience.

Our investigators that we have now our way cool i will tell you more about them next week but i was thinking about cool things that we could do here in the branch to be more united or unified (idk haha forgive my english) haha but yeah and i remembered when we went to a branch in ND and all of them ate together after church and elder zuvire said he saw that in oaxaca mexico too so we are gonna talk to the branch president about that. but yeah i hope that we can do that.

Alll is well here and i love you guys so stinking much.

Elder Nunley

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • June 28th, 2011

haha oh man i love the mission!!!

haha bryce you are lucky that i dont have to think about girls right now or else i would be pretty bummed for you stealing the girl I CALLED DIBS ON haha. JK i dont know if that sentence makes sense my english is getting so bad haha but that is super cool bryce congratulations Rachelle congratulations to you too.

oh so that is way funny that you all think the spanish from Chihuahua is way pretty haha cuz i was actually gonna write about the spanish today and haha welll yeah its way cool i love it but i found out that Chihuahua is a lot like Alabama i think haha people from other parts of the country hate how we talk haha for example the people here always say Sí me entiendes oiga? or Sí sabes como oiga? haha oiga is like the command form of to hear so everytime they say that i think of some old hick from alabama saying something like ya'll be good now ya hear? haha and like the other mexican companions ive had make fun of it alot haha especially the sh instead of the ch haha but for real i love the spanish... its the only spanish i{ve ever known and in Preach my Gospel chapter 7 it talks about how you gotta talk about how i should speak like the people here speak haha even if i have a spanish hick accent haha.

but yeah the clases de íngles were awesome we are doing two classes every week and we have signs on the fence of the church and the first class we had like 20 people there and it was way cool and the second class 2 teenages came and loved it and yeah it was really well. we are gonna have more classes today. other things that we are doing to work smarter...

this week we had a Family Home Evening with the whole branch and we taught. we read 1 nefi 8 and then we acted it out... oh my gosh we had it so planned out it was awesome ( and the best is that we had investigators there that loved it) but yeah we went out side and blindfolded everyone and then we had a rope that went from the church to a tree and along the way we tempted them with candies and quien sabe que más haha oh my gosh it was way fun and the members absolutely loved it!!! the investigators tambien!!!!!

so we have a couple investigators that are super cool right now and are progressign a ton but they had to go out of town on sunday and so they couldnt come to the church. ..

oh yeah!! im writing today becuase we all had to go to chihuahua yesterday and President Angulo talked to us for the whole entire day!! it was way cool...

haha that is pretty crazy you´re story about the fireballs at the house!! oh yeah i totally realized i lied to you last week. the people gain about 150 pesos everyday which is about 13 bucks everyday not every week.

so for real though my english is really suffering i hope you will all be able to understand me when i get back haha. but if not i{ll just go to a spanish ward in provo or something. but yeah what that girl said about mexico is totally true. mexico is so layed back it is great i love it. haha for real i would like to live here after the mission with like krabbs and greg lemer and link haha just work a ton in the united states and then come here and live super duper cheap haha.

oh yeah in the english classes i pass around a note book and they write down things that they want to learn how to say and then i translate it on the board haha and on saturday there was like 2 or 3 that wrote como se dice: Mexico is gonna dominate USA tomorrow in the Gold Cup!!! haha and mexico did win haha

but yeah i gotta go love yall haha bye

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • June 20th, 2011

hello family,

i love you guys so stinkin much!! haha the mission is so good right now. i have to say thanks to Elder Schneider though. his letter last week helped me out so stinkin much. because here too i{ve been workin so stinkin much with hardly any success and to be honest it stinks haha. but i loved what he said about (oh my gosh the guy here at the cyber just started playing the harmonica and is playing a hymn, How Great Thou Art he is totally not member) haha but yeah so i loved what Elder Schneider talked about working smarter and so i{ve changed a bunch of things and its already starting to be better. for example we have bikes here but to be able to talk with more people we only walk now. even though it is so much hotter walking its so much better talking to more people. also tomorrow we are going to be teaching english lessons haha i figured if it is working so so stinking well over there in Slovenia why not here in México. so im super pumped for that and the members are too.

oh yeah that reminds me there is a family here in the branch and the mom totally reminds me of Mom and the daughter of demory. haha its pretty crazy.

so when we talk with the families and stuff in the streets i ask the kids how old they are and oh my gosh and the kids that tell me they are 12 scare me to death haha. cuz i think about how amoray is about to have her special day this week HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!!! and they all look so stinkin old haha when i come home i dont know if i will be able to recognize demory dayton and am haha i imagine they are all gonna change a ton haha.

