December 16, 2009

Hey there family,

Thanks so much for that e mail, and the pictures. I think this week has been the hardest week of my life, and I think I’ve come closer to the Lord than any other week in my life.

(Tim describes a visit to an investigator’s home and a portion of it is shared below.)

...so I just sat in the other room and read my Book of Mormon and then one of my little 13 year old baptisms who I baptised with R. Ferreira walked in and said “Are you reading the Book of Mormon?”, and I said “Yeah.” He said “Hey I was just in my house reading it. Can you mark a part for me to read?” I said “Go get your book.” So he ran and got it and me and Patrick read. I read a verse and then he read a verse for about an hour, and it was exactly what I needed at the time. It was one of the best experiences of my mission. I love that guy. And then I saw this woman moving dirt. Her family was building a house and they had to poor concrete the next day and her husband had to work all night. So it was just her and a little boy shoveling and wheel burrowing dirt for this foundation, so I just went and started helping because my comp was just standing there Bible-bashing with this girl. Everyone here thinks Americans are automatically rich and they don’t know how to work, and it really makes me mad sometimes. So I grabbed that shovel and I moved dirt like you can’t believe. And everybody was saying “Wow, gringo (that’s what they call Americans) can work! And I don’t understand it because none of them even have jobs, but anyways we got that house all ready for pouring and the woman was so grateful and she gave us crackers. I represented America and I sweated like I’ve never sweated in my life - just soaked every inch of my body. My pants weighed 20 pounds and I actually enjoyed it because its been almost 7 months and I haven’t done anything with my hands. They started to look like girl hands but now they’re blistered up again ha. But anyways thanks for all your prayers. They mean the world to me, but I’ll be fine with everything. It’s just hard but in reality it’s been the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Thanks for everything I’ll try and send some pics now. Love you all.

And your questions:

I think we’ll be in Salvador the 21st and 22nd, but honestly ... it’s not even for sure. Those are just the rumors so I don’t know anything about calling you guys. Thanks for the money. We’ll go to dinner or something.
I haven’t backed up my photos yet but I will some day, ha.
Yeah I know how much you love me. Thanks.

Oh and I can’t believe I almost forgot; yesterday we had a huge conference with half the mission and with Elder Zwick (I think that’s how you spell it). I think he is in the Seventy. I got to talk with him a lot. Actually he stood in the lunch line with me and Elder Hadley and I got to see him again too, so that was cool. ... but it was good. He taught lots of good things.