18 May 2015 Letter

Week 16

As we near the last two weeks of this transfer, I have really been preoccupied for my next companion. I will probably stay here in my area and receive a new companion. We have kind of hit a brick wall here in our area, which apparently is one of the most difficult in the mission, and we don't know what to do. So maybe a new companion will freshen things up and we can start getting more work done but maybe not.  When the area is slow like this, with almost no investigators that are really progressing and assisting the church, it is really difficult.  We really start wondering what we are doing wrong, how we can improve, and what we can start doing.  So we will see how things go.  I know I am ready to lead the area.  I know all our investigators, where we are in our teachings, street names, the ward and all that jazz pretty well now.  It is crazy how fast you learn that stuff when all you do all day is walk around.

Anyway the week went fairly well even though it was a bit slow about midway through but we broke records on Sunday with lessons and new investigators and contacts.  So it was fun.  I was so tired at the end of the day.  P-day we played on a giant turf field as a zone with 20 missionaries for a few hours which was a blast.  The rest of the week was normal until Saturday night and Sunday because we had Stake Conference.  It was the best.  President Boswell (my mission president) and his wife spoke, along with a seventy (church general authority), and Elder Uceda, the general area authority in charge of the church in all of Northwest South America. That includes Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia.  They spoke on some awesome things about ward councils and how wards need to function with the missionaries.  It was an answer to every missionary's prayer here in the Campoy Stake, I know.  Elder Uceda also talked about the Sabbath day in a way I have never thought about it.

So dia de reposo, or sabbath day, translated into Hebrew means dia de expiacion, or day of atonement.  He talked about how Sunday is the day that we repent.  It is the day that Christ resurrected after having suffered and died for our sins so that we might have eternal life.  So the sabbath day is the day in which we keep in memory his Atonement, when He suffered for our sins so that we can repent.  In Doctrine and Covenants section 20 verses 75 and 76 it talks about how the person blessing the sacrament kneels WITH the congregation.  We obviously don’t kneel but we should be kneeling spiritually and in our minds.  We can truly thank our Savior and show deeper respect as we do this on Sundays.  It is the most important thing we can do every week and is actually necessary for our salvation.  I testify that is true.

Love you all and miss you too.

Elder Wes Wilcox

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