Talking to Everyone

Hello family!

This week has been a good one! A little crazy and out of ordinary, but good! We had exchanges, where I went to San Pedro and worked with Elder Pin for a day, My companion was sick for a day, and then we had interviews with the Mission President!

So during my exchanges in San Pedro, it was awesome. One visit especially, we visited a young woman named G. So we visit, and the plan was to check up that she read Alma 32 about Faith and maybe touch up on baptism and see if there was any interest there. Well, in the end we set a baptismal date!! She has seen that God has answered her prayers, and now she just needs to talk to her family. I am so excited for her, she has a lot of friends in the church which is Awesome!

I DID feel the earthquake this week! It wasnt terribly big, but you could hear the buildings shake a little bit and ALL the dogs went crazy. haha but no harm done here! But when I heard about Sechura I almost died!! It sounds like so much crazy stuff is going on down there since I left!! I haven't heard anything really from down there so I hope all my friends are doing ok!

One thing that we are really starting to do this week is TALKING TO EVERYONE. That was our District Meeting theme, and when we showed up, President Rowley was waiting outside, then asked "Elder Russell, may I attend your District Meeting today?" WOO! That was a little intimidating but he is always SO much help! After the class he got up and got a little at us for setting goals! So we set up a goal about how many people we are going to talk to this week. We set up goals and this week the majority of us in the District have been working wonders with that goal, we have talked to so many more people! And I LOVE it!! You meet AWESOME people! I met the Regional President of Piura just outside our apartment! haha it was a sweet deal, they have talked to
the missionaries before too! Some things I am really learning in the mission is how receptive people really are to hear about the Gospel, and how many people already know a little bit about the church! The Lord truly is preparing the people and His voice is being heard by every single person.

President Valverde of the Branch gave an AMAZING lecture about the Sacrament during the combined Priesthood and Relief Society, and how it is necessary to attend!! He was exclaiming much like I imagine the prophets, power in his voice, the spirit filling the room, and tears in his eyes from the intensity of his desires for the members to partake of this sacred ordinance. The most sacred in this entire Gospel is the Sacrament. By participating worthily of it, we renew ALL of our covenants with God and can become newly clean. I invite you all too to prayerfully ponder about the importance of the Sacrament. There is STRONG reason that people cannot be baptized without attending, nor recieve further covenants (or PROGRESS) without attending afterwards.

I love this Gospel. I am growing and repenting daily, or at least trying the best I can. And I know the Lord blesses us in our efforts. I KNOW that exact obedience is the most difficult thing we can ever do, but it is possible and we can see and be the hands of miracles as we are exact.

I love you all, thank you all for your emails!! I wish with all my heart I could write you all personally, but that would be an all day job, but I hope you all know I love you all very much and think about you all the time!!

Con amor y felicidad,
Elder Collin Russell