Louis Armstrong

Elder Ficklin and I are really good neighbors.  We´re teaching almost all of the people who live near us!  :)  

 This Friday, we found a couple that is really young, but the wife is pregnant.  The husband said that he was already baptized in another church.  We taught the restoration focusing on authority, and at the end, he accepted baptism!  I was surprised, because it would appear that the whole restoration of priesthood authority actually made sense to him.  

 That´s not really normal here, so this guy is pretty smart.  They are also really easy to keep track of because they live right next door.  haha.

 We had our Musical Fireside on Wednesday and Sat.  Elder Adrian Ochoa was there on Wed with our mission president, and it was super cool.  The big problem was that I had two solos, and I was really sick on Wednesday.  

 Ugh.... I had a really bad throat, sounded like a frog.  Yikes.  But in the end, I think that it just came out sounding like Luis Armstrong.  haha.  But with a little more soul of course.  

 Thursday we had a zone conference with Elder Ochoa, and it was great.    In the leadership meeting afterwards, he said that missionaries wouldn´t get sick if they were working hard enough, so I felt super bad... cuz he knew i was really sick.  haha.  I´m trying my best, I promise!  But now I´m healthy, and we´re getting things going again.  I love being healthy!  I love being a missionary!

I think that of all the things, I learned a powerful leadership principle.  Some zone leaders were asking, how do we best influence the whole zone, because sometimes we just can´t focus on every single one?  He explained some things, and I felt like it hit me.  

You focus on the leadership.  that´s how you make lasting change.  

Focus on the district leaders, so that they can help the rest.

 Focus on working hard with your Bishop and ward mission leader, and they´ll do the rest.  That´s the real change.  Those are the guys that keep the work going forward after you leave.

 So that´s what we started doing, and yesterday we had a meeting with the ward mission leader and the auxiliary leaders.  then we went with him to the bishop´s house and proposed some ideas.  

He seems a lot more unified with us now, and I think that that´s going to make all the difference.  Now we have to teach it to the missionaries, so that the zone gets going in the same direction.  The mission plans haven´t been taking off because of the lack of unity between them and the bishops and ward mission leaders.

So, that´s that.  Just learning the basics still... you´d think that´d I´d have that down before now right?  

I love every single one of you who read this!

Elder Thalman