The Work and The World Cup

Hey, I hope you are all doing well!

We are in the mall right now and it is dead. Chile is playing the Netherlands in the World Cup and everyone is huddled around TVs in the sports bars. We will see if the mall explodes in the next half hour if they score. It is more calm here than in some other parts of Chile. Here we have permission to watch the game and we watched the first half while we were eating lunch in a restaurant today. Every ten minutes you can hear all of Chile go, “Ahhhhhh!!!” when they get close to making a goal.

I have had a pretty good week. We are working hard. I am very excited because the P family is doing very well. They came to Stake Conference yesterday and the mother commented that she has noticed a difference in her boys lately. She opened the door to us because she felt like they lacked something and she needed help keeping them grounded. The gospel will help them so much. Yesterday it was their son B’s birthday. We bought a cake on Saturday and took it over with the youth on Sunday. It turned into a good experience for the P family and the youth. The youth shared their testimonies about how the gospel has changed their lives. Three of them were recent converts who have been members for less than a year. Then two of the young women offered to do the dishes, which was a really nice gesture. I was happy because I think those two young women really learned something as well as they served. Elder M and I were also a little worried about the dad because he has not been listening to us and has deep Catholic roots. Yesterday we asked his wife how he was doing and she said that he has been listening to the Book of Mormon more than anyone in the family. She said that he is re-reading chapters. She has also woken up in the middle of the night to hear him listening to it. He commented to her that he knows that it couldn’t have been written by men and is inspired. I think it will only be a matter of time. I was so happy to hear that.

We got two new elders in the house this week Elder H from Colombia and Elder Q from Mexico City. Elder Q is being trained by Elder U. He is a great guy and we are already good friends. Elder H is really great too.

We had a great stake conference this week and it was sunny most of the week so we are doing pretty well.

Some thoughts I had this week were actually about dad’s talk a couple of months ago in ward conference. I was thinking about how through small, simple actions of service to others we can receive spiritual strength. I think sometimes I get too caught up in studying and need to do a better job actually applying what I am studying.

I am doing well and hope you are all well! I hope mom had a great B day and you guys did something fun!