3rd Week is the Charm!

What a great week it has been this week! Let me start off with Monday - we were finding people and we found Jose! He is from Mexico and he is interested in hearing la palabra de dios (the word of God) he has a family in Mexico so he likes our focus on families. We taught him the first lesson on Monday. Also, about Martin he moved to Pamona :-( but he will be taught over there. We told the missionaries over there about him.  Tuesday I had the opportunity to go to Pasadena because I went on exchanges with our District Leader Elder Larson he is from Arkansas. We were finding people in his area and it's a beautiful area but you never want to go downtown! We taught one of his investigators and it was a pretty funny experience. We talked about temples and then we asked him if he was ready for baptism and he said I don't know. Elder Larson was asking him the baptismal interview questions and when he asked if he was married he said not all the way. So Elder Larson was freaking out because this is Tuesday and he was going to get baptized Sunday!! Elder Larson called other missionaries to see what to do because his family was living in Mexico. He wanted to know if it would be ok since this man (can't remember his name) didn't live with his family they said it'd be ok. Then Elder Larson said it was ok and we had a member say that the man should get married by law first. The man said oh I am married by law just not in the temple! haha! So yeah everything was good there! Then I ate real authentic Mexican food for the first time at a member's home in Elder Larson's area. We had carnitas it was super tasty because those members both work at restaurants and know how to cook really well!  Wednesday was a normal day but the highlight of Wednesday is that we got a referral from the English elders.  It is a man by the name of Alfredo because he speaks Spanish. We went over and shared a message about families and he said he would want to learn more! It was so great! Thursday was Elder Betty's turn to go with Elder Larson so it was me and Elder Chadwick (Elder Larson's companion) in San Gabriel and since I'm assigned there I had to drive! I was really nervous about the driving part especially because I haven't driven since January and I have never driven in California where there are A  TON of crazy drivers! It turned out good I drove well and we had lessons and found 5 new potential investigators so it was a good day! Friday is weekly planning so there isn't much else that went on. We were finding people and found 2 potential investigators that said we could go back though! Also, it was really cloudy and we had lots of rain on Friday! Saturday was a crazy day! After studying we went to this lady by our house named Miria (meer ee a). She has a family and we read the introduction of the Book of Mormon with her and she wants us to come back so there's investigator number 3! We also went around everywhere knocking doors that day! Sunday we had ward council and church it was a good meeting. We also knocked on doors and visited less actives and members for referrals.  Our goal this week is to go by members and get referrals because if a member gives a referral and helps with the lessons and stuff it goes from a 1 in 1000 chance of someone getting baptized to a 660 in 1000 chance! It will be a lot more helpful if the members can give referrals. So, if the missionaries come by give them everyone you know their names as a referral it will really help!!! This upcoming week we have Zone Conference and get to go to the LA Temple so I am super excited about that!!

Love, Elder Reisner