Hey everyone sound like from you emails you all had a great week. Big
shoutout to Anna for getting into BYU WAHOO!!!
This week was pretty crazy for me, I guess not anything too out of the normal but I was pretty tired. Good thing its p-day and I can kinda relax a little bit. The biggest news of the day would be the baptism of C and K A, they were both super excited,along with their parents. It was Karla´s 8th birthday so I bought her a birthday cake that we all ate afterwards. It was a fun day for sure, and a great way to finish the month of Febrary.
This week we also committed J to a baptismal date, the 22nd. Which was super exciting. He is the older son of the R family, and when we were teaching them, he didn´t want anything, and would always leave. His mom always asked us what we could do to help him become interested. We told her to be faithful and always keep him in her prayers. About two weeks ago he decided to go to church, with his friend C (who was baptized about 3 months ago) and now he is loving it! He went with the ward to the temple trip and said that he really enjoyed it a lot, and can´t wait to go inside. I think thats possibly what made the difference. Our mission president always says that the best missionary in all of El Salvador is the temple, and it is so true. Right now we are working on getting all of the members and recent converts, and investigators to go to the temple, the ward does a trip every month, and it is so important, in every aspect of our conversion. Right now the members need to work on temple attendance, normally the buses go pretty empty.
The zone this week had 23 investigators in church, and 11 new investigators, which means that this upcoming week we will be doing exchanges basically all week. I really like interchanges, it is nice to work with someone different,and to get to work in a different area. Sometimes they are tiring, but I guess thats just how it goes! We honestly have a great group of missionaries. I am really going to miss any of the elders that move out. There are quite a few that I plan on hanging out with after the mission at college. So we have changes this upcoming week, not sure who has changes yet but they have said who is training new missionaries and who is going to Belize. Elder Coates, along with one other elder in the zone are going to Belize, they should be leaving later today. There are three other elders training in our zone, so basically everyone but the zone leaders will be training, which always makes things very exciting. I can´t imagine that me or my companion wil have changes but you never know. Crazier things have happened. I talked to Elder Stoker in a multi-zone that we had, and he is going to be training, which means that I will have another "grandson" I am way excited. I just hope for his sakes that he leaves his area, He is still in Izalco, and now has a little over 8 months there. Just like I did. That's a long time to be in any area! But he has really whipped that ward into shape. Rumor has it that they are going to split Sonzacate zone and make Zona Izalco, which would be really sweet. If anything crazy happens with changes I will let you all know next week. Oh just so you all know last monday I finished making my white shirt, I am wearing it right now! It isn´t even that ugly! I don´t know if I will every make my own dress shirts but a flannel shirt for sure. and the principle is basically the same. The hardest part was the collar, but it was all pretty tricky. I had no idea how many details there are in making a shirt! It gave me an apreciation for all of the people here that work in clothing factories. They make Under Armour, Nike, Puma, Columbia, and all sorts of brands like that, it has got to be so hard, and they make at the very most, about 8 dollars a day. I can´t imagine what it would be like to be sewing hundreds of articles of clothes each day with the tag that says $50 dollars for a pair of shorts, when that is your weekly salary. It still makes me sad how injust the world is, I
don´t think I will ever get over that.
I was reading this week in the scriptures in Jacob 3:9, it was a personal machete, and that's probably why it stood out to me so much. I sometimes make the mistake of judging people here for not wanting to listen or for making incorrect desicions. This verse was a reminder not to judge, and to remember that these people are doing what they were taught by their parents to do, and that I have been blessed with the light of the restored gospel. I should always act like it, and if I don´t it will be worse off for me, for having greater knowledge and not following it. So lets do what we are supposed to do, and if we are doing something we know we shouldn´t lets change it! It's not that hard to do! Okay everyone have a great week and I can´t wait to hear from you all soon!
Elder Schriever
