"Tolerance is the mask of sin"

Tijuana Temple in the distance

Dear All,

So transfers came yesterday, and I totally didn't get changed. WOO! I actually am really having fun, even though this area is a bit harder than the ones I've had recently. Training is much better the second time around, and now that I know how to make my companion talk, it's been going a lot better. Also we got to watch the Mexico City Temple Rededication yesterday, so that was pretty cool. Pretty much just pumped me up for the Tijuana Temple, which is gonna be even more special and not that far away. They told us that the goal for non-members coming to the openhouse is around 100,000. The goal for baptisms in the following months are 800 per month. IT IS GONNA BE SO FUN. 

Usually I don't like doing this, but I feel like I should tell you guys a little bit about the investigators that we've found here. We have a couple families that we are teaching. One is the husband of a less active lady who wants to get sealed in the temple. So yeah thats kind of a solid goal to work with right? But they aren't married. They're working on it, so probably this coming month we are going to have a wedding in the morning and baptism in the afternoon. WOO.

Another family we are teaching are super cool. We saw them from super far away and they were walking away from us but we both felt like we needed to talk to them, so we basically chased them down and talked to them. When we contacted them, the husband didn't want anything to do with it, but his wife did. So we showed up at their house, and the husband was like "oh well might as well support my wife" but now the dude is reading the Book of Mormon, he loves the church, he's a stud. The other day we took another family with us to go visit them, and he was like "Man, I want a family like this one. What do I have to do to do it?" It was pretty legit.

Other than that this week was pretty normal. We spend the vast majority of our time street contacting. Just because when we got here the senior companion before us was in his last transfer, so he didn't exactly work that hard to find any investigators. We literally started from 0. But it's ok. It's all about learning. The ward is pretty cool. There are definitely those who want to work and those who don't, but those who do, work super hard. It's pretty cool. 

Fun Fact for you guys: Cinco de Mayo is not actually the Mexican independence day. It's tomorrow. But the best part is that most people work tomorrow and have the next day off. My companion said it's so that they can sleep of their hangovers HAHA this country I love it.

I got called the f word the other day too, in english, that was weird. I hadn't heard that word in a very long time. It kinda surprised me how offended I was by it, when in High School it was a word that I heard every day, many times over. I was thinking about a talk I heard a long time ago about how "Tolerance is the mask of sin". It's true. We become numb to such things; we start to think they don't matter or that it's not a huge deal, but it really is. Like Christ himself said, "it's not what goes into the body, but that which comes forth that corrupts it" (Something like that I'm not sure I'm trying to translate). 

Speaking of the Bible someone gave me a bible. It's super legit too. Its hardcover, red, and the King James version in English. So that's def something I'm gonna bring home with me.

In other news, GO COUGARS! Of course, the year I can't see they decide to be the miracle comeback team. I just hope you guys are recording the games and never delete them so I can come relive everything. Haha but seriously.

Como dijo el Elder Jeffrey R. Holland ayer, "Dios vive, la iglesia es verdadera, el evangelio es poderoso, y les amo con todo mi corazon."

Los quiero muco,

Elder Rawlings

PS here's a pic of the temple (top of page)  and of the giant Christ