Missionary Work is the Best!

I have gotten a little behind on the blog with job changes and just being busy. Here is Ben's letter from January 12, 2015

Hola Familia,

How are all of you doing? I hope you all have a wonderful time at grandma and grandpa's house. Today is the birthday of my companion. We're going to have an asado (Barbeequ [i don´t remember how to spell that]). I usually fix his spelling errors, but I thought this was a good representation of how much he has immersed himself in the language. He is forgetting English.

This is an amazing ward! The members are all super willing to help. It's amazing! My companion and I have been passing by all of the strong families and sharing some spiritual thoughts, gaining a little of their trust. There have been some "bad" missionaries here in the past and at first haven't been that trusting. But now they really have great confidence in us and are starting to participate in the mission work more and more.

It's something that my companion and I have noticed throughout our missions. It is that almost no one (missionaries and members) knows how we should be working together. There simply was no culture built up in the past. But now we're starting to get everyone on the same page. It's given us some good results. 

We've been blessed with some WONDERFUL references (people that they have been preparing for years but didn't really trust enough in the missionaries to pass the reference). Two are some relatives of a member. They are probably some of the sincerest people I've met. 

One is a lot like Gram and is really loving and grandmotherly, and the other reminds me a lot of a non member version of Aunt Jen. Both wonderful people sincerely looking for the truth. Another reference was Nefi; he is part of a family of all members that inactivated a few years ago, so Nefi was never baptized. Now that the family is reactivating we'll also be working with Nefi [Nefi is spanish for Nephi].

Missionary work is the best!

so...be thinking of people to share the gospel with and follow what the Spirit tells you to.

I've been thinking of a family back home and every time that I pray for Heavenly Father to give me the name of someone with whom I can share the gospel while we are with the members, this family always comes to my mind. So I'll prepare something written personal for them that the missionaries or you guys can give them from me.

P.S. if you could send me a mug shot of each person in my Family Tree that would be awesome. I've put the goal of filling out the pamphlet "my family" completely full to use with the investigators, recent converts and less actives, with pictures where possible. So if you could send me the mug shots of: me, Parents, my siblings, Aunts Uncles and cousins (All together), Grandparents, Great Grandparents. If they can be separate or cropped to just one person it would be preferable. and maybe a baby picture of each (if possible).

Love you all so much,

Chao

Élder Benjamin Taylor