Your letters make me happy.

Mom's note - Really fun letter from Austin. More pictures. He also sent a picture of our neighbor's son on his mission. Apparently, Austin's mission president just got home from being a senior couple missionary in Virginia, right before he was called to California to be Austin's mission president and when he was in Virginia he worked with our neighbor's son! Small world. Did that make sense??

P-day fun at his apartment.

 Maps of their area....Concord. They are mapping out new places to go to find people and where they have been.

**Hello Family!! Thanks for the letter. It really makes me happy!!

How was my week? My week was a really good week; just the last couple of days in specific too. We have found a lot of new people to teach this week and they are really good. We are working a lot with the members now and asking for referrals which has really been working out. It’s so amazing.

I will start with explaining about the investigators that we have and those that we have found. On Monday we taught a Brother Valenzuela. I taught him a long time ago with Elder Bradford and this time he asked us to come and visit him. His wife is a member in Guatemala and wants him to be baptized so they can be married. He is a good guy. In the lesson that we had he brought his copy of the Book of Mormon and sat down and was ready to learn. He is a sad guy. He works a ton and has a lot of trouble with the word of wisdom which really is hurting his health. We weren’t able to visit him again this week and we aren’t sure where is his interest because of his wife pushing him. We want to help him so were doing all that we can.

We found a new lady through a referral,  Sister Piliar. She is great, but has been so busy since our last lesson. She canceled our second lesson which was a bummer. We hopefully can visit her again tomorrow. We say here, Trabajo Mato al investigador! haha Es verdad pues. Pero de todos modos estamos felices and aunque muchos de nuestros investigadores no hayan podido a reunirse con nosotros segiumos trabajando. )(Looked it up on Google Translate…..means something like even though the investigators are unable to meet with us we are happy and still working. – Laurel) Oh oops. The other investigator that we have is Sister, Eliza. We have taught her a lot but she still hasn’t accepted a baptismal date which isn’t good. Her husband told us that he already changed religions and doesn’t want to again. The wife is amazing though but is very clinging to the husband and does what he does. She won’t come to church unless he comes and he will not! It’s tough because she is reading the Book of Mormon and prayed and received an answer it’s just her husband that’s pulling her back.

We also got in contact with Marta again. We just dropped by with a member after a lesson we had, after a long time of loss of contact. We knocked the door expecting to drop her but she opened it and said "Come in!" As surprising as that was we went in and taught her and got back in acuerdo con ella. (no clue how to say that in English). (This is Laurel again. Looked it up on Google Translate and it said Deal with it. That doesn’t seem to fit, so I am not sure what he means!) It went well and we invited her to come to the sister baptism that Friday. On Wednesday nothing happened. We went out to the outreaches of our area in Martinez and tried to find people. Found nothing. We came back to Concord and there I had a bad experience with a guy. He was yelling at me because I knocked his door... After dinner I did the baptismal interview for the three investigators of the sisters. The mom and the two daughters, 11 and 12. So they were young which was fun. I had been practicing that interview everyday with my companion so I knew what I was doing. I was still nervous and also was the mom. It was funny we both were scared! We did the interview in a little side room in the church. It was amazing! She amazed me with her testimony and her desire to be baptized! I had no doubt that she was ready. It was a great and powerful teaching opportunity also. The 2 daughters were easy to interview because it was in English and also I don’t need to go into super detail with the questions. One of the daughters is so smart. She answered everything and has such a testimony. The other girl was hard because she couldn’t sit still! It went well though! It was such a great learning experience for me.

Thursday we spent all morning with the Zone leaders taking them to Pep Boys for their car. We went back and Forth all morning. Got to know them pretty well. We had district meeting that day also. I chose the elders in my district to give the training, to give them an opportunity to teach and to lead. They did a great job. They did it on helping members gain a testimony of the book of Mormon by the spirit. You know me I am passionate about the book of Mormon. It was a great training and I was able to teach also in the practice because I had a good experience with that on my own. We taught a member to help him share the gospel with his wife. It ended up that he was talking about his testimony of the book of Mormon. He used to be a councilor in the branch and had read the Book of Mormon but had never PRAYED about it. I was like what? I spent that lesson explaining about the spirit and about the importance of gaining a testimony from the spirit. It was interesting the difference of "I know" and "I believe" in that lesson. I taught that the spirit gives us "pure Knowledge" and that through that we "know" it’s true and nothing can shake us. We invited him to pray about it that night and he said he would. So because of this experience I was able to help the district a bit in the training. It was good.

We went to the mission home on Friday to get a new phone. While I was there I saw Elder Bradford and Elder Rodriguez. Elder Bradford wasn’t too great to see, but Elder Rodriguez was like "HOLA TIO!!" and gave me a big hug. He is so awesome I love him so much! He has been my favorite companion so far! His companion is a red head and reminds me of Walker Johnson. haha. (A friend from school – Laurel)

That night we had the baptism of the 3 investigators of the sisters. It was such an amazing baptism. One of our investigators was able to come, Alfredo. Also the family Garcia. Brother garcia was a witness and sister garcia gave a prayer. They are so cute and amazing. They are awesome. Brother Garcia had us help him tie a tie and he looked so good! haha.

Sunday was the best day ever. Our district achieved our goal for investigators at church which I was so happy with them! After dinner and things we met with a member and we went with him to visit one of his friends. It was great, he let us in and we had a great lesson. After her we had the most amazing lesson in the world! We dropped that member off and went to go visit a new investigator who is the neighbor of a great member. We went to the investigators house and talked to him and invited him over to the members home. That was the best decision ever. This man that we taught, Brother Carlos, I had taught before with Elder Bradford. We had taught him but after a 2 weeks he just disappeared. Last night when we met with him he said that he never stopped reading in the book of Mormon and what happened was he was put in jail for some things he did. He said that he longed to meet again with us. The member was able to give him support and it was amazing. Brother Carlos explained that he can’t take his life anymore how it is and wants a change. He is so confused and none of the  churches he has been in have "filled him" We taught him the restoration last night and the member helped us so much. Brother Carlos wants to change and was so humble and wants to help his family. The member had his wife and family there and testified that the gospel does bless families. The spirit was so strong. I talked about the atonement and how it can change us. The member testified that and actually began to cry and the spirit just enveloped the room it was so powerful. That experience has been the most amazing I have had so far in my mission. This man investigator will be baptized, he has got the desire and wants it. Later that night we received another amazing referral from a member and the member wants to help us teach and everything. The Lord is providing us with those who are prepared.

thanks family! Got a email from Erik. Hi Erik you still make me laugh!!!! Love everyone and I'm waiting for that package! Talk to you soon!

Elder Hill