Hello once again to all of my family and friends out there. I’m super jealous to hear about the snow that you’ve been having back at home. How I miss the snow....sigh. I think the only thing worth missing out on the snow is serving the Lord!
This week has been somewhat melancholy for Elder Ortiz and I. The bad news is that Hna. Miriam moved out of her house this week. The owners of the house kicked her out because she hasn’t been able to pay the rent on the house due to her unemployment. She asked for more time because she didn’t want to leave and she has been diligently looking for a job, but hasn’t had any luck yet. We were really sad to see her go, but we helped her pack up her things, and we even gave her a couple of references of work that I hope works out for her. She told us that as soon as she finds work she is planning on coming back, because she likes the neighborhood she was living in. So....sad moment for us, but we have hope that soon she will return.
Due to the moving of Hna. Miriam, we have been kinda hung out to dry with respect to investigators. We got left with basically nothing, so Elder Ortiz and I got back into our contacting routine from the start of last transfer. This time it worked out a lot better for us, and we were able to find 10 new investigators this week (and 2 families out of those 10)! One of our new investigators is named Iris, and she is a small person. She is 30 something and about 3 foot nothin! She is a really nice lady who lives with her sister and brother-in-law. We were only able to talk to her for a brief amount of time, but we hope to return soon. We also have a new family, a young couple named Seili and Antonio. They are 20 and 21, and seem very young to be starting their own family, but I’m not one to judge them. Antonio seemed to be one of those sports freak religion stinks type of guys, but he actually turned out to be pretty positive and had a lot of questions for us. We taught about the Book of Mormon and left a copy of it for them to read.
This week Elder Ortiz and I decided to focus all of our work around the Book of Mormon. In basically all of the lessons we taught this week, we decided to talk only about the Book of Mormon at first, and then leave a copy with everyone we talk to. Before we didn’t have that luxury because there has been a shortage of BOM’s in the mission for a long time, but now they are abundant and so were taking advantage of it. The Book of Mormon truly is the key to our religion. And so if the BOM is the key to our religion, and baptism is the key to the Celestial Kingdom, those are the 2 things that we need to most be talking about. It has been a great success so far.
This week I had the awesome opportunity to go on interchanges with the Assistants to the President. I worked with Elder Thompson, a great friend of mine from my MTC district, in his area. The area of the Assistants is pretty rough since they have very little time to actually work in it due to the extreme amount of office work to do, and so Elder Thompson and I spent most of the night contacting. We decided to let ourselves be guided by the Spirit. Well...we got to talking and lost ourselves in conversation while walking down the road. As we were walking forward, my legs strangely decided to turn. I told Elder Thompson I didn’t know why I was turning, but I think we need to talk to the next person we see. At that moment a lady walked out of her house and started down the street. We approached her and began to contact. It was a wonderful contact, and I felt the Spirit very strong while we spoke with her. We set an appointment for another day, and today Elder Thompson told me that they were able to teach her and her husband, and that it was very successful. It was a small miracle that I definitely will never forget.
This week we held a special Zone meeting in order to welcome the new elders and sisters into the district. We let the district leaders teach most of the principles in the meeting, and just decided to take a little bit of time at the end to talk about the Law of Consecration. We watched a short film called Treasure in Heaven (I strongly recommend it) about the life of John Tanner. We then explained to the Elders about the Law of Consecration and how we really are living it as missionaries, as long as we are doing everything we can in order to complete our purpose. I invite each of you to see that wonderful movie.
On Wednesday the Stake President of our assigned stake (Comayaguela Stake) invited all of the missionaries in the zone to go and eat lunch at his house. His wife made us a lovely lunch and even served us apple pie as a dessert! Our stake president is a really humble guy, and he shared with us several uplifting stories of his life. He explained his expectations for us as missionaries, and solicited his help in whatever we needed. It was a very pleasant lunch.
I have a strong testimony of missionary work. I know that it’s the Lords work and that He is our director. He guides us every day, because he has a great work and glory to complete. I love each and every one of you, and hope that you are keeping safe.
Vaya Pues!
Elder Tinkham
Posts
