Despair

Haha totally kidding. Everything's good! I made you open this email though, didn't I?


Now that you're here and no longer worried about me, let's talk about this week!


This is Elder Rasolo's last transfer, and by now it is his last week. This makes it feel like something a whole lot bigger than a transfer is coming to an end. I'm not even sure if I'll be in Talavera next week so stay tuned for transfer news!


With our time running out, we've been working really hard! Here are some people highlights:


-Thiago has accepted a Book of Mormon in Portuguese and is reading from it and asking questions. He's still new in Talavera so his schedule is pretty open and we had a few chances to see him this week! We taught him about the Restoration and encouraged him to pray to know if O Livro de Mórmon (Portuguese is strange) is true.


-Wilson is also new here but a lot more busy. He's come to church twice already and attended a branch activity on Saturday morning. We've shown him the Book of Mormon videos and hope that he'll have more time for a full length lesson this week!


-We invited Isaias to be baptized this week and he asked for a few days to think about it. When we followed up with him on Sunday he told us he doesn't feel ready to join the church. This was hard to hear, but it's not hopeless. He's still willing to talk to us, has lots of friends in the branch, and even came to an activity about an hour after this visit. We're thinking hard about how to proceed but we know and love this guy and will just keep loving and teaching him.


Saturday morning we had a branch activity in the park, which was awesome for a lot of reasons. For one, Talavera is actually habitable in the morning when the sun hasn't been out for long and the air is still cool. The park in our area is actually beautiful, it's nice to have a spot full of grass and trees in a crowded pueblo. More importantly, it was just awesome to spend time with the members. We had a pretty great turnout and did a scavenger hunt about the covenant path set up by the Relief Society. We also just got a chance to hang out together and play tug of war and something like dodgeball. I love the Talavera Branch.


To wrap this up with a spiritual thought, I want to talk about the blessing of a modern prophet. President Russel M. Nelson guides this church and his works are counsel for our day. The words of ancient prophets sometimes require some interpretation to apply in our own lives, but prophetic revelation in our day can be applied easily in our day. Our prophet recently gave us 5 concrete suggestions for how to increase our spiritual momentum, or the strength of our testimony and commitment to our Savior, Jesus Christ:
1. Get on the covenant path and stay there 
2. Discover the joy of daily repentance 
3. Learn about God and how He works
4. Seek and expect miracles
5. End conflicts in your personal life.
We often feel a sudden desire to improve some aspect of ourselves or our lives, but it can be tough to know where to begin. These suggestions are concrete starting points for this, and I would challenge each of you to choose one and try to make it the spiritual focus of your week. If you do, you will feel closer to our loving Heavenly Father and discover a tiny piece of the boundless joy He wants to give you.


That's all for this week! 
Elder Curtis 


....


I say "that's all", but of course I have some pictures. It's been tough the last few weeks, I'll try to get more next week.
1. Isaías made us arroz con leche. I think it's called rice pudding in English but that name doesn't sound tasty enough.
2. We tried a lot of kinds of juice this week. Somehow the lemonade we bought as a palate cleanser was the best one.
3. Part of the Talavera Branch at the ward activity in the park


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's Called A Guagua

Image
Buenos días a todos, cerca o lejos, en tierra o mar Another week in Fuerteventura, although strictly speaking we weren't in Fuerteventura all that much, because we had an exchange in Vecindario on the island of Gran Canaria. More details to follow but immediately after that exchange I had to fly to Madrid for a residency appointment and was there for a night. A lot of travel but we got a lot of good stuff done. While we were here we've started meeting with a good chunk of the people we met street contacting, and those who want to meet with us are really fun to get to know and to talk to.  Our first appointment with this guy named Jorge was really cool, he mentioned he was in a park near the center of town and invited us to come join him, and he had his two kids with him as well. It's just awesome to sit down and teach people who want to learn. Running out of time for pday so the rest will be bullet points  Busses are called guaguas here, it's pronounced wawa but luckily...
Read more

I Feel Like This Shouldn't Be Such A Hard Question...

Image
"Que te hace feliz?"  "What makes you happy?" It's a street approach that my comp came up with. The idea is that since God's plan is a plan of happiness, and He doesn't do anything without the ultimate goal being our happiness, the best way to connect conversations to God's plan is to talk about what makes people happy. We tried walking around with a whiteboard the other day, and in general we found that it helps get people talking if nothing else! Some conversations from this week: -Que te hace feliz? -Nothing -... -Que te hace feliz? -Money and a different woman every day -Que te hace feliz? -I'm deaf -*points to whiteboard* -Okay, I'm not deaf. Nothing. -Que te hace feliz? -*points to boyfriend* He's a Muslim... -Great! Que te hace feliz? These are obviously the more extreme examples, but it's pretty sad that so many people wouldn't (or worse, couldn't) answer this question. Something I've learned on my mission is the i...
Read more

Nefi Got Me Trippin

Image
^^ Mildly edited actual text message from someone who just sat down and started reading the Book of Mormon. We love it when people actually do that because surprisingly few people are really willing but everyone who does learns a lot. This week was NUTS. Like I talked about last week, we learned a really cool trick to involve members in missionary work: don't run away to another island like two days after they notice you're at church. We stayed this whole week in Lanzarote and saw miracles. Where do I even start? Amparo, who tried several months ago to get baptized but backed off, is BACK. We had a few great lessons, talked to her son in Miami, and watched her connect with her friends in the ward again. She's taking her time but has baptism as her goal. José passed his baptismal interview! He's all set to get baptized in March. His wife Lely also just got back from the temple for the first time so they're ridiculously happy. We also had time to organize a Family Hom...
Read more