January 2, 2012

Well this week has been wonderful.  I love Alcala.  It is very beautiful, full of people, history, and members.  I love it.  Something that was a suprise to me during the week is that I was assigned a talk, no biggie. It was for 10 minutes.  I prepared some things, found some nice scriptures and yeah it was nice.  When I got up I noticed that there was a lot of time left, so I asked and they told me I could take a good 15min or so.  I used up all the time and they really liked it.  I talked about missionary work and the importance of the members, or member missionary work.  It went great and a lot of the members responded to it well, which was nice. 

Well this week we have been in the books, or should I say, Area Books.  We have a couple of them full of people that haven´t been baptized, and many who have been but just have lost their way.  So that has  been super good.  I have been calling a lot of people and a lot of them seem to want to talk to us again, which is great.  The one sad thing that I have seen, which it breaks my heart, but  some of the people that I see that are less active, are returned missionaries.  I have called up some of them and they just live somewhere else and are very active, but unfortunately there are many that live here and are not active.  Breaks my heart.  We have been visiting a lot of less actives in general, and the main reason they don´t come is because they have work, but then if you dig just a little deeper, a couple of them say that the ward is cold.  It´s a Spanish thing.  I  can see that.  We have an older ward, but at the same time with have a younger group that is super strong.  I can say that this is a ward that is a bit cold, when I came in,  I don´t know, they were nice, but it wasn´t a ohhh ooooowww! How are you!!! What´s your name, ohhh coooll!! It was a, ohhh cool. new missionary... hahah but yeah esta bien!  But I shall work on the coldness and make it more friendly.

Well this week we have been working a ton.  A lot of it is out on the street.  We walk a ton here, talking to people and just contacting, calling them up, and yeah just the missionary life, which is nice.  I like it.  One experience that I would like to say was in a contact.  Since it is the holidays, there are a ton of people out, just all over, it is swwweeeet!!  There are a lot of people doing things, playing instruments and all that.  Well there are these 2 guys from Ecuador that play their native music.  They use all sorts of really nice flutes and they were dressed up in a native clothing.  I thought it was cool, so did Elder V.  So we watched for a bit, and a lady asked if we would like to take a picture with him.  Well sure!! I would love that.  Well we get to talking and this man, Patricio, is a less active!! annnnddd just waite, he was the ward missionary leader back in Ecuador.  He was very active, but just lost his way.  He reallly wants to come back, so we got his info... then found out he doesn´t live in Alcala, that is fine.  That happens a lot to us.  Just talking to people then come to find out they are less active. 

Well times have been good.  I love my mission.  I just get soo happy talking to people, just so ready, wanting to do more.  I am glad that I haven´t lost that new missionary drive. I want to keep that.  It helps me out a lot on those long days of contacting. 

I have to say that this area has been teaching me a lot such as why past experiences happened.  It´s super sweet.  I love it, just things unfolding in my mind.  Just many things coming to pass.  I love this work in my life. 

I loved talking to you all last week, it was a really good pick me up.  I loved seeing all of you and I really loved talking to you all!! Esp to mandy in Spanish, that was nice, not a huge convo, but just enought.  :)  Gracias.  Hey I love you all soo soo much! My holidays have been good.  The members have invited us over to eat, not a lot though.  I hope they really get this drive like ferrol to invite, invite, and invite, not just us, but their friends to hear this great gospel. 

I love you!!!!

Love,

Elder Laubaugh!