Hey there everyone!!
Thank you for all your loving letters!! Grandma, I heard about your illness last week. I am worried about you and hope you are getting better :) Braxley, I am impressed that you can do a smiley face now :) :) I can wink though ;) haha =) or a heart <3 haha!! Keep it up in b-ball and don't get down. Kolby, that is awesome that you won the game for your team way to go!! Brinkley, where did you go, haha? Thanks for all the sports updates Kasey. I love them :) How's your scripture reading going? You studying Preach my Gospel?
So to answer your questions. Our house is very nice I think especially compared to the houses we have been in. There is no heat in our house, only for the shower thank goodness!! You are right grandma about the tv thing. Alot of people dont have running water, so sometimes when we ask if we could use the restroom you see their stuff from the day in the toilet still :( Kinda gross. Everyone does have a tv though and they treasure it, lol. My area has about 600 people who live in it all spread out! We can only work in about 2 sometimes a 3rd town in our area because our area is huge and it's too expensive to take a bus to the other towns in our area. We really need bikes. I did give my tie to Elder Christofferson, but we traded so I have one of his :) I also traded a tie with Elder Ferrell and gave him another one since its his uncles business, haha. Those last pictures are of my district and zone at our last temple walk at the MTC...wow I miss that place so much right now and all the friends too! I do wear my shower sandals but I still have athletes foot. That town we did our shopping in is about an hour away from us but I dont know if it is in our area? I think I got all the questions answered right? If not let me know.
So this week was not successful at all!! Tuesday was not so great. All of our appointments fell through and so we spent the morning and afternoon trying to receive referrals from members, but no success. Same with service...no success. So we took a cumbi (small crowded van) to Dolores. A town in our area about 15 minute drive away. We have an investigator there named Lorena. Her husband Pedro is a fabulous faithful member who has served a mission. They are soooooooo poor. They live in a one room hut and have no stove, shower, or toilet. They cook over the fire like camping. Pedro spends alot of the money he makes in the week just to take a bus to church EACH Sunday. Sometimes when he can't afford it, he will walk the hour walk to get to church. I pray the Lord blesses him with whatever he needs in this life or with treasures and mansions in the next. He is a great man and he always puts a smile on my face. Anyways we taught Lorena, and how when we live the gospel our families will be blessed. She was receptive and we gave her a Book of Mormon :) That evening I taught Luis Daniel the piano. We have lessons twice a week :)
Wednesday we had our district meeting so we traveled to Puebla. After the meeting we had divisions so I went with Elder Nielson in his area, while Elder Villalba went with his comp Elder Borrego. I thought it would be fun with Elder Nielson since he is an American, but all he talked about was cars. haha. He loves his cars. Anyways after we ate with a member we switched and I was with Elder Borrego from Sorona, Mexico. Apparently he has had some bad experiences with American Elders so he doesn't like Americans. Hahaha, that was fun to walk and not talk the whole time, lol. Anyways at 6:00 Elder Villalba and I traveled back to Puebla and that night we taught the mother of Fernando. She is the only one in her family not a member. As we taught, the father who is a member, started going off about something that I didn't understand. I felt impressed by the Spirit though to share two scriptures and testify about them. Ether 12:6 and Mosiah 2:41. I don't know if they helped but I did it.
Thursday and Friday we worked with Luis Daniel, the young man I am teaching the piano. He is 18 and is wanting to serve a mission so he worked with us. Absolutely no success. We even knocked on doors which we never do because it doesn't work here all that well. That shows you how deperate we were.
Saturday morning we knocked on doors again because we had no appts set up. We got two people for appts!! One is tomorrow and the other is tonight at 6pm! The one tonight is a family, sweet family :) The dad took the lessons 10 years ago when the area was open and still has the Book of Mormon today!! He never got baptized for reasons I dont know. I hope we have success with him :) That afternoon we visited Luis Daniel and asked if he would help us out with our activity for the night. He agreed but he started crying. Elder Villalba talked to him and I tried listening but didnt really understand. I found out that his girlfirend broke up with him because he has been trying to share the gospel with her. Also he misses his dad who has lived in New York for the past 7 years for better work for his family. I couldn't do much because I didn't understand, but after Elder Villalba talked to him again the Spirit urged me to tell him to go into his room by himself and read D&C 121:1-9. He did so and came back feeling much better. That night the activity was awesome and he shared that experience with the members and testified that us missionaries are here for a reason and the members need to help us with the work! He is going to be a great missionary!! I hope the activity was a success. I felt it was. I hope the members see their value in the work. The work progresses faster with the members. More people are baptized and stay active. Our calling is to teach, teach, and teach. The members calling is to find, find, find. This is how missionary work should work!!
Sunday was great too! Bertha came and received the Holy Ghost. We had Branch Conference and that was great too :) I also taught Fernando English :)
So anyways, I hope for better success this week! Especially with the people. This week I have had to put up with alot of trash about being from the US, especially Arizona. Also for not knowing the language, including members of the Branch. The language is getting better. I can understand more but not really talk much more, hahahaha. I having been feeling alright though. I got way home sick on Friday but things are fine and I am trying to move forward. I am almost finished reading Our Search for Happiness by Elder Ballard. Great book!! I reccommend you guys read it! Especially Grandma! :)
I love and miss you all!! I cant wait to hear from you!!
Love,
Elder Brady Lester
Puebla Time
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