Letter 2-11-10

Dear Family,

So, I have one item of business and then one missionary story. The item of businesss is that for the last 3 or 4 months, I have tried my hardest to get a photo CD sent home, but the CD creater things at WalMart have been possesed. Everytime I try them they decide to not work. They will print photos, but for some reason or another, they won't make CDs. The plan has been in my mind to create 3 CDs. I had 2 to create, Roswell Part 2 and Roswell Part 3, out here and then Roswell Part 4 for after I get home since that is the one from my last transfer, but by the looks of things, I may just have to do all 3 when I get home, so sorry for the technical difficulties. If time permits today, I may try one last time to create the other 2 CDs, but we'll see.

The missionary story comes with Sara Fink. She is my last hope to get one more baptism before I leave. Reviewing her story, she is the girlfriend of Travis Lueveno, an active priest in Roswell 2nd Ward and son of Bishop Lueveno of 2nd Ward (2nd ward is the other ward. I go to 1st ward). Both Travis and Sara are 17 year old high school seniors. Back on October 11th, all 5 stakes in the mission sponsered an idea given by President Robison. Invitation Sunday. A special sunday set aside for the members to invite their friends to church. All 3 hours were to be dedicated to the message of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, to show to the outside world who it is that we worship and follow and to also help them feel the spirit of this church, the restored church of Jesus Christ. Well, Travis Lueveno decided that he would invite his girlfriend, Sara Fink, to come to church. He did and she accepted. Without Travis even making the slightest hint to us 1st ward elders, we knocked on the Fink home the day before Invitation Sunday while we were out finding (tracting). We hadn't the slightest idea of who they were, but the mom answered. Mom wanted nothing to do with us, but quickly turned us over to Sara because of the fact that Sara's boyfriend was a member and Sara was going to church anyway. Sara easily accepted our offer for us to teach her about the restoration and told us the story of Travis inviting her to church. I think that was meant to happen. God doesn't work in coincidences. Everything happens for a reason. The 1st lesson went good and she enjoyed church. From then through December, things went slow and Sara was hard to catch. We saw her about once or twice a month because she had a lot of things on her plate at the time. When January rolled around, we caught her again and invited her to church and set up a lesson at the Lueveno home. She came to church, with Travis still, and we taught a great 3rd lesson, the gospel of Jesus Christ. I think everything was downhill from there. She has now been to church almost every single week since, 3 or 4 times in a row now, still at 2nd ward. 2 weeks ago, she asked us where she is in the process and told us that she really wanted to get baptized. All the other churches she went to have all fizzled out, but this one hasn't for her and everything makes sense. We have been wanting her to come over to first ward beacuse in the long run its a better option because there are very few young women in the other ward and none her age, so all the support she has is from Travis and if they were to break up, things wouldn't be good with no support, but here in 1st ward, there are several young women her age that would be a big help. Plus, if she comes to 1st ward, it will prove to many people that she's in it for herself and not just for her boyfriend. She has realized that and has wanted to come to 1st ward, but is slightly nervous about going to a new ward. Well, the young women in first ward this past week or so have done an amazing job with fellowship and have made her feel comfortable. She has come to 1st ward mutual and would've come to church this past week, but the day before she had to take a trip to the hospital, her equilibrium was off. She is fine now, but took some advise from her dad to get some rest. So everything is going very well. Another plus is that she has been attending early morning seminary with the youth and has mentioned to us that she wants to get married in the temple as well. Funny thing with that is that we haven't talked to her at all about the temple, so our job is being made easier with all the teaching going on behind the scenes. The only obstacle right now is that in order to get baptized, since she is only 17 is that she has to get permission from her Dad (her Mom left since we started teaching). He isn't really religious and doesn't mind her going to church, but she doesn't know what he will think about her joining and so she is nervous about that. Not about the baptism part, she doesn't think he will have a problem with that, but the temple issue. He won't be able to go inside the temple to see his daughter get married. Our advise was to take it one step at a time here and she did get some advise from 2nd ward bishop, Bishop Lueveno, so hopefully everything will work out. We are going to push for her to get baptized on February 21st, the Sunday before I go home. It will be a little bit of a push, but I think she is ready and I want to see her get baptized before I leave. That will be cool. A great way to end a grand and glorious two years. If it doesn't happen, I won't be too hurt because she is definitely converted to the gospel and will get baptized eventually, so I'm not worried.

Anyways, I will sign off now. I will update you on Sara next week. That was a long story as I look back on it, but I hope you enjoyed it since I only have one last email session left and it was probably the last big missionary story I will have on my mission. I will let you know how things turn out. And lets do this email thing one last time. Until next week!

Elder Adam R Droge
The DrogeMiester