What an incredible week! I don't even know where to begin. We've definitely been kept busy here. Lots of work, lots of visits, and lots of incredible experiences. I feel like this week went by super fast but at the same time, I look back on what I did last Monday and it feels so long ago. We had two really good meetings Monday and Tuesday and we talked about some goals and things we can do in the mission to help other missionaries and to also see more success. The Spirit was really powerful there and I learned so much. Wednesday I was able to go back to one of my old areas: Mataró! I went on an exchange with an Elder there and was there until Friday morning. It was really strange being back to be honest. A few things have changed since I've left but overall, it's pretty much the same. I went with some names from my old agendas from when I was there to help the other Elders pick up the pace and to get going, and we also got to see some people who I saw a year ago! It was so neat to be able to do that. I loved it so much. We had an eating visit with Juana and Nestor, a family that I taught the whole time I was there, and Nestor got baptized shortly after I left. It was a little strange seeing him as a normal member to be honest since the whole time I had known him he was a non member who was progressing towards being baptized. But it felt so good to see that I played a part in his life and that he's doing so well. I also was able to see another family whom we taught and got baptized which was really exciting. The only sad part is that they are semi inactive right now. The missionaries hadn't been able to get in with them because they wouldn't answer the door or phone calls. So I decided to see if they'd let me in and they did :) They're still so great and have their testimonies, but they just lack a little bit of drive at the moment. So hopefully the missionaries there can continue with them to help motivate them again to come back to church. Right after doing the exchange in Mataró we went to pick up another Elder to come do another exchange with us in Badalona. It was so much fun. Elder Morrison stayed with us until Sunday night and we had a really good experience. Even though he went to the U of U, we still got along just fine, ha-ha. He actually knows a few friends I met at the Hill Cumorah Pageant too which was pretty exciting, and I got to talk to him about that a little.
General Conference was just as incredible as expected. I loved it so much and learned a ton that I can apply and improve. We were able to see every session minus the last one since it started at 10:00 PM so we'll just wait until the magazine comes out to read it. We even got to listen to it in English :) We could've listened to it in Spanish but sometimes the translation doesn't go over perfectly. Plus, there's a lot more power in your native language, no matter how good you understand the mission language. We worked really hard to get our investigators to come to the conference and to bring specific questions, particularly about baptism because we knew that if they came with the desire to learn and to receive an answer that it would come. One of the best experiences with that was with a young woman named Kimberly who is now preparing to be baptized this month :) She has been coming to church every week since before I got here, has been reading in the scriptures and praying, listening to the missionaries for a while, but just hadn't felt the need to commit just yet and we weren't sure why. We tried a few different things but nothing worked. But when General Conference came around we knew that this was the best opportunity for her to receive an answer that this is something that she needed to do. We talked to her for a few minutes after Conference to see how she felt and how she liked it and she said that she wanted to prepare to be baptized! It was incredible. There truly is power through the Spirit and through the church leaders. We didn't have to do anything. The Lord did it all.
