To start off, I´ll answer the questions about the plaque. I actually thought that you did that a long time ago and that it has been hanging up during my mission. I don´t have my scriptures with me at the moment but I´ll try to remember the scripture reference. I think it is D&C 6:10-11, but I´m not sure about the verses. It says, “Tienes un don y bendito eres a causa de tu don. Recuerdas que viene de arriba...” Um, in english it says something about having a gift, that it comes from above, and you´ll use that gift to learn mysteries to the convincing of many of the errors of their ways. It was written to Oliver Cowdery. Those verses impacted me very strongly when I read them for the first time a few days after I received my testimony of Christ when I was 17. And Mom, I assure you that for me, the time has flown by much more rapidly than I could have ever imagined.
I´m glad that you are enjoying the winter Olympics so much. I love the winter Olympics, but I guess that I´ll have to wait 4 more years. I haven´t heard anything at all about the Olympics here.
This past week has been an ubrupt change from what I´m used to. Being closer to the city center, everyone here is a bit more established, making it a lot harder to proselyte. It is very different trying to preach to people who have lived in the same house 40 years, has a steady work in the which they are never home with time, and are never sitting in their front porch, than to do so with people that are still building their house, having moved there within a few years coming from another country, are always home because they can´t find a steady work, and are younger and more open to new ideas. But, I´ll say that the ward is a lot stronger.
Recently, the boundaries were changed to make the San Justo branch into the San Justo Ward. The bishop is really good, but I don´t think we´ll have quite the same relation as we did with the bishop of Jardines. This Sunday, Santiago Romero, a returned missionary that recently got married was called as the new ward mission leader. The old one was always working and didn´t always go to church. So, I have good hopes.
This past week, we mainly focused in several “eternal investigators” in trying to help them get to church, but even though we went to go look for them, they didn´t come. We are also teaching the 21 yr. old daughter of a member and she came for sacrament meeting. So, she helped renew our hopes. This week, we´ll try to expand the teaching pool. This week it also poured and poured. On Friday, the streets turned into rivers up to our shins. But we had fun plowing through them anyways.
It has been a lot harder to get to know the members here because we receive a vianda (carry-out?) every day from the members because their husbands always work during the day, which is good, but more difficult for us. I guess I´ll be learning how the mission is in the majority of the world here in San Justo. I´ve always heard that it is harder here in the zone of Oeste, but I also know that outcome isn´t caused by circumstance. We can have a lot of success here with the help of the Lord and adapting to the circumstances.
I know that these things are true and will go forth among the whole world. I know that God protects us and will always guide us. He is at the head of this work and will always be.
With Love,
Elder Drake Ranquist
I figured out how to get pictures back up!!! I got a new laptop in the summer and had never been able to do it. I would save his pictures, but then I couldn't find the file. Here you go! I'll try to upload some of the older pictures too...
Nieves, who got sick and stopped smoking. I hope to hear good news about her in the future.
Me teaching a little bit.
The piano class that I was teaching. Several of them are recent converts, family, and friends. Next to me is Jonathan Dominguez, our ward mission leader.
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