August 29, 2011

Hello everyone!!!

This week was a good week. It started out with one of the craziest lessons I have taught on my mission. We had a lesson planned for Monday night with our investigator Elaene who is from Brazil. When we teach her we have to go slower because English is not her native language so we usually bring a Portuguese speaking member with us when we teach her. We also have a rule that we need another male present with us if we are teaching a female. So on Monday night the member didn't show up and we tried calling him but no answer, so we were a bit disappointed and made our way to her place to cancel the lesson and reschedule for another day. But it just so happens she had her male friend there named Alijandro (he is from Panama and speaks Spanish) was there. He said he would like to listen so we walked in to teach Elaene and Alijandro, but then her other roommate walked in who is also from Brazil, named Monique, she said she wanted to listen as well. They all have different backgrounds of religion and the English barrier made it crazy to teach all three at once and address each one's concerns. So we got to the portion where we wanted to watch a DVD about the Restoration and we had it play in Portuguese and had Spanish subtitles on for Alijandro. Then halfway into the video their other roommate who is from Saudi Arabia walked in and joined us as well haha. It was a good lesson but boy let me tell ya, it was a tough one, to make sure they all understood at their own level. Anyway, I also had a funny moment this week. We walked into an apartment complex that is gated and locked, after being here for so long I have found which gates are always open and which ones we can easily get in to. We got in and this man I have talked to before (a very rude man) was walking down the path toward us heading toward the pool, with a microwaveable bowl of lasagna in his hand, so I smiled and asked him how he was doing and he said "Do you have a certificate to come in here every stinkin' single day!? Do you have the right to solicit people like this and harass everyone in here!?.....I just smiled and said "Well sir, we have been called by a prophet of God to share this Gospel with the world. However, we do have a certificate that is signed by the Prophet of God that gives us permission to share our message with everyone." He got a little flustered and then angrily said "Try the civic center!!" and then madly shoved a piece of lasagna in his mouth and walked off, so I said "Well, have a good day sir!". There have been a lot of people on my mission that do that sort of thing and it doesn't even bother me anymore, I just smile and love them. We have still been hitting the pavement and tracting all day long, we are on the search for new investigators. I love this work! I love you all and hope everything is going well!! Write me!! Until next week!