Hello once again to all of my family and friends out there! I sure do love you guys, and I hope that you’re all doing well! I am doing just great down here around the Equator.
First things first, we received the changes last night. Transfers are this Wednesday. The new catch is that they are going to do the changes differently now. The only thing I know is that I am going to be staying in Guaimaca to finish the mission! Woo hoo! Elder Torres is leaving, but he doesn’t know to where, and I don’t know who my final companion is going to be either. But I am really happy that I get to finish the mission in Guaimaca. That is exactly what I wanted.
Well, this week was Holy Week......things were a little bit slow. Holy Week in Honduras is basically Spring Break over there in the States. Everyone goes on vacation, or leaves to the beaches to go tanning and swimming during the week. There were several reasons why the work was a little bit slow this week:
1. Real Madrid played against Barcelona twice this week, which is a HUGE deal here in Central America (dad you understand). So, that day, nobody wanted to receive us due to the super bowl type game. (Real Madrid won! Boo Yah!)
2. The electricity went out like 3 times this week! So, after 6:30 you can’t see anything! So we have to just stay home and do nothing, pretty boring.
3. During Holy Week, there are a lot of Catholic processions. In the processions, the devoted go out and make like 20 sand carpets in the middle of the road, and they serve kind of like stations for the Crucifixion program to go around all of the city and do their whole show. I won’t lie, it was pretty cool, the Catholics have some cool traditions around here in Guaimaca.
On top of that, we got a phone call in the middle of a lesson that one of the missionaries had been rushed to the Medical Center in Tegucigalpa to be operated on for Appendicitis. So, we had to make a bunch of phone calls to make sure that he was okay, how to arrange the trio for his companion, etc. But, when he arrived at the hospital and after a couple of exams, it turned out to be a false alarm, so everything is good there. They didn’t operate on him.
About Josè Carlos and Paola, everything is going just fine. The progress is a little bit slow. Let’s just say it’s going to be a little bit difficult to get them out of a couple of habits, but we have hope. We are going to keep working hard with Josè Carlos. The one time we were able to visit him in his house, he had a ton of questions for us. The problem is, the supposed “friends” that he was going to give us as references, turns out that they are just pastors that have been bugging him a lot lately with anti-Mormon stuff, and so that was why he had so many questions. But as far as we know, everything is still going great. Tonight we have a family home evening with them!
On Saturday, we held a Priesthood Grilling Activity at the church. The objective of the activity was to invite a ton of less actives, and specifically, adults or teens that have been baptized, but haven’t had the opportunity to receive the priesthood yet. So, what we did is huddle them all up and offer them food and sports! (It works with every guy doesn’t it?) A bunch of people came, and we slyfully slipped a bunch of the guys in for interviews with the Branch President! It turned out to be a great success. Carlos, El Chino, who we recently baptized, got his interview and is now a Teacher, AND he is attending seminary. YES!
On Sunday, I gave a talk in church about Home Teaching. In Honduras, Home Teaching is basically non-existent. But, in Guaimaca, we are making a breakthrough on how to make it work. The branch president asked me to speak about it, and I sure received a nice admonishing from the Spirit that I need to be a GREAT home teacher when I get back. Thanks for the good example dad! By the way, to all those who read this....GO and do your visits for Home and Visiting Teaching!
Also on Sunday, the Reyes Family gave us a reference and went with us to the house of a family member. It was touching to hear the testimony of someone that you were able to teach, it’s one of my favorite parts of missionary work. The Hna. Miriam gave her testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, and how she came to know that it was true. It strengthened my own testimony as well.
Thanks so much for all of your support for me. Take care everyone. I love you all!
Vaya Pues!
Elder Tinkham
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