I Love being a Dad to the new Elder!

What’s Happenin Fam?!?!?!

How are you all doing? I haven’t heard from you all this past week but I hope you are all in good shape. My prayers are with dad and the musical, Rachel and Rebekah in school, soccer, and band, mom in the home and her other super-tasks, Austin in school, Grandpa in his health, and everyone else. In return, I ask for your prayers because this week has been a tiring one. We have worked hard but started off a bit slow in the week. By Thursday, we started having a lot of lessons and put in practice the commitment our Zone Leaders had given us on Wednesday at Zone Meeting. They committed us to invite everyone to be baptized or pray about being baptized in all of our lessons if they hadn’t accepted the invitation yet. Honestly, I thought it was a little intense to begin with, but when they started to explain their reasoning a lot more I totally understood. My calling is to invite, teach, testify, and baptize to the people I encounter on my mission. More than anything is to baptize them because that is what will give them Eternal Life. The ZL’s showed us the last two verses of Matthew 28 and then showed us some verses in the Book of Mormon as well to help us understand what we are suppose to do with the people. Our Zone hasn’t baptized very many people recently so I feel like this bold lesson that we received from them was necessary.
I love working with Elder Roundy because he is so supportive of me and is ready to work his hardest. We are getting closer as a companionship every day and are both committed to being better. (Side note: I love the word “committed” because it makes me feel truer to myself and the things that I do in my life. I put the thought in my mind that I will not quit what I am doing until it is completed. Commitment is what bases everything that gets accomplished in this life.) Roundy is learning Spanish very well but I’ve gotta learn to shut my mouth a little more in lessons and let him talk a bit more because I talk a blue streak. He LOVES collecting and writing down quotes which reminds me a lot of Dad. Some of the quotes he has are awesome. We have the most random conversations in the street and it really helps us to relax with all that we have to do.
As for investigators, Susana and Patricio have had a very serious situation happen between them because Patricio gets drunk once in a while which makes him angry and depressed. That separated them for sometime. Susana was with their children at their house and it looked like their relationship was going to be finished so we invited Susana to pray about baptism. She accepted…hooray!...right? NO. At church yesterday, Patricio came to church instead of Susana because he apparently wants to change. He told us that Susana let him back in the house. I don’t know what we’ll do but I know the spirit will guide us to the best solution. There are also 2 other new families that are praying about baptism as of right now. The mom of one family used to house the missionaries in the house where her mom lived. That is how she first met them. We have been teaching her (Rosa) and her 3 kids (Matias (18), Jacob (13), and Pedro (6)). The husband Esteban is one of the nicest guys I’ve met but he doesn’t want to hear us. We’ll be persistent with him though. I am pretty stressed lately with having to be responsible for everything in the companionship as a trainer but I guess it is just part of the job. Elder Roundy helps lighten the mood and is really a stress reliever. I think this could be one of my funnest and best companionships. I am SO EXCITED!!! This church is true and I love you. The Book of Mormon is true and our Heavenly Father loves us. There is my uncoordinated testimony for you all in this letter. Take care until next week!!! :) Con muchísimo amor, Elder Josh Boaz

P.S. Mom, could you send me Cody Jordan’s contact info if it’s posible. Also Corey Wilkin’s mission info. Love you tons and I will get a little letter out to you and dad soon. Bye Bye!!! Oh! Btw, pic 21 is Elder Roundy and me. :)