New Pictures! And last weeks letter!

Tons of new pictures from Colton this week! Take a look http://coltonbaines.shutterfly.com/
Also here is his letter from last week, sorry I have been so bad about putting them up. He is doing great we talked to him last week and he sounds fantastic. I am so proud of him, what an amazing thing that he is doing and I am grateful for the wonderful message he is spreading to those people. What a great brother I have, I am glad he is such a great example to so many. Have a wonderful week!




Hola!

Well this week is just racing by! I am sure that i say something to that extent every week but its true and it always amazes me how fast it goes. Elder Dye and i just say that the only days in the mission are Sunday and Wednesday (P-day) because it seems like we have always just passed one of them when the other is tomorrow. That might not make sense but oh well. But i had an awesome phone call with the family on sunday it was great to here from all of you!! I think i pretty much covered everything there is so there isnt much more. But for those that couldnt be at the phone call here is a quick update.

We have some really good investigators right now. One, Glorimar, has lupis and is going in to get a hip replacement becasue the disease ate her hip away. She came to church on sunday (even though she wasnt suppose to go anywhere under doctors orders) and sat through church in pain. She absolutley loved it and refused to leave early. Needless to say she wants to come back to church as soon as possible and get baptized. Problem is it could very well be up to 6 months (max) before she could get baptized due to the surgery. But she is awesome! Then on sunday we found a guy named Pablo. He has a baptismal date for June 6th! The lesson we had with him started out HORRIBLE. He told us the only reason he inveited us over was to be friendly and he cant read so he wanted us to read the pamphlet we gave him to him. So we started reading and it was just going nowhere. So we gave up on reading and did a really simple example and the light just flipped on. He said it felt as if god was talking directly to him when we shared the example with him. We moved on to the Joseph Smith story and asked him if he understood and he was like "yeah! i am looking for the right church just like he was!!" so he is coming to church this sunday and is preparing to get baptized! Awesome!!! Our other investigators are also progressing, slowly but surely.

That is about it as far as what has been going on. the work is moving forward and elder dye and i are having a blast! Something that i was thinking about while reading an email today, is how we always have a fresh slate, so to speak, at the the start of a new day. I have come to realize on my mission that by the end of the day i could be feeling really good, wanting to work hard, wanting to be obedient, just wanting to do everything right. Sadly, i wake up the next day and feel as if i have to start from ground zero and once again build myself up to that point again. WE can make the best of our day, but we have to find the things that will turn it from not so good to how we want it. For example; I have found that i start my day on a low. Waking up. This is not my favorite part of the day. So how do i make it better. Exercise. I love to work out it makes me fell better and i feel alert and awake after wards. When i dont work out i the morning, for me it is the start of a not so great day. Im sure we are all wondering where i am going with this. Well here is my point. Lets say we end the day with a grand desire to follow Jesus Christ and do all we can to live the commandments and be better than the natural man. This is our disposition at the end of a fantastic day. We say our nightly prayer and go to bed thinking of how great the next day is going to be. The problem enters here. Sleep. Sleep is something that we, as the natural man, fallen, and imperfect, need. So we wake up the next day having perhaps lost a little of our fire from the night before. Maybe we still have our desire, but how do we start the day? Do we jump out of bed shower, eat, race out the door to our daily duties? Or do we wake up say our prayers, read the scriptures, spend a few minutes with the family when possible and then execute our day according to the desire we have to follow Christ? It is easy to see the turning point in a day if i am having a bad one. It is when we find someone that is willing to talk to us. But what if i could be the turning point in someone else's day and be the one willing to talk to them? That was a lot of randomness all at once im not quite sure why i even wrote it, but enjoy the glimpse of what goes on periodically when my mind actually is turned on. Have a great week everyone!!

Love
Elder Baines