Hey, better late than never, right mom? Sorry that this has taken so long to get to you. We had a freak blowout tire in our return from Pochutla on our P-day and it restricted us from getting to the internet in time. But here we are again. Week 3 in Puerto Angel, transfer 2 down. And well, it was a week of work. Every week here is a week of work. We just work, all the time. We walk up and down the hills, we sweat a lot, we talk to a lot of new people, we help at every opportunity we get, and we work. What God wants to give us in terms of physical results is His decision. Our responsability is just to keep trying to do His will. So we work. With smiles and with faith. By the by, I totally turned 8 months in the mission this week. Only 2 years left to go, right?
Anyway, so on to how I'm doing. I'm tired. But that probably has something to do with winning our intense four person game of 21 on a last second for the second week in a row. I'm feeling it. Maybe because playoff time is just around the corner. Who knows. I sport my Jazz shirt at all times that I can these days to show that I'm thinking about them when I am not thinking about the investigators. Wow, being a missionary really has changed me. I've tempered my Jazz obsession for the Lord. This is what we call "building your mansion in Heaven," right?
Back to Elder Johnson's life. So we've sort of kind of been obsessed with finding new investigators these past couple of weeks. Aside from one awesome couple (Antonio and Arsenia, who, although they haven't come to church yet, show all the signs of being converts), our investigators don't really want to progress. And, unfortunately, we cannot take their agency away from them because that why we fought against Satan so long ago in the first place. Funny how we fought so hard for it and now it's the thing that damages us. Bummer. But I guess God's got it all worked out, so I'll just trust in Him.
So we've mostly been working with contacting and trying to help the recent converts and inactive members come to Church. This is a surprising dificult task in Puerto Angel. We're a tiny branch of like 20-30 people and a bajillion inactives, but the inactive just refuse to come to Church. I don't know why. It frustrates me. We went to an inactive family's house the other day (trying to follow the General Conference advice that helping the inactives is a very important task) and the hermana that we found there answered "I don't remember" to the question "What's your name?" That's when we figured she didn't really want to talk to us.
But on to happier things! So we helped a drunk change his life this week. We were walking in the street (going to a recent convert's house who had recently taken to alcohol again, as a matter of fact) when Arturo greeted us. I have now been in Puerto for over 2 months and a day has not gone by when I have not seen Arturo. Also, I have never seen Arturo not drunk. At times, I wonder if he really drinks and if it isn't actually just his real personality, but then I see the alcohol bottle in his hand. He is always drunk. The other drunks of Puerto Angel I've seen sober. Not Arturo. That man's liver hates him. Luckily, he's a really nice drunk. Anyway, so he greeted us. He likes to ask us for our pamphlet and only God knows why because he doesn't know how to read. But he always asks. At this point, we've given him every pamphlet we own. So we didn't want to give him one on this occasion. The conversation went something like this:
"Hey, give me one of your little books!"
"NO because you're drunk."
"But I want one!"
"Then you need to stop drinking."
"I'm going quit drinking!"
"Good. When are you going to quit?"
"Tomorrow!!!"
"Then we'll give you a book tomorrow."
"Okay!!!!!!"
Folks, this is why you never put off for tomorrow what you can do today. That's really the coolest thing that happened this week, other than God answering a few prayers, chastising me in several ways, and teaching me a bit of humility. I'm not His best servant, but we're learning. Anyway, got to go, but I love you all and I hope you celebrate Easter just as happily as you should. Peace out, girl scouts
Love,
Elder Johnson
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