June 2012 Letters

June 18, 2012
      Hello family and friends. Well, everything is going well for me this week. It's been kind of a downer for me. We were planning a big activity this week and we went to every house personallly  handing out invitations. Then, when the activity came, nobody showed up. It was a bummer, but that doesn't mean that we should give up. We are planning another activity in 3 weeks and we will try it again. We are hoping to receive more help from the branch presidency. We are trying and trying, and will keep trying until I leave. The invesigators that we have are progressing slowly. We can never find them on the weekends, so they say they forget about going to church. But we will see how it goes this next week.

       Yesterday I had an opportunity to talk to the stake president. He is 29 years old and really a very very good man. We talked about the branch and how the stake could help them more. So at least we have help from the stake president. We will see what they will do to help us.

       This last week we had a lot of other activities that caused us to lose time with our investigators. We had a night with the stake visiting the less actives and then another activity with the ward on Friday. Then, on Fathers Day....everybody is drunk or almost drunk. We just visted the people that we could, and tried our best to contact the people that weren't drunk. So that was our week...

       Everything is going well and we are still trying to do the best that we can. 
                                                                                                       Love you all,
                                                                                                       Elder Clouse
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June 11, 2012
       Well hellllllooooooo!
       Well, tomorrow are transfers and I am staying with my companion. The sisters are getting transferred and I am receiving 2 new sisters. I already know them so they are not very new. But new to the area. This will be very interesting. One of the sisters I was with in Moyobamba forever and a day plus one. As I said...this will be interesting... My other companion, Elder Castillo, is coming to be another district leader. It’s cool to see him here. We will see each other until we die in the mission. That will be cool!
       In our area, we have been having some difficulties with finding people on Friday and Saturday so that we can invite them to go to church. We have people that have promised to come to church but
usually they forget before Sunday comes. After church we go visit them and they say directly, "Well, I forgot about going to church." It’s a little frustrating so we will see what we can do. We are continuing to find people to teach which is good. But the progress part is suffering a little bit.
       Elder Oceguera is doing well. This week we had a work visit: my friend Elder Reeb came with me and he went with the other zone leader. He had a good time and had an opportunity to show his progress. He will be a zone leader by the time I leave. Well, everything is going well and we are working hard. Please pray this week that my investigators can go to church this week. It would help out to have baptisms.
                                                                                                     With much love,
                                                                                                     Elder Clouse