January 6, 2011 "Start of 2011!"

Sent: Thursday, January 06, 2011 10:12 AM

Subject: Start of 2011!

Dear Friends and Family,

What a quick start to a new year!

   Yes, I know I'm coming home THIS year but let's not focus on that ok haha?? So the big news of the week is that Sabastion Mendez will be getting baptized on Saturday! He "passed" his interview yesterday with Elder Jones (ZL who I'm doing an exchange with right now) and tonight we are gonna set up the program and all that jazz (who I hope are still winning haha!). Sabastion is 12 and his brother "Gordo" who is 8 will be getting baptized as well. It's about time with Sabastion cuz missionaries have been trying to work with him for years now! What put it over the top is a boy named Isaac Porras who moved here from Tulsa recently and was baptized in June I think. Isaac and Sabastion have become fast friends and it's really helped the progression cuz Isaac is such a great example! For example, I'm reading the Book of Mormon right now (almost done!) and Isaac saw me reading it and he said, "I wanna read the whole Book of Mormon by myself." So he started! This kid is only 12 and he comes to church by himself cuz his dad is remarried (active mom lives in Tulsa!) and they go to the Catholic church. Isaac's dad drops him off on Sundays and Wednesdays. What a great example to all! 

    So a quick thought, read Alma 9 and think about our country! A lot of similarities me thinks! New Years Eve and Day were pretty anticlimactic around here. Needed to be in by 6 and still were normal teaching days! This year I stayed up ha cuz last year I was in the MTC and just tired haha! Now I'm used to the whole lack of sleep deal! The only thing different was that Elder Pennington got sick cuz his body didn't quite agree with some Mexican food we ate at a members house! So he was throwing up for New Year's Eve! Speaking of Mexican food, when we broke our fast on Sunday, we ate with Maria and Fernando (owners of Rascal) and they made Pasoli or however you'd spell it. Anyway it's basically pig's feet with pork and corn and cabbage and red pepper all cooked for like 16 hours! I actually ate the pig's hoof! Ya it was weird to try but surprisingly good! Last p-day we played a bit of b-ball at the church's half gym and I dunked it (have video evidence!!!)! I felt that the next morning! Oh ya, Rascal got attacked by another dog and was bleeding form side, neck, and head but is healing pretty good now!

    We had this lesson with a catholic person (referral) this past week and the first lesson was great! We went back a few days later and she had all these random questions and basically she'd been "anti-ed" by family members. It was pretty crazy ha but hard to explain! So I guess there's a member of the branch who's really not active and is about 40 who had his own church. It's a "cowboy church" which is a whole nother thing I'd have to explain. (I once saw a cowboy church that the members rode their horses into and sat on them for church!) Anyway, he uses his "priesthood authority" to teach haha and says he got his authority from the Mormon church. Well the stake president told President Roberts to deal with this and it's been turned over to us. We have tried to find his house and get a hold of him but haven't been able to yet. Basically we're supposed to tell him to come back to church or he'll be excommunicated!!! Crazy!!

    Jason is slowly progressing. I still feel like he'll get baptized but he just needs to keep his commitments before he's really gonna know this is true! It'll just be later then we originally planned. Still got faith and hope there!

    I instructed at my first district meeting on Monday. It went well and I taught about teaching people and not lessons!! We also had interviews and they went well as well! Big news: we have texting!!!!  WOW! Weird but President Monson said missionaries need it! So we have it! We had to basically sign our lives away to use it though! It will all be monitored and if a missionary misuses is then it'll be made known to the whole mission and that missionary will lose their emailing privileges for the rest of their mission! Scare tactic?? haha! But it's been a good tool for the few days we've had it thus far! We've been able to contact some people who we haven't been able to get a hold of for weeks!

    Oh on Sunday this member of the branch presidency was conducting (or how he says it conducing haha) and he said something way funny! And he didn't even know he messed up haha! He's Spanish. Anyway he called someone to be sustained as a primary worker. "All those that will in favor please show by the raise of the right hand. Any oppose please raise your left hand." HAHAHAHAH! It was hard not to laugh but I had to try not to cuz I was sitting on the stand to bless the sacrament! And he's "conduced" a lot so I dunno why he just slipped up on that ha!

    We have some great new people we're teaching! Veronica Woods, who wasn't able to come to church cuz the night before she suddenly lost all vision in her right eye! Way crazy but she's gonna come to church this week (hopefully) and really wants to know her purpose here in life! We had a great lesson with her last night with President Roberts and will see her again tomorrow. Yesterday we tried to see a less active family but they were "busy" so we did some knocking around that area cuz we had some time. Anyway I randomly picked this road after a few houses and after a few houses on the new road we met this man named Erafmo Estrada, but we just call him Mo. Mo invited us right in and we had an amazing lesson. We taught Mo, not a lesson. We taught him what he needed to hear. When we started talking about Joseph Smith a little bit and how he received an answer to his prayers and how how Mo can get answers to his prayers too, Mo said, "So what happened to the Smith guy? Did he find the right church?" Boom! We told him straight up what happened. He said he felt amazing and really wants to read and learn more. We'll be seeing him tomorrow as well! Veronica and Mo are 2 of the most legit 1st time teaching experiences I've had yet! it was great! I'm excited to work with them more and help them progress!

    Hmmm that's about it for the week I think! Elder Jones and I are gonna head to Lubbock here in a bit and switch back cuz we're on exchanges. We'll prolly play some b-ball there in Lubbock too! SWEET! ha

    Well I hope ya'll have made great goals for the new year and more importantly ways to achieve them!!!

Love ya'll!

Elder Nix