Wednesday, May 25, 2016

IT'S GETTING HOT and the temple!

Hola a todos :')

I hope that you are all swell :) I am emailing today because we had
the wonderful opportunity to go to the Madrid Temple and when that
happens, we change our P-Day. Let me just say, the spirit that I feel
in the temple is incredible and undeniable. I absolutely love being
there with every fiber of my body! If you haven't been in a while, do
me a favor and GO! And a tender mercy occurred while I was there this
morning... I was changing and I heard "Elder Smith?" And when I turned
around, it was my old Branch Mission Leader from Valladolid, Hermano
Julio! I literally screamed (on accident) and he gave me the biggest
hug of all time! He said "how is my son doing?" Hahaha talk about
TRUNKY! It made me so happy. I miss Valladolid a lot, especially the
people. He said the branch misses me which was music to my ears. It
was pretty great to be able to see him :)

I don't really have a structured format for this week, since it was
extra long it kinda threw me off. But we had a really fun week! We met
with a lot of our friends and they are all doing good as usual. I have
to say that Talavera is definitely the most tranquillo place on the
whole planet. I love it so much here. The contacting is a little rough
some days, but overall it's been a great experience. We have transfers
this week and I'm 99% sure that Elder Johnson is leaving. I'm sad for
him haha! I'm already dreading the day when I leave this place! We
have a lot of goodbyes set up this week with the members :/ but, it
will be nice for a change and we will have to see what happens :)
also, it's officially reached the stage down here where I sweat no
matter what I'm doing. I can literally be standing in the shade, not
moving a muscle and I am sweating bullets. It's awesome/awful but if
you know me, you know how much I hate the cold, so I'm just soaking up
all the sun that I can :) I have started to carry a towel around with
me to wipe the sweat off my forehead hahahaha. It's gnarly. And it's
only May. Apparently here in July and August it's even hotter.
Hopefully I survive!

We had an English Class party this week because we are pretty sure
Elder Johnson is leaving and another one of our students, Nancy, is
moving to Madrid. We were sad but decided to go to a bar and get a
coke to celebrate :) we had a blast just talking about everything.
Somehow, the gospel always gets brought up and maybe they don't have
interest right now, but we are helping plant seeds for missionaries in
the future! One of our other students, Guillermo, called us right in
the middle of the party and told us that he was going to take his
English Speaking Exam right then and he asked us to say a prayer for
him! So all four of us said a little prayer for him in the middle of
the bar and apparently he did good on the test! It was so funny hahaha
:) and about 10 minutes later, a man who had just moved here from
Chile called us and asked us about English Class! I don't know why,
but Heavenly Father has opened the windows of English Class Heaven and
dropped us students after students after students!!  It's the
greatest.

We played soccer on Saturday morning and that was fun, we had a few
less active kids in the branch show up and even a few friends of the
members came! It's a great opportunity to show everyone that we are
normal people. People sometimes forget that behind the shirt and tie,
there's a couple 19 year old kids. And then later that night, we went
to play basketball with like 10 straight up Spaniards and I freaking
balled out. We have really taken off with the sports thing here and
have made lots of friends here! I feel like the work is slow at times,
but we are always busy with Family Home Evenings, meetings, lessons,
visiting members, contacting, or other stuff. It's weird but we are
always doing something! I get home at night and am so happy to see my
bed because we are always exhausted!

I'll finish off with our buddy Pedro, he has been coming along little
by little. He definitely feels the spirit when we are in his house and
when he is at church and he asks really inspired questions. He has
come straight out and said that he would like to be baptized and
receive the gift of the Holy Ghost, the Priesthood, and be able to
enter the temple. So, it's just a matter of getting him to agree to a
fecha and then preparing him from there. He is a man of great faith
and it has been fun to be able to watch him progress! Please keep him
in your prayers!

That's about it for this week. I say it every week but I love it here!
I don't want to come home anytime soon, no offense to any of you! You
are all wonderful people and I love you all soooo much but I am happy
right where I'm at :) I'll talk to you all next week and report on
what transfers have brought! THIS CHURCH IS TRUE and don't ever forget
it :) oh and last night we had a sleep over with my good buddy Elder
Walster in Madrid because Talavera is like 80,000 years away from
anything! It was a good time :) haha love you all and talk to you
soon!!

Con Amor,
Elder Brady Smith

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