Elder Ethan Crisp

Another week gone by super fast. I went to the doctor Monday and there is nothing wrong with my heart so I´m back to work. I´m here in Culiacan in an area called Aquiles Serdan with Elder Sandoval. This area is cool and my companion is "bien chaca" as it is said. He just goes out and works. He doesn´t care about positions or impressing President Cantú (like my last companion)--he just goes out and works and actually cares about what i think and what i say to him. I appreciate that. We have some investigators that are "bien potente" in that they have a testimony already or are willing to change. They are just missing out on going to church. Once they overcome that challenge, we´re set to have a lot of baptisms--more importantly THEY will have THEIR baptisms. Being in a city is WAYYYY different than being in a ranch obviously. There are actual members that go to church and help us out. We have a real life bishop. So in that the work is different. I really like Culiacan--its a good lookin city. Its pure hills which is awesome on the eyes but terrible on the thighs (yah that rhymes). I´ve gotten like a billion complements on my spanish and how good it is. With this i remember back when i was set apart and Pres Osbourne blessed me that i would receive the gift of tongues and always remember it is a gift from God. So though i continue to get these complements i always realize that it is from God. With that also is the responsibility--there is a reason why i have been blessed with this so quick--i gotta keep working hard and realize that responisibiltiy.

Bueno pues--we already had a baptism--in fact i was there when we found the baptee (i do´t think that´s a word). His name is Eduardo--he´s 13. His mom is a member who recently emerged from the trap of inactivity so he already had gone to church a couple times and we found him Tuesday and baptized him Saturday. he picked me to baptize him (my third time! :D). It´s always awesome to go to baptisms and just feel the power of the ordinance--its also awesome to be the person that is helping them take this step. They truly are opening the door to their salvation--and you can feel that every baptismal service. Because of that, i advise y´all to go to more baptisms!

A thought for y´all. I was reading in Corinthians in chapte 13 and found an awesome scripture about charity. Here Paul has his little shpeel on charity, and to start in verse 2 he says,"And though i have the gift of prophecy and understand all mysteries and all knowledgeñ and thouh i have all faith so that i could remove mountanis and have not charity I AM NOTHING." Here we see the importance of charity. We could have all the faith in the world adn all the knowlege and everything--if we don´t love EVERYONE, we ARE NOTHING. I can see that clearly here in the mission field, in that when i am judging people that i see or think bad, i lose the spirit. We can´t think bad about other people--some people are different, adn most don´t have the same standards as us but we gotta love em. Christ died because he loves all of us, so why can´t we love eachother?

Some notes: I got my package, woot woot! Thanks for the candy and the CDS and the tie--I REALLY like the tie. Thanks. Also, i don´t know if i told you but all of the companinoships now hav eDVD players to watch instructional videos and they also play CDs. Every companikonship has one so i won´t need to buy a CD player. I really like the CDs. If you could find more and send em with the next package or whenever that would be great (and ties and maybe laffy taffys :P) The package took 6 days to arrive in the offices. Of course I didn´t get it until last tuesday and only cause i was in the offices--i would have gotten it next monday. Para que sepan. Also a note, there are no post offices near me here in Culiacan. I had gotten a letter from Tucker and wrote another and my comp informed me of this. If you could maybe email him and let him know that would be cool of you. I saw a newspaper the other day and the saw the results--that the Cardinals won. They LOVE baseball here in Sinaloa so thats cool. Its probably equal with soccer. Also, since his bday is before next monday i gotta say ¡FELIZ CUMPLIAÑOS, ESTEBAN! That means Happy Birthday Stephen in espanish. And I think those numbers look about right--i always think of pesos and dollars like 10 to 1 but its more like 12 or 13 pesos to a dollar so that seems about right. I´m gonna start looking at cameras so let me know when there sufficient money on the card.

Well i think that is it. I am relieved that nothing is wrong with me (at least not with health) and that I can stop worrying about things that don´t really matter. Hope you all have the bestest week ever! (And thanks everyone that writes to me--i appreciate it :D)

--Elder Crisp

PS, I wanted to send some pics but it didn´t work--you´ll have to wait until next week.