Another Good Week

Dear All,

I'm still sweating, and I'm still loving it. Puerto is just as great as ever, and I'm always happy to be on the Lord's errand. I've set some more personal goals to consecrate myself even more to the work, and thus receive more blessings as part of it, both in the work and in my life.

Speaking of the Work, it's awesome. We're finding lots of chosen people, but our challenge is getting them to come to church. Most of the people have different work schedules that they don't know about until the day of, which makes it hard sometimes, but it's all good. Basically the policy here in Puerto is "He who cometh to church three times shall be baptized." There are so many people who are so humble and ready to make covenants with our Heavenly Father, we just have to get them to the chapel on Sundays.

As for my companion and I, everything is going really well. The challenge for us is speaking Spanish more than anything, because since we're both Gringos, we like our English. But that's alright, he already understands almost everything, and can speak alright as well. I'm not too worried, as long as we keep practicing.

We had a really cool training meeting with President on Friday, and he really followed the Spirit to help us with some specific challenges that this group has. He reminded us to stay humble, and not to get mad if someone else goes up to a leadership position and we don't. Aspiring to leadership is a sin, it is pride, and we can't have pride if we are to have the Spirit to be with us.

We've also found so many people this past week who are absolutely amazing. We have two young men who would have been baptized long ago if they had attended church. We also found out that Patty's son (she was baptized last week) has some challenges with some of the commandments to overcome before he can be baptized, so we're working hard with him. He's just so close to being baptized, we just need to help him overcome these challenges. Same thing with another family we've got. He has to stop drinking and they have to get married so he can get baptized (she's already a member of the church).

I would just like to quote a scripture from the New Testament that I really like. Christ said:

"Come unto me, all ye who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, for I am meek and lowly of heart, and my yoke is easy, and my  burden is light."

I felt inspired to share that scripture while giving a blessing to a sister who is a recent convert and was about to leave her husband. She had decided to do it, then we visited them and gave them blessings. I then called the husband on Sunday morning to see if he was going to come to Church. He told me that they hadn't separated and that the whole family was going to come to church. And they did. She told us that she told him that she would stay on one condition: that they would go to church. That's the answer to many, many prayers, since I arrived in this area, and I imagine, beforehand as well. The Lord listens, but he answers on his own time.

I love you all,
Elder Banks