February 28, 2011

Dear Mom,

Things have been going pretty good in the mission... more or less. I'm more happy. I've found a new love of the morning. For the past few weeks Elder Fuentes and I have been getting up between 4:30 and 5:00 so that we can have more time to study and it has become a pretty big blessing for me to help me stay calm during the day. There's still been a lot of people getting after other people here but I have been more careful in doing things exactly as they should be done, when they should be done, if not to be more efficient, to save my neck. I've avoided quite a few "machetes" as they call them here. I still have the hope that I can remain in influence here in the mission and that I can be more sure, confident and bold in helping each Elder that I become acquainted with, learn the principles of loving those who you serve and serving those you lead. I've found many friends who feel the same need for this in the mission. Yes the mission requires good business skills, and we are being taught these things. Nevertheless, some have forgotten or never learned how to do so in a loving, uplifting, edifying manner. Everything is mechanical. There is a balance between the two and my goal is to find out where that is and teach that to everyone else that I can.

Elder Bown still has his amazing experiences every day and even though I love hearing his amazing stories, I try to keep his daily reports down to 20 or 30 minutes. This week he's going to baptize a family of 8 that has received a dream just about every night about the elders visiting them, baptizing them, fighting off demons and all that crazy stuff. In my studies I've found in the scriptures that people will be visited by angels, preparing them for our message. That has been fulfilled in many different ways here in my district. I truly have been blessed with such a good district. They've had success in ways people doubted were possible. If I've learned anything these past couple of months it has been from my companion and my district.

Love Elder Landon James Crapo