Week 60

March 7, 2011

Well family,

That`s awesome that BYU was ranked 3rd and super bummer that they lost their power forward. Hopefully they`ll still be able to do well in the NCAA tournament. The rest of the team is going to have to really step it up. Good juju for them.

Well, here we are in Prosperidad still and I`m on a computer that has a good keyboard. Didn`t know those existed down here. Wow. We had 8 investigators in church yesterday...that`s pretty much the average lately. Today and tomorrow are holidays...ok sidenote, get this. School started last Tuesday and now they already have a two day holiday and some schools are giving the whole week off. So that makes 4 class days to 5 holiday days, no wonder education fails down here, sidenote terminated. So anyways, we have two couples going to get marriage dates on Wednesday, one to do divorce things, and then another couple that does not yet have a predetermined date but are going soon. The only sad part is that generally they will get married 2 weeks later (after going the first time) which more than likely means that these people will all get married and baptized the week I leave. poo. I really hope it works out better than that but we`ll see. I think I would be pretty much heartbroken and devastated if they all get baptized the Saturday after I left. I don`t really care about (missing) the baptisms themselves, It`s more of the fact that these people are my family. I`ve found all of them and taught them everything since being here. It`s hard enough realizing that I`m not likely to ever see them again in my life. :(

To answer your question...yes I received letters 58,59,and A. I also got a letter from Sister Beth Peacock...evidently a recent convert in the ward. She wrote a really nice letter where she shared her conversion story. It was really nice. So you can let her know that I got the letter safe and sound. I was so confused when I received it, because I do not know her. Also, I was going to send pictures this week, but sadly this computer does not recognize things put into the usb ports. So I guess it`s either pictures or a good keyboard. :/

Huge congrats to Patty (Patrick) and Krees (Chris) on the super man-style win in the championship (Church basketball) game.

Well, the mission is super awesome. I hit 14 months yesterday. How did that happen? I swear we just hit new years last week. Oh well. I`m living it up out here. My comp and I are seeing some amazing miracles. Also it`s absolutely amazing how the Spirit directs lessons. On Saturday we gave the same general lesson 3 times to 3 of our main investigator families. It was about covenants and the main focus of the lesson was to make sure they knew who they are making a covenant with. I told them flat out that they don`t go to church for the people or the bishop. They go for God and some time during their life they will see something they don`t like in the church. They just have to accept it and move on. It`s a very direct lesson, and I seriously doubt that there are many missionaries who would give that lesson, but my purpose (as I see it) is to give them as many tools as possible to stay active permanently. Anyways, as I was saying, we taught it 3 times and the Spirit cleverly adapted to each of their needs. During the last time we taught it, I was thinking about what we had done previously, but it just didn`t feel right so we took a slightly different track and ended up talking about gossip, which we hadn`t touched on previously. Well it turns out that that couple had been talking about that very subject of gossiping right before we arrived. We had no idea, but the Spirit did. It`s really cool how that all works out.

As for the weather, it is cooling down very slightly, but we still have hot days. We do have a type of fall, where it starts to rain more, but it won`t get terribly freezing until June or July so that`ll be fun. Last year we walked around in short sleeve shirts until June.

Have a great week. Velvet`s (family dog) birthday is coming up soon. Don`t forget to give her some love. :) I love you all. Thanks for your support and prayers.

Love Always,

DJ

Say hi to everybody for me...like always.