22 de Abríl

Hola mí familia buena! It was nice to hear from you as always. I guess I'll start by answering questions. We as missionaries ask the people who they would like to baptize them. We kind of encourage a ward member to do it, usually the member that has fellowshipped them the most, someone who is their friend and they will always be reminded of their baptism each time they see them. A lot of people, as much as they love the missionaries who baptized them, forget our weird american names and often a lot of their special day. With their fellowship the one who baptized them, if they go inactive their fellowship can get on their tails. So yes we baptize, but more often a member does it. It's better that way =) Noeli's family are all members, just a few are less active. Jeffrey and Stefanie are preparing to be baptized this Saturday. Yesterday their dad Clemson (we found it wasn't Klifson haha kinda hard to understand people when they say their names sometimes) received the Aaronic Priesthood and he will baptize them on Saturday. We had the goal that each companionship will baptize someone this Saturday in our zone, and so far it looks pretty good. There are 14 or so with fechas for Saturday! Caroline has a
fecha for the 2nd of may, we'll see if she's ready or not. She's in the process of moving out and lots of stuff and is having a hard time, and hasn't been reading the Book of Mormon which she obviously needs to do before getting baptized. A friend of Joy's, Isoken, and her son Michael, have fechas for the 4th of may. We also have been picking up a lot of new investigators, we have a list of about 12 or so that we plan on teaching and setting a baptismal dates.
Yesterday was our ward conference, so the stake came and taught the classes and the Bishop and Stake President spoke in sacrament meeting. It was neat because we never really see the stake people much, but they are so great! The stake president gave an outstanding talk about tithing. It was the perfect balance of rebuke (I guess its a hard commandment for people in Spain to live...go figure) and promised blessings and emphasis on the Lord and building his kingdom. It was so great! We also had two new families show up to church with friends. A Bolivian family with 3 young girls, and a couple from Ecuador. We're going to go visit them this week. We've had another week of miracles!
It sounds like a fun experience with Ethan's ordination. Congrats! I hope he had a fun birthday. Last hope of America sounds like it was fun too. All of those patriotic songs. All I hear here is the Mo Tab America cd on my ipod =)
It is super sad to hear about a new bishopric! We already had the best one! It's always a hard change, people naturally get attached to their great leaders, but the Lord calls whom He wants called and at the right time, so the following are always great. It would be neat to have Joseph Smith to have been the prophet for a long time, but the saints needed Brigham Young. And consecutively we can learn so many great things from each prophet, a different perspective or focus. The Lord has His purposes =) Let me know what happens!!
I'm glad to hear Jacob Eddington did well. He's great =) Hope he gets out to Perú super quick!
I thought is was funny that you got denstist reminders for me. Kinda funny that you say that, because one of those would be nice! This last week we bought like a kilo and a half of Spanish chuches (candies) to teach tithing and the word of wisdom to Jeffrey and Stefanie. So we've had lots of junkfood =) The water here in Spain has a ton of calcium or something in it, so we buy drinking water or use a filter. It still makes your teeth feel wierd after brushing and supposedly makes some of your hair fall out from showering in it. I haven't noticed though.
 We press on in the work of the Lord!
Have a great week!

15 de Abril

Hello to all! This has been such a great week in Valencia!! We went to work! Elder Dayes is a beast at contacting everyone, and we found 7 new investigators! We also had 6 at church, so that was a great blessing. There are Standards of excellence, kind of a weekly goal that we work for with our numbers, and we hit 4 out of the 5, something you only see in a few companionships each week. It was great =) We also had the baptism of Noeli, a 9 year old from the Dominican Republic that we've been teaching. It was such a great service. A special spirit of humility and family unity was there with everyone. Hopefully we will keep up the great work! Klifson, Joy, and their kids are doing great. They learn impressively quick, and love the church, feeling the Spirit, and reading the scriptures! Joy already invited a friend to come to church, who brought her 12 and 6 year old sons! It was so great. Also, Caroline will be moving out to live alone with her kids, the man doesn't want to be married and they've had a few arguments lately, so that like sealed the deal, and she could be baptized on the 27th or the 4th. It's just great!!
Thanks for the emails. That's so great that my brothers are getting close to their eagles. Get em done!! Haha dad should just make a pinewood derby for old times sake  It is wierd to think that one year ago I was opening my mission call. It was wierd to be in the same place in December too haha. I hadn't even thought about school and how its almost over. That was probably the wierdest realization I had after reading that. Before I know it I'll have to be registering...time flies!
I'm glad the Sunday School class went well. Doctrine and Covenants is so great. A special book of scripture unique to our day. I'm in like section 50 in spanish. It's a little harder to read than the book of mormon in spanish, but by the end I'll have lots of great scriptures marked to use =) Using the scriptures is really the best and only way to teach. We can say what we want and they can take or word for it or reject it.We talked yesterday with a joven from California doing a masters program in music here, and his friends have been missionaries and he's talked with them before. He seems to have learned all the pieces, but can't connect them and has lots of questions. He asked the other missionaries why his other baptism wasn't "valid" and of course they told him that his priest had no authority. He asked us the same question, we answered basically the same way, but read in Acts 19 about people having been baptized by John, the prophet who baptized Jesus Himself, but Paul baptized them again under the new authority he had been given with the established church of Jesus Christ, and it made all the difference in the teaching and how he took it. The scriptures have power =)
 Have fun at hope of america--last time! También, cumpleaños feliz a Ethan!!  Su regalo:
Also, enjoy the snow! We got none of that here!

