Week 31

Nothing terribly exciting happened this week. We are working with a man named Claudio and his pareja (the woman who lives with him who isn´t his wife), Evelyn. They are both progressing a lot. Claudio has a baptismal date for the 11th and Evelyn has a baptismal date for the 25th. All they need to do is get married or live in different houses, which isn´t easy. We have also been teaching Evelyn´s litte brother, Mauricio. He has gone to church two weeks in a row now by himself. I´m not sure what happened, because he never did that before, but we will see what happens there. There have been a lot of fires here lately due to the heat and the wind. The light yesterday was an eery yellow because the smoke was covering the sun. I had a really good experience with my companion yesterday. I´ve been feeling really weird in our lessons and I noticed that yesterday when I worked with another missionary and felt a lot more comfortable. I have been trying to figure out why I haven´t been feeling the Spirit in our lessons by looking for things outside of me. But, last night, my companion helped me look inside myself. When I was younger, I was obese and experienced a lot of bullying. I mean, a lot. It killed my self-esteem and it´s something I´ve always struggled with (even though Micaela thinks otherwise ;)). I noticed that I´ve been comparing myself to my companion. He has been in the mission for 19 months and is a great missionary. He´s a great teacher and great with the people. I´m his district leader and do not feel at all capable of being his leader because, frankly, I think he should be my district leader. Instead of focusing on what I can do to improve and being myself, I had been comparing myself to him. Obviously, I´m not going to have the Spirit if I´m doing that. I´m extremely grateful for what he said to me when I realized that and I know that´s why he´s my companion. Our Mission President is truly called of God and receives revelation to guide and direct his missionaries. The Lord puts us with those who are going to help us grow the most. Now that I acknowledge this weakness, I´m going to put Ether 12:27 into practice. I know that we all have weaknesses. Everyone struggles with something. I know that when we recognize it and go to The Lord to receive the strength we need to overcome them, he lifts us up and makes weak things become strong. There is nothing He can´t do and there´s nothing we can´t do when we humble ourselves and put our trust in Him. I have no doubt about that. On the 11th of January, Micaela Morgan Wright and I will have been dating for 1 year! I can easily say this has been the greatest year of my life and that I look forward to spending eternity by her side. I love you, Micaela! Have a great week, everyone!

Elder Reynolds