BoM's and Cinnamon Rolls

 ***If anyone would like to offer specific prayers for Brayden, please pray that his companion's heart can be softened and that Brayden can feel the love we all have for him. 

Hello everyone! I hope you guys are having a great week and sorry this email is coming a little late! Not very many things happened this week so ill keep it short but the cougs are 8-0 and basketball just beat north carolina so lets go!! I guess this is a bad year to miss byu sports or something like that haha! 

This week i gave out my first book of mormon all by myself without the translating of my companion haha! We also had intercambios (companion splits) with the aps and zls this week which was awesome and very needed. Im not going to sugarcoat it this has been one of if not the hardest weeks of my life, but we got through it and all we can do is put more trust in the lord and have more faith! The work is really really slow here in san filipe and its very hard to find people and have people make commitments. And the language seems like its not coming along at all haha but ill get it soon.(i hope haha!)

Highlights!

Gave out 2 book of mormons

Got a guitar! (Thanks elder cooley) 

Intercambios with the zls and aps

Made some amazing food

Had my first cinnamon roll in a few months!!

Byu is killing it

Spiritual thought:

Everyone in their lives will feel forsaken by the lord and feel like hes not there. The prophet joseph smith cried out unto the lord asking why he had been forsaken, while he was in the darkness of liberty jail. There are two ways we can react to this feeling, we can stay feeling this way for as long as we want, or we can figure out what changes we need to make in our lives to come closer to the lord again. Dont stay feeling alone and without god, the feeling is terrible and you never want to be there. Ask for help and earnestly pray to our father in heaven to get through the hard times and do things that bring you closer to the savior. We all need to learn from these times, and we always need to lean on the savior and feel the infinite love of his atonement. I invite you all to go a little further this week, study a little more, go to the temple, pray out loud, focus during sacrament, etc. The lord is there waiting for you to turn to him, take the opportunity and act upon it. 

Sending all of my best wishes to you all, i pray for you all constantly. Send me an email if youd like it always makes my day!

It Will Be Fun They Said...

 This week has been really slow and not much has happened, we had 1 lesson fall through this week after having around 10 appointments. The work here is really really slow and not much is happening but hopefully itll start picking up soon. 

Crazy encounter!

My comp got bit by a massive pitbull and he's doing good now but he had to limp around for a day or two. We had knocked at this ladies house for a lesson and someone was coming to the door when this pit bull slowly walked up toward the fence and he looked pretty friendly but as soon as he got to the fence he shot his head through one of the gaps and bit my comp in the knee, i pulled him backwards and away for the dog so the damage wasnt too bad and hes almost back to 100%. 

On saturday night after the pitbull incident we went to check on this last lady and see if she would still like to have a lesson. She didnt answer so we walked back to the house feeling pretty defeated because all of our lessons had fallen through all week, but my comp wanted ice cream so we walked to get ice cream and on our way back a guy (named jesus) stopped us and asked if we believed in the bible and we said yes and taught him about the book of mormon. He was really interested and now we have a lesson with him this week, that same night we got a Facebook reference and my comp gave the guy a call(ironically his name was also jesus so we met two Jesus's in the same night) it turns out that he had taken lessons from the missionaries in mexico city but had to leave back to a small town close to san filipe for work. He was getting ready to be baptized when he had to leave so we will pick up where the other missionaries left off and hopefully have a baptism soon!

Nothing else eventful happened this week, mostly just walking and trying to set up appointments and things so i hope that it is way better this coming week haha! Also my spanish is still terrible sooo yeah havent had much success in the language area as of late but its okay itll come eventually haha!

Spiritual thought:

Ive come up with a saying in the last few months that has helped me recently, "i dont believe in coincidences, only miracles" basically what this means to me is that every little coincidence, every little slimmer of hope is a miracle. We are surrounded by miracles every day in our lives and often we just write them off as coincidences. I challenge all of you to look for the miracles in your lives and not just think of them as coincidence, or events happening by chance. Theyre miracles and we need to always look for them in our lives because they are there!

Love you all hope you have a great week and please send me an email! It makes my day to hear from all of you!! Also to all of the ute fans, 5-2 isnt bad, but

7-0 is a whole lot better! Better luck next year haha cause the cougs mopped the floor with the utes this weekend! And dont make any more excuses cause you guys got cooked haha! Go Cougs!! 

Also I think my grandma said it best when she showed me this picture this week.

I'm A Missionary

Hey everyone! Hope you guys are having an awesome time! In the last two weeks ive had conference, moved to my first area, met my trainer (doesnt speak english so i still dont really know him) slept on the floor for too many nights because our house didnt have beds, tables, a fridge, a stove, or a washing machine. And i kill more cockroaches here in our house than ive ever even seen back home every day. All i want to do is go home but its all good cause weve got a bed tonight! At least thats better than the floor!

My first area is called san filipe, its a little town south of san louis potosi and its a brand new area. There have only been a few missionaries here and only for a day at a time, me and my trainer are the first people to live here and serve for longer than a day and weve got at least 3 months here. There are 6 members here and at church on sunday there were 8 people including me and my comp. Hopefully the work will start picking up because the people here hate the missionaries, in the few days weve been here we probably have like 1 street contact so hopefully itll start picking up soon!

It seems like everyone here hates me haha, the amount of times people stare or give me dirty looks because of the color of my skin is crazy. Even more so are the people that yell at me and tell me to go back to the states, one guy even chased us down while we were walking just to ask me where i was from and tell me im not welcome here. I just asked him if he wanted a card of jesus and he said no im catholic haha i thought that makes a ton of sense cause catholics totally dont believe in jesus haha. 

Spiritual thought

Thank you guys for the prayers, they truly are felt and i really need them. The power of prayer truly is amazing and we can always talk to heavenly father because he is listening! Heavenly fathers plan is perfect and no matter how hard it is or how much we want to quit, we need to keep going and remember that theres light at the end of the tunnel, even if we cant see it. In the story of ammon and his brethren traching the lamanites it tells about all of the hardships he and his brothers faced and the lord helped them overcome everything and it eventually led to them bringing the word of god to tens of thousands of people! Even though it probably wont be tens of thousands hopefully i can bring the word to a few people who can feel the love of their savior. Love you all! Send me an email or let me know how you guys are doing cause its very appreciated!

Elder Ericson