I am glad that you were able to
celebrate the 4th and have a little fun; I honestly had nothing by way of
celebration.... just Exchanges with my Zone Leaders :)
Thank you Thank you Thank you
Thank you for your prays for my companion... I too have been praying a
lot for him. in fact he was the subject of my fast :) I am afraid because I
have heard down the line (Zone Leaders) that President was starting to consider
sending him home... so yah, many prayers! But he really is doing better. No
more days in the house! we are leaving to work every day now. The rubber
bottoms on his crutches are wearing out quickly with all the walking he´s
doing. A member found us a new rubber foot (what are they called?) to put on
his crutches, and he wore through the rubber in one day, with all the heat and
walking! He has two new ones on his crutches right now, we will see how long
they last! We are also going to try a walking boot soon, we will see if
it helps.
So like I said my last email, we
went on Monday to eat hamburgers with a family whom we are teaching. It turned
out good, and then we went and panted a door and a window on a member's house.
I painted the top of the door. imagine that :)
Not much to report Tuesday,
other than I tried to cut up a jalepeño pepper in order to make a tuna salad
that night, and ended up, as they say here, enchilado. It was so hot I couldn’t
stand it, and I only ate a small piece! Then it spread to my lips which started
to burn. Then to get ready for bed, I washed my face. Bad Idea. I spread the burning
sensation to my entre face and my eyes! Once I could see again, I then
made another stupid decision and used the bathroom. Yep, it spread. I layed in
bed waiting for the burning to go away, and thankfully, it did, and I was able
to go to sleep :). Ok, so I guess I am not as Mexican as I thought it was. I
will be more careful with peppers from here on. after eating a lot of spicy
food I thought that I would be ok, but not yet :)
On Wednesday my companion was having
a lot of troubles. We had to rest in the house for a little while. I was
singing hymns in English while he rested. I love hymns in English! Next thing
I knew, he walked out wearing the walking boot. He said that he said a prayer
of faith, and was ready to leave walking. So we went and visited someone, him
walking the whole way. He went painfully slow, but I was super happy to see his
faith show and we were of good cheer :) And then, like always, someone in the
street commented and told him he would get a hernia from walking like that with
the limp all day, and now he is scared to use the boot, even when President
sent another, even better one for him to use... he doesn’t want to use it, but
I really think that he should....
Thursday were back to crutches,
and a Jehovah´s Witness (who are like our rivals here on the mission) came and
talked to us for 10 minutes straight about how Elder Hernandez had to rest and
how God wants his servant to be healthy and was using a ton of, only slightly
related scriptures to try and make her point. She left, and Elder Hernandez was
again super discouraged. So I tried to cheer him up, and we talked about the nobility
and faith that we show when we keep moving forward fighting the fight even when
we have a difficulty or weakness, and that sacrifices bring forth blessings. It
was interesting that it took 10 minutes of twisted truth to discourage him, and
only 2 minutes of pure truth to lift him back up again. There is power in the
truth of the Gospel.
And on Friday, like I said, I
had Exchanges with our Zone Leader, and I went to work in their area for a day.
I am super glad for the Exchanges that we had with them, because I was able to
express how felt and receive a lot of good counsel from my Zone Leader.
They also helped us put a lot of good goals as a companionship, mostly about
being more united and about serving each other. At first I was a little
offended to tell you the truth when they started talking about how I needed to
serve Elder Hernandez more and asked me what more I could do for him, because
I felt like I was already doing everything for him AND around the house, but as
we talked, I realized the importance of charity and saw that I really could
help him more and help him feel better and more excited for the work. We were
able to have a really good chat after they left, and we put a lot of good goals
to help us be a better companionship.
And I don’t know if it is a law
around here or what.... but a drunk started talking to us about how he was going
to report us for walking around in the streets with crutches, and took a photo
of us... in which we are smiling with a thumbs up :) I think he had a mind to
send it to the police or something, but I doubt that anything will come of a
picture of two smiling missionaries :)
Fast and Testimony meeting is a
little slow hire in the small ward. There were a few longish moments of silence
waiting for one of the few members to share their testimony. Unlike in my last
ward when the missionaries hardly had time, all four of us were able to share.
I feel bad though... we came to church with our investigators but got there
late, and we weren’t able to partake of the sacrament..... But by the end of
the meeting I felt super happy to be there and it was great to see the members
come and befriend out investigators. I really have been trying to develop my
love for this ward and area, so during sacrament meeting I was saying a silent
prayer for each member, one by one, as I saw them in the chapel. It really
helped me to feel a great deal of love for the members here.
And then this morning for P day
I deep cleaned our bathroom. I think that if had been a really long time since
it was cleaned. The phrase that Dad says came to my mind: ''you'll make a great
wife for someone someday'' :) I kind of got into a cleaning mode and took an
entire hour to clean the little bathroom, but at least I feel clean now! I
wasnt able to mop the house though, and it really needs it... but oh well! Time
is a missionary's enemy. Especially on P-day :P
Well that is the goings of my
week. We are teaching a family, Damian, who are excited and getting close to
baptism. We might baptize his three daughters first, and then him and his wife
the next week, since they have come to church more. We'll see how it
plays out.
I love you!
Elder Redford
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