Helping people experience this mighty change in their hearts is what it's all about!

We had a really good week. Heavenly Father is blessing our area a lot, we work our tails off and we are blessed for it. 

We knocked a lot of doors this week. There is this massive trailer park in our area that's is pure Hispanic. We knocked there two whole days this week. One day we got there after lunch and knocked doors until dinner and we only talked to 2 white people. It was awesome. We found some really good people. One day it snowed so people felt bad for us and let us in, I loved seeing snow. I forgot that was still a thing. 

We have had some really good progression with our part member families as well. 

Our mission president is the man. Our mission has been setting goals and we are completing them. On average our mission baptizes 30-40 people a month. This November we baptized fifty and this December we baptized 114. Our goal is to baptize 200 in a month and we believe it is revelation from the Lord that we can do it. We have been trying to complete this goal ever since I got here but now we know that it's possible. February is the month where we plan to baptize all 200. We are setting all of our dates for Valentine's Day giving converts an opportunity to show God their love. It seems a little cheesy but I bet it works. There is 100 companionship's in our mission so that's only 2 baptisms per companionship in the month. Some areas probably won't complete the goal but other areas will have 5-6 baptisms to make up for it. Pray for us to reach our goals it's been a long time coming. 

So many people came it church today it was awesome! Several times I had to step out of sacrament meeting to answer calls giving people directions on how to get to church because it was their first time! The girl in the pic below, we found street contacting, she came to church. Idk if that's ever happened to me in my mission. If so it's been awhile. I have just always focused so much on part member families. I really need to do a better job of talking to everybody. 

Almost all of our investigators are going through some real problems; abuse, adultery, bajos ingresos, suicide... you name it we see it first hand. It breaks my heart. I always think of Mosiah 2:41 "blessed and happy are those that keep the commandments of God". But the scripture goes both ways; "damned and depressed are the states of those that don't keep the commandments". Often these people have these problems because they haven't kept crucial commandments. As soon as they repent they start the healing process. Watching a family change and become happy because they repent is one of the easiest ways to gain a testimony. Now that's not to say that if we keep the commandments we won't have trails but if we aren't keeping commandments I can promise our load will get lighter if we repent. Alma 5:14 Helping people experience this mighty change in their hearts is what it's all about! 

Love,

Elder Pattee