Elder Andrew Peña:

Jan. 4, 2010

Can you believe it is 2010! Well it is! And it's time for goals and resolutions. Things to do and people to see. Lives to change and a new attitude and new way of life and a new beginning! Though we do it every week by partaking of the sacrament and renewing and committing ourselves to the Lord it seems appropriate to set a yearly goal! Some of which I have already set! I set these goals a while back and didn't think of them as being goals for this year coming up but that is exactly what they are! So I will stick to them and find great joy in it! Thank you for everyone's e-mails. It was good to hear from everyone. Thank you! It sounds like everyone is having a great week despite those who get their wisdom teeth out:)... Life here in Turlock is amazing! No matter what happens I'm grateful for the experiences! I was blessed and able to baptize Janelle Bucio, a part member family and the baptism was awesome. It was on January 2nd and on the 31st of December, yes New Years Eve, Joe Dillman was baptized and it was at 8:20 at night and I think it was the latest possible time for a baptism let alone the latest time of the year! Haha he was probably the last person in the world to be baptized in the year 2009!! Haha it was truly amazing! Again in those that we have been able to teach as they have been confirmed and received the Holy Ghost you can tell a difference and that is a miracle in itself! As a mission we were able to have 937 of our brothers and sisters enter into the waters of baptism in the year 2009 what a miracle! We just fell short of our goal but we have achieved so much! The year before in 2008 we had 588 and the year in 2007 we had 518 so that is amazing! On Friday we set our goal for this year of 2010 to have 1200 for our goal! As a mission we were going to set a goal for 2000 but we decided to come together and base our goals off the stake goals! So we are coming more unified with the stakes and wards and working together to accomplish this great work. Once we can get the unifying effect of missionary work and member work it will be absolutely amazing! So that is our goal! In the month of December alone we were able to have 122 people be baptized which is the most we had all year long! We have been asked to pilot church tours as a mission! Elder Perry has asked that we do it and it has been something that we knew would come just didn't know when! About 8 months ago two of my last companions were running the program in the Modesto stake! That was my first area becoming a zone leader and they ran it there for about 3 months and within three months they tripled their baptisms by doing these church tours. They were averaging 11 baptisms. The Washington Tacoma mission has been doing it for several years and they went from 800 baptisms averaging to about 1400 baptisms a year! AMAZING! Anyways we are piloting that in our mission and Elder Cook and I received our "training" and we will be training our zone tomorrow on the church tours! We are not allowed to take investigators on the tours until March 1st but until then we are practicing by using our members! So far we have done like three. And we need to be doing about 12-14 a week at the minimum! So a lot of our lessons will be at the church! The church tours are very specific to the questions you ask and pictures we use. It's awesome! I love it! We do a 10-15 minutes tour and then have a 10 - 15 minute lesson in front of the baptism font (it being open and the investigators facing the font). Not only are we doing something that is exciting but also Elder Ballard is coming to our stake conference on January 17th and I am super excited! We need to find a lot of investigators to invite to that! Here I am receiving all this information about some kind of supper of green chili and a family home evening with all my best friends! Yet I'm doing the best work I can be and I'll be able to meet an apostle! I'm excited! I would not want to be anywhere else at this time! I love my mission! I love you all and hope you continue to keep me in your prayers! I love you and and can't wait to hear from you again this upcoming week! We were listening to a talk by President Hinckley this morning and he talked A LOT about faith and missionaries and how being on a mission shows a lot of faith! I love the gospel and I have no doubt within my heart it is true and everything else that comes with it! It is great to be in church and in the gospel principles class with investigators I have been able to teach. And being able to see their lives change from night to day because of the teachings of the gospel! How does it happen!? It's a miracle and it's because of their humility and willingness to listen and obey the commandments! I love you all! Have a great week!:)
Elder Peña