we can't change the wind against us, but we can adjust our sails

Greetings from here in Spain,

Well that week just flew by, holy moly. Time always goes a little slower when you get to a new area or get a new companion, but lately, since we´ve been together for a bit now, it's been going by pretty fast.

So some news for this  last week--my left eye hasn´t stopped twitching since Tuesday, getting kind of annoying now. I´ve got a permanent goose egg on the top of my head from hitting it on the door frame while walking in and out of houses or rooms. You´d think I would have learned by now but nope, they still get me, And it still hurts. Kayla remember when we went to LA together and I jumped on a mattress in Justin and Julie´s garage and I unfortunately didn´t see the screw hanging down from the shelf? Gosh, I smacked that thing hard! Haha took everything not to cry in front of everyone, had to choke down my tears and ask you in secret if my head was bleeding. Haha poor kid.

Well the missionary work is moving forward, we continually witness blessings every day. We found a woman from Haiti the other day (didn´t Uncle Sam serve in Haiti??) and she is super awesome. Doesn´t have much except her 2 little kids, no job. But she is so humble and sweet, makes me feel horrible for everytime I was selfish and whined about not having a cool phone or being able to by nice and expensive clothes all the time. The mission has opened my eyes, There are some many people here who just have the bare minimum and go day to day to live, and I think it should be a life lesson learned for each one of us. Many of us haven´t had to worry each day if there will be food on the table, but I don´t think it would be a bad thing to experience either. We could all learn something from them and quit worrying about that and focus on the more important things. They are able to recognize the littlest of blessings, which is important. We had zone conference on Thursday and they talked a lot about having a good attitude and how that can change the outlook of your mission in whole. So I´ve been a personal goal, and I hope you all will as well, to always strive to have a good attitude amidst the trials and hardships. We can´t change the wind against us, but we can adjust our sails.

The family from Bolivia is doing great, Carmen, the mom, is so golden. It amazes me everytime we leave the house. She has true desires and the Lord is blessing her and us as well.

I´m doing great, happy and healthy :) I made those cookies on Wednesday and they are sooooooo good. I had forgotten how good they were!! Wow, thank you so much for sending those ingredients. Thanks for all of the gifts as well, I love the flip flops and shirt! I had a great birthday, not that it was much different than any other day haha, but it was really good. 

I hope you all have a great week!

Love Elder Franson

teaching mostly south americans

Hello to all,

This week was a pretty good one, had some great experiences and miracles. First I wanted to tell you about this new family that we are teaching. The Lord blessed us big time with giving us this opportunity to teach them. The mom´s name is Carmen and she has 2 kids, a girl who is 14 and a boy who is 8, kind of like Cady and Porter :) This family is super golden, honestly they just accept everything and also they have some really good questions. The 14 year old girl asked, sincerely, "Just, why aren´t there prophets now? Can´t we have a prophet just like they did back then?" I don´t think I would have ever of thought of things like that when I was 14 haha. The thing I'm worried about is just the dad. We´ve never met him and I don´t want him to think we are going behind his back and teaching her crazy things. Pray for them, please. 

 

Interesting story, so we´re serving in Spain, right? Spain, should be a lot of Spaniards here is what I thought. Well there are a lot of Spaniards but typically they are a lot more hard-hearted, they just have a harder shell that needs to be cracked. The South Americans are a lot more accepting and open. The Spanish people have a long history of Catholicism and don´t like to change from their ways very often. But we do have one investigator who is from here in Spain. He is pretty good but his life is really tough right now, just barely lost his job and around the same time, his wife left one day with his 2 kids. We can tell he is depressed and is struggling a lot, but I hope that as we continue teaching him and helping him get closer to his Heavenly Father it will help him have more strength and confidence. He has already come to church twice!

Ok, love you all so so so so much! Have a fantastic week.

Elder Franson

american breakfast, minus the syrup

Hey all,

Okay. This week was amazing and frustrating...but more than anything amazing.

So, the frustrating moment was when we were at English class on saturday (and that Ecuadorian family always comes), and when we invited her to church again (she came once) she said "Oh well actually we just want to go poco a poco (little by little), and we already attend an Evangelist church. So for now we´re fine. I mean its all the same God, right?" Ugh, made me so sad. She obviously didn´t understand us when we taught the authority part. But who knows, maybe their time isn´t quite yet.

But the miracles were flowing this week, we have a total of 5 new investigators--found them all in the streets--who are just AWESOME. Two of them are a couple, in their mid 20s, the guy is super buff and my companion has dubbed him as "the Abocrombie model" haha. he wouldn´t seem like the type to accept the Gospel, but he did! The other one is a guy from Peru who just accepted everything super easily and gladly. I was super surprised and happy. The other ones are a family from Ecuador (ok I swear everyone we talk to here is from South America, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia, Columbia. The Spaniards typically have a lot harder of a shell than Latinos. So basically I have all of the South American missions in my mission haha). They are all really really good and I´m so happy! Pray for them please, Satan is very motivated to make everyone fall.

Also, on Thursday, we cooked an American breakfast for the recent converts Beatriz and Edison. We did pancakes, french toast, scrambled eggs, and bacon. Mmm so good. Other than the fact that syrup is no where to be found here in Spain which is annoying, but we made do. They really liked it, or maybe they were just saying that to make us happy, never know. I always tell the members when they feed us that their food was super good even when I was about to gag, so maybe they are giving me a taste of my own medicine.

Thanks for all your love and prayers, sure do appreciate it. Oh, tell the Blums thanks for that card for me.

Can´t wait to Skype you this Sunday!!!!

Love, Elder Franson