"It's raining, it's pouring the old man is snoring"

July 14, 2014

Hola familia!

Thank you all so much for your wonderful emails. I have the best family in the world! I hope that the family reunion was great. I'm guessing you're driving home right now... well if you are i hope that you are all safe and make it home healthy and peacefully. 

All is going well here in Jazmines! We played some more soccer this morning, it was a lot of fun. The young men don't have school this week so it was fun to play with Jonathan, Jose, Oscar, and Carlos. Brother Yanez the Elders quorom president also played with us. 

I forgot to tell you guys last week that Kevin, Jonothan, and Christian, the three boys we were teaching a while ago, Elder Flores and I, moved into the boundaries of another ward so we passed the reference to the other Elders and now they were just baptised! Super awesome. 

Last week I was blessed to do two more baptism interviews for Elder Wilson and Elder Rodriguez. They are working hard. I'm so happy to be working with all the Elders in my district. They are all great! The baptism of the two sisters went great. As the font was filling up the water suddenly shut off so we had to fill it up to a sufficient level by going to houses around the church, filling up buckets and dumping water into the font. That was a lot of fun! :) During the baptism service I just felt so much joy. I don't know what it was I just felt so happy! 

Brother Visente is moving along very good. Yesterday we went to his house later in the afternoon. We yelled to alert him that we were there (yelling buenas tardes or something like that is how you knock on doors here) but he didn't answer. We walked through his gate and found that the door into his house didn't have the lock on it and the window was open so we kept yelling, I yelled super loud right through the window and he didn't answer. We decided to go and teach another family. After teaching we decided to try again. The house was in the same condition but this time he answered! Turns out he was just sleeping like a rock! He happily welcomed us into his home made of clay blocks and we talked with him. Brother Yanez has been so wonderful with him also. He almost always goes and visits with us and one day we found him sharing a message with Visente as we got to the house of Visente. That got us pumped! Visente having a good friend in the ward is helping a ton! Last night he told us that now he has no desire to smoke. He used to be very addicted. There was a time when he was smoking three packs of cigarettes a day! He told us that the church is changing him. It really is the happiest thing I can hear as a missionary. He is such a great example of the power of repentance. The gospel truly blesses people and changes lives for the better. Please continue to pray that Visente can conquer his temptations. Thank you for all your prayers.

I love you all so much. Things are going great here! Have another fantastic week. Keep living happy. I encourage you to read the general conference talks. They are so powerful. Today I was reading the talk given by President Packer this last general conference titled The Witness. It is one of my favorite talks. Near the end of his talk he says ¨I know the Lord¨. We are so blessed to be led by apostles and prophets who know our Savior Jesus Christ and teach us of Him and His teachings. I know we belong to the true Church of Jesus Christ. It is a great blessing to be sharing this message everyday. I am so happy to be here with the power and authority to teach with the Holy Ghost and watch the gospel change people. 

Love Elder Conover

Pictures:  our church; chopping weeds and grass...with machetes for Hermana Josepha; after soccer, our bishop is the man with the grey shirt and hat. He is hilarious! We have been playing some good soccer lately.:)