Week 48

Hello family, friends, loved ones, acquaintances, people I know, God's children, and yeah! Hi. Hope you all had a fulfilling week full of joy, happiness and success. I had a great week! Every week in the mission field is fantastic. If you don't believe me then go on a mission! It will be great for you. So the work has slowed down a little bit here in Panorama Heights. But! We have exciting news! One of the wards split Sunday and we picked up one of the pieces! We now cover the High Range ward too. It is exciting! I have never covered two wards on my mission before. 2 times as much church on Sunday. More members. More meals! It will be awesome. I am also super stressed about it because we white washed into High Range. We know nothing about the ward or the area. But the Elders who have been covering it are in the zone still so it will be great. We are pumped. We are excited to help both wards grow and split again! We went on exchanges last week with Elder Summerhays and Elder Olsen. I went with Elder Olsen to his area. He has been out for about 2 months and it was the first time he took over the area. He was nervous but did a great job. We had a lot of fun getting to know each other and working hard. I learned a ton. We had a cool miracle that day. We decided to go tracting in Chamisa's area looking for YSAs. We found a referral to give to Chamisa while we were there. When we called them they needed some supplies that we just so happened to have in the truck. We went to see them and they just happened to be on the street of one of Elder Olsen's investigators. We just happened to find him while he was home and talked to him for 20 minutes and set up an appointment. Lots of things just so happened to work out for that to happen. It was a cool miracle. The Lord clearly was in charge of the day. The church is true. Later that same day we stopped by a member to give a blessing. She insisted that I looked like a bishop. No amount of denial from me would stop her from calling me baby bishop from that point forward. It was funny but definitely not prophecy. We had MLC this week! When all the leaders of the mission get together and are trained by the Assistants and President. It was a lot of fun! And the spirit was really powerful. We were really excited to go back to our zones and train the missionaries on what we had learned there. I love days that we get to spend with President. He is truly inspired and I love him. It will be sad when he goes home in July. We had another exchange this week with the Assistants. We went to their area and I spent the day with Elder Gardner. It was a lot of fun. We laughed a ton and spent the whole day knocking on doors. We talked to a lot of people. I enjoyed this exchange much more than the last one with the APs. Yesterday was the first day taking over the High Range ward. That ward happens to have a hospital in its boundaries so we got to go give a blessing there yesterday. It will be an interesting couple of weeks. We are hoping that since transfers are only 3 weeks away that they will keep Elder Summers and I together for one more transfer. I have never had a companion for more than 2 transfers but now would be a great time to start! That is pretty much our whole week. The update on R and his family: We still teach R everyday. He is really excited for his baptism on the 23rd. He came to church on Sunday and bore his testimony to the congregation. He actually challenged them all to never give up. It was powerful and a true sign of conversion. We were also able to teach his family this week. His wife and son both accepted baptismal invitations and we will hopefully teach them twice a week. It is so amazing to see them all progress. They are such an amazing family. R is the most sincere person I have met in my life. Full of love and generosity. I look up to him. That is my whole week! Love you all!!

Elder Carruth