November 16, 2009

Hey!

This past week wasn’t too special. We did have zone conference which was amazing. All 4 of the zones meet together, so basically that’s half the mission. I think zone conference pushes me through each transfer to work hard. Right when I start to get tired its zone conference again and it pumps me up. It went all day long, but I learned a lot. We have been working hard everyday just trying to talk to people. We literally talk to every single Spanish person we see. We have a big area but the Spanish are in one little area so when we do see them we definitely stop them. It makes for some pretty long days and nights but it’s still good. We are getting some more investigators. We don’t really have anyone too amazing yet. We have that one guy that read the whole book of Mormon still won’t make a baptismal date. He says he isn’t prepared but he is. Our Thursday night was one of the roughest nights ha-ha it was awesome though. It builds character. Everyone we tried to talk to rejected us so hard but it was fun. I saw this kid punch his pretty little girlfriend in the street so I told him what I thought about that. It was a rough night and that just added to it. New York has made me hate people that beat their spouse and children. We had an awesome experience with a less active family. The ones I talked about who came to church last week for the first time in 5 years. We went over there again and had another amazing lesson. We talked for a while and to be honest we went over there not knowing what to teach. I usually teach most of the lessons cuz my companion still doesn’t know what to share and doesn’t feel comfortable. I just said a prayer in my heart and asked for some insight of what to share with this inactive couple. We started talking and then I decided after a while to share some of the atonement of Christ. I had them open up to Mathew in the bible and read about Christ’s suffering in the garden of Gethsemane. I told them that often time’s people only look at the suffering on the cross but don’t realize the greatness of the suffering on the Mount of Olives. We then went and read where Christ got beaten, mocked, and crowned with thorns. Something interesting about that whole deal is he was beat with 39 stripes. Well why not 40? Because if it were 40 times he would have been forgiven for whatever he had done and let go. This was the law back then because no man could endure 40 lashings without dying, but Christ could. Thus, the atonement wouldn’t have been completed. However, he was beaten with 39. We then read about when Christ was nailed on the cross in mark. He cries out to god and says why hast thou forsaken me? We talked about that and bore testimony on the power of the atonement. It was awesome. They then afterwards promised me they would be active in the church from now on. They had started reading the b.o.m again last week and are ready to come back to church. I taught a big lesson in district meeting on the atonement, so I was prepared for that lesson.We had stake conference yesterday and it was nice. It was in another part of town so no investigators were at church. This week is crucial to getting investigators at church or they can’t get baptized this transfer. I’m hoping we have some more success. My companion is having back problems so he can’t walk fast, it stinks but it’s all good. Everything sounds like its great at home. It’s getting a little cold here. I love you all and thank you for all your support.
Have a great week.

Love,Elder Breinholt