Dear Family,
Okay, real quick, if you haven't already packed up my stuff, I need a pair of jeans! I have those 32x34 aero slim jeans that I would like, seeing as the jeans that I brought have a big ole hole right in a bad spot for a hole, and I'm hoping it's cheaper to send jeans than to buy them? Let me know!
And I did get the asmonex, thank you!!
Also, I got the valentine's package last week, but some of the dots were missing on the note that I was supposed to put together....so I didn't get much past "happy valentines day" haha...what did it say?!
Let's start with the exciting news today! Obdeli called us yesterday after church and was like "Elders, can I get baptized next Sunday?" So WE'RE FLIPPING HAVING A BAPTISM ON THIS COMING SUNDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! AT LAST, AT LONG LONG LAST!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I'M SO FLIPPING STOKED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Keep him in your prayers, and expect pictures next week.
This week has been alot better. I've tried to open up and be myself more, and we've worked hard, and E Diaz and I are getting along alot better. I think this will be one of my hardest companionships in my mission, but I think I can endure these next 5 weeks. (whew!)
One thing that really helped me was that last wednesday, I took some study time, went into my room, really studied my patriarchal blessing and prayed for help. That really helped me feel like I can do it, and that God has my back. And that's when things started to get better!
It's been hard to teach alot of lessons this week, no one has been home!! The weather has been really weird too!! The beginning of last week was snowy, the middle was sunny, friday it poured one of the hardest rainstorms I've ever seen, and saturday and sunday felt like april/may! But we have had a really hard time finding people to teach.
One thing we have been doing is a lot of contacting. As a district we're doing these "verse to converts" where we share a B.O.M. scripture when we contact someone on the street, and it's been really cool!! We havent' been able to get any new investigators yet, but it's still been fun! The funniest is when we accidently contact drunk guys who just wanna argue ;) we committed one to baptism right on the spot, he was knocked out haha ;)
On friday we went down to the doctor with E Maughan down in Newark, the heart of the hood. Everything went well, the doctor prescribed me for some medicine for the swollen lymph nodes, should be back to normal by this weekend. He also shared some really good scriptures in the bible about the great apostasy. 2 timothy 3:1-5 and 2 timothy 4:3-4. I will definitely be using those in the future! After the doctor, E Maughan took us to this place called Elm Street BBQ, which was sooooooo goood!!!! It's like this brazilian bbq place, some of the best food I've ever had!! Traffic on the way home was really bad too, so we only got one lesson with Hno Acuna that day :/
I had my first true Bible Bashing experience on Saturday. We received a referral from the sisters named Alejandro. So we knocked on his door, and after a few minutes of talking at his door, he reluctantly let us in. He acted really schizophrenic or paranoid to me haha! But we sat down and started a how to begin teaching and tried to get to know his religious background a little bit. Right off the bat, he started throwing at us that there is only one god, Jesus Christ, and that he is everything and the only one. So we pulled out several Bible scriptures about how the godhead is three separate beings, and he still argued with us. His argument was that in the Bible, it's Jesus that says "who will go down to die for all mankind" and then he tells us he picks someone, but decides to come down himself and calls himself "the son". Which makes absolutely no sense because as one pioneer convert said, "I knew the church was true because I had read the Bible." So therefore, we are right. ;) He told us he'd study up and we'd better study up, and he's expecting us to be back at his house right after Obdeli's baptism on sunday haha!
I'm still a little bit frustrated with our branch mission leader though. He's really passionate about the work, which is good. But he can't see the good in any of the members, and seemingly, nothing is changing at all. The Maughans and the sisters are also feeling the same, so hopefully we can work to make everything function! I really do like the guy, he's a powerful teamup and a great member, he just focuses too much on the negative of the members....
On a side note for the week, I invented a sandwich this week. Grill up a little bit of pineapple, toast two pieces of bread, cook up some rice, put it all together with BBQ sauce, and you get deliciousness. (Weird combination…but hey, the idea has merit……maybe we'll try it for dinner).
Other than that, not much to report this week! We are stoked for Obdeli's baptism and praying that everything goes well for it!! Good luck with everything at home and the move, you guys are always in my prayers!! Love you all!!!
Love,
Elder Tanner Nelson
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