Looking to the Heavens

Monday 7.8.2013

This week was really great! I feel like the work is starting to move forward here. It is a slow process but the important thing is that it is progressing. Last week I mentioned that I lost my keys and so we had to replace the lock to our house. The guy who came to change it was really nice and even lowered the price the more he talked with us, so I gave him some mangos to take to his family. We now have three copies of every key. 

For P-day, we played sports like we do every Monday now it seems. I am really improving on my soccer skills. We also had pizza for lunch. I really liked the cheese that was on it. I miss cheese a lot here. 

Tuesday, the Zone Leaders came to our area to work with us. We were spending the day in San Raymundo so they got to travel with us. They are not huge fans of how big our area is but they did mention they liked the buses in our area with their music and TVs. I am not a fan of the TVs on the buses because of what is played on them; it is not the best.  The day was really productive though and I feel like we did not waste one second. I truly love to work with different missionaries and learn from them. Elder Torres was relating reading the scriptures and praying to texting and calling a friend and  going to church was like visiting them. I liked that.

In the evening we had a meeting with the President of the branch for the first time in three months. It was really great and we finally got to share some of the ideas we have to strengthen the area and the members. Right now we are focusing on the less actives and inactives in the area. There are about 400 members in my area and only about 100-120 go to church regularly.  

To end the night, we had a Family Home Evening with the Chachach family. We go to their home every week and have a lot of commitments to complete. They are a part-member family. Some are active and others are not but I love how they are starting to really read their scriptures, pray and do missionary work.

Wednesday, we had a reunion as well with the ward mission leader. That was the first time he had ever met with the missionaries in the 1.5 years he has been the ward mission leader. The stake president has really been working with his leaders lately. I love it and I am excited to see what we can do as we start to work together. I also learned from everyone here that there are only 5 continents. Who knew... that is what they learn in school.

Thursday was the Fourth of July and my first out of the States. I made sure to wear red, white, and blue however. Even Elder Tau had a tie with the flag on it. That day we went to San Raymundo and watched Joseph Smith: Prophet of the Restoration with our investigator with a baptismal date. He really liked the movie and is progressing rapidly.

Saturday, when we went back for another lesson he told us he wanted to watch the video again. It cleared up a lot of questions he had. Then he started asking questions about who was the next prophet. We talked a lot and he said that he knows Joseph Smith is a prophet and he believes the Book of Mormon is true. I think that is the first time I have heard someone say that on my mission. I was so happy!

We showed him mormon.org and lds.org. We even told him about the chat function and he tried it out. He told the missionaries on there about his baptism date for the 27th. I really hope I will still be here for that.

Sunday we had the plan to have about 5 investigators and 5 less actives in the church. We even had divisions to bring them all and members helping out. Unfortunately the bus to San Raymundo never left. Our investigator said he would come solo but then got a call from his mom and had to go to the hospital in the Capital. Everyone else couldn’t come either so it was kind of sad. Next week I hope things will go better. 

My companion and I did have a bonding activity last night though. We laid under the stars and talked about gospel things along with our families. It felt so nice to take a little time to relax and also it wasn't raining so we could see the stars. I love pondering things that are important to me. 

Well,  have a great week and I will write you next week.