Still Training

Late email this week!

This week was awesome. It was the last week of the transfer, so we're going to have to say goodbye to many great missionaries in our District and Zone. However, we're also getting 4 new missionaries straight from the MTC to our Zone, including the South Side Elders. So, my trainee and I will share the ward with Elder Owens and his incoming trainee. We're pretty pumped.

The people that we're teaching are progressing really well! We've stopped teaching a couple of them and are focusing on those who are really ready to progress. We taught Marbeny today, which was awesome. She is really ready to be baptized. We went throught the interview questions and everything. She has a couple of minor things that she wants resolved before she gets baptized, but it should be within the next few weeks. We're going back over to resolve those on Wednesday and she wants us to try to teach her husband on Sunday. That's pretty awesome.

Luz brought herself to church and took herself home. We're going to go over with her friend from the ward and teach her this week and try to see how she feels about baptism as well.

This week was pretty interesting. On Sunday we were walking down a busy street when a guy with his window rolled down and shades on started yelling to us. We couldn't figure out what he was saying, but he sounded kind of irrational, so we just kept walking as he turned onto the side street that we were about to cross and into the neighborhood a little bit. He put his hazards on, parked halfway into someone's driveway, and left his car running and front door open as he ran over to us. We quickly realized that the gentleman was absolutely sloshed. Drunk as a skunk (sidenote we were chased by a large mangy skunk this week through the city), he came up to us and started talking about why we were wasting our time trying to preach. He asked us to tell him something about Jesus. He spoke Spanish, but almost punched me when I tried to speak Spanish. He started asking us about politics and ranting about how bad the world would be without President Trump. We told him we were politically neutral as missionaries. Eventually he shifted into praising us and offered to buy us food and a drink nearby. We politely declined. We were on our way to get some awesome tamales from a member anyway. Currently eating said tamales as I write. He congratulated us for our service and told us to never let anyone dissuade us from what we were doing and left. Interesting guy.

I got a new phone, so I can finally take people's numbers down without waiting like 5 years for stuff to load, so I'm pretty psyched about that.

We've been contacting people with a poster about the prodigal son. That's this week's spiritual thought. Heavenly Father loves us. He waits for us with open arms even when we go off course. All we have to do is correct course back to Him.

Here's a great scripture about it:
3 Nephi 9:

13 O all ye that are spared because ye were more righteous than they, will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may heal you?

14 Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will come unto me ye shall have eternal life. Behold, mine arm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will I receive; and blessed are those who come unto me.

I know that we all have things that we're going through that we need healing with. Just like we all go through physical wounds, we also go through spiritual and emotional wounds. Christ has power to help us to have healing. We just have to get ourselves closer to him. Sometimes people get hurt and scared and worry about meeting with us. Sometimes we ask, "Do you think you'll find more peace moving towards God?" They always say yes and realize that at the end of the day, that's how we can find true, fulfilling, lasting happiness for eternity.

Have an amazing week everyone!