A Great Week . . .

What a difference a week can make! Just goes to show that everyone has trials, even MISSIONARIES :). We sure love Elder Garrett McEwan and are so proud of him and the things he is learning from his mission, his companions, and the people of the Dominican Republic!

April 14, 2014

Dear Family,

Sounds like you are all doing so great!!  I love reading all about what you guys are up to back home, working hard in the church, school, work, etc.  I love hearing aobut your cool spiritual experiences and things like that as well!!  I must say, you guys have gotten really craftsy while I have been out here with the rooms, the cortinas, and the jardín.  It all looks really nice!!



View of the new area ~ Los Palmas

So on Tuesday, I went to the church in San Geronimo to get my new companion.  They told me that his name was Elder WATSON, so I got to the church, was just talking to everyone, said hi to some people and started looking for my comp.  I hear a voice behind me saying,  "Elder, there is your comp."  I turn around, and my comp is standing there... Elder WASSUM.  Haha I had just barely said hi to him and didn´t even know he was my comp because they told me the wrong name!!

Elder Wassum is from Wyoming, and he has 7 months in the mission.  He is from the group right after me, so that was cool to see someone with about the same time as me.  He is 19, and really likes playing soccer, was all state first team in Wyoming.  He likes to write, and wants to be an author and coach when he finishes the mission.  He has his own fiction book that he is writing.

Pizza Place for our Friday Pizza Night :)

But anyway, we hit the ground running this week, and turned it into the best week that I have had in this area.  We taught more people, we did more fun stuff...  It was a great refresher!!!  We had a Zone Meeting on Friday as well, and I got a letter from Mom, Dylan, and finally some correspondance from Sean!!  He sent me a little arrowhead thing, which I tied to my scripture case!!!  Thank you all for writing me letters, it is such a nice surprise to get a letter in the mail at a zone meeting!!

Now on to the investigators.

Dari....  She now has a baptismal fecha of May 16.  We want to take it really slow with her.  She wants to get baptized ASAP, but we want to make sure that she is understanding us perfectly, because there is a little bit of a language barrier between the Spanish and the Creole.  But we are working hard with that, and she is understanding more and more each day!!

Beyilin....  That was a little hard this week.  All of the missionaries who have been through this area have said that she is a such a sure person, and that she was going to get baptized like it was nothing.  She had one of those roaming fechas, meaning that once she finished her course in school, she was just going to get baptized straight up.  We were reading with her and I just felt prompted to ask her about how she felt about baptism.  She told us that she knows that it is something that is needed to go to heaven.  Then I asked her how she felt about HER personal baptism that she is working towards, and she said that she didn´t know.  We just went back to square one, trying to build a testimony for her.  Lots of people here have this problem, they get baptized with out their own personal testimony.  We want to avoid that and build converts, not baptisms.  So we are working hard with her, and she is doing great!!

Esmeralda and Yasmín....  We were not able to meet with them much this week, they cancelled us like 3 days, so hopefully next week we can meet with them a little more often!!

Dolores....  She is a less active that we just reactivated!!  She now has 5 times consecutive in church, as well as going to all 4 sessions of conference!!  She reads usually 3 chapters in the Book Of Mormon since we started reading it with her, and we are reactivating her mother, who is like 70 years old!!  She is about to finish 1 Nephi!!

Angelica....  We started teaching her again.  Went by her house to let my new comp meet their family, and she told us that she wants to learn!!  I have read all her old teaching records, and she has been investigating for 4 years!!  I asked her bluntly why she investigates and nothing happens, and she told me that it is because she felt pressured in the past by the missionaries!! So we are just going to go really slow with her, and not force anything, just let her come unto Christ!!!

We also had our ward mission activity, a little rough as usual because none of the leaders showed up, and they are the ones in charge!!  It says ward MISSION activities, but we are just supposed to go and support, and we have no responsibility.  But it was ok!!

We also have made the goal to work with the members as much as possible, so we have put some citas with the people in the ward, and asked them to invite non member friends!!  Hopefully this works!!

I love you guys so much!!  Keep being awesome!!

Love,
Elder Garrett McEwan