Letter from Sept 8, 2014
Hey Dad,
I'm doing great. Just realized in a few days I
only got 5 months left, so its killing me inside. The finish line is
getting ever more visible and it's a little scary. Not that I am dreading
going home, but Sacramento Mission has been my home. I have a great
family here, too. Of course, it's not the same, but I love them,
nonetheless. It's been pretty crazy here in Stockton. We have a lot of
families progressing and we are averaging about 25 lessons per week. For a couple weeks (for Spanish work) we were leading the mission for the
amount of lessons we had. I was pretty proud of myself and my companion
:)
I love being able to work hard and see the fruits of my labor come
alive as I work. The other day, we saw a kid walking from school and I
just decided to stop him and talk to him about the gospel. His name is
Treyvon Skelton. He is a senior in high school and was having a rough
day. Ironically enough, he has a good life and nice family, but his
problem is that he didn't understand what his purpose was in life and
had thought several times about ending it. He couldn't find God in his
life so he had wondered, "Then what's the point?". I felt impressed to
say, "The point of it all is to be tested. This is our training ground
Trey. Here we hone our talents and skills so that we can become
joint-heirs with Christ. It's a monumental challenge bro, but its
through Jesus' sacrifice that allows us to press forward. We weren't
sent down here to fail. Our Father in Heaven has been guiding you and
has heard your cries. His answer is the message of the restored gospel
that we share. That is why I stopped you, so you could listen to what
the light of his restored gospel brings." To make the story short, we
taught him the Plan of Salvation and passed him off to other English
elders. He has a date for the 4th of October and is very solid. That is
the umpteenth time I have sent a referral and it automatically turns
into a baptism. Kinda makes me want to do English work sometimes, but I
love teaching in Spanish so much. I've gotten really good at it ( I can
say that since I have become more fluent). I have gained a lot of
confidence in my language lately. I have been speaking words that just
flow off the tongue. Everyone just thinks because I'm half Cuban that I
just learned it growing up, just to be utterly shocked when I tell them I
learned in the field. I am pretty proud of what I have learned. I look
forward to speaking Spanish to you all when I return home. That is the
jist of what is going on right now. I love you very much and am trying
to immerse myself and then some in the work, so I won't notice the time.
But the problem is that I lose track of time and then realize that it's
all slipping away!!! Love you all.
Elder Sierra
Mom got:
no jafarin joke!! (using disney to cover slang and bad words)... the
entire zone thought it was clever so they are doing it too.
You will hear "Son of a Pumba" or "You're a Mufasin' Rafiki"
My favorite is, "Oh SIMBA"
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