Errors and all...

Dear Family!

  This week I don't feel like writing because everytime I make a mistake, the backspace button doesn0t work right away. Soyou now what?= I'm going to leave the errors . Sorry. It's jsut wey esier. Oh my gosh. I'm not doing this ion purops.OH MY GOSH hahahah! really? NAyway, this week has been pretty fun! President came to visit us in our humble apartment. He interviewed us tand talked about FOCUS. (i just typed "focus" all wrong, but it looked too much like a foul word, so I took the time to correct it). He told us to kae (TAKE) 5 minutes 12 times a day to just meditate on ONE topic without letting the mind wander. IT IS SO HARD. Try it. Then onece we can do it, he told us to take 10 minutes 6 times a day. then 15 minutes 3 times a day. Once we can do that, we'll be way better at focusing and receiving revelation for our investigators. Elder Turner, who had been feeling SUCH a lack of desire (seriously, i was doing all the work, all the thinking..." What's on your mind?" "Nothing" "Really? How can you have NOTHING on your mind?" "I really don't.") now is all up and wroking angain. That's good. President told him that I'm a great missionary who know s how to do everthing and that he needs to become like me ASAP. Wow. That made me feel good. This week we had s

  This week we had success too! We baptized Emma!!!! She's so cool. After the baptism she came up to me and told me "thnak you for being that lucecito that (the little light) lead me to this" and had tears in her eyes. I didn't realize how much she really felt this was true and wanted to do it. I felt humbled. She's really tough too because ALL of her family rejected her now. Even her 3 daughters. Whoa. And I spoke in sacrament meeting. It's one of my favorite things to do, speak in church! Everyone here gives boring talks,s o i Get to spice things up. I talked about OBEDIENCE: and commpared it to a pie. In 1NEFI 20:10 it says in spanish that we're all pies in an oven of affliction. So if we want to turn out right, we've got to follow God's recipe. WE CANNOT DISOBEY. I compared three obstacles to making a great pie 1) mixing the ingredients mal (priorities all wrong. 6 days work 1 day God. Family > sports etc)  2) never putting the pie in the oven! (like not doing hometeaching, reading scriptures, family prayer.."YOU AREN'T PUTTING THE PIE IN THE OVEN")  3) leaving the pie in the oven too long (being in the world not of the world). I talked about how IF WE LOVE HIM, WE KEEP HIS COMMANDMENTS. I told about how dad USED to be a firefighter and would come home with sad stroies of childern drowing or accidents caused by drinking and driving. The commandments are for our PROTECTION. STOP JSTIFYING SIN. It was great.

   The part that I want to tell you about was this: at the beginning I joked, "I'm really nervous and am shaking. Let's say it's because I only have.. one month in the mission." Everyone chuckled. haha. At the end, wehn I bore testimony, I told them, "The truth is that I almost have 21 months and soon will be going home. Wow" AND IT HIT ME. And I started to cry. I had to take a pause and collect myself. We had 11 people we'd brought to church (families are way more effective that just one person, Max. DO IT! :) ). I didn't want to embarrass myself. I ended fine, control. I sat down. And I just wanted to cry. I really really feel I've been serving with all my heart might, mind, and streght and I know that the Lord is very pleased with me. He loves me. I feel it strongly. But I'll never get to be a missionary again. And I just feel such a love for everyone here! Everyone kept complimenting meon the talk. They felt such inspiration to be obedient. I'd told them (in the talk) to take a few minutes and analyze what they could be doing better to be more obedient and to do it!

   Have I told you that I love going to church! I never recognized the peace and sweet spirit that I ALWAYS feel in church. Probably because I felt it at home too, but here I really recognize the spirit just being in the chrch. I have converts and investigators that tell me things like this "I want to get to church early so that I can ENJOY all of sacrament meeting" or "when church is over, I want it to be sunday AGAIN SO THAT I CAN COME BACK" WOW. That makes me want to cry. I think we all really underappreciate (not a word?) the spirit we have by being part of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Others don't even know what it feels like!

   May you all take a few minutes to analyze what else you could cahnge to foolow Jesus Christ more fully. I love you all! I love you for loving me enough to have prepared me for and now support me in this mission. Thank you for loving me enough to say goodbye to me for two years. I can't explain the joy I feel knowing that I have served with my ALL and the gratitude that I feel that I still have another 3 months here to serve!

   Love,

  Elder Mitchell Poirier