how beautiful the sound‏

of my family's voice! I loved talking to them. I LOVE MY FAMILY!!!!

Well ya'll, this week was sickkkk. We had a baptism yo! and baptisms always make me happy. :) Josè got baptized! On Saturday, he and his wife Mery got married. Everything went great and they looked great. Then on Sunday, we were going to have his baptism. But Saturday night, Sunday morning, it stormed. SUPER HARD. The thunder was so loud it woke me up and the wind was thrashing water on the windows. Outside was like straight christmas because the lightning kept everything lit up. And Sunday morning, it continued. But we made it to church. I play the piano at church now and this past Sunday my comp and I had to give a talk. And Mery and Jose didn't show up! Where could they be?! Today is his baptism!! I wanted to leave during sacrament meeting to go find them but I couldn't becuse I had to give my talk and everything. So I prayed really hard that everything was ok. After my prayer I felt relieved and felt the words ''its ok. everything is ok. Mery and Jose are just waiting for you. Go pick them up after sacrament meeting.'' So I calmed down a little. After saacrament meeting I talked to a member and asked if we could go pick them up. He told me to call them first to see if they were there. So I called them and Mery answered. ''Elder!'' she told me. ''We are here at the house waiting for you! We can't leave because of the rain! Can you come pick us up?'' :) claro que si I told her. So we picked them up and after church we had Jose's baptism! It went great and He felt so awesome afterwards. So did his wife. Mery bore her testimony during the service and started crying because she is now one step closer to being a family forever. She talked about all the blessings she has. Maybe God hasn't blessed her with the biggest house or a lot of money. But she has great, healthy kids, a loving husband without a single addiction and a happy home. What a great testimony to me! I was so grateful God let me be part of their lives and help them change their lives. I love them :)

Well the reason I didn't email this past Tuesday is because we had a meeting in Escuintla. Elder Amado of the Seventy came to talk with us! What an amazing experience! He was so great and I learned a ton. He talked to us about a TON of different things. But he talked to us alot about recognizing the spirit and helping our investigators recognize it too. I learned a ton of new things. It was great to hear from a servant of God, and somebody who works so closely with the prophet. What a neat experience.

On Friday I had to go to the capital for a retencion meeting. It was good and I learned a lot. I like retencion and understand the importance of it but I'm kinda hoping that this is my last change of it. Yuck, but hey, someones got to do it right? And it is possible that I contacted the WHOLE bus on the way to the Capital. Stand up in the front and yell at everyone to listen to the missionaries? Yeah. I did it. nbd.

Well other than that, nothing TOO exciting. We have another investigator that we are working with named Luisa. We are trying to get her married and baptized on the 27th but she lives very far away and that makes it hard. But poco a poco, little by little, she has the desire. Now we just got to make it happen, but everything is going great here. En serio. I love each and every one of you. Solo me falta la mitad de mi mision! Half of my mission gone! I'll see ya'll soooooooooon!!! I love you. I love the church. I love the gospel. I love the scriptures. I love life.

Elder Yates

 

Jose, Mery, Wilson, Alejandra.

Jose gettting baptized

Elder Loayza, Jose, Mery, Elder Yates

Elder Yates and Elder Loayza at the beach

 

well well well.

It's mothers day this week!! Which means that I get to call my fam bam. I'm so excited. I just wanted everyone to know that :) Because I love my family.

Well this week was a get to know you week for Elder Loayza and I. He's a great little missionary and we get along great. I told him that I visited Peru a long time ago and he knew the part that I visited! Hooray!

We had interviews with the mission president this week. President Brough told me that I'm doing great and he's super proud of me. It made me feel good since Satan is always putting doubts in my head. It's great to hear it from the Man in Charge if you know what I mean.

Well sadly, I don't have much time. I have to leave it there. The computer has been freezing ALL OVER THE PLACE and the hour has come to an end and the district leader is saying that its time to go. I am sincerly sorry that this is so short, but next week it'll be longer. I love all of you and can't wait to see you in 13 months. That's nothing! LOVE YOUUUU

Elder Yates

Elder Yates and Birthday Cupcakes

Elder Yates

Elder Yates and Elder Loayza

Today is another big day....

Because it's my father's birthday!!!!! Happy Birthday Father!

