January 22, 2013 (Perth Amboy)

And this is life eternal . . .

... that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou has sent.

John 17:3

I read this scripture this morning, comparing it to Christ's prayers of the Nephites in 3 Nephi 19. I love the intercessory prayer and I love the scriptures. I love knowing that we have a personal relationship with our Father in Heaven and that as a missionary, I get to teach my investigators how to learn to know their Creator. As I was praying this morning to close my personal study, I felt a fullness of spirit and mind as I thought that I was about to kneel and speak with the Being that created me, and about the fact that he is my Father and more, that he loves me, more than any earthly father has felt. And to think that we can not even comprehend that love. Man oh man.

I am emailing today because yesterday was MLKJ day and the libraries were closed. This week has been awesome. We taught a high of 27 lessons. One reason why we taught so many was because we went on a split Sunday night. Elder Giglio went with our branch president, President Zapata, and I ran off with Ezequiel Vasquez, a Puerto Rican brother (my same age) who is preparing to go on a mission. It was a good night. Ezequiel and I visited a Dominican family, Germania Figueroa and Nelson Abreu (woman in the Latin culture don't take the last name of their husband so it can be confusing sometimes). Germania is so awesome. Nelson, her husband, is not a member and no matter what we teach, be it about prayer, scriptures, or the Plan of Salvation, she brings up baptism and testifies to her husband and tells him that he needs to be baptized. It's hilarious. I swear, she's a better teacher than us. Nelson will be baptized soon, he just needs to start investigating and really putting himself into what we're teaching him.

We also had zone conference on Friday. I love zone conferences. They're such awesome opportunities to receive revelation, to spend time with President Jeppson and listen to his wise counsel and blessings, and also to have a good time with other missionaries AND get a free lunch. We did How To Begin Teaching roleplays, which was basically where we practiced teaching missionaries acting as investigators as if it was our very first lesson with them. I LOVE How to Begin Teaching, because you set all of the expectations that they have and that we have as missionaries. There is a list of 10 bullet points, that Elder Boyd K. Packer himself wrote, in Preach My Gospel, and I've memorized them and I USE them SO much, even if we've taught an investigator like 6 or 7 times. It's so important to let them know again and again why you're there, especially if they're slow investigators, or ones that have been investigating for TOO long. WE call those eternagators. Sorry I'm rambling, as usual.

One hilarious thing I wanted to share: Maybe sometimes when we're on the computers updating our Mormon.org profiles and on LDS.org, Elder Giglio looks at the profile pictures (on mormon.org, mind you, so duh they're not bad at all) of all the asian women. It's hilarious. I know he's in love with Japanese people, especially with a Japanese sister that he met in the MTC, so I'm not sure if he's looking for her or something. All I know is sometimes I look over at his screen and I see him selecting the "asian" button and for the age "18-24" and then I usually start dying of laughter inside as he scans all the photos ever so nonchalantly. Man he cracks me up.

Anyway, it was an awesome week. I felt the spirit frequently, tried my best to obey it and we taught a lot of lessons.

LOVE YOU ALL. Know that I love this gospel, my Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and I love the scriptures.

EC

ps - Some guy by my computer was asking me how to spell "conqueror" and another guy was asking me if I could help him with his resume and the word document, so I did. I definitely live in a low-income, blue collar world. I love all these people so much.

pps - Juan Jose's baptism is this week on Sunday and he's super excited for it. We're praying really hard for him and we're actually starting to teach him English too, as we teach him Gospel principles. I love him so much and I'm stoked for him to be baptized and become a MEMBER of the church.

ppps - HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOM AND KAI. I love you both.