Giving Thanks

Hey guys hope you are all having a great day, and enjoying this time of year! This is my favorite season-from Thanksgiving to Christmas. It is the time to be grateful for the blessings we all recieve in our lives. This week I am especially grateful for my all you guys. I may only write you once a week but you guys are on my mind throughout the week constantly and I pray and search the scriptures for ways to uplift you. I love you guys a lot and am so thankful for everything you have done to help me be who I am!

It was kind of a weird week, but yesterday Jose Alberto was baptized and that was awesome! He is a super cool kid and already has a goal to start his papers in july of next year to serve a mission! We are super happy for him.

This week my companion invited me to pray only giving thanks and not asking for anything and it has been cool so far. This week of thanksgiving I invite you guys all to try it out. 

Have a great week eat lots of turkey and potatoes, I'm going to eat tacos al pastor that probably none of you have ever tried but it's better! 

Elder Draper

Black Sheep

Chucho

 

Getting to know people

Hey guys not much time today because my comp and I are headed on a 5 hour bus ride to xalapá in like 45 minutes! 

This week was a good week, my new comp Elder Acosta is super awesome and we get along really well. He plays guitar and sings like enrique iglesias so all the sisters love this guy. He goes home in 5 weeks, I am his last comp! 

Hermano Oso - We use him to practice teaching lessons.  He is progressing pretty well

My sexy comp - Elder Acosta

 We spent the week helping me get to know the area and the investigators that they have been teaching. We found some awesome new investigators as well! Right now we have a baptism scheduled next week for a sister named celeste, she is 19 and has this little boy named gustavo that is our best bud. Her whole family is members and she is separating from her husband that wouldnt let her get baptized and hated the missionaries, which is bummer because we want eternal families not eternal single strugling teenage mothers but her family is a great help for her and I know they will help her out. 

Ok so the title this week has to do with something we do every day which is contacting people. We talk to random strangers all day every day! A skill you have to develop as a missionary is get to know someone in like 5 minutes on a pretty personal level. In 5 minutes we know their name, where they live, if they are married, how many kids they have, what their kids names are, how old they are, how long they have been with their spouse, what they do for a living, where they are from, their background experience with God, what they believe, what they dont understand, and what they want. It is honestly pretty nuts!

 I always looked up to my grandpa thomas because he could talk to ANY person he met, in line at walmart, the waiter at porters place, the bus driver at warm springs, or the guy parked next to us and find SOME mutual point. He ALWAYS has something to talk about with them, and they always end up telling him about themselves. ANYWAY, my point is it is a skill I know he has used to share the gospel and its a skill we all need to develop if we want to be more like Christ. We are to be a light to the world, the leaven that lifts those around us and if we don't get outside of our little buble, we will never be able to share the gospel with others. So my invitation to all you guys is to get out of your comfort zone, help others, talk to strangers (if you are older than...13), get to know those around you a little better and you will be able to see how YOU can change the lives of those around you.

Funny story of the week wasnt that funny, there are two sister missionaries in the ward and one is from peru (mision trujillo elder rbod su apellido es pampañaupa busca su familia) and the other one is from honduras and to mess with them we always ask them questions about bolivia and guatemala and joke that they are from there but they just end up getting mad. 

Miss you guys! Start getting ready for general conference it is only 4 weeks away!! 

Les quiero mucho,

Elder Drawpear

 

My good buddy Elder Degroff and I

Super Dope Mcnasty kiler carne asada this sister made on wednesday so gooooooooood!

Week 4

I can't believe how quick it has gone by. I fly to mexico in flippin 11 days! so nuts. anyway, this week was cool last pday we went to the temple in the afternoon and man alive the temple is a good place. I had the most profound personal revelation I have ever had in my life. Just go to the temple, it really is the house of the lord. and the Lord answers our prayers you guys. we play volleyball constantly here, I kick butt. just saying. half of our branch left monday for their missions and we had a great last weekend  Oh we got new guys this week too! four sisters, and four elders. they should be good. I was way bummed when the old group left, they are going to be good misionaries and really helped me in the last month of me being here at the ccm. 

      This week we taught two new investigators victor and isela! victor is from houston, doesn't believe in god, christ, or the scriptures, and thinks god is vengeful. he also speaks really quick spanish. MAN! it was rough the first lesson, but we taught another one yesterday and it was way good. His question was "if we are commanded in the ten commandments not to kill, why did the lord command nephi to kill laban?" good question right? flippin hard to answer in english let alone spanish. but it was good, we talked about obedience and modern revelation, if pres monson  came out at general conference and said it was a commandment to only eat coffee and a lot of red meat, the word of wisdom would be partly nullified, and that would be the new commandment. again, hard to explain a little but good nonetheless. 

       We also skyped with a member in monterey mexico, not too far from where we are serving and had about a 30 minute lesson on faith with her, so fun to speak to natives. She bore such a beautiful testimony of her faith in the attonement and Jesus Christ. We heard from the primary general president sunday night, she spoke so eliquently and simply only as the primary president could :) I am learning a lot here, a ton about charity and how god answers prayers. If i pray for charity, god blesses me with opportunites to be charitable, same with patience, virtue, happiness, all things. I love the gospel so much, it is so true, if it wasn't true, us dumb missionaries that couldn't speak the language would have messed it up a long long time ago. the lord is hastening his work. from 1830 to 1947 the church gained a million members. since then we have gained 14 million more. I know that my redeemer lives, he loves us and answers our prayers. I love you all and miss ya, read your scriptures, haz lo justo, and always repent, we are a bunch of sinners ;)

Your amigo and friend,

Elder Draper