Letter 90

April 8, 2013

Hello Everyone!

Well the reason for me not writing on Monday last week was because.... The library wasn’t open for some reason! I know it sounds better as an April Fools joke but alas.... I didn’t do ANYTHING for April Fools. Next year will be different though so watch out.

It sounds like everything in Utah is great. Mom and Dad working and hanging out with the Browns, Madi stressing about crazy homework assignments, and to top it all off Austin busted a hole in Chases pants. (Just to clarify…Austin was wearing Chase’s pants). I'm so happy to hear that though I've been gone for almost 2 years, some things never change :)

General Conference was really amazing! I have been looking forward to it for the past... 6 MONTHS! I can't believe how much I took it for granted when I was home. To think, we have living prophets and apostles of God that receive direct revelation from our Heavenly Father to lead and guide us, His children! Why in the world would we not listen?! On the way to the church to watch conference we passed by a Catholic church and saw a group of people walking from the parking lot full of cars and I pretended to yell out the window,"There's a living prophet speaking down the street!!" The message that we share is so important and there are SO many of our brothers and sisters who are none the wiser. I can't help to think of the parable told by the Savior "Can the blind lead the blind? shall they not both fall into the ditch?" We must help those around us to understand this message and be lead by those that truly see.

Unfortunately Elder Hobbs and I weren’t able to bring any of our investigators to conference! UGH.... we did all that we could but to no avail.

We were able to find a family of 3 this week, Josefina and her 2 kids. She investigated the church a while ago and was about to get baptized, but her machismo husband wouldn’t let her. Eventually she and her husband got divorced, but she ended up just going to a Christian church. We had our first lesson with her scheduled on Tuesday, but we ran late and missed the appointment. We saw her again on Wednesday but couldn’t come in because we didn’t have a man with us so we set the appointment for Thursday. When we went by on Thursday we weren’t able to find a male member to come with us again but we knocked anyway and figured we could sit outside and have a lesson. She didn’t answer the first few times we knocked, but after about the 3rd or 4th try she came to the door with tears in her eyes. We asked her what was wrong but she wouldn’t tell us. I asked her "Why do you think that God has sent us here right now?" she thought about it but didn’t answer. We set up one last appointment with her for the next day and promised we would bring someone. The next day we were able to get a male member of the spanish ward to come with us and we went inside and taught her. During the first part of the lesson Josefina told us that she has been having a hard time being a single parent and that sometimes it gets to her. She then said that when I asked her why God had sent us there she was touched and knew that He had indeed sent us. She said, "If they come back with someone so they can come in I will listen them. But if they don’t have anyone I won’t open the door." Never in my mission have I been so grateful for a member present! We were able to teach her and set BDs for her and her 13 yr old son and 10 yr old daughter. They didn’t come to church this week, but gosh darn they WILL be there next week if I’ve got anything to say about it.

We were also able to set a BD with our investigator Pat. She is a miracle that we found just talking to everyone, but she is having trouble committing. She is willing to meet with us but is just a little bit flakey. She had to work this weekend suddenly and so wasn’t able to come to conference... She would have loved President Uchtdorf's talk on dwelling in the light too...

Well I've blabbered on enough I think. I love you all so much and I love being a missionary. There is nothing in this world that I would rather do. I thank my Heavenly Father for this great opportunity to grow and get to know myself and Him better than I ever thought I would. I love you and hope you have a great week! Keep bustin’ those moves Austin! Try not to bust the pants....

-Elder Jordan Stewart