Elder Taylor Moulton: Week 38: Movie Power, Lots of Tears, and Glow-in-the-dark Stars

Hola family!!!

Dang it was heavy this week. We worked our posteriors off working with
members, spending lots of time with our progressing investigators, and
having the great experience of our phone almost dying because the cord
broke, leaving us running to catch a train on Saturday morning to the
district leaders piso to get it charged before we lost the phone,
phew! We had two investigators who's baptismal fechas were dropped
because they couldn't get to church too, we only had one who could
come. But at least there was one! But yea what's life in the mission
field without its highs and lows!

We had the sad opportunity to listen through the tears of one of our
investigators named Jennifer tell us she couldn't meet with us
anymore, with Hermano Toni one of the amazing member here who helped
us teach her there with us. Dang that hurt. That's the second time on
the mission when I've had an investigator tearfully tell us that they
couldn't continue with the lessons, it doesn't get any easier... But
hey, she's super nice, lives in our same building, and wants to meet
with us in the future!

A miracle that happened this week is just another example of how
prayers get answered! It was Saturday night, our lessons had almost
all fired on us, and we were on our way to some back up visits. We had
prayed before we left for help to find some new investigators, because
we had had a hard time with that the few days before. We headed down
this one steep hill in town with a few cafes and a bunch of Muslims,
and up on a balcony was this super nice old lady named Maria Angeles.
We talked to her for a bit about what we do, and she invited us back
on Wednesday, yes! 10 feet later(not exaggerating) we were
individually contacted by two people, a Cuban man who owned the bar,
who Elder Woodmansee talked to, and me with a middle aged Spaniard
woman named Montse, who was there with her 10 year old Nieto Orion!
She had had some bad experiences with the Jehovah's Witnesses, and had
5 of her close family members, including her husband, die in the last
few years too! I ended up testifying to her and her grandson about the
plan God has for us, and she gave us her address, accepted a Book of
Mormon, so did the Cuban man, and we continued on with our night! We
also found another new named Laura a little while later! I now know
that the Lord answers our prayers in line with our faith, that he will
not leave us alone to fight the fight, and that those four children of
God were not there in our path by accident!

We also showed Mar, our bright and happy investigator who's still set
for the 28th to be baptized, "The Testaments". She's been really
sensitive to videos before, especially the one of Christ's birth, but
dang this woman was in tears at the end of that one. Seriously, I love
that movie, and she loved it so much too that she's requested a copy,
even if she doesn't have a DVD player herself! She's so good, our only
struggle is helping her to understand that baptisms are the beginning, and
that she doesn't have to wait until November 29(her birthday) to do it
haha! Long story there haha!

Time management, I've never been the best at this one. I'm fairly
certain President Dayton knew that too about us missionaries when he
wrote for his weekly newsletter last week all about management our
time and the Lord's time as well. As well put by Spencer W. Kimball,
"wise time management is really wise management of ourselves!". If we
use the small amount of time we have on the earth to do something
good, positive and sometimes life-changingly amazing, we can look back
in 50 years and be grateful for the time we had, rather than
regretting the time we didn't use to its fullest! I hit 9 months in
the mission field this week, dang. And it surprises me still how each
month that I'm out goes by faster and faster, no thanks to the fact
that we've been working and using our time to our fullest the entire
day here in Manresa(we could still do better but hey effort!). Now if
one were to look for someone with the wisest use of time in their
lives(my mom, since she's always gotten me out the door on time!), it
would be Jesus Christ! "I thank him for his marvelous management of
time, for never missing a moment, even moments of meditation. Even
his seconds showed his stewardship!" Neal A. Maxwell Are we using our
seconds? I invite all of you, and I'm part of this too, to take a
moment to think, and pray for the ability to use our time for the best
things in life, to plan our days to live without regrettably wasted
time, and to show our love for the Savior by using this life to make a
difference(however big or small it is!)!

Another fun thing this week was when we had to stop by a chino(dollar
store) to get some things for the piso. We found in the maze of aisles
a stack of glow in the dark stars, for like barely nothing! Our inner
five years olds burst out with excitement, and now we have the Milky
Way above us as we sleep. We find some strange ways to entertain
ourselves here in Manresa! Overall a long, testimony building, and
great week in the mission, and I'm pumped to head into the last two
weeks of the transfer!

Love and miss you all!

Elder Taylor Moulton