April 15, 2013

Cuenca from the bridge between the San Pablo Monastery (now Parador), and the city of Cuenca

Another view of Cuenca

Hello all y´all!!

 

I just had to practice my Texan accent if I´m going home in 2 weeks. I must say that I´m more nervous than excited about that, but I can honestly say that I´m not letting it get to my head so that I can continue being the missionary that God needs me to be! This week has been full of cool stuff, and long trips, but it´s been really cool!! I´m hoping that things continue to go well over there at home and that you guys have a good week this next week!! I´m really looking forward to the growth of Cuenca in the weeks and months to come!! Anyway on to my week!!

So Monday we went to an investigator’s house after we did the Cristo hike, but then her boyfriend left the house, so that meant that we would have to leave as well. Bummer since I wanted to get to know her a bit more before that happened. Oh well, rules are rules. We then went to another home.  He is a less active member and I really hope to help him come back and gain a testimony! We haven´t been able to do too much with him, but we did teach him about faith, prayer, reading the scriptures and going to church. I hope that something comes out from that! Not too much else that day.

Elder Bauer's set of keys

Tuesday we did quite a bit of finding out there on the streets of Cuenca! Some of the people are the ones that burn up in the sun and wither away. Others get eaten by the birds. Some actually take root, but then wither away since they were in shallow ground. One of them is among thorns and weeds, so we´re trying to help them grow and get rid of the weeds. Overall, we do have a few that have the potential of bearing fruit and we may be able to see the fruits of our labors! (I knew that you´d enjoy that dad. It wasn´t even my idea, Elder Lyman, my companion, gave me the idea.)

 Pretty cool how many people we have found in just two hours! Not too many, but more than normal since we contacted like machines!! We then went and ate with a member and it was good food like usual!! I like food!! Food is good! Makes your stomach all happy and stuff!! Anyway, we then taught an investigator a bit of Mosiah 24 since she´s having a few problems and basically the message was to help her see that there are examples of people that suffered in the Book of Mormon, so it was good! We then saw another investigator, and it´s pretty difficult to teach her, since she goes on about other things. We then had English Classes, and a lot more people came than last week!! We had a full class of 2 people.....HA, that´s not full. We haven´t really put in an effort to pass out little cards either, but oh well. We´d better get on that!! Well, that´s it for Tuesday.

Wednesday we didn´t have very much go on, but we did get to visit two people! We visited one of those that we found that was “among the weeds”, but we hope to be able to help her out of them. Her husband isn´t really interested in the message, and doesn´t show hope of understanding it. Adriana though, she has potential and I hope that the potential doesn´t die away. We basically got to know them and gave them the Book of Mormon and a pamphlet of the restoration. She started to read it while we were there, and she said that she really likes it and will read it!! I was really happy!!! Later we finished the night with a family from Peru! They are pretty cool, but the lesson could have gone a bit better on both of our parts. I have a lot to learn still. We pretty much just shared the restoration and they liked it! They then had us stay and we ate with them! It was really good food!! I just love the food here!

A plant growing in the missionary apartment (hopefully that is the only thing growing in their apartment)

Thursday we had weekly planning and it was pretty good!! We planned for a lot of people since we found a lot of people (as mentioned above, haha)! We then went and helped a kid with English, but it didn´t help him out a lot since he doesn´t study...ever!! Oh well, but I really hope that he studies and then he wouldn´t feel the way he does. At four we went with Jose, and taught a new investigator, actually a less active member that works every Sunday.  We got to know her and it was pretty cool! She´s from the Dominican Republic and it was a cool little visit! We then tried to go and visit someone else, but they weren´t home, so we had to go to the bus station to go to Madrid for zone conference and so we did that. When we got to Madrid at 8:30 or 9, we went and visited someone from Barrio 8. Super cool family and they are members. It was a cool little visit!

Friday I saw the Temple from up close for the first time in 5 months!! It´s pretty cool how I really needed to be close to it after so long!! I just love the Temple!! Super cool and lovely! We then had the conference and it was one of the best ones that I´ve had on the mission!! I really enjoyed it!! I felt edified and it was just awesome!! We then ate Dominoes Pizza and it was good!! Elder Lyman and I then went to the bus station and tried to get the 4:30 bus, but it was full, so we had to wait until 6:30. We walked around and it was fine. We finally got back and contacted for the rest of the night.
Saturday we went to the church and did a "service project" which was move the ping pong table from the bottom floor to the top floor. We had to buy some tools to do it and we succeeded!! We had Jose there helping us so it wasn´t too hard. In the evening we saw an investigator and her friend. We committed her friend to come to church and he accepted so it was good! Later we saw another investigator and her husband and it was a mini English class. We left soon after that to go over to a member’s house, and visited her to help her animo [enthusiasm] go up! She hasn´t been to church for a month and so that could be a reason why she´s feeling sad and down. I hope that we helped her out. We then visited an investigator and it was a good visit. I´m not sure if he´ll progress, but we´ll see as time goes on.

Madrid, Spain Temple

Yesterday was church and we had testimony meeting. I bore mine on missionary work, of course, and it was good!! The whole meeting was good so yeah!! I liked it. We then met with a less active Dominican lady and she´s cool!! She has a bit of the desire to return and her husband is also Dominican and he has potential!! I have huge hopes for Cuenca!! Later on we saw an investigator in whom we had great expectations, and he doesn´t have as much hope as I had hoped for. He would take anything that we say or teach, and look it up on the internet. I told him that we have to look through prayer, to be able to get the answers and then committed him to read the pamphlet that we left him and pray about it. He accepted so I really hope that he does that. We finished the night with an investigator from Africa. We talked about how trials are like when Nephi built the boat [see 1 Nephi 17, and 1 Nephi 18]; we could either give up, or do as Nephi did and do what the Lord told him to do! Super cool!! I loved this week!! They just keep going by faster and faster!! Wednesday we have the opportunity to go back to Madrid and go to the Temple!! Super cool and exciting for me!! I can´t wait!! I hope that this next week is good for you guys!! Take care and I´ll talk to you soon!! Love you all!!

Elder Bauer