It´s official, I´m old in the mission field. Friday, we were going to have a baptismal interview (it fell through), and when the District Leader arrived(who´s from my same generation of missionaries...but is Mexican so he has more time in the field than I do), Elder Loya congratulated me. I was like "what?! Our appointment fell through and you´re congratulating me?" He laughed and said, "No, not that, congratulations! We completed 10 months in the mission today."
Wow. How weird, huh? It is so weird to think that I´m near to being halfway done with my missionary service. Everyone says that the second year goes faster than the first, and if that´s true, I´m in trouble! It´s going way too fast as it is. The months seem to fly by. Yesterday when a member mentioned the Christmas devotional, I was like, "Oh yeah, I guess it´s December." It´s really weird reading about home and how there is a bunch of snow and all that stuff. Here in Toluca, it´s pretty calm. November gave us a scare when it reached like 34 degrees Farenheit or something like that, I though it was going to get COLD, but it´s pretty warm now, and basically nothing like what I´m used to this time of the year.
Well, the time keeps going and all you can do is 1) look at the marvel of it, or 2) get to work!
This week, we could have done better on option two. I don´t what happens, but every appointment we have with investigators seems to fall through....including the baptismal interview we were going to have Friday, and a trip to the temple on Saturday. This week could have gone a lot better, and unfortunately, my companion got quite a bit discouraged because of it. I tried not to, but when your companion is discouraged, it´s hard to keep your head up. When you´re discouraged, that´s when the adversary works harder on you, because you are already likely to look at your failures, and your inadequacies. (which are multiplied when you're in another country and speaking another language.)
That is, discouragement is a downward spiral. Luckily, I was able to recognize that early on, and the next day, although, it wasn´t the best day, did get a lot better. I think I will start doing what Elder Javier and I did whenever we got discouraged. We would stop what we were doing, read a passage together in the Book of Mormon, say a prayer, and then get to work. After those moments, we were able to find investigators like Irene Sanchez, the Family Orea Zavaleta, and other golden investigators. I think the adversary really tries to get down on us when we are at the point of doing something important, the key is that we don´t get down on ourselves and find out what miracle is about to happen that Satan doesn´t want to happen.
We keep hearing stories of missionaries in the rain and deciding to knock on that last door, and finding investigators that want to be baptized in that last door that they were thinking about leaving unknocked. I don´t have experiences exactly like those....maybe I need to knock on more doors in the rain(and not a cloud in sight), but I believe it´s the same concept.
That said, I´m incredibly excited about this next week, I really feel like we´re filling the tank with new investigators. Finally, we are doing what we should have done all along, looking for new investigators. Only when we have people in teaching, can we be the best we can be.
Thank you all for your love, support, and prayers. Please continue praying for us. We need the help.
Cariños,
Elder Blackham
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