Week 94 - "hello!!!" - June 18 - June 24 (Primavera)

This past week Jonah and Elder Nuñez were able to work with some missionaries in Casa Grande.  This was one of his previous areas and also a previous area of Elder Nuñez.  You can go back in the blog to weeks 63-74 (Casa Grande) if you would like to reminisce ;)  They had a good time visiting their area and working with the missionaries that are there now. 

I'm sorry, not a lot of time to write, and we have a cita (appointment) at 6 so we have to head out a little early. We had a great week! We had 2 interchanges, with Elder Schwan, Elder Guerra, Elder McKamey, and Elder Alles. Arizona, Nevada, Chile, Argentina. They were some great interchanges and we met some pretty amazing people those days. One, is named Juan. Elder Nuñez and Elder Alles contacted him and then Elder Nuñez and I went back to teach him just yesterday and he is so sincere. Most people we teach aren't very sincere, or they become sincere as we teach them more, but Hermano Juan as real sincerity from the very start. During the lesson, he mentioned that ''God messed up when he made us because we are doomed from the day we are born. How does he expect us to be good enough to make it back to Him?". He also mentioned something about how it all had started with Adam and Eve, so we read with him in 2 Nefi 2 where it talks about the Fall and how it was part of the plan. When he read the verses, especially the one that says, "Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they might have joy", his face completely changed and tears welled up in his eyes. He was feeling the Spirit, and he knew that what the Book of Mormon said was true. He didn't know HOW that was true, so we explained it to him a little more and briefly explained why we are here and where we will go after this life, and he said ''I have never thought about it from that perspective''. We didn't have a lot of time to continue teaching him, but we invited him to come to church and to continue reading the Book of Mormon. He committed to doing both, and he did so with confidence. We then invited him to pray, and he said that he didn't know how to pray. We taught him, and he inclined to offer one. In his prayer, he thanked God for sending us to meet with him. And then he asked for forgiveness for all of the things that he had done in his life, and expressed his desire to be better and to follow Christ. It was such a powerful experience. When he ended, we all lifted our heads with tears in our eyes. He said that he was sorry for getting emotional and we laughed and said we're sorry too. Tomorrow, we are picking him up and bringing him to Church and will be presenting him to the ward members. It is so cool to be a missionary and see that happen first-hand. It's such a blessing to be here, and that's why I always joke about not wanting to come home because it just won't happen quite like it's happening right now ever again. 

Here is one other experience: One hermano told us that before he had talked to us, he had never had any interest in listening to any type of missionary. But when we offered to unload the things out of his car, he invited us in his home and sat down naturally to talk with us. In his prayer at the end of the lesson, he expressed his curiosity to God in learning more about the Plan of Salvation and commented that he was surprised at himself for letting us in. We know that he felt something different and, once again, thanks to Plan of Salvation, he has sparked a new interest in learning about who he really is. We also were contacting the surrounding the houses of the members and we had similar experiences as the first day."