Yeah - January 16th

Hola familia,
You know sometimes I have to wonder if I will have my own book with all these emails I write. Of course if I stop writing I suppose that wouldn’t be the case. Don’t worry, I will still keep writing. It is just that sometimes I feel like I don’t have much to say or anything. So lots of questions to answer is usually a good thing.
As far as Elder Cranford goes, he is an awesome Elder. He is learning a lot and adjusting well to the missionary schedule. He doesn’t seem like he is much of a morning person as far as getting up and going, but with an encouraging word or two in the morning he gets right up and going. I have been pretty tired lately too with all this heat we are having. I haven’t been able to sleep too well. We have been hitting a good 40 grados and it is suppose to be hotter in February. Someone told me winter is suppose to start earlier this year though so we will see what happens.
So yeah about Elder Cranford. He is from Tennessee and lives in the Knoxville mission area (I don’t remember the city name). His parents are members but not really active I guess. They got separated and he just had to keep going to church on his own. He took his younger siblings too. That is pretty cool. He plays guitar and played tennis in school. He is a big music fan and sounds like he was a pretty crazy guy before the mission (sometimes it is best not to know too much about companions and what they were like before the mission. I have had some interesting companions I decided.) By the way, Elder Costa is named Peter and played the drums for his band so that is certainly him.
I am sad to hear about Josh. I don’t know that my mission is quite the same. I have definitely faced a lot of rejection and members that don’t want to come to church and think they are okay, even people that have gone to other churches and “use to be members.” We have received some pretty strong rejections, but I don’t know that it sounds quite so bad as what he is putting up with. Some people are just stubborn. But it did sound like Josh was doing a lot better in his first area. Maybe it is just the area he is in right now. It sounds like the people just don’t understand at all. That really frustrates me! I did write a letter to Josh and need to mail it today. There will also be some other letters for you guys to copy and mail to people, including one to Brooke. Also I am finally hoping to send the copy of all my pictures to you along with a CD that president Shakespear gave us for Christmas. We will see.
I also this week have gotten a bit tired of people here in Jardín America. We have had a lot of investigators fail us in keeping commitments and we just had a lesson yesterday where they totally shot down what we were trying to tell them about Joseph Smith and how the Book of Mormon helps us find the truth. They just kept saying that people like Joseph Smith are just good stories. That the BOM just has a bunch of stuff taken out of the Bible (just like Elen White and her books). I tried to testify and get them to read the BOM but I just feel like it is going in and out there ears. The mom especially just kind of laughs at us and smiles. Don´t you people realize the truth when you see it! What have you got to lose? The lesson just kind of frustrated me a bit. Still, I am going strong. I just always seem to have problems with Seventh Day Adventists.
As far as investigators go, we have a lot that want to be baptized, but have a bunch of problems with marriage and the situations are complicated. So close and yet nothing is changing. I really hope the family Benites can get things going. I would feel content knowing that they were able to get baptized. I guess I need more patience.
We had my first district meeting this past Monday. I felt a little nervous about it all and how I could make it a great meeting to strengthen my district. I was thinking about it a lot and felt I received the inspiration necessary for the meeting. It was pretty good. I spoke about the Book of Mormon and how we as missionaries need to utilize it in our teaching (chp. 5 PMG). It went really well and I knew exactly what to say. I have really gained a lot of confidence during my mission. I hope I can transmit this to my district. I must say though that we have a great district. I am the oldest person in the district which is weird because I have always been with people that are so much older than I am. (by age I mean time in the mission). So it is new. I like it!
So overall things are fine with me. I am trying to gain back my animo that I lost yesterday with this lesson but luckily I have a nice relaxing pday to help me out and then a zone conference on Thursday. Oh yeah, zone conference!
Love you family and hope you have a super week!
Elder Aaron McDonald