October 24, 2013 -Thursday - Newport Temple

Hola! Well this week was full of ups and downs haha It started out less than 5 minutes after I finished emailing last week, we got a text from Fabiola and her daughter Jennifer that neither of them would be able to be baptized or even meet with or talk to the missionaries ever again. :( It pretty much broke our hearts and made the rest of Pday not as good as it could have been but we decided to move on and the Lord would bless us. When we got to the Zone activity(which was basketball and volleyball) I got a letter from Jessica! :) That made my day a lot better and got me ready to get back to work. She is awesome! I have been doing a ton of biking since I have been in Cali. Two of the days we went 20miles each and in total we have gone 120miles so I have been a little sore some mornings which is good. I have also been eating a ton and I have gained 10 pounds in my first 2 weeks out here so I think I should start slowing down haha There is this family in our ward, the Vasquez family, and we see them almost every day. They are way helpful, need a lot of service, provide us with people to teach, come to teaching appointments with us, and feed us lots of food. When I heard working with the members in Conference, now I know what they were talking about because of the Vasquez family. Last week was a little discouraging because we weren't able to teach nearly as much as we wanted to and because one of my companions is so trunky it can be hard to focus at times. But we continued to work hard we just weren't seeing the results and Sunday night we felt a little down about our week. So you remember Zaira right? The one who ran away, well she had come back from running away and it was weird because her family didn't even seem to care or think that it was a big deal that she wasn't home for a few days. Anyways on Sunday night we got a call from this lady in the ward who had just talked to Zaira's parents and her dad said she could be baptized. Way crazy because her dad hated missionaries before, but we were able to talk to him and I think he respects us now and so she has been ready to be baptized for a while so on Tuesday we asked her to be baptized this Sunday and she was really excited to say yes and so it turns out I'm having my first baptism this Sunday!! :) :) This came as a complete surprise because we felt that her dad was not going to change his mind but the Lord works in interesting ways and I am just so excited for Zaira and he decision to find the truth for herself and act on her faith by being baptized. Also last week we were knocking and found this awesome Arabian dude named Mounir(Mo for short) and his is literally a rocket scientist. He is way smart, and loves the bible and knows it very well. We started talking with him and he seemed really hesitant but after a minute he became way interested and had amazing questions. We talked to him for a while and when we asked him if he would read the Book of Mormon, he told us yeah, and if it is true the Spirit of God will tell me. Then he asked us if we could come back in a week and answer any questions about the Book of Mormon and talk more. He is amazing and we are going to teach him and Zaira tonight so I can't wait for those lessons. The temple was way awesome today. It was nice to go through in English, since I have gone in Spanish my last 3 trips. I also wanted to to tell you guys about this golden family, the Paniagua family. I'm not sure if I talked about them last email but they are awesome. This guy Max, his wife, son and daughter are awesome. The parents and son are wanting to be baptized, they are just wanting to finish the Book of Mormon first to make sure they know it is true but I think they will want to be baptized in the next few weeks. They are coming to Zaira's this Sunday to see how they work and I hope that will give them even more of a desire to be baptized soon. Everything is moving along well. While the work is really hard and discouraging at times, the happiness and joy that comes if well worth it. I love being a missionary, I love just trying to continue to get better every week and I have seen a lot of improvement in myself but there is so much more that needs to take place, but just one step at a time. Love you all, that you for all the encouragement, Heavenly Father has blessed me so much to have so many that love me and that I love too. Have a wonderful week! I have Pday again on Monday so you will be hearing from me soon! Love, Elder Hyde