so this week it got up to 111 degrees haha.... yes it is stilll ooooober hot.

haha but Elder Schneider thanks a bunch i will let you know how the classes go and if you have any hot tips lemme know haha

oh my gosh in the package that you send mom, could you please please please please send gatorade mix!! haha all the people here say that water doesnt do anything when its this hot haha and for real gatorade is way better when it makes so much heat haha

umm id have to say that Mario Guardiola is my favorite person here is Saucilllo haha before he met with us he had been drunk for 4 and 1/2 months straight and becuase he wanted to change he gave it all he had to repent and change his life to come closer to Christ. But yeah so im super excited for this week we have lots to do.

oh dayton with how much money you are making i wanted to share a little bit about what mexico is like. a lot of the people that i talk to here say that there is no work here and when there is they can usually get about up to 150 pesos every week....that is a dicent(i dont know how it is spelled) job. 150 pesos is about 14 bucks and imagine you are making that every hour!! pretty crazy huh.

oh so another thing that boosted my confidence this week is i read the talk from the conference by Elder Johnson that talks about how all of us are going to see trials but they are essential to be able to live with Heavenly Father again. There is a way good scripture i think its in Romans 8 that talks about what is it going to be that seperates us from Christ. that talk is way good.

OHHH something way cool that happened this week is that the father of the Branch President has been inactive for about 6 months now and Elder Zuvire and i went and taught the family and we taught the talk by President Uchtdorf about the guy who went on the cruz and found out the last day all that he was missing. and guess what... HE CAME TO CHURCH on Sunday haha it was so cool like all the members were crying and what not haha but yeah

hey dad HAPPY Fathers day!!!! thanks for coming to the border to receive the congratulations and all haha. welp i gotta go ... Love yall

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • June 13th, 2011

hey family,

oh my gosh i would just to first of all start off by letting you all know how unbelieviably ridiculously disgustingly amazingly inconcievably hot it is here haha so im gonna share a story about the heat and we will see how many people believe me even though i promise you that it is totally and completely true. so this week my companions pedals on his bike melted from the pure heat haha like for real they turned into straight up gum looking like stuff haha and so we ripped the pedals off (but in the middle of the pedal there is like a little metal bar and that little metal part burned a whole all the way through his shoes haha oh my gosh for real everyday after eating until like 6 my brain is fried haha i dont know how else to explain this heat,,, but the point is is that it is super hot haha.

oh yeah that is totally fine if you send my letters to krabby,, HEY KRABS!!! haha oh John Robinson yes i am getting your letters haha thanks for writing too but for real there is no time to write back sorry! For real thanks to everyone who is writing me getting letters is the best and i appreciate it so much even though i dont write back.

So this week we got a reference from a family in Chihuahua for some people who live here in Saucillo that we should go and teach and so we went and turns out that this lady is super depressed. Her husband just barely died and then shortly after that her son was murdered so now she is just living really super depressed and we had visited her a couple times before but hadnt been able to teach like a real lesson until yesterday and we taught the Plan of Salvation and how she can know exactly where her loved ones are. i felt really impressed during the lesson to talk about Nate Williams and how much comfort it gives me to know where he is at and to know 110% that he is absolutely loving where he is at. and to be honest i teared up a bit and she did too haha but the best is that after the lesson she said she was going to pray to feel the same sureity haha i think thats how it is spelled, that she felt in the lesson.

Man being a missionary and jsut focusing on other people is th ebest!! for real i love every single day!!

so President Angulo has been talking alot about the santification process that all of us need to be going through and this morning in my studies i read a talk about the Atonement of Jesus Chirst and i love every single time i read the scriptures because all the things htat we hear all the time can really jump out at us all of a sudden and that is what happened today. I read a part that talked about how Jesus Christ could very easily know what we would need to feel better through revelation, BUT what he did was a pure act of love becuase instead he suffered EVERY SINGLE pain affliction temptation whatever it be and knows now EXACTLY what we need in those hard times to get closer to Him and get through those difficult times. Studying about faith just blows my mind al the time too haha for real like Ether 12:4 the hope of a better world that is so stinking awesome!!!

haha oh i love getting the letters from Elder and Hermana Schneider please keep sending them.

I love all of you guys so stinkin much!!

Elder Nunley

PICTURES: Elder Nunley

"I bought all those cheetos for 2 american dollars - haha for real!"

