Hello!
We
had a great lesson with Teodoro this Wednesday! He came over to the
Branch President's house for dinner and a lesson. We talked about the
Gospel of Jesus Christ (Lesson 3). I think it really helped him to
understand the importance of baptism and of the Holy Ghost. When Elder
Smith asked him if he was excited about his baptism, he said, "It's
getting there." It was a good lesson, overall! He connected pretty well
with Presidente Osorio, even though he (Teodoro) is a pretty reserved
guy. We told him about the importance of coming to church, but alas, he
did not come. That was a bummer. Hopefully he'll keep progressing!
We
had a couple of good first lessons with some new families. The mission
standard was just raised from 4 to 5 new investigators each week, and we
hit it! We didn't even find out until Saturday morning that the
standard had changed, so I'm really glad to have hit it. The mission is
definitely lifting. It's a completely different mission than when I got
here!
One
magnificent blessing I have received from the Lord is the gift of
tongues! I've been able to speak much more quickly now than I used to,
and I realized it's because I don't have to translate nearly as many of
my thoughts from English to Spanish. Most of the time I can just think
and speak in Spanish. Another indicator of improvement is that everyone
understands me (most of the time). People used to say, "Como?" or
"Mande?" a lot, either because what I said didn't make sense, or they
couldn't understand my pronunciation. Now people respond without
obstruction or delay! As far as the interpretation of tongues, that's
been improving a lot as well. If a gringo is speaking Spanish, I can
pretty much understand perfectly. It's still iffy when a native goes off
on a rant, but I can understand them when their sentences are
relatively short, MUCH more than I used to! Of course there are still
words I don't know, conjugations I mess up, and so on, but there's been
noticeable improvement. Blessings from the Lord!
It's
been getting colder, and there was a nice little blizzard on Sunday!
Elder Smith's first snowfall! It all melted. But there will be more!
On
Saturday we had our Branch Thanksgiving Festival, or as our branch
mission leader calls it, "Festibal de Thansgeeveen." He's a gringo; he's
just trying to be funny. It was great! We (Elder Smith, the Sisters and
I) prepared a limbo game.
 |
| Let's Limbo! |
We had lots of delicious non-Mexican
Thanksgiving food, and then played games. We threw darts at balloons,
played stick pull, and the greatest hit: shooting a turkey pinata with a
bow and arrow! It was lots of fun. Unfortunately, none of our
investigators came, even though we invited them all. But there were a
couple of less-active members there and Alejandro and Chelsey came! It
was a good time.
We
are focusing a lot on... well... missionary work! I was going to
specify all of the things we're focusing on, but then I realized it can
be summed up as missionary work. We're just getting another push to keep
up with the Lord in this hastening of the work! There's a huge
Christmas season initiative from the First Presidency and Quorum of the
Twelve called "He is the Gift." We'll be focusing most of our finding
efforts and our work with members on utilizing this new initiative. It's
going to be huge!
I'm
grateful for the gospel. I'm grateful for the scriptures. I'm grateful
for my jacket and earmuffs, my car and apartment, my branch and my
fellow missionaries. I'm grateful for all of you, and I'm grateful for
this opportunity to serve a mission! I love you all! Count your
blessings! There are a lot of them, I promise. Remember that Heavenly
Father loves you! That's something to be grateful for! Happy
Thanksgiving!
Sincerely,
Elder Rogers
Elder Rogers
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