Bomb Week!

John the Beloved in the new Bible videos!

Hello everyone! How was everybody's week?? Thanks again for always writing me and keeping me informed of your lives. It’s always so good to hear from you all.  Okay well as for my week we had a bomb week! It was super great and I actually want to share what just barely happened about an hour ago.   As a zone we had the opportunity to have "Spencer" the man who plays John the Beloved in all the brand new Bible videos come here and talk with us.  He showed us some behind the scenes footage of them filming the life of Jesus Christ and the New Testament dialogue. It was fantastic! He is a super real down to earth guy and was a very good speaker. He actually lives in one of the wards I cover and said he would come out to lessons with us since he speaks Spanish from his mission in Peru. Now how many missionaries can say they have had John the Beloved come out on splits with them??? Yeah not many :) ha-ha For those who don’t know who he is, he is the long haired clean shaven apostle in the videos.  So go check them out. They are amazing and I learned so much about them!!

Chating with John  the Beloved!

As for our teaching this week, we had a great week (even better than the week before).  We have improved in every way and in our numbers and confidence as well. Elder J** and I are doing great together and really have seen the Lord bless us as we have tried to live and work to the best of our abilities. Okay so as for baptism dates, we still have A** who should be baptized on July 26th! We also now have a man named L** who has a date for Aug 22nd.  I will explain more about him in a second. But A** is by far the world’s coolest and most prepared 9 year old I have ever met! She understands everything and every time we come over she is always asking us to teach her friends or cousins or somebody random.  It’s always great!  Ha-ha. L** is a man in his 30s who is going through some very tough trials in his life at this time. He has severe type 1 diabetes and is suffering from that and he also had an accident at work where he completely destroyed his foot and so his whole leg is bandaged up and he CANNOT get it wet. He has accepted everything and said he knows this church is true and that he will be baptized once his leg heals. However it has been in a cast for over a year now due to the lack of blood flow from the diabetes he doesn't heal very quickly. So please keep him in your prayers that he will heal and be able to stand and go into water!

Sprained ankle!

We also have been teaching a man named R** who is a crazy miracle. So on Tuesday, we were getting ready to go to the doctor for my foot since I was hoping on my foot and couldn't walk at all. So I hoped into the car and shut the door and was waiting for Elder J** to come in when I heard a guy contact him and they started to talk outside of the car.  At first I didn't think anything of it but then I was all, "what the heck am I doing??'" ha-ha So I got out and we all started to talk. Turns out he has just gotten out of prison of 12 years and is ashamed of his life and wants to change and be clean from all the guilt he has in life. His family kicked him out a while ago and he has nothing and lives on the streets. We talked with him and had two great lessons with him this week! He said he wants to join our church as he continues to learn more!! Wow God puts people in our path when we least expect them and I am always being reminded as to how I need to talk to more people and never ever judge anyone! All of us have sinned, and the atonement is for all. It was a great week overall and we just hope to keep teaching more and improving daily.

Fun with the Seniors.

I was also able to go on exchanges this week with Elder B** who I watched be "born" into this mission back up in Ximeno.   I was able to go into his area and it was great to see how much progress he has made especially in the language. At first he spoke not a lick of Spanish but now he is making great leaps so props to him.  We had a great exchange and were able to teach a lot of less active members in his area. As we passed by one member’s house in particular we were able to talk to her 15 year old daughter at the door. She explained how she has had a rough life and suffers from depression and all sorts of other problems and how she started binge drinking at age 10 and then got into drugs later and how she has decided to stop and put God in her life so that she can receive more guidance and strength. Wow it was very humbling! I have never met anybody who has started that young and was able to want to change their life around so quickly.  I hope we will be able to help her down this road.

Horseshoes with the Seniors!

But that’s about it for my week! We have of course still been passing by our older ladies at the senior center to play lawn bowling, bingo, and horse shoes. Ha-ha There is a 97 year old woman who plays with us and she is hilarious. Ha-ha Love it. But love you all and miss you so much! To everybody who reads this just know how grateful I am for each and every single one of you and for the impact you have made in my life whether big or small.  I do appreciate it :)

Dios sea con todos ustedes esta semana!! Nunca se den por vencidos!

Con amor "el lobitio"
Elder Woffinden