Chalco Highlights

Well I’m in paradise!!! I’m loving it here in Chalco, aka "the hood"!! I’m pretty much one of the natives here now so I blend in pretty good! There’s not a whole lot of time today, so let me just get to some of the highlights!

We have several investigators progressing right now, but the best one is named Adriana! She is doing great and knows the church is true! She just needs 3 more Sundays and she will be dunked!! Hoorah!!!

We had a lovely visit with a recent convert that is less active. "Elder Johns! How could someone be a recent covert and a less active at the same time?" I’ll tell you how! The chumps of missionaries before us baptized this guy and left us to clean up the mess! He is an Ex Jehovah witness so our conversation was a little nutty! He obviously didn’t have a testimony so we had to set him straight. We answered his questions and saw that he just wasn’t getting it. So I decided to be a nut, you got to be a nut! The following is more or less what I said to him:

"Brother, you do not have a testimony. You wanted to get baptized for all the right reasons, but you just don’t have a solid testimony. When I sometimes doubt my testimony I take it seriously. So you could try asking yourself the same question I do to myself. If someone kidnapped you and then put a gun up to your head (I make my hand into a gun and put it up to my head so he can really feel it) and told you if you don’t deny your faith they were going to pull the trigger... (pause to let the scenario sink in) what would you do?"

I told him I didn’t want an answer but I wanted him to think on it. He had a somewhat shocked face after all that, but hey! He showed up a half hour early for church for the first time in 2 months. So it totally worked!!!

And Saturday we helped an old member in our ward kill rabbits! He held it up to me by its back legs and then said “hit its neck as hard as you can!” That was so sweet! I went all karate kid on those bunnies!!! I’m going to see if I can get a rabbit pelt next time!!!

That’s all I got for this week! Thank you all for your prays! As Always!!!

Stay Classy,

Elder Johns

Farewell Cuaulta

Walt Disney once said, "When you wish upon a star, makes no difference who you are. Anything your heart desires will come to you." Well Walt, I've been wishing and my heart has been desiring for one thing for almost nine months! And just like you said, my wish has come true! I’M GOING TO CHALCO BABY!!! That's right people!!! I’m going down into the hood!!! This area has been great, and I'm sad to leave. But I also want to be straight thuggin' over there in Chalco. So it’s a bitter sweet.

Not too too much time today, but I’d like to point out some highlights of the week!!

1- WE FOUND JULI!!! She’s working at her store after 2 weeks of problems and being out of town!!! She looked so sad when we arrived. She had just finished crying and it was super sad to see. Her problems are with her brother so if you could send a prayer her way just for peace and comfort that’d be so awesome!!! Also she went to church Sunday and looked so much happier being there!!! Her whole aura changed and you could literally see the difference.

2- Friday was pretty funny. We were at the church around 8 for a meeting we had and when we got out there was a stake dance going on! Now because of what follows I know that I’ve been in the mission for a while. Me and my comp passed by, heard some pretty cool music and when I looked at him we both said the same thing, "that looks like so much fun!!" We were probably more excited than half the kids there haha and we didn’t even participate!!! Good times.

3- Like I said I’m going to Chalco. It’s going to be super sad to leave this area because I’m pretty sure it’s my favorite up until now!! Maybe I’ll get permission to go see Juli’s baptism. But I’m super stoked as well to be on edge at all times because you don’t know who has a shiv!!! That’s what I like to call living like Larry!!!

4- The Patriots Won yesterday! Nuff Said!

Good things happening here!!! Thank you for all the prayers! They help unexplainably!!! As Always!!!

Stay Classy,
Elder Johns

Juli

Arturo

Andres

Victoria and Vivian

Where's Juli

Not too many lessons this week. But that doesn't mean it was uneventful! I mean I felt like I deserved a Scooby Snack by Thursday! Now on to the week!!!

Tuesday. We ran around doing our thing, not too much happenin'. But we did decide to pass by Juli's store because she didn't make it to church last week and we wanted to see if everything was alright. We got there and it was closed. No big deal, we'll pass by tomorrow! So we kept running around. We chased some dog’s downs and barked at them just to shake things up a little. Average day.

Wednesday. We did a swing by on Juli's store to see what the happs were. And she wasn't there!! Somebody better make a call to those crazy kids from Cooksville and their dog too, because it looks like we got a mystery on our hands! We tried calling again and no answer. Not even the neighboring store knew what happened! And they talk all the time! We weren't worried, we were just confused about what had happened with her. Other than that, a few lessons fell through and we didn't have much success.

Thursday was a day of weekly planning. Oh joy. After we finished, we went over to the food. It was a sister who said she would be trying out a new recipe on us this week... that’s never good. This sister talks to TREES people!!! And she wants to whip up a big ol’ dish of who knows what, making us her test monkeys!!! To save the drama, luckily it was just a bunch of differently cooked mushrooms. There was also crickets on the table to eat. You best believe I went to town on those puppies!!! Salted and drizzled with lime!! That's good eatin'!!! We passed by Juli's store again, still nothing. So we finished the day off and at 10:25pm, we get a call. It's Juli!!! She's alive!!! She had had some family problems and won’t be working in the same place. But she's still very excited about her baptism!! Please send a prayer her way!!!

Friday was one of those all day leadership meetings and was just long! We got home at 8:30, so that was just delightful.

Saturday. Another day of not much. But that isn't our fault. We have a Zone meeting Monday and we are eating afterwards. And we were in charge of rounding everything up. We did get a lesson in with Maria and her daughter, Esmeralda. I don't remember if I mentioned her. But she is preparing to be baptized on the 30th of September! Also another investigator is Gabi. She's progressing so great I forgot she isn't a member. Therefore, I have forgotten to mention her. But she will be baptized this Saturday!!! She's awesome!!! If you can send a prayer their ways too, I'd appreciate it!!!

So there's my story this week! As Always!!!

Stay Classy,

Elder Johns