8 de Abril

Hola buenas a todos! This was a super great week! First off, I am now with Elder Dayes. He has been the office secretary for the past 6 months, and so was kind of excited to leave, and doesn't know what to do with so much proseliting time to fill! And not having to stay up until 2 to do numbers was great for him haha. He is from Arizona.  He's a great missionary, always talking to people, something I'm not as good at so he's a good example haha.
General Conferece was so great! We watched them in the Church. The 10 am session was broadcasted live here at 6 pm. On Sunday we watched Priesthood at 11, Sat afternoon at 2, and then sunday morning live at 6. We never got to see sunday afternoon, where I figured that Elder Holland, Oaks, and Christofferson would all speak, some of my favorite speakers! So we'll have to download it and listen to it at home. It was so great though! Me encanta los discursos de Pres. Eyring, and his testimony--super fuerte!!! I love Tad R. Callister, and he gave a great talk. Elder Packer and Elder Ballard gave really good ones too. I noticed the same theme with almost all of them--family relations, priesthood blessings, obedience to commandments, missionary work, and standing as a witness in all things. Quit being super flojo about it all! You have a testimony, show it! I think that is why the Savior condemned hipocrites so sternly. Everything about the gospel is intended to help you become something, to be someone, not just do or not do things. Something hipocrites profess to be but aren't. It also seems like there are some hard times with testimony trying experiences that we have yet to face, and so we need to start now being a witness and having our answers ready! It was funny, we as a piso were trying to guess where the new temples would be announced, I joked about one being in Utah again, and what do you know! The Rio temple should be super neat too. It will be so great to hear one of these days a Barcelona or Valencia! There are a ton of missionaries too, I can't believe it! So amazing!
We had a great miracle this week. Our Ward mission leader had reffered us to a less active family who the parents were baptized about five years ago, but then stopped coming after a trial and went back to the catholic church. Elder Dixon and I passed by once, taught about living prophets, and they accepted us to come back. The second visit we talked about the Book of Mormon, how it can bless our lives. They opened up to us in that visit and told us that the reason they stopped coming was because they didn't feel like they had testimonies of the Book of Mormon, and when their kids would ask them questions, they felt embarrased that they didn't know the answers and couldn't give a good example and so they taught them what they knew, catholosism. We invited them to read the Book of Mormon, told them we would help, and teach. They accepted. We passed by and left a kids book with fotos and copies in Spanish and English so that they all could read, and were super excited. They expressed to us their desire to try to come back into activity. The man, Klifson, has been sick but was able to make Saturday's General Conference session, and loved it, especially the talk by Elder Ballard. The Sunday session the whole family was there with our ward mission leader and they all loved it. They are super excited, and we will hopefully see two baptisms from their two oldest kids who have not been baptized. They are so great! They speak spanish really well for most africans we've seen, so thats great. The kids are a lot more fluent since they go to school and have friends here. We don't really translate for people, they want to try to get headphones, for sure have them study scriptures and books on their own. We'll have to see what they want to do. There were just a few points or power phrases that I loved out of each talk, and then we downloaded conference today to listen to the last session. That's the highlight of my week, can't think of much else to say. Have a wonderful week, be happy, apply, ponder, and live the teaching of the prophets! Don't miss me too much  You're always in my prayers! Have a fantastic week.