Very jealous

You guys got to see Glenn Beck!?!?!? What the flip?

Oh...

Hey familia!

Anyways. I´m a bit jealous that ya´ll got to see one of my heroes. I guess I´ll be able to go to an event of his when I get back.

We have transfers tomorrow (I had to think for about ten minutes before I translated ¨cambios¨ to ¨transfers¨) and all that I know is that I´m staying here in Juarez 2 and Elder Diaz is leaving. We don´t know where he´s going or who our new companions are, if we´re training: nada. Elder Bird changed the way they do transfers here. Now we get a notice from our leaders if we need to report at 9:00 in the offices on Tuesday. That´s it. Elder Diaz was mad and I was just a bit disappointed that I´m staying here in Juarez. I was throughly convinced that I was going to be transferred.

But the work progresses. Sort of. We haven´t had an investigator in sacrament meeting for about a month despite all of our work. We did have one less active member attend, so there is that. Hopefully with the fresh blood of my new companion the work will get a bit of a boost.

Oh, we´ve had some weird experiences with a family named Castilla Villejas (still not used to the whole two last name thing) that we were teaching the other week. It was one of those ¨missionary experience¨ moments. We were heading back from a failed contact when a shirtless man rushed out of his house and invited us in to teach him, and, being misisonaries, we obliged. After he put on a shirt he and his wife related how they had been in Las Vegas (home!) the other week and had tried to visit one of our chapels when it was closed and that they wanted to learn more. 

We started in with the First Lesson and watched as their excited faces transformed into nervous and confused faces. When we comparted the First Vision and asked them what they thought the formerly shirtless man said ¨The Bible says not to listen to angels.¨ And they were very skeptical and hesitant to agree to reading the Book of Mormon, but we eventually got the wife to agree to read which pushed the husband to do so. We comparted our testimonies, tried to get them to commit to baptism, and left a bit discouraged.

A few days we returned to the house to teach them again. We were greeted by the visibly shaking, nervous formerly shirtless man. He invited us in and we began talking about the Book of Mormon and asked if he had read it. He said ¨No, but I want to show you guys something.¨ He then turned to the computer which had been playing a pastor´s speech and changed it to another video. It was a grainy, grey, obscure picture of two missionaries with a voice talking in the background about how evil we were, how we believe in salvation through works, how we don´t believe in the Bible, yadda, yadda, yadda. Then, still shaking, he told us ¨Tomorrow you´re going to remember what we talked about today.¨ I responded with probably the most heartfelt testimony I´ve ever given about the truth of the Gospel and the ability it has to pierce the darkness that exists in this world, including the lies of ¨locos¨ (I used that word) in YouTube. He sent us on our way and we have no plans to return.

Not exactly a happy story, I know, but it´s a story of how a man who was given all the opportunites in the world to accept the Gospel and completely rejected it. It´s an example of free agency and the fact that God and his servants can do all they possibly can, but sometimes people are just to deeply steeped in the darkness of this world to accept the truth. It was a bit of a wake-up call for me and gave me a little boost of energy to keep on trying to bring light to a world that has a little bit too much darkness.

Still very jealous that you guys got to see Glenn Beck. And you kids are flipping old. In 4 months you´ve all gotten so old. It´s a bit sad but good at the same time. It´ll be interesting to compare the before-and-after-the-mission pictures.

I love you all and am still praying for you guys every day. Remember to pray for me. Here´re a few parting words from the Prophet Joseph Smith that I´ve memorized in the last few days:

"The Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear, till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done."

Love, 

Elder Brayden Decker