Monday, April 25, 2011

Happy Easter

So this week had a lot of downs but had a happy ending! :) Last monday we went on splits and it was a blast! Ready for this...it was my first day in my whole mission that i was on a bike all day! Haa i feel like such a sheltered missionary! It was such a blast though. I had to get used to the extremely uncomfortable seat that by the end of the day felt like i was sitting on a pointy rock, but we talked with sooo many people and just had so much fun. We just went into down town in the morning and literally there were people everywhere! I felt like prophets and missionaries of old going around preaching to groups of people hahah, calling them unto repentance. We were outside some little coffee shop and there were like 7 people smoking, we went and talked to EACH one and they were all sitting right next to each other. By the time we got to the last person they had heard what we do as missionaries about...7 times and still we got a return appointment with one of them haha it was pretty funny. My goal was to make everyone i talked to laugh or smile, and it ended up working out pretty good. Even when someone rudely rejected, i know my intentions were good and that they are missing something really special.



The next few days were pretty rough though. Talk about missed appointments and flakey people left and right! We had jessica who has a baptismal date, and she was sick all week! We get so nervous because she never tells us what's going on so we can't tell if she's ignoring us or there's something up. Then we found out that a lot of the time, she can't meet with us because her sister, who she lives with, is kind of crazy and is a drug addict :( So while jessica is doing pretty good at staying away from the drugs sometimes, she can't do stuff with us because her sister monica who is paying for their house is just tripping out on something and she is creepy when she is using. I feel so sad for jessica's two little girls. But we tried to see her all week and had nothing. Then on friday we find carlos jr. or Bubba is what we call him, outside on his front porch eating taco bell. He is 10 and he is the son of a recently activated family who had a date for this past weekend. We see him (finally, it took us all week), and we go kick it with him on his porch and we talked about spongebob and he tells us about his halo game for a little while haha and then we talked to him about his baptism and it was sooo awesome because just talking about those little things in the beginning helped him open up a ton to us. And he got excited for his baptism too. So that was a huge blessiong and then we ended up seeing his mom and dad later too which was another huge blessing because it had been all week! We then planned a bbq for saturday with them and they said they would invite jessica. So all the happened, we get to the bbq and jessica and monica cAME! it was great, we brought the meat and had a carne asada bbq. It was sooo good! We talked to jessica too and she said she was sleeping over at kelly's (the recently activated member), so that she could go church in the morning (THANKYOU HEAVENLY FATHER!). So that ended up great. The week itself was prett slow. We are running around looking for spanish people still, man it's tough! We had hardly any new investigators this week which was kind of sad. It's almost next transfer too so i might be getting a new companion, i don't think i will but you nevver know. We are trying to plan ahead though so that next transfer we still have people to teach when it starts.


So last week, i found out that i was teaching at zone conference this friday the 29th. I'm super excited for it and me and elder Nelson, the missionary i'm teaching with, planned it all out this morning for studies and it went great! At the same time we are kind of nervous. Then on saturday, the branch president gives me a call and asks me to give a talk in sacrament meeting. So that was a little nerve wracking! And wihle i still had a day in advance to write it, it was more to think about. Also the AP's called and asked if me and two other elders would do a musical number at zone conference so we have started to practice that too hahah! There is so much going on, this will be a crazy week. It'll be cool too cause we will have the AP's come down and they are going on splits with us and another companionship for a day. They are pretty cool elders and i want to learn something from them.


So my talk went well yesterday, it was on service and well i'm a missionary so it wasn't tooo hard thinking of something to talk about. It was kind of sad though that the whole easter thing wasn't that emphasized in sacrament meeting. We just had one talk about Jesus Christ and then mine about service, so i tried to tie it in as best i could. We did have an awesome bbq afterward though and everybody, well almost everybody we were expecting came to church! WE had bubba and his family, jessica, and her sister monica came! Because bubba had his baptism planned for easter sunday. So they all came and brought their kids too who actually did pretty good i was impressed! They all came though and really enjoyed themselves. Monica was talking about how for some reason she felt like getting emotional, the whole time she was in church. We talked about how the holy ghost talks to us and how what she was feeling was a good thing, in fact, it was heavenly Father telling her it was the right thing, her being in church. So it was a good turn out and the bbq afterward was super fun. It was nice we had a lot of the branch members and it was good for the camachos becasue they are just getting back into things, and told us at the beginning that they wanted to make friends in the church so they could ditch some of their old ones that were bad influences. And jessica and monica met some new people too, it worked great all around!