Well everyone. I have tragic news. Child services took my child away from me. The visa of Elder Reyes came and he left yesterday to go to Mexico. It kind of sucks (ok it sucks A LOT) becasue we got along GREAT and we only had 2 weeks together. And they even told us at the beginning of the change that we were going to spend at least the first change together, it doesn't matter when his visa was going to come. But, I talked to President Brough last week and said that it DID come and that his mission president there needs him asap, so yesterday he left :( My new comp is Elder Loayza. he only has about 5 months. He is from.......Peru! It's cool. He is from Trujillo and for those of you that know Peru, he LOVES Inca Cola. :D Although I miss Elder Reyes, I know that I don't understand the workings of the Lord so I trust that it was for the better.

We had a baptism this weekend! I met a hermana this past week who I thought was a member and it turns out that she isn't! She has been going to church regulary. Unfortunately, she isn't married and her husabnd isn't the type to want to get married. But we are working with her. But in the meantime, her 8 year old son wanted to get baptized. And he wanted to do it this past weekend. So we taught him all week and set up the baptism and he got baptized. He even asked me to do it! First baptism with Elder Reyes! I wish he had done the baptism but he will have plenty in Mexico. It was a great experience.

Right now we are still working with Hermana Mery and her husband Jose because he wants to get baptized. She is a member already and he's not but like always, they need to get married first. They actually got married before but the lawyer didn't register the marriage right. Getting them married again shouldn't be a problem. So pray for them please!

We do have a couple other families that we are working with. I will let you know how they progress! As for now, I'm going to leave it there so I can send pictures. Thank you all for everything. I love each one of you. Yo sé que la iglesia es verdadera. yo les amo y no puedo esperar hasta que yo les vea de nuevo. Cuidense bastante y sigan orando y siendo bien calidad. Hablaremos pronto! oh y Feliz Cumpleaños a mi papá! Te amo Papá! Tu eres mi Papá favorito en todo el mundo! :) Espero que tengas un dia buenismo porque tu lo mereces. :) Te AMO!

Elder Yates

At the beach with Elder Reyes

Eating cake with Elder Reyes

Being Goofy

At the beach with Elder Reyes

I gave birth....

to a little Latino Missionary. I am his Father. His name is Elder Reyes and his is actually from Mazatenango; like 40 minutes from our area. His is brand new and fresh out of the CCM (MTC). He completes a month of his mission this coming Saturday! He actually isn't assigned to this mission though. He was called to serve in the Mexico Mexico City South Mission, but his visa hasn't come through yet. So once it comes, he´s out. How long is that going take? Solo Dios sabe. But we are going to enjoy our time together while it lasts.

Good day everyone. How is everyone doing? Everything is going good here. So like a already explained, I´m training! In the mission, there are some things that I didn't know. Your first area is where you are born and your first companion is your father. And your last area is where you die. So the mission is kinda like life. So right now, I am a Father. I have a son. His name is Luke. Ah just kidding. He is Elder Reyes. :)

So this past week has been great. Ive been learning A TON from Elder Reyes. He is great. We get a long good and have fun. I really appreciate Elder Lagos a lot more now because being a trainer is really hard. He was under a ton of pressure. But thanks to his example, I've learned a ton of things that I can do to be a great Trainer, a great companion, and a great start to a mission.

This past weekend, we had the confirmation of Angelica, the niña of familia Estrada. It went great. Now we are working with the other niña, Faviola, so she can get baptized too. The only problem is, she is TERRIFIED! When she was a little girl, she fell out of a boat when she went fishing and almost drowned, and since then, she has never liked the water at all. She does want to get baptized but she would prefer that it wasn't in water to do it. Too bad there is no other way to recieve a remission of sins.

Also, yesterday something crazy kinda happened. SO we had a meeting in the capital for all the nuevos and their trainers. The meeting started at 9:30 so we left at 6:30 to be there on time. There is usually traffic in the Capital but we planned it that if there was, we would still be on time. But what we didn't take into account was that there was going to be a protest yesterday and there were going to be tons of people sitting in the highway in protest. What they were protesting? I have no idea. But traffic wasn't moving a inch. So we had to get off the bus and walk to the meeting. Thankfully, we were pretty close and only had to walk a couple miles. But that was my experience. We showed up about 20 minutes late. And we were early. President Brough didn't show up until about 11:30 because he was so far away. And thankfully, getting home was a bit easier.

So everything is going good here. Elder Reyes and I are working hard and finding people to baptize. Being a missionary is great. And if I'm not mistaken, aren't finals this week at BYU? Let me know how everyone is doing and how the tests went! I want to know! :) I love you all very much and I pray for you everyday. Keep being awesome and we´ll see each other real soon :)

love,
Elder Yates

Elder Lagos, Elder Yates and Elder Reyes