Elder Jarom Sessions: San Pedro Week 1

Gringos!

Wow this week was crazy fast! and crazy different! Hmmmm where to begin.... well I had changes! It was a sad time. All Tuesday I spent visiting members and investigators saying goodbyes. It was rough! I made some really great friends there and I will miss them! And I'm disappointed that I won't see the people we have been teaching get baptized and progress :/ But its all good because I get to go spread the word in a new area!!.....the city of San Pedro!! And my comp is Elder de Leon from Guatemala!

New Comp Elder de Leon!

Im super excited to be here! My area is called El Smith! Its right in San Pedro like the west side I think. And let me tell you...it is soooo different than Dos Caminos. First there are no dirt roads which is super weird and all the streets are numbered and people actually give good directions haha. The houses all have' big walls and we have to ring doorbells to talk to people! Our house is just for me and my comp and its pretty nice! Big for 2 people. We live behind a members house. We also have a ward here! Church was so organized and started on time I almost felt like I was in the states haha And everyone has cars so its weird not seeing any moto taxis. If we visit a member at night and its 9 and time to go home, they drive us home because they don't want us to get robbed.....and they want to help us with our investigators...very different than Dos Caminos haha

Here in the Smith we had 2 baptisms this Saturday! It was so cool to see the whole ward show up and support them. One to get baptised is named Janette and she is so awesome! She is heading to the temple this next week to do temple work for her family!

Next was this little girl named Sury whose family we are reactivating! She is a special little girl and is so funny. And the first day I met her my comp asked her who she wanted to baptise her this saturday and she pointed at me! So this last saturday I had the great oportunity to baptize Sury! It was so amazing! usually she is bouncing off the walls but she was so sincere and full with the spirit. It was a great day!

Also In Dos Caminos Alicia and Mariela got baptised so hopefully I will get the pics today to send to you guys.

The weather here is really different. Every night it just pours rain(not like in mesa this last week) and my first day here when it started to rain I remembered I didn't have any of my books and camera in a bag and I had to crouch over and carry my bag and run through the streets. Its a weird sight for Latins to see some lanky gringo running by their house haha. But I'm excited to get to know more of my area and meet more of my zone!

Elder Porter, his bro from the CCM , is in San Pedro too!
They get to see each other on Pdays!

One thing i want to share was when I was in my last day in Dos Caminos. Its about Isis again im sorry im sorry its the last time I promise! haha. Well the last time we visited her it was a rough visit. She told us she believes in what we were saying but she wanted to know for sure and was praying to God to find the answer. But she hasn't received anything. She said when she reads the Book of Mormon she doesn't feel anything. She says when she's at church she doesn't feel anything special. And her whole family is fighting against her to get baptised and feels like God isnt answering her. As a missionary that is so hard to hear and I felt really down. I felt like that's not right... why is Heavenly Father not helping her? For a week I was praying to figure out what we could say to help her and my answer came literally the morning of our appt with her. I was packing my things and one of my old Ensigns fell to the ground on a page from a talk from Elder Ballard exactly about what Isis needed! About how God answers our prayers and what we need to do and really it was just perfect. We used his points in the next lesson and her whole attitude changed. It strengthened my testimony so much about the power of prayer and Heavenly Father always answers. Doesnt matter how hard the mission is at times, its expierences like this that make it all worth it!

Love you all!

Adios!

-Elder Sessions