"Carta Semanal"

Dear Family,

Wow! This week was so much better! I swear, the past month was like a roller coaster. Lot's of ups, and lots of downs. Now I'm hoping to be more on an escalator that is just continually rising up and progressing! I have realized that I only have about four months left, especially since Mom and Dad keep talking about the trip they'll be taking with Kevin to come pick me up. Ha ha! But it's ok. It's necessary to be able to plan the trip right. These last four months are going to fly on by!

I am very, very grateful to have Elder Cruz as my companion now. He has been quite inspiring and has reminded me a lot of myself when I first became a zone leader. Today we decided to go to the transfer meeting to help Elder Gonzalez take his luggage because he actually went home today! He got a call on Friday night from president telling him that he'll be going home on Monday, today. Anyway, while we were at the meeting, the elders and hermanas that are heading for home were ALL my friends! I can't believe that there are only two more groups that go home before me now. Time's running short and I still have so much that I want to do!

So this past week, we exploded in our area again! I swear this is such a ripe part of the Lord's vineyard. We only had two baptism dates and now we have 17! :) Got to love having lots of investigators with the goal of baptism! Anyway, we found quite a few people this week and we were able to put new goals with other investigators that couldn't attend for some reason. One family that is progressing really well is that of Hilda. She is so determined to educate her kids about the gospel now. She makes them pay attention and she takes them to church. They're quite a handful too! She's amazing.

We have another great lady named Alejandra. I don't remember if I told you about her. She speaks ONLY in Guarani. We've been translating bits and pieces for her and she's been super anxious to get baptized. She's this cute, old, Indian looking lady. She's got a wonderful spirit. She's very humble and knows that she needs to be close to her Heavenly Father. With these transfers, one of the new elders in my zone is from Paraguay and speaks Guarani perfectly! He's going to come this week and teach her about everything at once to make sure she gets an idea of what she's really doing while getting baptized. She's going to be baptized this coming Saturday if we can prepare everything for her.

We found a few more families and had some great lessons. We still don't know them very much nor have total confidence with them, but they were fairly interested in the message we had to share. One family fell through, though. . . Anabella was a contact that Elder Tantachuco and I did. She had recently lost her pregnancy and was really sad. Elder Cruz and I went by this week and we had an amazing lesson with her! She accepted to be baptized and wanted to do it in two weeks! She told us all her problems and basically asked us to tell her what to do in order to receive God's help. When we passed by another day, we met her husband that was very receptive at first. He listened, answered questions, and was listening attentively, but when we took out the Book of Mormon, he flipped out and got all defensive and didn't want anything to do with us after that. He asked us to never come back to his house and told us we weren't allowed to talk to his wife anymore. Bummer. We were so shocked that he was so against reading the book. I believe that Anabella might search for us anyway, though. She had so much faith! All we can do now is pray for her.

Alright, well, I have to go now. My time is up. I'm super excited to keep working and I think I'm working harder than ever! I lost another four kilos. I am getting back to my original weight from before the mission without even doing crazy amounts of workouts. I've just been dedicated and working with all of my soul to bring to pass this marvelous work of our Father. I love Him soo much. I love my Savior. I'm grateful for the plan that they have provided for me and the rest of you. I'm so glad to carry the name of my Redeemer over my heart and bring this glad message of hope and joy to all my brothers and sisters in Argentina. These people are so beautiful. They have amazing spirits and I never thought that my heart could be so capable of loving people I hardly know. My heart yearns to help them understand the gospel. The mission is the best thing that has happened in my life. I'm so grateful for it. I'll never pass a day without thinking about my mission. I'm sad to know that I'm coming up on the final stretch. I love you all and am so grateful for your support and love. I feel the strength that comes from your prayers. I miss you dearly. Well, until next week, remember to be happy and to just smile!

Love,

Elder Blake W. Cowan