Hey All!

 

Wowsers! Another P-day here already. I seriously cannot believe how fast time seems to fly out here in the mission field. I guess it's a good thing because it means I'm working but I kinda wish it willl slow down...the mission is going by too fast! :)

 

We had a good, productive week this past week. It felt a little odd but it was good. Elder Giles and I had some awesome lesson experiences and we are very excited for the progress of our investigators. We hope to continue the trend this next week. We have some pretty lofty goals but we are determined to accomplish them!!

 

I guess to start out, this past Tuesday we had Zone Conference where we discussed "The Divine Companionship". We started the conference discussing our Key Learnings from the Book of Mormom reading challenge we had a little earlier this year. I wish I could say how strong the spirit was in that room when we were discussing....It was almost tangible it was so strong. I was blessed with the opportunity, along with 3 other Elders, to do a barbershop quartet on Hymn #328 "An Angel from on High (Men's Chorus)". It was a ton of fun and I am SO thankful for the opportunity to use the small amount of talent that I have with singing. Hopefullly I'll have more chances to do it in the future! :) But, the rest of the conference was just as good as the first part. We discussed the importance of the Holy Ghost as the "Senior Companion" in our companionships then practiced on performing effective Companionship Inventories. All in all, I feel it will have a fantastic effect on the work down here in Phoenix South.

 

For the rest of the week, we had some great progress with some of our investigators. We had an investigator tell us that, because of our spirit and a message that we shared with him, he knew that he could and wanted to change his life when, before, he struggled with his past. It was an incredible experience and I wish I could share more of it. Our week was filled with tender mercies of the Lord and I am so grateful for the chance to witness them. The coolest and most amazing experience however happened Thursday night. Elder Giles and I went with our Recent Convert Carlos to go see our investigator Esperanza. We go to her house a little late but we started right away. When we checked up on her reading/praying to know she told us, "I prayed and I know that it is true. Do you want to know why? Because when you missed our appointment on Monday I thought it was a sign from God. But, I prayed really hard, pleading that Heavenly Father would tell me if the message you had was good. I wasn't going to call or try and contact or anything. Then today (Thursday) when I heard your message, I knew it was my answer. I know it is true". I WAS BLOWN AWAY!!! It's really hard to explain but we had a bit of an "emergency" lesson on Monday that prevented us from going to her house and the rest of the week something always seemed to come up right a the last minute we needed to do but I suddenly realized why everything happend the way it did. My friends, Heavenly Father hears our prayers and he gives us the answers we need to hear. I know this to be true....I KNOW this to be true! :D

 

As a result of our increase in success, the Adversary worked very hard also. The funniest example of this happend on Saturday. Elder Giles and I had planned to do some major tracting before we went to the Easter Pageant at the Mesa Temple. We went to this pretty ghetto part of town where we locked up our bikes (securely might I add) then proceeded to tract the street. We didn't really have any success but when I got back to our bikes, I noticed something to be out of place on my bike. About 5 seconds later I realized, "Where's my front tire???" YUP you guessed it! Someone had robbed my front tire right off my bike! In the process they did a little damage to the breaks but nothing that can't be fixed. I ended up carrying my bike on my shoulder for about a 1/4 of a mile to meet a couple of Elders with a spare front. I'll be getting a new tire from our Ward Mission Leader in the next couple of days so, thank goodness, I won't be out too much. However, the story is WELL worth the experience! :)

 

Well my friends, I need to depart,  I hope you all know how much you are loved. We have such a loving Heavenly Father that is always there to listen to our prayers. I know that we also have a Savior who loves us and, because of this love, gave is life for each and every one of us to repent and have the chance to live with Heavenly Father again. I hope that you all have a fantastic week. You are in my prayers every day. But, until next week, iHasta Luego! :D :D