The time seems to slip by faster and faster. Boy I am not sure where to start.....I guess I will start with an amazing experience we just had. On Tuesday Elder Martin and I had some appointments fall through, unfortunately we called everyone and no one was available so we decided to go street contacting. As we were driving to the point we agreed on we saw a huge group of people gathered around watching some guys playing some basketball. Being very interested because we were in the heart of the ghetto I pulled over and we got out. Elder Martin found someone to talk to who was watching the game, and I decided to go over to some of the players who were sitting watching waiting for their turn. I started talking to one by the name of Shaggy (I can't remember his real name right now.), and in the spur of the moment decided to challenge their best 3 basketball players to a match of 3 v 3 game the next day at 5:30 (if we win we got to teach all of them, if we lose I had to buy them a soda); well, everyone who was watching, basically the whole community laughed me to scorn. Even so we took off. The next day we called the zone leaders to come be on my team and play, for their dinner break, to which the readily agreed. At 5:30 we started, it was street ball so there were no fouls (we got the whole thing on video if you want to watch) and the other team was not going to let some white dudes just show them up. So, once they found out that were actually decent they started playing dirty. Long story short, we won by 2; 31-29. Everyone blew up when we won, haha it was awesome. Most importantly I think is we gained their respect as well as everyone who watched. Well, the second part of the story is that we went back today to teach them, and wow.....what a powerful lesson. Every single one of those players opened up, the Spirit was strong and many people joined in for the lesson. I just can't believe what a powerful experience we just had. Not only was the Spirit present but every single person there opened up, and shared some of their deeper feelings, that was something I didn't expect.
In the middle of the lesson, some man came up to us and started telling us there was no God. What is even better is the ball player who, didn't believe there was a God confounded him. God uses many different ways in silencing the wicked. At the end of the lesson, they all jumped and asked us when we would come back to teach them more. They all agreed to pray and ask god if we were telling the truth, as well as read the plan of salvation. We shared with the man who didn't believe in God, the story of Ammon. He was touched, I could see it in his eyes. He very solemnly said that he would try it for himself and see if he got the same feelings he had when we were teaching him. I just wish you were there. I learned that God uses our talents to bring forth his work, even with a silly game of basketball.
Everything else is still going. The office is running smoothly again and we are finishing up everything, just in time too with Cesar coming this week. We will see how that goes. Elder Martin is doing better and better everyday. He is taking the lead more and more, he knows what is going on here in the office. He is an amazing Elder.
Well that is it for this letter. I love you!
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