Another week come and gone!

February 24th This week was pretty sweet. We had the opportunity to have Mission Tour with Elder Antunes, an area 70. Mission Tour is when you have a general authority come to the mission to talk to all the missionaries. I was able to learn a lot from him and wanted to share a few of those things with you guys. Elder Antunes got here on Tuesday right around noon, and after talking to us in the office for a little bit we went out to lunch with him. he's a really funny guy and it's pretty cool that he wanted to come and eat with us. We then had a meeting and he used D&C 81 starting at verse 3 and really went into detail. He talked about the importance of being "faithful in council". We need to always make decisions in council; with our leaders, spouse, friends, etc. and then with this council, pray always! Like I mentioned before, this is something that I'm working on. The final step is proclaiming the gospel. And if we do these 3 things, the Lord promises us that we will do the "greatest good" to our fellow beings. Simple things, but super important. Then when we read verse 5 where it says "Wherefore, be faithful" he stopped the person reading and repeated super loud and excitedly "BE FAITHFUL!" We have to "faithful until the end"! We can't do these things only somedays but when we get tired take a break. It was a super cool example to me of how much we can actually get out of just a few verses if we really study them. When he was talking to all the missionaries, he focused on the importance of faith and miracles. He said something that I'll never forget; "Many have faith that the Lord can do miracles, even devils know that. But... do we have the faith that the Lord can do miracles or that he will do them?" I've been thinking a lot about that since then... do I really have the faith that the Lord will actually do miracles in my life? Then he said "Faith is a present the comes from righteousness. The more righteous we are, the greater our faith will be." So many people don't know what they need to do to have more faith in Christ, but the way that Elder Antunes said it pretty much sums it up. We just need to be righteous! Just follow the commandments! If we do, the faith will automatically come. I was able to be around Elder Antunes more because I'm in the office, and I'm super grateful for that. I noticed though that I really have a loooong way to go before I get to his level... if I ever do!! He just has so much faith and knowledge, it's really inspiring to see and to be around him. I'm very grateful as well for the leaders we have in the church, I have no doubt they're inspired. In the field, one of our "eternal investigators" (Marcos, 17 years old been going to church for a year but doesn't want to get baptized) went to youth conference and now he's finally excited! We're going to visit him and mark a baptismal date with him. Speaking of miracles, the Lord have given us one with him! We're still working with Cesar (his 10 yr old daughter refused to wake up to go to church and he couldn't leave her at home alone) and Leila and her daughter Letícia. It's a slow process, but we're making headway, slowly but surely! That's it for me though. I hope you have an awesome week! Love you! Elder Odom