This week

Hey guys

We had an awesome week. It was filled with so many blessings.

First of all, I took lots of photos, but this computer sucks and I'll have to send them next week.

We had a baptism!!!! One of our investigators, a 9 year old girl got baptized. Her name is Gabriela. Her story is awesome because her family is less active. Or inactive really. But her getting baptized and listening to the missionaries has activated her family completely in the church. Seeing her there with her mom and her siblings and her aunt and grandma in church was so incredible. The lord works in really mysterious ways.

We worked super hard. We found 8 new investigators, taught tons of lessons, and we had 6 people attend church which was really awesome. Honestly it was probably the best work week I've had in a while.

A funny story. Oftentimes, people see that I'm a 6' 5" white guy and they come up to me and talk to me in English. Lots of people have been deported from the US, and they like to practice their English and talk and it's really fun. This past week, a guy stopped me on the street, and said that he had lived in Conroe, Texas for several years. I told him that I'm from the Woodlands, and it was really cool meeting someone who knows that part of Texas.

Anyways, that's been my week. Today we took the bus up to Amecameca to play basketball with the elders of the mission. In Ameca, they have public wooden courts. Playing up there was really fun. I got to see a ton of old friends.

Anyways, that's been my week.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

Mi semana

Hey everybody,

Well I'm not sure about what to say... it was a very interesting week.

Really fun and edifying, but also super stressful.

For starters, Elder Piper who is the area president of Mexico, came to the mission to give several trainings. So we had a special multi-zone conference with him, and another meeting, and it was so much fun. He really changed a lot about the mentality in our mission. Our mission is a mission that baptizes a lot, and is successful, but it needs a lot of fine tuning. His talks that he gave, combined with talks from our mission president, were incredible and really changed our view of how to work with members and how to find new investigators, and how to effectively teach. It was so incredible.

The day of his second meeting with us, in the afternoon, Elder Sanchez and I were in a park studying when everything began to shake. I thought he was moving the bench, so I looked up at him, but he was looking at me with the same confusion. We both immediately knew what was happening; it was another earthquake. So we got to a safe place, waited out the shaking which was fairly brief and minimal, and then we started calling all the elders and making sure that they were okay and then informing the assistants and our mission president. The good news is that there was very minimal damage, and everything turned out okay. But it was surprising because it was our third major earthquake in 5 months which is pretty crazy.

Other fun things, we hit our goal of new investigators this week, so to celebrate, we went and ate pizza today. And we also hit our goal of speaking in English in the house, so we went out for milk shakes as well. 

We're working really really hard. It's really interesting being old in the mission. I've now been out for more than 17 months, and it hurts, I'm physically fatigued, but at the same time, I'm more spiritually mature, a way more intelligent missionary, and it's just been really interesting.

Anyways that's all for this week. I love you guys a lot.

Elder William Jacob Long

I'm all good

There was another earthquake here in Mexico but far away from here (I think the epicenter was in Oaxaca). But yeah I'm okay, my comp is okay, our zone is okay, so don't worry about me. I love you guys a lot!!!!!!!!!!!

Jacob

This week!

Hey guys!!!!!

So we had a great week!

I feel a little bit obligated to talk to you guys a bit more about my companion. His name is Elder Sanchez. He's a fairly tall, skinny guy from Tijuana who loves basketball, especially the Cavs. He plays really well. Every single morning, we play basketball during our half hour of exercise. It's keeping me in shape and motivated to get up on time which is great. He's 20 years old, has 17 months in the mission (we actually go home together), and he's in his fourth transfer here in this area.

Our area is pretty sweet. We're in a medium size ward that's directly in the middle of Cuautla center. Our area is really cool. We have about 4 small little colonies, but there are so many people here it's crazy. There's tons of work. Our ward is really good. We have our services in the stake center, and we live a block away, which is just so convenient. We live above the house of our bishop. He's really awesome. They give us breakfast every morning while we study, they let us use their washing and drying machine, and they help us out so much. It's such a huge blessing.

Our week was fun. We went to the temple and did a session as a mission. It was stressful but fun, and being inside the temple is so edifying and spiritual. It was such a blessing. This week, a seventy is coming to the mission. We're really excited about it. He's going to come and give several talks. His name is elder Piper. He's the president of the area Mexico.

We have some good families that we're teaching as well. Everything is going good. I'm gonna attach a photo of my comp and I, our house, some views of the area, and eating pizza today with the zone.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long

My week

Hey everyone!

So this week was really crazy. I got to my new area! I'm right in Centro de Cuautla. It's the sickest area ever. There are so many people. It's super cool.

We're working really hard to get the ward working in the missionary work. We don't have that much time to proselyte, so working with references, having a really involved ward mission leader and bishop, and good ward missionaries has been the focus. We're receiving lots of references, but it's been a little slow. but were finding lots of people, and working really efficiently.

My comp is Elder Sanchez. He's from Tijuana, and he has the same time as I do in the mission. He works really hard, is really obedient, and he likes basketball a lot. We wake up in the mornings and we play basketball in the church (it's a block away) until 7, when we have to start getting ready. It's really fun.

It's been fairly hot here recently. I'm trying to hold on. I sweat so much every day. My shirts are starting to turn yellow hahaha.

So that's all from this week. But I'll take photos this week of our house, our area, my new comp, our chapel, and everything.

Love,

Elder William Jacob Long