10 months! (Week 42)

Hello family!!!

Holy heck! 300 days as a full time missionary?? The days feel like weeks but then the weeks feel like days... Sure is true! I really hope all is well with each and every one of you and I pray for you all when I remember... I still am working on not falling asleep as I pray in the morning hahaha

This week has been AMAZING. I am so blessed to be here as a missionary. We are definitely going into Winter here... Its getting colder earlier in the day and I am NOT ready for that. We don't have heaters here, so we just have to bundle up as much as we can. All I can say is that Im grateful for my super fancy shmancy bathtub shower. I may live there when it gets cold.

Anyway, THE WORK! The work is going really well. We are just seeing a lot of success with the Book of Mormon. We are reading it with our family that feeds us lunch each day and they came to church Sunday. Power. We worked with my favorite old man, Fernando Villegas, and read the Book of Mormon with him and after 3 weeks HE BROUGHT UP BAPTISM! Hahaha LOVE IT! MAGIC! I know I was called here to help bring him to baptism so I am sure hoping the 31st works out for him.

NELY WAS BAPTIZED! Yesterday morning at 7am. It was a super early morning for me, but it was great. For the first time in my mission, I am really seeing people progress as I become a better missionary. I know that I am imperfect, but the Lord works with imperfect people! But I am JUST SO EXCITED to see these people coming closer to God! We even have our great joven, Leo, just loving the church and wanting to get baptized! the 31st is going to be a great day, I think!

So you ready for some other craziness? So president willard, in answer to prayer, called a district leader training meeting and we CHANGED district meetings! They are ALL ABOUT PRACTICES! I hate practices. Even though I practice to live through life with piano. But I hate it. So president told us we need to practice and we really helped and was spiritual and I saw my best friend ELDER WILKINSON. We met right when we received our calls and now we are both leaders together. Love him. So I sucked up my pride and we started practices and we are seeing MIRACLES! the district meeting was a success and we are applying what we practice and we are just sulking in the lords blessings. I love it. Oh, a sister in my district got CHICKEN POX! no joke. Yup. Elder Risueño to the semi rescue.. the sister leader trainers did most of the work because i cant enter their house or visit them...

OH! I BARFED AGAIN THIS WEEK! Sorry, but its a good sick story. So my 10th month mark came and I ate a lot. I bought some delish white chocolate from a less active, a member bought us chicken and fries, I ate cookies, and coke, and oranges, and chips, and more chocolate. So when I got home I was like OH DANG IT. Here it goes again. And it came and went. I was NOT TOO WELL yesterday. But I was like THANKS DAD FOR HELPING ME. I just kept plugging along like my dad. And I made it through. Love yall.

Anyway, special thanks to Mom for the card. I sent her an email April 14th telling her I was going through a hard time and 3 days later she sent me this card cheering me up. PROPS TO KARE BEAR! I love you! You're the best.

And a special thanks to DFM or Dawn Fudge Miller for my books. Brad R Wilcox books are the best. Thanks for your testimony in it. I really just want you all to know something I've studied this morning. A testimony isn't just the light that we carry through the dark tunnels of life, it is the light that carries us through the dark tunnels of life. When we feel like we cant get through the troubles that face us, we know that the Lord is walking with us and will never leave us alone. I testify of that. I testify that as we search for a greater knowledge of our Savior, that it was what will get us through the dark days. As we take that light that we have and share it with others, we will see our light get brighter because God will want us to bless others.

As a favorite hymn says:

Abide with me, tis eventide

thy walk today with me
has made my heart within me burn
as I communed with thee

Thy earnest words have filled my soul

and kept me near thy side

I promise you that our Savior will abide with us only as long as we take this burning within our heart and help those in need.

I love you all and ask that you PLEASE send some piano solos for church or special musical numbers for vocal solos. That are hymn arrangements. People sing in my zone.

For a dollar!
elder Risueño