A Crazy Awesome Week

Ross with companion, Elder Gonzalas
This is a chili manzana, hotter than a habanaro!
This is a rare scene, the Los Angeles Temple with no grass!

Wow, what an awesome week!!! First off, it sounds like you had an awesome weekend. I miss the family. Best regards and such to all. I really liked the pictures that were sent to me! It's good to see what everybody looks like! Hey dad, I had a dream the other night that you and I were wading in lake and fishing together. Awesome huh?

But seriously, we have seen a lot of miracles this week. We have been trying to boost our faith so that we can boost the miracles. And it works! We got a referral last week for an 11 year old young man in our area. We went over and contacted him and he ended up being really interested. We invited the mother to listen too. We taught them the Restoration and set baptismal dates for them on the 11th of September! After we invited him to be baptized he got really excited and wanted to know how we baptize people, and he asked us "after I get baptized, does that make me a mormon?" haha he has family that are members of the church, so he's heard a lot about the church. His mother felt the spirit soooo strong that she started crying. Now the next step is for the father!! They are from Honduras. Very nice. Please pray for them!

The other day we were doing tons of street contacting and knocking doors to try to find some new investigators. We had been walking for about 2 and a half or 3 hours and I wanted to get in the car and go somewhere else because I was pretty tired and we had had some good success. But the the Spirit prompted me to keep walking and finding on that street. So we kept going. As we were walking down the sidewalk we saw a bald latino man talking to somebody in a car, so we quietly gave him a card and moved on. We turned the corned and started knocking doors. After about the 5th door we saw the bald man come around the corner and call us back! We approached him and he started telling us that he wanted us to teach him!! We asked if we could go back to his house and sit down with him and talk, and he gladly accepted! It was sooo awesome! . He is from Guatemala. Very nice. Please pray for him so he can come to church.

"W" got confirmed this past Sunday! She is very happy to be on the right track. Her only support at home is her mother. Her husband isn't too excited about her decision. Please pray for her family. We tried teaching her little brother, but he just wants to argue and bring up anti-mormon things. Pray for him too. He has lots of potential.

You are probably wondering why I'm writing on Tuesday instead of Monday. We had an awesome Zone Conference yesterday instead of p-day. Elder Kevin R. Duncan from the Seventy came and held an 8 hour meeting with us! It was awesome! I learned so many good things. He talked about boosting our faith because the bounds are infinite for those with faith. He also talked about loving the people we meet with even more. I'm starting to learn that love is key in missionary work. Sometimes it's hard to love people when they just want to bash, or if they treat others poorly, or they live inappropriate lifestyles. But if we look at people how God sees them, our missionary work and our charity will increase! Awesome huh? I liked it a lot.

Hey guess what?? I've broken 180! I weigh just over 180! That's a new record in my life. All those pupusas are really starting to build up. We got up early this morning to go run before regular exercizes. Your son will be a tank by the time he comes home. Look out Dad and ANdrew!!!

We got to do temple service last week!! It was awesome! They are tearing out allll of the grass in the lawns! It looks terrible! Apparently they do it every 7 years and they re-plant it so it always looks nice and thick (like the hair on my head before my mission). But we got to do service inside while everybody else labored in the heat outside. My companion and I got to clean chandeliers. We got on ladders and took tons of little crystals off chandeliers and cleaned them in a solution, then put them back up. It was really tedious and took a long time. Kinda scary too. It was amazing to see how clean they keep temples! The clean every little crack! We wiped down marble and air conditioning vents after that, then we got to clean some glass. It was neat to see how many rooms there are in the temple that most people don't get to see usually. That temple is gigantic!!!

So that was our week. REally awesome! God has given us some great blessings, and we keep working harder and harder so we can give back to Him. Thank you for your prayers! I love you tons! I know this is God's work. His plan is perfect! I know the Book of Mormon is true, and Jesus Christ is our Saviour! Love, Elder Watkins