Jordan: 1/14/2013

From: Mike Schouten [mailto:mikesphotomm@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, January 14, 2013 5:03 PM
To: Mike Schouten
Subject: Jordan: 1/14/2013

Well, as for our invest... the lady that was supposed to get married and baptized this week didn´t. It was a bummer. Basically, a bunch of really dumb things happened, and her family kind of rebelled on her, and in the end, she and her husband ended up getting in a fight and now, he doesn´t want to get married anymore. So, it was a bummer, and now, it looks like she´s hiding from us. i don´t know why, but she doesn´t answer her phone and she didn´t come to church yesterday, and she always comes. So, we´ll see what happens.

But, this next saturday, we have a baptism for sure. There´s a couple that has been investigating the church for 7 months and the wife is SUPER ready for baptism, she just has to get married. And, now, her husband is committed to getting married. So, they´re getting married on saturday, and then, after the wedding, she´s getting bapitzed. So, we´re pretty excited. The wedding is going to cost me a lot of money, but, it´s worth it. They´re too poor to pay for their own wedding, so, we´re paying for it. But i´m excited. we´ve been working with them for the 3 months that i´ve been in this area. it´s been a battle, but the Lord has won.

Then, on saturday, we had the most powerful lesson of my whole mission. They guy´s name is Antonio. (I think i talked about him last week) but basically, he´s our best investigator, but his family hates the church. He´s about 50, but he lives with all his extended family. So, they cause a lot of problems. But on saturday, we called him to see if everything was okay for the appointment that we had later in the day. And he told us that he couldn´t keep meeting with us because it was causing too many problems with his family and he didn´t want to fight or anything. He didn´t want to meet with us anymore. My comp was talking to him on the phone, but i could hear everything. And my comp was getting SUPER frustrated. So, i told my comp to give me the phone and he did, and i basically just bore my testimony over the phone. And he felt the Spirit, so he agreed to meet with us one more time, later in the day. So, we had a lesson with him aobut 30 minutes later, and it was the most powerful lesson of my entire mission. We just talked about how people that choose to follow the Lord are always persecuted for it, but that the Lord will always be on our side to help us it we keep the commandments. We just helped him realize that he was happy when he was talking with us and keeping the commandments, and now, that he chose to stop hearing the gospel, he wasn´t happy anymore. So, he said a prayer at the end, asking God if he should keep listening to us, even though his family is a problem. And the Spirit was stronger in that moment than i´ve ever felt it in my entire life. I he felt it too, and he decided to keep meeting with us. So, it was amazing. I truly was a miralce. We have an appointment with him tonight, so, hopefully everything will go well.

Other than that, not too much happend this week. We´re in the process of looking for new invest. because we don´t have any. We found 3 yesterday that seem pretty promising, so we´ll see where they go.

We also had interviews with Pres. Agazzani this week. My interview was good. Short, but good. But, he told me that in our zone, there are a lot of problems and he told me that me and my comp are responsible to fix the problems that 3 or 4 companionships are having. So, we´ll see how that goes, because i know about most of the problems and they´re BIG so, we´ll see how that goes.

Also, THAT WAS A LOT OF SNOW. Wow, i don´t ever remember seeing that much snow and school NEVER closed down in my 19 years before the mission. Weird. I´m pretty sure snow would make my heart stop right now, seeing as this week was the hottest week of my entire mission. This week was about 100 everyday, but, this week was SUPER SUPER SUPER SUPER humid. Every day was about 90% humidity, instead of 50 or 60% Everyday it looked like it was going to rain, but it never did. So, it was just hot and humid, but, it´s okay. It could be worse. At least my house has air conditioning. I went on divisions this week and the air conditioning in the house i went to is broken, so it was kinda miserable, but, i choose to count my blessings. 

Mom- thanks for the BYU sports update. Hope you learn a lot in your Powerpoint class. I liked what you said about choosing to be happy and not wishing away your life, thinking about the next phase. I´m trying to do that, to enjoy and take advantage of every minute i have left to be a full time missionary, because, unfortunately, my time is coming to an end. But, i´m not thinking aobut that. I´m just trying to baptize everyone i meet.

Dad- i really liked your letter this week. it was really cool and it was so true. Possesions don´t make us happy. Only the Gospel. Possessions make life easier, but they don´t bring happiness. Only obedience to the commandments brings true lasting happiness.

John- i prefer about 60 or 70 degress, every day, 0 humidity. i don´t want negatives, and i don´t want 100 degress, 100% humidity either. I´m glad you thought again about missionary work. It´s the best.

Austin- i hear your almost done with your papers. cool stuff.

Tasha- i´m glad you had fun on your snow day. i never got one.

Shaylee- same as tasha.

The church is true. i have no doubt. Gotta run.

Love, Elder Jordan Schouten