-Elder Nunley-

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • June 6th, 2011

Subject: Re: Did you know it takes longer to drive to ND than to fly to Australia?

hey family! thats neat about nates funeral and that everyone is doing good with it.

sounds like you all want to hear about my new companion so i{ll share a little bit about him. so he is from the biggest city in the world haha Mexico City and he doesnt like at all how the people here talk. he is really cool and we can teach together with lots of enthusiasm but he is really negative haha like its sarcasm but really negative haha he has a lot of patience with my spanish because he answers my questions that i have about spanish all the time but everytime i ask a question he calls me an idiot haha thats the type of sarcasm like i know he doesnt mean it and he is just kidding but imagine trying to learn a new language and everytime you ask a question you get called and idiot and you´re told you dont know anything haha so i talked to him about that and he said he´ll stop hahah but we´ll see about that. but like i was saying we get along really well other than that for real i love him haha he is way cool and im super pumped to work with him a bunch. everyday in our studies together we receive revelation in where we can improve and whats cool is that Most of the time we remember to apply it during the day. i hope that we can be here for a couple months together so that we can get things down pat haha that is one of the down sides of me getting moved around so much haha i´ve never really had my area, i dont know how else to explain it but i think i will be staying here for a while. Ojalá :)

but this week we have had a bunch of success and we have been working with a lot of younger people which is good because the branch needs that haha.

but yeah the Liahona with the conference talks JUST BARELY arrived haha oh my gosh im loving em. i still think that the talk by Elder Scott is the best. and not because it talks about marraige but because he talks about love alot and charity and just doing things for other people and the security that we have in the gospel knowing that familys last much much longer than just this life. i also am loving the talk by Elder Ballard about the little pieces of gold and how we should look for the small examples of love from Heavenly Father instead of the Huge miracles that we sometimes look for. i realized that is also another weak spot in my humility is i like looking for the big things when instead i should be more than content with all of the uncountable smaller blessings that i have that add up to an incredible amount.

MOm you should totally try to learn spanish like that. but im pretty sure that Julie Beck studied spanish too to be able to understand why things are written the way they are. cuz there are a lot of rules and conjugations that will throw you for a loop if you dont study them.

I love you all so stinkin much and thanks for writting me every week and for all that you do.

Elder Nunley

oh yeah in the picture that im sending i bought all those cheetos for 2 american dollars haha for real

LETTER: Elder Colton Nunley • May 31st, 2011

hey family, im sorry to hear about nathan but something that Elder Nelson said came to my mind when i read about Nate. death is like a homecoming, but a homecoming way better than we can even imagine. Im sure Nathan is doin work right now up there in the spirit world and i hope that he can come here and help me out here too :) but i hope all is well with the williams family.

thank you all though for your experiences that you have been having. who translated the letter for you guys haha.

but yeah im in a branch here and there are about 40 people that normally come but this sunday we only had 28. i think that is about it for the questions haha the members here dont realy provide references but if we are lucky we can have 3 lessons with members a week and the lessons with the members are always way better.

umm so this week we found an investigator of pure gold haha we were touching doors (in spanish they use the verb to touch for knock haha) and this muchacha came out and we started talking and when we began to talk about the book of mormon she told us she has read part of it before and that she really liked what she read. she read it in her grandmas house and then when her grandma died Ester(the muchacha) had a really special experience with the spirit and prayer and so when we taught her the doctrine of Christ..... la fe, el arrepentimiento, el bautismo, la recepición del Espíritu Santo, y el perseverar hasta el fin... she loved it and then when we put a baptismal date she said actually i have a question first before i say yes or no, and then she asked us, How can i know which of all the churches is His church? hahaha oh my gosh a missionaries dream come true. so then we taught her the Restauration (sp?) and she was like wow ok im gonna pray like right after you leave haha. but she had to go to chihuahua for work this week and couldnt come to church but she is way cool and i cant wait to teach her tuesday again.

oh my gosh it is so dang hot here haha dayton you have no idea. they tell us that it has been like 40 degrees the whole week haha 40 degrees celcius is a little bit more than 100 Farenheit haha every stinking day!!!!!!! haha its alright though the work is going good.

the Lord is testing my faith right now with like no success but with me giving all i´ve got everyday. but thats how it is right. the real blessings come after this life and thats where and when i´ll know that it was worth it haha. right now i know its worth it too haha i just straight up love the mission. but i love all of you guys so much and thanks for writing every week... oh in the next package you send if you could put a USB in there that would be awesome haha oh yeah i also need the name of the new ward that you are in and the stake i think its just Bismarck North Dakota Stake right? but yeah i gotta go love yal so much

Elder Nunley (Nuñez) all of the members here call me Elder Nuñez because that have such a hard time saying Nunley haha