Hola Todos,
This is Adam (Elder Rich). This is the new MyLDSMail.net. It´s run through gmail now and works a lot better. It´s pretty much the same thing as an e-mail through gmail. Anyhow, I´m going to star using this now as it should let me write to everybody without any problems. For future refference, please let people know that my e-mail address has changed lightly. Before it was AdamRich@myldsmail.net, Now, it´s Adam.Rich@myldsmail.net. honestly, either one should end up in the same place, but please use the second one. Pictures should be recieved and sent much more effectively now as well.
Anyhow, as for how the rest of life goes, everything´s been great this last week. We have a lot of people progressing right now and we´re working hard to keep them progressing. It seems like every day or two we find another family to teach. Tommorow we´re going to the mission office for a zone conference and we´re going to get there early so that we can work out some paperwork to get a family married. We had 24 investigators in church again yesterday and at the moment we have baptismal dates for eight investigatores. If all goes well, fefteen or more of our investigatores could be prepared for baptism by the end of the month. I´m really liking this area. We´re completely exhausted when we get back to the house every night, but it´s deffinitely worth it. Thanks to the abundance of hard work, I´ve been able to sleep batter than I ever did before my mission.
We had a companionship exchange with our zone leaders this past week and it all went pretty well. The zone leader, Elder King, who came to our area for a day with Elder Valdez was shocked by how big our area is and how much the members have been helping us. On the reverse, I went to his area and was shocked by how small it was. The zone leader who I was with, Elder Marte, Is new to the area and doesn´t really know the area very well yet. We were lost for a good portion of the night, although by the end, I think I know how to get to everybody in their area now. I was amazed by how much of the Bible ELder Marte knows. He used to be and Evangelical and converted to the church just a little while ago. The other thing he amazed me with however, is how he also taught (fought) like an Evangelical. I learned a valuable lesson about how important it is to establish a trust and friendship from your investigatores and to teach in such a way that doesn´t make them feel like they´re being torn apart.
I was able to ecercise the restraint I learned from this last night. There was an Evangelical who tried to bible bash us. He did a horrible job of it. Of his three refferences in the bible, he got confused about where two of them were when he tried to find them. I really wanted to give him ten refferences on the spot that would have destroyed everything he was trying to say, but I felt it would be better to hand him a pamphlet, bear my testimony, and walk away. Before we left, Elder Valdez decided to leave him with a verse in the Bible to read. He asked to see the man´s bible to show him the refference in his own book. When he asked to see it, the man agressively said "No! This is my sword! Draw yours! Draw yours! A man should fight with his own sword!" I couldn´t help but think of how ironic this statement was, as he had already proven that his personal knowledge of the Bible was comparable to one of those foam swords you can buy from Dollar-Tree. When I thought of this I also couldn´t help but picture, in my head, him wildly swinging around this foam sword in front of me and my companion while we drew out two really, really, big swords each that said "Stick of Juda" and "Stick of Joseph". It gave me something to laugh about.
Anyhow, that´s all for today, Hop you´re all doing well.
Cuidense!
Elder Adam Russell Rich
