Elder's "Mormon Census" . . .

This young man NEVER ceases to amaze me with his positive attitude. I know he has hard times and there are things that are difficult for him, but he always tries to put his best foot forward. I'm so proud of how he has served his mission to this point and know that he is going to FINISH STRONG!

June 1, 2015

Dear Family,

This week was really good.  We have been able to work super hard lately, and have been trying to find a bunch of families to teach.  It has been slow going, and it has been tough, but every minute is worth it!  I have just been trying to keep my perspective eternal and think about all of the good that we do here!

So this week we were able to invite Yeni to be baptized, and she said yes!!  She is still building her testimony up, and is reading lots in the Book of Mormon, but she is doing really well.  She loved when we taught this week about the Plan of Salvation, and it was a really good lesson.  We talked about the Atonement, and it was refreshing and very spiritual for all of us.  I loved it, and was greatly blessed by that lesson.  We are hoping that she continues to have such a great desire! We were also able to find a new family this week in our contacting adventures!  We have just been knocking on every door, street by street, and talking to literally everyone that we see!  Everyone has these stickers on their doors that the government put on, saying that the house was part of the census.  It always has a little place that says,  ¨Hi!!  We passed by to visit you!!__________¨ With that blank like for the names of the workers....  I am not going to lie, when I started seeing that, I started writing my name on that line!!  They have now been part of the government census, as well as Elder Palomar and I´s ´´Mormon Census´´!  There are easily over 1000 doors that have our signatures on them  ;)

Anyway, back to the family that we found.  The mom´s name is Carolina, and I forget the daughter´s name because it is a mix of her mother´s and father´s names, and it just does not even sound like a name!!  Anyway, she is 17 and Carolina is her stepmother.  The first lesson that we had with them, Carolina told us that she believes in God and that He loves her, but it was interesting because the daughter told us that she wasn´t sure if God exists.  I felt like Ammon teaching King Lamoni in the Book of Mormon!!  It was obviously a little bit different, because she wasn´t an indian who believes in ´´The Great Spirit´´, but she did keep saying that she believed that there was some sort of supreme being that is over us.  Basically just like chapter 18 of Alma in the Book of Mormon!  We contnued on in the lesson, and at the end of the lesson we invited them to pray, and I asked them ´´Who's the only person in existence who won´t and can´t lie to us?´´  With out hesitation, the daughter responded,  "God."  That was a very rewarding moment.  The next lesson we talked about prophets, and they understood perfectly!

I have started something new with Elder Palomar as well.  At 5 p.m., when the day is exactly half way over, I stop and ask him what his favorite part of the day has been to that point.  We don´t continue until we have both said what our favorite part was.  Then we continue the day, and in planning at night I ask him again what his favorite part of the day was!  It has been truly rewarding to be able to analize our days in that form!  Loving it!

I was thinking this week a lot about faith, and just trying to figure lots of things out.  I was thinking about the physical darkness, and how it is scary sometimes.  But, we need to have faith that we will be safe.  Sometimes we have to show our faith by taking a few steps out before we can see the path where we need to go.  It is never going to be easy, it is never going to go the way that we think it will go, but if it is hard, it WILL be worth it.  We don´t know when and we don´t know how, but we just know that it will be!! 

I love you all!,

Elder Garrett McEwan