I remember that this time last year I was making fun of everyone because they acted like the 40-50 degree weather was really cold. This year it's not so funny. I am pretty much freezing.

This weekend was a girls'-camp-type of spiritual experience. We were wet, cold and muddy, and we could see our breath inside the house, but in the end everyone came through for us. We were able to have investigators in church, and our members even came, which was somewhat awesome. Our little branch had better attendence than the local ward (and they have six missionaries) and our members have to travel much further to get to the chapel.

On Saturday, there was a stakewide mini MTC activity. It was really cool. After a morning of training, the youth got to go out to teach with the missionaries. I ended up with the group of young men from the branch.  They're pretty much the most ADD, long-haired, Argentine group of 15-17 year old punks that there ever was. I had to control them. Dont laugh.

Anyway, I was really excited because one of the three youth was Silvio, the kid that was about to be baptized that evening. His testimony is so strong. It was a really cool experience to teach him and then see him teach other people. He's going to be a great missionary. I included pictures from both of the activities.

Hey guys!

Happy fourth of July!  And no, there were no fireworks.

We had a crazy and incredibly spiritual week. The members in our branch are really excited about missionary work. We've been having little training meetings and we've also been trying to do service in their houses.  We're starting to see a lot of unity and families are being reactivated. Everything that we've fasted and prayed for is coming to pass.

Two weeks ago we found a kid named Silvio while we were looking for a reference from a member.  This week Silvio got permission to be baptized. He's really excited.

At the end of Principles of the Gospel, my companion and I shared our testimonies. We were both kind of surprised when Silvio said: I'd also like to share my testimony. We were even more surprised by what he
said. He testified of the Book of Mormon and that the church was true. He thanked us for teaching him and bore his testimony of his upcoming baptism, quoting 2nd Nephi and saying that it was the "door
that leads to the path that leads to eternal life."

This kid is 17 years old and met the missionaries two weeks ago. He goes to seminary, mutual, bears his testimony and reads his scriptures every day. Then, when my companion and I ended the class without
challenging the students to pray about what we had taught, Silvio did it for us. The kid is incredible. I started to cry a little bit right there in the class because the Lord has blessed us so much.

This week we finally saw the end of the whole Argentine futbol craze.  I decided not to make fun of anyone. Mostly because there are a lot of them here, but also because I heard that some of the young men cried.
I felt very merciful.




Elder Rasband