Zone Conference!

Hey Mom and Dad,

I´m glad it sounds like all is well back at home. That´s neat to hear about all the news in the ward and sounds like that new Spanish branch is going great. So is Elder Fuller working in our ward and the Spanish branch. Seems like that´d be hard to work and teach in both Spanish and English. I think it´s really a blessing to be able to just submerge yourself in Spanish down here. We´re currently teaching a English class for anyone who wants to come in the ward hoping they´ll bring friends and this last week I taught how to bear your testimony in English. At the end we had some practice bearing their testimony and it wasn´t bad. Then they wanted me to bear my testimony in English. Oh man, it was rough, lol. When I started my mind just went blank of what I used to say in English, lol. My first sentence was “I know that, er, Jesus Christ es nuestro Salvador, oh er, is our savior. . . “ lol. That´ll be neat next week that Walker and two other RMs from the football team will speak at the branch. I didn´t realize that there were 3 RMs on the OSU football team but that´s awesome :)

Well everything here is going well. We´re working hard to prepare our investigadores as much as we can for a “Noche blanca” that we have planned in the Zone for this Saturday. I guess the Stake Presidente really likes noche blancas here so he´s asking us to plan them more often. At the beginning of the month the sum of all the goals of all the missionaries was around 40 baptisms for this Saturday. Sadly, that number has decreased to around 25, which is still a great number, just not what we were hoping for. From our ward we have 3 that have the desire to be baptized. Two are youth, who are cousins that we´ve been teaching for just a little over a month. We found them my first week here. They´re excited and already have lots of friends in the church so we´re excited.

Well the highlight of the week was definitely this Wednesday. We had Zone Conference and this time we had Elder Gavarett of the Seventy (and president of the Area I believe) preside. Oh man that was an amazing experience. It was neat too because we had the Conference in Babahoyo, lol. Usually I guess they have conference here in Quevedo because we are a good distance from Guayaquil and there are 3 zones close to have it here. But this time I guess they didn´t want to travel too far, so we had it in Babahoyo (which is 2 hours from Quevedo) and in fact we had it in the same chapel of my old area!!! Lol it was fun to go back and walk the same streets and see the same chapel of my old area and see all the missionaries from my old Zone. Also it was kool to see Elder Sanchez, he is now the zone leader there so he directed the conference. But yeah the conference was amazing.

Hermana Gamboa spoke and told us about a new effective program for language study that the mission is starting. It´s an English study program that the mission and many other missions in the area are starting to help learn English. It sounds pretty neat, requiring the help of all gringo companions, lol. So I´m kind of excited to help Elder Vinueza learn. It´s pretty neat, with activities and weekly assessments and everything. And I guess that if you really stick with it and sign up online at the end you can take a test and will get a certificate of BYU worthy of college credit of an English class. Yeah, pretty sweet.

We heard from Elder Gavarett and oh man, it was powerful. He was funny but spiritual at the same time. He talked about why we´re here and why we came. How we can help the investigators come to church and prepare them for baptism. A lot of how we can improve those basics. And he gave us awesome suggestions. After about an hour or so he let us take another break, lol. After the break he had President and Sis. Gamboa come to the front and talked about how it was when they received their calling to be President of the mission. It was neat to hear how President Gamboa got two phone calls, one from Elder Perry and another call a month later to come to Salt Lake to have an interview with President Monson. It was amazing to hear how he was called to preside over this mission. Then he talked about temple recommends. First he asked us what signatures we have on our recommends. Well 3, our Stake President, our bishop, and our own. Those are the three in order to assure that we´re worthy to enter. He said that on his own he had the signature of one of the apostles. Then he asked Sister Gamboa how many signatures she had. She said two, her own and that of President Gamboa. Then he asked Presidente Gamboa how many he had on his. He said two, his own as well as his own. We were all amazed. He told us that just temple presidents and mission presidents are authorized to sign their own temple recommend. That´s how much confidence the first Presidency has in them. That was way neat to hear and I think important for us to realize how truly inspired President Gamboa is and how much more we should hearken to his counsel. After that he talked more on how we should find families and leave blessings in the home. Again, powerful. I think after all he spoke for maybe 2 or 3 hours. But funny thing was no one seemed to notice the time. It was such a spiritual lift it was amazing. Easily my favorite conference so far.

Then after the conference was over, when we were all setting up chairs and such me and Elder Díaz wanted to ask President if it´d be alright if we visit one family that live near the church that were converts. But when we went to ask, President asked us to wait one moment and took me by the arm and told me to go wait by one door down the hallway. Yeah, I immediately thought back to something I could have done wrong to be in trouble, lol. Inside that door, Elder Gavarett was interviewing Elder Cevallos. When they were done he asked me to come in. Yeah, being asked to be interviewed by one of the Seventy, nerve racking! Lol but it was interesting because he interviewed me like normal, just asking how the mission was and my goals and such. It was way neat but I was a little nervous. But yeah it was kool. Then afterwards Elder Díaz got permission to see the family that we had taught so we went to see them real quick before going back to Quevedo! It was awesome! The mom, Julia started to cry when she saw Elder Díaz and me coming, lol. But it was neat.

But ok other than that all is good and I´m out of time so I´d better go! Thanks for everything! Love you!

Love,

Elder David Frome