November 19, 2012

Hello Awesome Family,

It was so wonderful to recieve all of your letters. You all sound so happy and I am glad to hear that the dedication of the temple was a spiritual experience for all.

I am glad that Papa had a wonderful day yesterday on his birthday!! I sent him a email. It will be great to have everyone together for Thanksgiving up there at the ranch.

Grandpa and Grandma Clegg- Thanks for sharing your experience of the temple dedication. Thank you for all of your love and support. I love you both so much and I am so grateful for all that you do. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving and know that I am thankful for you.

This week has been a great week. The highlight has defiantly been the progress of Miguel and Martha. They are just loving everything. They are really excited, just excited about the Gospel. I love it. We have changed the baptism date to the 1st of December. Our Bishop wanted to be sure that they had three church attendances, which is fine. The Bishops here have a general fear of people never coming back after their baptisms. That is hard and it is something that we are really trying to change in the mission to have and experience real growth. It is so sad to see when that happens. Tragic.  Martha and Miguel are some of the most prepared people I have seen. They are reading the Book of Mormon everyday and tonight we have a FHE with them and a great family in our ward.  Today I am going to Mar Del Plata with Elder Gravelle to do division with the Zone Leaders in Mar Del Plata.  I want to be back here as soon as possible to teach Martha and Miguel Angel. Today my companion will be with a member. It has rained every other day this week. But is is hot humid type of rain. It is a lot hotter here in Bahia then in Miramar last summer. We had a couple of meetings with President this week planning Christmas in the mission. The mission has improved a lot in the last two weeks in the amount of investigators that we have found and so we are hoping for a high convert month in the month of Christ (December).

I wanted to share a cool experience with you all. On Saturday we left the house the morning after studies to work in our area. We have to walk about 11 blocks to get to our area. We were two blocks from the house when the cell phone of Elder Costanzi rang - it was President and about 15 seconds into the call he looked at me and moved his head like we have to go back to the house. So we turned around... I will admit... I might have been murmuring a little in my head because we had so much to do.  We needed to find a lot of investigators that day and we had a full day to work. After we had turned around and we were heading back to the house a man came up to me and started talking to me. Elder Costanzi was still on the phone and so I started to talk to him and Elder Costanzi realized I wasn't at his side and stopped. The man asked me if we were missionaries, I told him that we sure were! I could tell he was a little shaky and wasn't sure if maybe he had been drinking or not. He then explained to me that he had seen us walk by the first time from the other block and wanted to call us. He explained how he had just barely left his church because he got in a fight with his Pastora and was really upset. He talked about how she was cheating the people to go to church and had a another motives and how he was sad because his girlfriend was in the church still. Basically he was really upset because he had argued with the pastora. He was really upset...shaking. He told us how he got out of jail five years ago and was starting to find the light with this church and then he realized that the Pastora did not have pure intentions. We were able to share the message of the Restoration with him and gave him a Book of Mormon and set an appointment with other Elders in his area. It was a neat experience. I need to talk to the other Elders to see if they were able to talk to him. It was a testimony of how God sometimes just puts you in the right place at the right time.

I bet that you are all excited for this week. I am sure that Mikesell is really pumped to be coming home and spending time with the family. It is crazy how quick time is going I can not believe that it is Thanksgiving already. I hope you know how grateful I am for each of you and all of my blessings.

Dad- I hope that you enjoy this week. I am glad that you get to speak in church this Sunday. I am sure the dedication of the temple was wonderful.  I sure love you Dad. Thanks for all that you do.

Mom- I am super grateful for you. Thank you for your letter and your kind words. I hope that you have have a wonderful week. Enjoy the wonderful time with the family. I love you so much Mom.

Mikesell- Enjoy your time at home this week.  Give everyone a hug and kiss for me. I love you Mikesell so much and I hope that you have a great week. Drive safe. I am so grateful for you.

Brennen- I hope that ball is going well. Say hi to Coach Sharp for me.  I hope that your can enjoy your time with the family this week. I love you Brother. Keep being a stud. Love you!!

Alex- Thanks for writing brother. I am glad that you are enjoying your time with Mrs. Otto. She is wonderful and I love her. Have a great week and keeping being great in life and on the court.

Harrison- I sure love you little man. I hope that you have a wonderful week. Enjoy the cousins!! Eat lots of Turkey. I love you buddy so much.  Big hug...

McCall- I love you sweetie. Enjoy your Thanksgiving.  How many blessing do you have?

I love you all so much. I read the talk  "Of regrets and resolutions" by President  Uchtdorf.

If we:
Follow the Savior
Work with Diligence
Listen to and obey the spirit
= Reveal things to us we never knew... illuminate the path ahead, open our eyes to see unknown, and perhaps unimagined talents.

I also loved the scripture in Romans 13:9-10

I love you all so much.
Have a wonderful week and know that I am grateful for each and everyone of you.

All my love.

Elder Austin