I am glad everything is going well and everyone is close to perfect health! Please remain as such and be gooooooood! Glad to hear you always help out with other people and dont worry too much about my karma here it will probably be just fine. Very nice picture of the snow and sunrise at the house, very beautiful! Im sorry the winter is upon you and that I still live in paradise haha. About me sending pictures, our closest internet center is kind of stinky and doesnt have any ports on the machines at all. Um, as much time as I always think I have it runs out really quickly and I havent really done any experimenting with the camera to do much with it yet. I will try really hard the next time to do something about sending pictures with formatting or something like that. The pictures arent overly interesting haha. There isnt any fancy buildings to see here. But I will send something eventually. The Dear Elder letters came pretty quickly I think. I think one week is all it takes for them to be sent but sometimes the trouble is on this end of things where I dont always see leaders to give me my mail and such. But really the DearElder things come pretty fast. Hardcopy not so much.
So this week. Well, we taught stuff. Obviously. And now our house is REALLY FULL OF PEOPLE. The Elders from the adjoining area had to move to our house since theirs was not secure and had thieves in it four times previously. 6 Elders in a 4 man house. Wow. We lost a day of proselyting to move them and a lot of stuff. But we did see all our friends the office elders and had a good time anyway. Our house is very new right now full of greenies and such. So there is a lot of English speaking. haha. One new Elder has a wonderful Utah accent in spanish it sounds super funny. Apparently a Canadian from Quebec or Toronto is in the mission now too.
We had an intercambio (splits) with the zone leaders and it was interesting to learn a lot of things about teaching, and to hear good things from the zone leaders about some of our investigators. One reference we have been teaching for a little while, a 16 year old girl, is progressing amazingly and will DEFINITELY be baptized in november here unless she suddenly decides she doesnt want to follow her faith anymore. We have a pool of 5 people who are progressing rapidly and only need to come to church and comply with their commitments to obey the commandments. We are so close yet so far haha. The zone leader commented on them very nicely, but said I definitely need to take control of lessons with our older people who TALK so MUCH. Cant let them say anything about their life story. Or you sit for another half hour. Oh well. Our progressing investigators make me really happy each day, other than when they dont come to church. Everyone must go through the trial of the faith, and I am seeing that right now with everyone. But in truth, many of our investigators are bakanisimo and super cool and I really want to see them grow in this gospel. It is amazing to see the change it makes in them, how nothing but a few prayers, some scriptures, a hymn and a couple of good friends in the church makes a person go from just living their life into something entirely new. Its something I really want them to understand. That I used to coast around like they had been, but now is the time to do something different. They really see that now. We really commit them differently, especially after learning from the zone leaders. We are really super direct that they need to commit to God to follow Him. I hope they really find the faith to do so.
Teaching is more comfortable now. I make more jokes and such with the investigators about things. Like sitting in church and how the air conditioning rocks but maybe they should bring a jacket since its kind of like Canada. Or somebody said once Im like a child because I always look out the window when the loud music car things drive by even if Im talking and I say that I am a child in the mission still. I joke a lot about being ¨chino¨. Apparently it is a super funny thing. Ive had some kids do this weird spinning motion when they call me chino and try some sort of kung fu and karate haha. I also can talk with members and others and chat about things. Talked with this one Dominican elder about surfing and how there are surfing beaches here and cheap equipment too haha. So we are having a surfing activity for the church sometime (kidding). We watched the restoration movie about joseph smith in the church with a bunch of our investigators with popcorn and juice (awesome). Super good movie. Despite the fairly annoying children running around and screaming. I still cried in the movie (gets me every time).
We had this strange surprise in church. We left a note with an investigator we were preparing to drop since we could never find him for some time and he never came to church. So we left a note telling him to come to church. And... he did. No one does that. But he did. He also sat with this guy who lives across from him in his apartment complex who happens to be a member who just moved in and now they are friends and this guy could be a progressing investigator soon. WOW.
Really shared a lot about the book of mormon in recent lessons and the power of the book. That all people need to do is find that spirit in its pages and then all of a sudden things are going to be different. Its amazing how our younger people are just so willing to do so. Amazing things are starting to happen. Albeit slowly and not perfectly. But it is happening. I am super glad that we have members around when we teach the law of chastity. Or it could just be super awkward. And since we have a ton of returned missionaries in the ward, they know how to help us really well.
Speaking of good times, our house is a total party with 6 people in it. We eat together all the time and do lots of strange things. Like Elder Diaz fed me an oreo with shaving cream in the middle. Charlatan. And the amount of BYU stories just rocketed in the house with the new people. The bathroom gets really dirty now. Basically disgusting. Also lots of running around. And dirty dishes. It takes forever to wash the dishes now.
Anyway, I hope everything is going well still. Always remember I love you all. Something I have learned about teaching and helping people in the gospel is this. That people need to understand something that even I didnt understand before the mission. That no sacrifice is too great for the Lord. Because he already has all the things we could possibly give. But he is still missing one thing. He is missin our hearts. We have to give him our heart if we want to have given him anything. There will always be excuses. Every day a new one. But in the end, shall we not go on in so great a cause? What could possibly matter more than salvation for all? What are we not willing to give, and why could that possibly even be important?
Well, enough of my musings.
Have a wonderful week,
Con todo mi amor,
Elder Sullivan
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