hello everyone. it was great to get to talk to you all yesterday. a little weird for me to be honest though, so sorry if it was a little awkward. it is weird to realize that that world still exists, and it is weird to actually see it haha. it was fun to talk though and to see you all and see that you have grown and are keeping busy with everything. hope you had a really great mothers day mom. i love you.
this week here went really well and also was really tough. we´ve been working really hard these last few weeks working on how we can start to build up the area nad the ward again. we talked to a ton of ppl and taught a lot as well. we even got some references from the members and everything. by the end of the week we had put 9 people on date to be baptized. or in other words we had 9 people that accepted to be baptized on a certain day. which is really good for one week. the only bad thing is that nobody in the end showed up to church. it is a problem that basically every missionary in the whole world has all the time which is hard. how to get ppl to come. they have to have the desire, but we also need to help them understand the importance and the blessings. i prayed a lot about it yesterday and figured out a good thing that i am going to try. First you need to show love towards the person. then you need to understand and comprehend what is happening, sympathize that it is something difficult and that the devil is doing everything possible on his end to make it not happen. then teach the doctrine to help them understand and see the big picutre. then invite them, but have them make the decision that they are going to come. then remind them of the goal and help them each day to acheive it, keep them focused on the goal. I am going to try that this week and we'll see what happens. it seems like something you could apply to any sort of problem or argument. Usually we dont try too hard to think about who the other person is, what their circumstances are. the more they talk, the better.
Yesterday we had a fun experience. after i talked to you on skype we left and looked for this young couple we taught once. we got there and they let us in. they live in one of those houses made out of metal sheets. at the endish of the lesson it started to rain. then started to rain really hard. you could barely hear anything, and there was water falling down and i had to hold a cup and try and catch the water before it landed on us. But in the house almost yelling we invited them to be baptized, and they accepted. then at the end the man said the prayer in a very loud voice. there was a really cool spirit there with us. it was an experience that i hadnt had before. this family is really out of options. we made promises to them that if they gave all that they had left to god and promised that they would serve him, that he would provide for them all that they need. they accepted and it was a really great lesson. as the lesson ended it was still raining really hard. and as we prepared to go out into the rain, they didnt really believe us ha. we put our books in little plastic bags and then sprinted out into the flooded streets. We ran down the middle of the street in pouring rain with water already up to our ankles. lots of ppl saw us which was funny, but we had a lot of fun with it. we got soaked! but after like 10 min a taxi came by and we jumped in and he took us to our house. The rest of the night there wasnt power all the time, so i got out my flashlight and we hung up our wet clothes and i played hymns on the guitar. it was a fun night.
also i found out that in my last area Vicente (baptized the 14th of april) was just called to be the young mens PRESIDENT! It is so crazy. im way excited for him and know he is going to be great. can you imagine having a month in the church and being called as a president of all the young men. He has made strides in his spiritual progress and will do great though, but he does have a lot to learn, but he will do it all well.
i love you all and miss you and hope you have a great next week.
love
elder smith
pictures: last night after the storm, coming from mina to villa in the morning.
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