Hurry up and Wait

 

Hello everyone! I´m so happy to have gotten all or your dearelders this Friday! There were a few that were really late... like from may. One from Mitra, Victor, Ben C., Ariel, and Anna. There were also a couple more recent ones from Casey and Anna. Thanks so much. I really love and appreciate you all!

So this week was a lot better, and we finally feel like we´re progressing with the area a little more. We had some good investigators in church finally! One was this lady we visited Friday. We hadn´t gone with her much, but the lesson on Fri was cool. We asked if she had read the Restoration pamphlet, and she had. What´s more, she remembered stuff! haha. Usually they all just say... "yeah, it was interesting, but i didn´t remember anything." She´s seems to have been really well educated, and we think that her kids and her could be super great members of the church! Also, Juan Francisco is walking better now, and came all on his own. One day he will get baptized once he can work on his leg and live on his own. He´s read like all the way to Alma 32 since we gave him the book to read four weeks ago! He reads more than we do... haha. He´s gonna be awesome.

We´re working with a really sweet family that´s already married, Jessica and Wilmur. Love them. They are really interested, and we are going to help them prepare for baptism. They just need to start coming to church, and they´re a go. They really like us, and they are a reference of a lady we recently helped come back to church who went inactive. Mari. She´s so excellent. She´s so excited to be living the gospel again, and helps us a lot! When we call her to come to a teaching appointment with us, she says, "yeah, I´ll go over right now before the appointment to remind them to read and everything." Missionary´s best friend!!!!! Love her.

We have found that this week we are learning something that is hard for two north Americans to learn. Slow down!!! Focus on the investigators and their needs. There´s no substitute. Goals are great, but there´s no number better than baptisms. And no one is going to get baptized if they don´t think you care about them. It´s tough to think that we´re just learning this for real right now, but it´s the truth. Not to say we´ve been stone cold robots, but we just have been so focused on the work and not slowing down to really think in the moment. When you´re with the investigator is the most crucial moment. Some of the best lessons are when you just feel the Spirit and say "okay, we´ve gotta go, thanks for your time." Then they´re just stunned with the Spirit. It´s hard to do that just right, but it´s cool when it happens. They almost always seem more likely to progress after lessons like that.

I love this mission! It´s going by way too fast!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! But I´m not even half way through, so I´m happy. Just keep going, that´s what I´m going to do.

I love and miss you all. I will do my best to stay in contact with all of you. Permit me to send a quick personal note to Victor. I think that the Lord sent me your letter late for a reason. You said some things that I really needed to hear, and I´m glad that I got it when I did. Love you man. You´re awesome!

You´re all awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love,

Elder Thalman

Starting Over

 

So, Elder Andersen and I have started totally over with this area. Almost all of our investigators totally quit on us, so we hit heavy on new investigators through member references and prayer. We pretty much stopped doing tricky things to find new people and started having them introduce us to everyone they know. While that isn´t what a good missionary does with all of his members, it is possible to just ask people, and those with more faith will help. We have one lady who just showed us everybody! We found a family of 5 and another of 10! haha. Her name is Francisca, and we both love her.

 She is a really childlike 60 year old lady who loves the missionaries. She loves leaving with us to introduce us to all of her friends. And she is constantly inviting people to church. We love and greatly appreciate her childlike faith. If the church were composed of members like her, the church would grow at an incredible rate!

Conference was a little stressful because we set it up using internet... kinda nuts. We missed the first session, but after that it all worked out. My comp and i may need to repent for how bad our attitudes were durring this trial. But God teaches with lots of patience, and I know that we will start seeing success here. Listening to priesthood session helped us realize a lot of things that we could change. Forward!

I love and miss you and am grateful for the letters and the package from the Berbert Fam. Also, for the letter form Casey! Loved them all, and I send you my love in advance of whatever slow reply I may send in the future. I have lost a lot of faith in sending hand written letters as I have received no news of a single one reaching anyone. Post as a comment to this post if you have in fact ever gotten anything from me.

with great love and effection,

Elder Thalman

Fruits of Thy Labors

 

So, some really sweet stuff this week! First, we did not have a change!!! I´ve got six more weeks with Elder Anderson!!! We´re gonna tear it up! I´m super happy about it.

We have been working super well, but unfortunately we don´t have investigators coming to church...

Well, we had three, but we´re used to having like 12 or 14. But the members are finally coming again. I ended up giving a talk on Sunday, which was fun. Our last fam, Jaun and Maria didn´t come to church... and we can´t find their new house. Agh!!! But we´ll figure it out and I´ll keep you all updated.

On Friday I had a really cool experience. Melissa, the girl who got baptized that first Saturday after I left Nuevo San Juan called me! She doesn´t understand that that´s against the rules. So now she knows, but we got to talk for just a few minutes. She said, "they called me as a missionary!" I was like... I don´t think so.  She´s been a member for six weeks and is only 16 years old.  She´s a branch missionary!! haha. and she leaves (I think he means goes) with the sister missionaries out there all the time now. She already sounds like a missionary.  She said, "We´ve already had two baptisms this month!" haha. Nicol, whom we were working with forever finally got baptized!  Then she said she got a friend of hers from school going to church, and he joined!!! I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. A few people I think thought that she was only a flirt bc of the missionaries, but now both missionaries are gone and she´s helping the work progress in that area! 

 

Another really cool experience was on Saturday... the whole branch found out that it was my birthday,  and if you don´t know Central American culture, birthdays are a really big deal.  They threw me a surprise birthday party! haha. they smashed eggs filled with confeti on my head and gave me cake and pizza. It was a really sweet experience. I love them all so much, and I´m so glad that I´ll have more time in this area. It´s pretty much for sure now that because we didn´t get changed, that I will have at least 4.5 months here in the end.  Who knows. maybe six! But let´s not push my luck. haha.

And our zone leaders didn´t get changed, so that pretty much means for sure that I will have Elder Polendo as my zone leader for three transfers! I love that guy (my trainer for those who have forgotten).

Love and miss you all! Keep me updated!

Elder Kent Thalman