Hey Family!
Another week has gone by, and I am just wondering where the time
is going. I don’t want this mission to slip before me, but it is and I
don’t like it. It feels like I have hardly left, but at the same time it
feels like it’s been awhile since I have been home. I am coming up on my
last transfer, so next week I will be emailing on Monday. Transfers are
on Tuesday next week, and I think I am probably going to stay put and end my
mission in the hot desert sun. I love it, and I am rocking a pretty sweet
tan right now, so I am happy. It sounds like the Rugby trip was a
success. It sounds like Oly went crazy and tore it up. Tyler sounds
like he played a lot so that was awesome to hear. Is Rugby still going to
be going on when I get home? I sure hope so; I want to see the Tyler in
action. He sounds like a beast and fearless.
This week was really busy to say the least. Not much
missionary work happened due to the fact that we were in ABQ for 2 days, and
then we sat and watched conference all day Saturday and Sunday. I love conference,
and it was a great boost. We had some crazy things happen to us and we
weren’t able to watch half of priesthood. Then the computer we were watching wasn’t
working here or there so I missed some of Sunday session, but that is all
good. I love it out here, and we are just having fun. We really
need to find new investigators because the ones we have aren’t going
anywhere. We need to ship them out and bring in the news. I hope
this week we are able to find some and get the ball rolling on that
front.
Noe and Patricia are still where they were a while ago, but he is
reading which is great. They haven’t been making the effort to come to
church so that has been really hard. We are going to have to sit them
down this week and show them that they either have to progress and come or we
can’t stop by as often. They love us coming over, and they are starting
to feed us every time. I can’t figure out the Spanish culture and feeding
you. I feel like our day is sometimes just eating because all Spanish
people want you to eat, but I love it. Patricia makes some pretty good
food, so I am happy. But some days it’s
hard to eat because we just came from a meal, and they expect us to eat their
food as well. I hope they find the desire to come to church and
progress. They are so close but yet so far away. They just need the
faith, and that will make all the difference in life. If we have that
faith to do what we need to and the spirit of doing, it will set us up for
success in life. When we push things off and not do them, we aren’t going
to see a growth in ourselves or our lives. I sure hope they do something
this week that will make us hold on to them.
We finally saw Joy this week, and I was so happy. He is a
stud with great amounts of faith. He just eats up the gospel, and he
knows the blessings that come from it. We watched the restoration film
with him this week, and after we asked, “Do you have any questions or anything
that you didn’t understand?” He looked at us, smiled, and told us, “No it
makes total sense!” I just laughed, and we just went on with the
visit. He is amazing, and I am so happy I have become his friend.
He keeps on asking me when I am going, and I have told him, but I promised I
would come back. I told him my family is going to come, and we probably
will want to do something that is fun. He was happy. I love him so
much, and he is one of those persons that the Lord prepared. He just needs his servants to come in and
teach and baptize him. I am excited to see what the future holds for him.
Come to find out, the crazy Marquez are still in our area.
We were looking on the map to see where they would fall, and we found out that
it’s still in our area. We went over this week to their new place, and we
were driving in the outskirts of our area. It was kind of freaking me
out. It seemed like these paths should be in a scary movie. We were
passing by this power plant that looked just super old, and then a few feet
down was a business that is run down. We went down this dead end road,
and there house was. We went in, and the oldest daughter looked
completely weird like usual. The mom asked us where the sisters were because
we explained to them that the sisters where going to come by and teach
them. We told her that they were going to come by, and then it was
us. She was like, but I want sisters, and we were like sorry. The
dad was piped in and was like but we got the missionaries who know us. It
was pretty funny. I am still happy we are going to be teaching
them. I hope they go somewhere. So the Marquez are back with us!
We had MLC this week, and it went really well. The mission
has kind of gone downhill, so we counseled together for a while about what has
been going on. President Miller spoke up
about boldness. We received a lot of trainings on how to be bold with the
spirit, and it was really good. I love MLC, and it was good to catch up
with Elder Folsom and everyone.
Conference was great this week. I loved Elder Holland’s talk
about the rock climbing experience. I
also really liked Elder Perry’s talk about marriage and how our church has the
only true marriage. The 70 who talked about dancing was one of my
favorites as well. That got me chuckling, and it was just awesome.
The whole conference was great, and I really enjoyed it.
That was my week for you in a nutshell, like usual. We
didn’t get too much done which was hard. I love missionary work and how
much joy it brings to you. This is the Lord’s work, and I am his
servant. Through him and by him is the way we are going to receive salvation.
We don’t need to fear because he has overcome the world. He is life, and
I love him. I hope your Easter was great, mine was. I hope you have
a great week ahead of you. I hope work, school, and whatever is going on goes
well. I would be fine to come back on June 15th but anything
floats my boat. I love you tons, and have a great week! You are in
my prayers!
I forgot to
tell you why I was late to Priesthood. We showed up at 5:45 to watch it
at the Stake Center, and Hna Silva called.
She is a really nice member whose kids are somewhat crazy now as they
have grown up. She was pleading for us to come over to her son’s trailer
because it sound like he was about to OD on drugs. We booked it over to
give him a blessing like she requested, and we walked in to this trailer.
By the way Elder Folsom baptized their son but then he moved into the sisters’
area which is part of our ward. We walked into the trailer, and there was
this Buddha statue broken on the dinner table with drugs spilled
out all over the table. We found him in the bathroom, and he was
sitting on the toilet. We brought him out and gave him a blessing.
We told him to call us when he had any problems and needed someone to talk
to. I think his parents are trying to get him to move back into their
house because the woman he lives with isn't the greatest influence,
and the sisters haven't really helped him out. I hope we get to
work with him and he moves into our area! Just
another story, I thought I would share!
Love,
Elder Smith
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