Alright so i think we've basically decided when we will be skyping. I will be calling at 7:30 AM your time. My companion's parents have church from around 11-2 so we are doing it earlier. It'll be kept to about 45-minutes to an hour too this time. I definitely went overboard during Christmas I think. Anyways it should be fun!
It sounds like you are having a grand time down there in Guadeloupe, apart from the raining! Does it basically rain all year in that part of the world? What is it that you do all day long? I imagine it's not exactly like Italy where you have these world famous museums, historic sites, or architecture. Are you just hanging out with members? I do wish I would have done better at having more personal relationships with the members. It's been difficult for me having changed cities so much. It's something I really do want to work on a lot.
Quick question before I forget. So what ended up happening with the package
you sent with the Blanks? Did they mail it or just bring it back to Utah with
them? I still haven't sent off the package yet for Mother's day. haha don't ask
me why. Mix between never having time and yet being lazy. Mom I want you know i
love you and that that love is more important than any gift. There will be a
gift coming though......sooner or later. The fact of the matter is that I wanted
to sent something else with the stuff I've already bought but I haven't been
able to get it yet. The other gifts I got a long time ago.
So this week has been very up and down for us. We are having a lot of fun
seeing the Lord bless us and then test us. We did reach our goal of 20 lessons
again at the last minute. It did involve a flat tire and quite a bit of driving
but we reached it. This week our mission had some really cool records broken.
As a mission this last week we taught more lessons than have ever been taught
and we beat it by about a 100 lessons. We also finally reached 100 baptismal
dates as a mission which had never been done. For us it was a really cool
achievement and we got to spread the "excitement" through the zone. They are
really doing great and we've been so pleased with the hard work they're doing.
Recently we've decided to start working with the youth of the ward. We
wanted to get them involved in missionary work and really exercising their
faith. We taught each one about the power of prayer and talked about our vision
for the transfer. We explained that we as missionaries needed their help and
then at the end we invited them to start praying to know with whom they could
share the Gospel. Well seeing how this last Sunday was Fast and Testimony
meeting both Alessio (17years) and Andrea got up and bore testimony. Both
talked about the lessons they had with us and how they really felt the
spirit.
Alessio talked about how he immediately started praying and that the next
day had a wonderful experience. One of his friends started talking about how
he'd been going around visiting various religions because he was curious to see
what they taught. Alessio, remembering the invite we'd given him quickly asked
his friend if he'd visited our church! His friend said no and so Alessio invited
him and so next week his friend will be coming! The other youth, Andrea, also
bore a really spiritual testimony about our lesson and about other things. It
was really reassuring for us how much this work really does. It's brought a
renewed energy for me to really focus more on helping members as well as
investigators grow their testimonies of the Gospel.
You remember Marines right? Well she is the less-active we found about a
month ago. She has come to church the last few weeks and took serious our invite
to prepare to go to the temple. She will soon be speaking with the bishop about
what she needs to do to be ready. She is great! On Saturday though we asked her
if we could get her 8 year old son, Marlin, as a referral. He's living with her
parents right now in Brazil. So I think the missionaries there will start
visiting him and her parents pretty soon! Area Book and convert lists work
miracles.
The less-active Benemerito Family is also doing well. The wife has really
justified her "doing good" as being active in the church. We found out that
they aren't sealed in the temple. The father, Angelo knows what he needs to do
but is lazy. The wife is a bit arrogant yet always claims that she wants to be
active. One of the last lessons we had with them we basically had to call them
out and be bold. It really helped! They realize that they need to act and they
need to act sooner rather than later or else it'll be too late. Apparently
during our scambio on Monday(I was away in Bolzano) the lesson went great. The
Benemerito's kids were there too(their 25 year old less active son Salvatore and
their other daughter Maria Rosaria). Many were in tears and hit hard by the
spirit is what my companion told me.
This transfer has definitely been full of crazy stuff so far. haha it's
both fun yet hectic at the same time. We are still praying mightily to have some
solid investigators. We have one, Maria, who is a referral from a less-active
Peruvian woman. She is going back to Peru in like a month though so hopefully we
can get her super prepared for the missionaries in Peru. The less-active lady,
Arleni who I found on scambio two weeks ago will hopefully soon be active. With
her work as a "bidante" she can never come to church. We really helped her
realize the blessings of church and of being active in it. She is going to move
back to Peru soon so she can leave her work and be active!
I'm really grateful for the way the Lord has been blessing us. I have never
done so much less-active work until now. He's blessings us in so many different
ways and I think I'm beginning to recognize his hand more clearly. haha I just
need to be more grateful and thank Heavenly Father more for the way in which
he's helping us fulfill this great work. I really hope though that all this
hard work we are doing will pay off in the form of a convert baptism. The ward is
in dire need of a new strong member! With that being said I see Marines as a
Young Women's President or consigliere in the Relief Society Presidency. The ward
just needs to integrate her.
Well Enrico is getting baptized on FRIDAY!!!!wahooooo... (Enrico is the young man that Tucker found while doing a scambio with the other Verona elders).
I'm looking forward to Sunday. Try putting together some questions so you'll be
all prepared come Sunday!
Love you guys a lot.....Ciao
Tuck!
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