Buenos días, time for another update from the República Dominicana, the hottest place in the world.
These past couple weeks have been really good, you could even say they've been great. We dropped/stopped teaching a bunch of people in one week because they weren't progressing, which is unfortunate. There were a couple people we dropped that were super cool, but the work has to always be moving forward, so that means we must keep moving forward as well. A debido que we dropped a bunch of people, we also had to find a bunch of new people to teach. We've been really focusing on just one-half of the area and leaving the other half unvisited. This is for many reasons, but mostly because "the other half" is far away from the house and is super popi/rich, and the rich people don't like talking to us (Matt 19:24, Mark 10:25, Luke 18:25). The half that is closer to us/less rich is a lot smaller, so we've been really focusing on knocking ever door we see, and we've been finding a lot because of it, which is good.
On February 10th, we had Benson's baptism. An absolute miracle--the guy was able to return from getting abducted, and that he decided to be baptized, and that it all went well. I actually got pretty sick the day of and could barely work properly, but of course it was a baptism, so it was too important to not work. What else was I gonna do? "Ah sorry Benson, I know you're ready to make a covenant with God, but my stomach is a little weird so... gonna have to push it to next Saturday." Ain't no way I would do something like that. I prayed a lot for God to give me a bit of strength to get through the baptism. The baptism went well thankfully, then literally right after it ended, and I'm talking the moment after the closing prayer, my sickness got a lot worse, and I spent the rest of the day resting (sleeping in a bathtub) and relaxing (throwing up a bit).
In other exciting news, we did really well this month goal wise. At the beginning of every month, we set goals to help us see our progress and to push us to work hard. This week we achieved our goals, finding 45/40 new people and getting 25/24 lessons with a member. We only got 1/2 of the baptisms, which is great, and did well on our other goals. I really focused myself this month on the goals that we set, and I remembered just how fun the mission becomes when you make it goal based. There's more motivation, the area progresses more, and it's all around more exciting.
I'm starting to say goodbye to the people here, too, because I'll be leaving here next Friday. I'm excited because I always love change and to see and experience new stuff, but I also know I'll miss this area. It's been a great time, and I've enjoyed my stay quite a bit. Ever since I got here, I knew this area was special. The area is called La Esperanza (Hope) after all, and "There's always hope in La Esperanza," as I always say. I'll definitely be paying a visit here after my mission. It's been super fun, and I'm excited to see where God calls me next.
That's all for now. Thank you all again for the prayers and support, I can definitely say that everything you guys are praying for is being answered, so keep going! And I'll be sure to keep praying for ya'll too, as always.
I must go -Elder Barlow
