January 9, 2012

Hey everyone,
We had a "Rebound Week". In other words we worked hard and have things back on track. We had a ton of investigators show up to church, not only in our sector, but in the entire zone. We worked really hard this week and we have seen the fruits from our labors. This week I actually had the opportunity to go on splits and work with Elder Reed for an entire day and study with him the next morning in our sector. We have changed a couple of things that we are doing in the sector and one of the things that we have done better is that we have bettered our planning at night. The night before Elder Reed came over to work with me I planned out a day of pure finding...we didn't have a single visit scheduled and we managed to enter into 7 houses of non members and teach lessons to every one of them. The day went really well and the next day when Elder Ford came back we managed to do pretty much the same thing. We have invited almost all of the people that we have found to be baptized and almost every single one accepted. It has been a really good week and it was topped off by what happened on Sunday. Marcelo came to church again and although he hasn't accepted a specific date to be baptized he is progressing toward baptism for sure. Anyways, Sunday was testimony meeting and his wife got up and delivered a powerful testimony directed right at her husband and said over the pulpit that she was glad to have her entire family in the church and that she knew her husband would be getting baptized soon and that she was glad that his time had finally come. It was soooo good and I felt sooooo good seeing the tears roll down her eyes as she bore testimony of the truthfulness of the restored church of Jesus Christ.

Anyways, I have to go write those essays for my BYU application, but wish me luck and keep on praying for the people that we are teaching. I love you guys with all of my heart and hope that all is well and that you all are safe.

Yours truly,
Elder Cody Dastrup