Then afterward we had to go get ready for bubb'as baptism! Everything workied out how we had hoped and planned and it was just all coming together! wE HAVE been working hard all transfer and were seeing the benefits not in our own lives, but the lives of someone else. He was excited for his baptism too and so was his whole family. Oh i forgot to say too, when we got to their house on sunday morning to make sure everyone was ready for church, they all came out with brand new church clothes! it was awesome, they had new ties and white shirts with slacks and shoes. They looked soo good! But we got the baptism all set up and it was awesome to see their family so happy. You can see in the picture just how happy they were and jessica and monica came too and they loved it. By the end they were talking about how they wanted to be baptized next and it was awesome. We have a lot of work to do with them and one of them, monica, doesn't quite understand why we are baptized. She just wants to get dunked and then move on, so we got some work to do with her but we are looking forward to it and jessica was feeling really goood about it. I just remember looking up from the font though standing in the cold water with bubba in his white jumpsuit and seeing kelly and carlos, his mom and dad sitting there staring at their son with tears int heir eyes, soo happy! We just completed the family and so now their next goal can be the temple. It is soo cool beacuse the building where the font is, is right next to the temple and so we had a long talk about it afterward. So that's the next step for them!!! How awesome is that. It was the best easter sunday of all and bubba was pretty excited to be able to remember his baptism was on easter. Afterward we went over to their place and had a little easter egg hunt and then we left. We didn't have anyone signed up up for dinner so we just decided to work all day and then take dinner at 8:00 or 8:30ish to end the night. We were exhausted! It was such a crazy weekend and we had a spiritual high going all day yesterday hah. We meant to color eggs on saturday night but didn't have time with our nightly planning and working on some stuff for our zone, and then we were gonna do it sunday during lunch, dinner, or after dinner, but we ended up eating and just kickin it until we fell asleep haha. We were so drained!

This week is gonna be really good. We are hoping to see Jessica get baptized in the next 2 weeks and monica hopefully will follow. We also have another guy named carlos morales who is the most amazing guy ever. He is just living with his girlfriend who is an inactive member! It is the most frustrating thing to see when a non-member is more committed to living the gospel than a member of the church. His girlfriend drives us crazy and you can tell he gets frustrated with her. He basically has all the lessons memorized he knows them so well, and we left him some homework last week and he recapped everything in depth and told us how important it is that we get baptized just like Jesus Christ was. He wants it soo bad but just as before, his girlfriend doesn't want to get married. They have a kid together and Carlos is ready to tie the knot but she isn't doing it. We were having an awesome lesson with him on saturday, after we sang them a church song and played it on the ukulele. We talked abotu sacrifices we make for the blessings of the gospel and how abraham was gonna sacrifice his own son, and lehi and his family left their home, money, and precious things, all because the lord asked them too. Or job how he lost his family and essentially everything he had, but later they were all rewarded and their losses were made up for. Carlos was getting way into it and asked for all the scripture references so he could study them during the week when he goes to work in california (bummer). Then his gf gets home with her mom and just ruined the spirit there. We asked them, hey are you coming to church with carlos tomorrow and susanna, his gf, laughs and says "ha he says he'll come but last second something will come up and he won't make it". It was so frustrating for me i was going crazy. i wanted to scream. This girl who knows the church is true, is hurting her should be spouse, and is so discouraging. You could tell he was feeling awkward too and so we decided it would be best if we just said a prayer and left before we said anything innapropriate to her. She was just such a downer on everything and she is holding him back from so many blessings. Not to mention she's living in sin. Man sorry, but this carlos guy is amazing. I wish you could hear him speak and hear his testimony. He was talking about how his whole family is catholic and the sacrifices he has made for the gospel he was like well i was catholic, and then when i got my answer, i figured if God really told me, i better follow it, and so i told my family and they don't like it at all. The poor guy puts up with so much and yet his testimony is soo strong. Pretty soon, if nothing changes, we are just gonna hit him with a spiritual train, and invite him to move out. I love that guy.

I gotta run though the lady is leaving pretty soon. But man i loved hearing from you guys! It means everything to me that you write me every week and it really does make my day. Thanks again for the easter box, i think i've already eaten all the pringles, the mac cheese, and the little dehydrated fruit stuff (sooo good!). haha but i love you so much! have a good week this week and i can't wait to hear from you and tell you about how zone conference goes :)
Love Elder Edwards


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