October 24, 2011
Dear Family and Friends,
Life is good and my companion is the man, we have been all over the place this week and a lot of good is happening. Of course the enemy of all righteousness is trying to thwart our plans but I know as we work hard our investigators will continue to progress! Real quick, I just wanted to send you this email I got from our Mission President that he sent out to the whole mission. “Please DO NOT have any personal letters posted on the internet by your family that can be found on the internet by any search engine. No information about any investigator or member should be on the internet for any reason. Please LET YOUR FAMILY KNOW, that no personal letters should be placed on the internet which would allow the public to view letters from you which contain any personal information about anyone by name or address. Thank you for your attention to this matter”. Anyway, I think you have already fixed that and you’re not putting the names of anyone we are teaching on the blog.
About my new glasses, I got the glasses last week and they are getting ordered this week. Sorry I didn’t wait but the doctor gave me a good deal. The eye exam was free I just had to pay for the lenses and frames. I should go get a physical as it would be a good idea to check my health out too. I’m playing soccer everyday and my companion who is a farm boy from Logan said he wants to learn how to wrestle so I’ll get into pretty good shape this transfer. I’m glad to hear about all the good news that is going on back home and that everyone is healthy. I got a letter from Abuelita the other day and it sounded just like all the old ladies we talk to out here, always saying, “Que Dios le bendiga" and referring to the Lord a lot. She is so awesome and I can’t wait to talk to her this Christmas on the phone ha-ha. Well a lot happened this week and I have got some pretty cool stories to tell you about.
This week we helped our Branch Mission Leader, Hermano P, with some service this weekend. I love Hermano P and he is the man. He is about 70 years old and stands all of 5'4, but he is a Spiritual Giant. He will stand up in front of Elders quorum and rally up all the members to support the missionary efforts. He is from El Salvador and when he speaks English he’s got an awesome accent. As we were helping him clean his garage, he kept saying to us in his accent, “Easy Money, Easy Money!" It was pretty funny and we would all laugh and have a good time. He is a great example as when we take him out to go teaching with us he will approach everyone he sees and share the gospel with them, Chyeah!!!!!!!!! O yeah, as I was doing service for Hermano P, I found some old school Reebok pumps. They are the shoes that you wore back in the day and you can pump them up. Remember the movie Robin Hood Men in Tights, when Achue is fighting the knights and he says," Hold up, let me get some air" then he bends done and pumps up his shoes. Ha-ha it reminded me of that movie and Hermano P said I could have them. I just thought that was a funny thing to find in my mission leaders garage!!
One of our investigators is getting baptized this weekend and he has a fresh fade haircut. I asked him if he could hook me up with a haircut and he said he would. So the other day we went over and he gave me the nicest haircut I’ve ever received. As he worked with precision, it took him about an hour and 15 minutes to line me up in the front so I would have a nice hair cut. I thought that was kind of like a tender mercy because he did a really good job and he wouldn’t let me pay him. O is the man!
Things are going great out here in Woodburn. We are working hard and stopping by daily so that we can help our investigators progress to baptism. As the goal gets closer for some of our investigators, greater challenges face them. C was supposed to be baptized on Saturday but we postponed it due to some word of wisdom issues. Now she is having doubts on whether she can continue and the word of wisdom is truly something very difficult to overcome. We will continue to prayer for her and her husband so they can progress further. A and O are doing great and they are getting baptized this Saturday. They have truly made some big changes in their lives and I’m glad to see them make this covenant with the Lord. S is doing well and still has the date of the 12th to be married to his girl friend. He is having troubles leaving his old buddies and his old habits, but as we teach him I know he will have the desires to change. Things are going very well down here and we just need to focus a little more of our time on the less active and the members so we can help strengthen their testimonies as well. We are trying to find a good balance and as some of our goals are changing, we are seeking the lords will to know what he would have us do.
My companionship is awesome. Elder B is the man and it is awesome as we both have the same work ethic. We don’t have to remind each other to do stuff and I’ve never lived in a cleaner apartment. I’m learning a lot from him and we are having a lot of fun.
Well, a lot of funny things have happened this week and I’ll let you know about one experience we had. We were contacting these people in an apartment complex and every so often someone would drive by blasting their music, whether it be rap or Latin music. So we decided when we were leaving the apartment complex to play some real music. So we turned on our LDS hymns pretty loud and drove through the apartment complex slowly. The faces of some of the Hispanics were pretty funny as they probably hadn’t heard LDS church hymns played in that parking lot before. It left a good spirit and hopefully that will leave some lasting impressions on those guys to listen to more uplifting music.
Love you all,
Elder Payne
