HOLY MOLY!!!!

Hey Family!

Well, another transfer has come and gone! Here's the news: I'm staying

in the area but losing Elder Lavea! I'm really sad to see him go! I'm

going to miss his singing (everywhere we go, especially when he finds

a room with good acoustics!), sarcastic jokes and playing pranks on

him when he falls asleep during studies. It's been fun! We've worked

hard together, biked a hilly area in the heat of summer and had tons

of fun. He's going to the other zone too, so I won't see him too much!

 I'm going to miss the Polynesian culture, it's something I was never

really exposed to before the mission.

My new companion is Elder Mayer! He was in our district last transfer,

and I've served around him a lot in the past, so we know each other

pretty well. It should be a blast! I'll include a picture below of him

and me when we were cleaning someone's house one day for a service

project. Our district will change a little bit but not tons! We're

looking forward to a good transfer!

This week we found a golden couple!!!! Their names are Miguel and

Ericka. They're someone that we've been trying to get ahold of ever

since we first got into the area 3 months ago. They work a lot, and

for some reason we've just never been able to find them at home! But

this past week we finally got a hold of them and had our first lesson.

It was amazing! We taught about the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus

Christ and His church. They had been to temple sqaure before and they

were really interested in he idea that in temples, through Gods power,

families can be bound together in marriage not only for this life, but

for all of time, even after death. They accepted our invitation to be

baptized and have been reading and praying about the Book of Mormon!

It's crazy because they're married but they're the same age as me! 20

and 21. So they're a pretty young couple.

This week we also taught the Piñon family and the Madrigal family.

We're still struggling to help the Piñons progress. I don't know what

it is but something just isn't clicking with them. They seem so ready

and they need the gospel...I feel like Hna. Piñon almost knows that

what we teach is true...but it's so hard to have a sit down lesson

with them and really work through their doubts. They're so occupied

with their life right now that they're not giving much time to God.

They recognize they need to be praying and reading the scriptures and

things like that, but they just don't do it. So we're praying for them

a lot! One miracle that happened this week with the Madrigal family is

that they let us in this week! Haha. The Madrigals come to church

pretty regularly and want to be baptized but until now haven't really

made time to let us teach them the pre-baptismal lessons, so it's been

kinda weird! But this week they actually let us in and they opened up

to us a LOT. Brother Madrigal has a long history with investigating

the church and has known it's true for a long time, but hasn't wanted

to give up some of his lifestyle habits. It's pretty crazy though

because he said that every since he was little he somehow has ended up

living right next to a LDS meetinghouse. Anyway, he knows he needs to

get baptized, just lacks the faith to repent and make the necessary

changes. So hopefully we will be able to help him with that!

There were a couple other new potential investigators that we found

this week but I'll tell more about them when we actually teach them a

lesson. But we're pretty excited about them! A lot of them seem to

have a lot of potential! We also stopped by Ivan this week and his dad

invited us for dinner. It was perfect because we didn't have dinner

that day. Ivan's dad really likes us and we have a great relationship

with their family. He actually told us that we could move into his

basement because he's looking to rent! We're probably moving into a

Hispanic family's house in the ward already though. But that will be

good to finally live in the area! I'll be sad to stop living with

other missionaries though, that's been super fun! But anyway, Ivan was

really cute and wanted us to follow him on our bikes to a couple

houses that he wanted us to visit. It was funny! We still don't know

why he isn't getting baptized, but God has a plan! We'll see soon

enough.

This week I also spent some time fixing my bike again. It's finally in

good working order! I have brakes that are actually reliable now! It's

great. Before that though, we had an incident! I had spent a little

bit of time adjusting the brakes in the morning before we went out,

and so I thought I was good. But later that day I found myself riding

nonchalantly down the biggest hill in our area with an ice cream bar

in one hand. Well, when the time came around to start slowing down I

squeezed my brakes and nothing happened. The following happened almost

without even thinking: I chucked my ice cream bar onto the sidewalk to

the side of me, grabbed my handlebars with both hands to brace myself

for impact, and attempted to slow down by jamming by shoe against the

tire of the bike. That didn't work, and the only thing ahead of me was

a street busy with cars. So as soon as the wall to my left ended, I

dove left into a patch of dead grass and weeds and dirt. It was a

bumpy ride but it brought me to a stop and I made it without even a

scratch! #blessings. Elder Lavea couldn't stop laughing and eventually

he got me laughing too. We couldn't stop for like 2 or 3 minutes,

everyone on the street probably thought we were nuts. The thing that

got him the most was the image of me looking wistfully at my ice cream

bar and then chucking it and bracing for impact :). Good times. So

after that I did transplant surgery and took some brakes and other

parts of of an old bike and put them on my new bike. It works like

gold!

We also finally found Alberto again this week. We had a first lesson

with him weeks ago, and it felt like he just disappears off the face

of the planet. His wife is in Venezuela right now with his daughter

and he's pretty worried about her and is trying to bring her to the

states. It turns out that he was more interested in getting temporal

help than coming closer to Christ. We had good lesson though and

talked about how God blesses us temporally as well as spiritually when

we follow him. It was good! We've also been getting the service

missionaries involved with helping him, so hopefully he can pull

through!

Well, I think that's about it for the week! It's be a fulfilling week,

and I'm so grateful I've still got some time on this mission! I love

every minute of it. I'm so grateful for the knowledge that God has

given us through prophets past and current of the plan of happiness

that God has for us and for the gift of repentance and the ability to

change through Jesus Christ!

Love and miss you all!

Elder Baxter