October 11, 2010
Hey family:Well Im glad everthing is going well for you at home. It sounds likeAdam and Alex are dominating at soccer this year, and when I get backand play them it will be pretty interesting. :) Im glad that the newward is going to be pretty good, and Im definitely excited to not bethe tallest person in the ward like I am here, and if it wasn`t for mycompanion and one other person in the ward I would be the tallest byfar... Don`t know if Ive mentioned this, but Elder Kasat is actuallypretty tall. He is 1.86 meters tall and I am 2.07 meters tall. Imnot sure what that converts to in feet and inches for Elder Kasat, butI would guess that he is around 6 feet tall. Needless to say, I amthe only person taller than my companion and Im quite a bit tallerthan he is. Shame on Utah State, for losing again, but its prettycool that BYU finally won again and Im glad Utah is doing well. Atleast they can represent our Utah schools.Well this week in the mission was interesting. We didn`t have asingle day that we proselyted in the morning which was a littlefrustrating for me, but it was still a good experience. Monday wasour Reunion de Zona. Which is pretty cool to have because it gives usan opportunity to learn from other missionaries in the Zone everyweek. Tuesday we had our District meeting because Wednesday we had amultizone conference. President Tyler and Hermana Tyler talked aswell as the assistants to the President. One of the Assistants, ElderWeber, talked about the suffering of Jesus Christ during theatonement, and then he focused on the pain that our Heavenly Fathermust have gone through to watch His Only Begotten Son suffer. It´ssomething I had never really thought about before. But when I thoughtabout it, I realized that it must have been terrible. Elder Weberreferenced it with a video of a man who works for a train company whohas one son. His son is fascinated with trains and loves going towork with him. One day he is working at a spot with a bridge thatraises and lowers for trains and boats and lifts up the tracks when heshouldn`t have. Afterwards his son notices and tries to fix theproblem, but falls into a spot where he will be killed if the tracksare lowered. A train is coming and the man has a terrible choice tomake. Save his son and in turn let the train crash into the water, orsave a train full of total strangers and allow his only son to die...The man makes the sacrifice of his son and saves the lives of thepeople on the train. I cannot imagine having to make a decision likethat. I can`t imagine doing that in a situation with any of ourfamily members. I think I would rather sacrifice myself thansacrifice the important people in my life. Two scriptures that I haveloved my whole life, John 15:13 and John 3:6-17 talk about this. Inthe past I have thought that I understood these scriptures, but Irealized I have absolutely no understanding of these scriptures.These scriptures show the perfect love of our Savior and His Fatherthat I cannot begin to understand. However it is important for me totry to have this love for others in my life and show it in my mission.Friday we had interviews with the mission president. We have theseevery two changes, and while the other missionaries in the Zone are inthe interviews with have a training with the assistants to thePresident. Elder Asqui talked about the importance of our personalstudy and our scripture study. Elder Weber talked about the GreatApostacy. I learned a ton from both. I also learned that I may havean ingrown toenail so I get to go see the doctor later today.This weekend was general conference for us because of the eleccions. Iactually learned a ton from conference even though it was a littlehard for me to understand it. The spirit was so strong. and Ilearned a ton. I took 20 pages of notes from conference 100% inSpanish and gained a bunch I could use with investigadores. I knowthat I probably didn`t understand completely the meaning of all thetalks, especially after reading what Jantzen got out of Dallin H. Oakstalk and seeing what I wrote, and they are completely different, but Idefinitely think that I can learn from these talks. One thing that Ireceived personally for me was the understanding that I can keep thespanish after my mission. D. Todd Christofferson and Neil L. Andersonboth translated their own talks. It made it a little differentbecause they were past recording so they ended at a different timethan the actual talks, but I learned that if I try after my mission Iwill be able to stay fluent in Spanish.Our investigators this week were a little bitter-sweet. We are oneweek closer to the baptisms of Josè and David, and these are still setin the plans. After conference we also had the opportunity to visit areferral of a member whose name is Milagros. She has an incrediblyopen heart and has so much love for God and for learning about God.Im actually glad that she is open to our message, because Im prettysure if she had wanted to argue with us about topics in the Bible andhad presented us with hard questions from the bible I may not have hadanswers. Her knowledge of the Bible was incredible, and when I usedscriptures by the time I finished she was quoting most of them . Sheis catholic but has some doubts about catholics especially Priests inthe catholic church so it makes her more open,especially when shefound out we agreed with her doubts. We also talked to Carmen who isthe only person in her family that is not a member and she accepted abaptism date for November 6th which is great.The sad things were that Leidy has quit progressing. She has beenavoiding our questions about baptism and won`t let us know what herconcerns are. She also didn`t come to conference this weekend. Wealso only had 1 of our 6 to 8 investigators who said they would attendconference actually attend. This includes both Josè and Carmen, whichis making things a little difficult for us.I hope everything continues to go well for you at home this week, andI hope that the new ward turns out to be great. I love you all.Jesus Christ and our Heavenly Father love you. The Book of Mormon isTrue. The church is true.TRUTH WILL PREVAIL! We are all called to serve in this great work.Keep moving forward. Keep pushing on. Life is great, so smile andenjoy it. Tyler