Another Great Week!

Hello family of mine!                                           

This week was good! I had exchanges with the Zone Leaders one day in Tumbes and that was really fun to learn from Elder Bradshaw. He is from Alpine Utah and really cool! They also have "Happy Burger" in their area, which has the Burger King sign but says Happy Burger and they sell delicious hamburgers! So I took advantage of that opportunity. Quality Hamburgers here in Peru are hard to come by. And also when I got back to Zarumilla, Elder Romero, the other Zone Leader, and my companion got one of the investigators with a Baptismal date!! So that was a real treat! Her baptism is set for the 27th of September. Honestly, we are going to have to work reeeeeally hard for that one. This is her 4th time with a baptismal date, and her parents are currently opposed to missionaries. She is 18, she knows the church is true, but we gotta work hard for her to get truly prepared. So that’s the homework.

Also J. is progressing great! We finally got to his house Saturday when someone was home and they were like "What a miracle you guys showed up!" And he has been waiting for us to come and help him prepare for the next Gospel Principles class at church! He was so set on attending and also in the lesson he understood everything super well!!! The weird thing is he actually didn’t show up for Church, so we gotta go see what happened there. But I think he could be one of our next baptisms.

Church was interesting. All the people we expected to come, didn’t. But the good part is that all the people we DIDN’T expect to come, DID!!! We showed up at like 8:45 (we start at 9) and there were 3 people sitting there in the sacrament hall. A middle aged woman and two teenage boys. I had met one of the boys about a month ago, the 17 year old, we knocked on his door about a month ago to share a message but never made the follow-up visit. And now he was at church with his aunt and cousin whom we didn’t recognize! Apparently she works in the store next door to us, but I never made any notice to that honestly... But they just showed up!! Then during the 3 hour church, Elder Orellana got to know them best, sitting with them chatting between all the meetings, and now Elder Corpona and I have the visit set for Tuesday! And Elder Orellana said they were asking about Baptism!! Now, let's not count the chickens before they hatch, but I am very, very excited to see what comes from this family. It was really a miracle they showed up! I'll keep you posted.

Also this week we helped Bishop Pastor in his chacra (plantation is the translation, more or less I think...) of Bananas. We got machetes and cleared off the dead leaves and all that. Super awesome experience, I will send photos soon.

Well, I have lots to tell you, but I seriously lack time... man. Sorry!! But this week was great and another great week to come!! We have a bunch of service planned, new investigators coming up (finally we are finding!!) but we also have transfers coming up next week so we will see what that brings,

Love you all!!

Elder Collin Russell

I sent some mustaches in his birthday package… 

it looks like he put them to good use at a District Meeting :)