11-24-14

Hello Everybody!!

So Elder Moolenbeek hasn’t updated me on Daylon, well see if he does this week. And no I cannot believe its Thanksgiving already. I feel like if spent this year in the Millennium Falcon in hyper drive. It feels like it was Christmas a few months ago, not even kidding. And it’s only a month away now already.
That’s awesome that Jeffery found a truck, good for him. I hope I can find a small work truck when I get back, but if I have to I will drive the good ol' Cougar. Hopefully Walter is taking care of it and it’s not giving him any problems, that thing is a bucket, haha.  Mom, that’s actually my plan. I’ve been thinking about it a lot lately. Either Idaho or a small school in Utah, possibly UVU. And I plan to just take that first semester working when I get back. If Jeffery would come with me that would be freaking awesome! And I actually want to take a trip back here as soon as I can with Jeffery and Walter when I get back, probably just road trip it to catch up after being gone for two years. Thank you for the package! I got it last week, getting my journal back made my week.
This week we have been super busy with investigator lessons. We taught Blake, Demetrio, Nick, and Miguel. And we actually picked up two new ones! Ryan and Rudy.
Blake is a stud, he has been keeping his commitments with reading and praying. And when we ask him about it he tells us all about how he feels the spirit when he reads and that he has a great feeling whenever he is at church. We only have to teach him a few more things and he will be ready for the 6th. You can see the light of the gospel in this kids eyes
Demetrio has gotten a little tricky. He doesn’t seem to really be grasping what we’re teaching him and we can tell that he hasn’t really had a spiritual witness that baptism is something that is absolutely essential for our salvation or that it means he will be taking upon himself the name of Christ for the rest of his life. When we ask him simple questions about things like who Jesus Christ is or what baptism means to him he gives an answer that’s almost the complete opposite. He also doesn’t quite understand why we’re meeting with him, so we have had to set expectations a few different times. We will have to set a tentative date for him right now and keep working with him. We have baptismal goals for the year and sometimes it seems like missionaries just drag people to baptism, and that definitely not what we want to do with Demetrio. It would be sad if he just jumped into the water not really knowing what he is doing and then go inactive in a few months never to come back. It would be pointless.
Nick is a good kid. We teach him at the institute every Tuesday and Thursday. His parents are very anti and don’t want him to go to church or meet with us, but he really wants to learn about the church and to find out if it’s true so he continues to meet with us. He’s old enough to make his own decisions but he respects his parents desires enough that he won’t go to church, which kind of sucks.  He lives in Vista and goes to school at Palomar, so in between classes he meets with us. He’s very sincere and just wants to know the truth.
Miguel was a referral from the Hermana’s after they contacted him on the street. We taught him the restoration last week and has been to church. He has a Joseph Smith kind of mentality. He understands that there are many different beliefs and religions and wants to find out which one is the right one.
Rudy was another referral from the Spanish elders that they contacted into. He is taking time off from work and school to study religion.  And he graduated college with a bachelors in psychology. He knows a lot about Islam and has made multiple trips to the Middle East. He has tons of questions that we answer to the best of our ability. He is like a sponge though, he soaks up everything we teach him.
Rudy is a friend of a member we met briefly and short be starting to meet with him here in the next week.
The work is picking up like crazy. The sisters in our ward picked up three new investigators in the past week, and that never happens. They haven’t had an investigator in six months. Miracles baby!!!!
I love the work, I hope that the time I have left will continue to be an adventure. Hopefully it won’t go by too fast.
I love you all, I pray for you all the time. Have an awesome thanksgiving!!!

-Elder Daniel

p.s. - Say hey to Gerry and Dana for me!!!


-Taco shop
-The real Mormon Mafia
-E. Cowan is a missionary