Wednesday, September 7, 2011

September 5, 2011: 1 Year

HOLA FAMILIA!

   Well this week was a super week. We got in a ton of great work and best of all I feel like I am becoming a more intelligent worker. I am getting better at working with the members and with my comp and especially how to work the area.

    First of all I would like to say Happy B-day to Kels! Crazy she is already 17. BLOWS MY MIND. I can't even imagine how much she has changed. Sounds like from the e-mail kels sent me that it was quite a crazy week for her. That is a lot better than my 17th birthday. Let's see what happened.... OH YEAH! EVERYONE FORGOT MY 17TH BIRTHDAY! haha that was the year that Asher was born. I didn't realize it at the time, but it was a great birthday present haha. I am glad though that Kels had a better 17th birthday than mine.

     This week though we got to do a lot of great stuff. We put our goals at the beginning of the week and we worked super hard to achieve them. In my mission I have had a harder time getting members out and working with us. I think it was my fault though cause it was always a lot easier not to try as hard, but the results never went as well and so it has been one of my goals to really get better at working with the members.

     Right now we are still working with the same investigators, but we did have a break through with one of them. I have explained I believe many times about Walter. We are teaching him and his brother and they both went to the temple and have both been going to church, but something hadn't clicked. We had been praying a lot and trying to teach everything and this week we decided to start over and teach the first lesson and emphasize on prayer and daily scripture reading. We found out that he hadn't really read The Book of Mormon and also hadn't really prayed. We left the commitment to do them both and for the next two days he forget, so he said. Finally Friday we went by and we prayed and we started talking about his progress and he said that he had finally read. That he read and really liked it and ended up reading 12 chapters in The Book of Mormon and after prayed. He said he knows it is true. We talked and in the end we started talking about goals with him and we all put daily goals and weekly goals. He said he wants to read 2 chapters everyday and stop drinking coffee. He also wants to do service 3 times a week. At the end we asked where does he want this to lead to and he said, "Baptism". So we put the goal with him and his brother for the 25th of this month. It was a great lesson and the spirit was so strong.

     There is another investigator named Roberto who is about 50 and lived in The United States for like 15 years. He is always drunk and his wife makes pupusas and whenever we pass they give us free pupusas. So we started talking to him and he was quite the interesting guy and we invited him to church this week. Yesterday during church in the middle of sacrament he strolled on in. Not drunk and I believe it was the first time I had not seem him drunk. He said he really enjoyed it and after sacrament meeting like 4 members came up and already knew him. We talked to him after and he said he won't drink again and that he wants to come back next week. It was such a miracle.

     This week though we got asked by the Relief Society to go and show them some recent converts so they could know and visit them also. So we brought them around and it went super SUPER well. There is just something different to an investigator when someone who is living in the exact same situations bares testimony than when some nicely dressed whiteboy bares testimony. It was sweet.

     One of the ladies we visited had her husband pass away about a month ago and he had planted a lot of corn and she is about 60 and now has all this corn and it takes a lot to take care of it all. We invited to go and help her and Thursday in the morning we went out to the "Milpa". They gave us machetes and we did what is called "Doblando". Where you cut off all the leaves and then cut the stock to prepare to seed the beans. My comp was loving all of this cause he is still pretty new to all of this and it was his first time working out in the field with a machete so it was an experience for him We did that for about 4 hours in the morning and it was sweet, but I was sweating so bad. There is also this stuff in the corn leaves that if you are sweating it causes you to itch a ton, so I got a nice rash that night, but it has already gone away luckily.

      Well it was a super fun week and I really learned a lot, but this weekend we had to plan for this next week and I realized that this week.... I complete a year in the mission. I can't even believe it. The mission has already gone by so fast. At times I will catch my self thinking, "Where was I a year ago?", but this week I will reply, "Oh ya, in the mission". It is really awesome to look back on all that I have done though and all that I have learned. WOW, When I think about the change in a year ago til now it is.... GRANDÍSIMO! The good thing is though is that I still have another year. It will be good to see all of you in a year, but I still have a lot I need to do.

      Well enough with that thought. I love you all a ton and I hope everything keeps on going great. It has been getting hotter here and in Elders Qourum yesterday all I could think about was going for a swim. Then Jof and Kylie sent those pictures of them swimming. It looks super nice haha. I would love to go for a swim at about 2 in the afternoon when it is super hot and humid.

     I always pray for you all and I have been reading a bit in doctrine in covenants and I really am liking a scripture in Doctrine and Covanents 130:20-21. That whenever we recieve a blessing it is through our obedience. I love that and it is true. Doesn't mean we wont have trials, but we will have the help of God getting through them all. I really like that and I thought I would share that thought.

    Love you all and Have a great week.

  Elder Gillette

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