These letters seem to get more and more repetitive. Still doing well.

Hey there family!

These letters seem to get more and more repetitive. Still doing well.

This past week has been good. It has been hard for the zone to have a lot of success because starting the month they had no one progressing. We are trying to animate the missionaries in the zone and we are going to work a lot with them to invite their investigators to be baptized. That is one of the hardest things missionaries have. They are scared to invite! Mom, you said something about not knowing that you should bring non-members to a fireside. I think you should ALWAYS bring non-members! Just invite them.  It is key to expose them to the Church. Also, when missionaries go to visit somebody to teach them, they should invite to be baptized. That is what we are hoping for after all. So they can make this promise to God. We shouldn’t wait to invite the people to whatever it is – an activity, church, or baptism. That is one thing I love being able to get better at. Inviting them to act. I could go on and on. I am excited to apply all these things that I have learned when I get home. :) Tomorrow we have a zone meeting. I love those books you sent me mom :) I plan to use some of those ideas when I talk about the importance of prayer tomorrow. Elder Goodrich and I already started using the example of 12 candles as the apostles and a candle for the prophet. People seem to understand well and it is more fun to teach in other ways.

Guadalupe is progressing! We have tried to teach her family and they always say, “If I can go I will.” Fortunately, Guadalupe came to church yesterday and liked it a lot. We had the primary program. It was pretty good. I love being reminded of the innocence of little kids. It reminds me of why Christ loved teaching the little kids. Very simply with love. That is something I always want to improve on as I teach. Elder Goodrich is really good at teaching simply so they understand, so I am learning a lot from him.

The family that was suppose to get baptized last week (Segunda Rangel) accepted once again baptism this week. They just get upset over stupid things. We passed by their house yesterday for the first time since last Sunday. They said they didn’t like how people were using their phones and stuff during class and some were talking. It was kinda dumb, but we were able to help them forgive the members and realized that no one is perfect. They accepted to forgive them and they said they will be baptized on Sunday to follow Christ. We will see this next week. 

We have this other family that is SUPER GOOD. Her name is Jazmin and her 2 kids Erick, and Jesus. Jazmin (the mom) and Erick accepted to be baptized, but Jesus doesn’t because he is scared of what his friends will say in school because he goes to a Catholic school. They really want to be baptized but we are trying to help Jesus out. 

That is pretty much a wrap-up of our investigators.

On Saturday we had a noche de hogar with Jazmin and her family with another lady and her two kids who are members. We tried teaching them how to make chocolate chip cookies. Unfortunately, I don’t think that the same brown sugar exists here. It was more just like regular sugar that was brown. So they turned out super hard. They don’t eat cookies and brownies here :( There desserts are more like jello and arroz con leche. 

Other fun thing... Yesterday in the principios del evangelio class the Arriaga Muñon family came! I guess they found where the church is and they wanted to come visit me! It was really fun to see them. They are doing well and told them that they did a noche de hogar with some other members on Wednesday. I love that family. They said Elder Goff had special changes though and so now the other missionaries don’t visit them that much... But they are still really excited about being sealed in a year.

So all is going well here! I love this area. Super rural filled with crazy dogs. We usually carry a rock in our hand for protection. It also is getting cold here. Even though everyone thinks all of Mexico is always hot, that is not true. My area is one of the coldest in the mission. And it’s about to get a whole lot colder... blehh. Luckily no snow though. Thanks for your love and support!

-Elder Thomas