A Conference With Elder Zwick

Dear Friends & Family:
This week was really good. We had Stake Conference and Elder Zwick from the Seventy was here. He even talked with one of our investigators! The conference was great, and I saw a lot of people I knew from when I was in Flour Bluff and Portland. They reorganized the Stake Presidency and released the Stake President. All in all it, was great.
This week was also homecoming here in Sinton. We were driving the other day and noticed that a bunch of the roads were blocked off, and so we got out and it turns out they were having their homecoming parade. It was pretty neat seeing as how Sinton is such a small town, and everybody was there and stuff like that. You don’t get that in LA.
I can’t believe it is almost November, these past few weeks have really gone by quickly. I know that it will all be over sooner than I can imagine. We keep having these missionaries from another church knock on our door. They have come by 3 times in the past 2 months of so. I don’t think they know that we are LDS missionaries, but I suspect that they keep coming back because were nice to them. I think they’ll be surprised one day when we knock on their door!
Things are going great here. We have an awesome investigator (the one that met Elder Zwick) Please pray for him. I think he can be baptized before I leave, which would be awesome, but if not I know he will in the future. Take care!

Ryan

Only 4 More Blogs Left

Dear Family & Friends:
This week was pretty good. We had Zone Conference on Wednesday. Sadly, it was my last Zone Confernce ever! It was one of the best that we have had though! We have Stake Confernce this upcoming weekend, and there will be some General Authorities there, although I'm not sure who. Somebody from the Seventy. We have been having a lot more success lately. We have found some amazing people that we are teaching. My companion, Elder Cardenas, is great We recently found out that somebody that Elder Bugg and I taught, Tiffany, was baptized over in New Mexico. She is one of Johnny's daughters and moved over there a few months ago.
We had an amazing experience this past week. We decided to go over to a less- active members house at about 1 p.m. Even though I have been here so long, I have never met her before. It turns out that her mother had died a few days earlier, and she had just attended the funeral. She was grateful that we came by. Ig uess nobody had visited her in a long time, and we were able to share some scriptures with her and help her feel more a ease. There are so many times on a mission where you just happen to be at the right place at the right time. It is amazing how the Spirit will guide you to those people who need the gospel.
I can't believe that I only have 1 month left. A few months ago somebody told me that the last 3 months of your mission are the slowest, and so far that has been the truth, but now it seems more real to me! Mom, the Mission Office is supposed to send you something this week. They called to verify our address, so look for something in the mail. I hope you all had a great week! Only 4 more letters to go! Love to all, Ryan

A New Investigator and a Departing Testimony

Dear Family & Friends:
This week was great! I didn’t get transferred. My companion, Elder Kocherhans, went to Laredo, and I got a new companion, Elder Cardenas. He is from San Francisco area. He has been out about 15 months or so. He was companions with Elder Kocherhans before, and we have lots in common.
We found this new investigator, and when we talked to her, she said that she knows a member and even went to church a few years ago. She said that she felt great when she went. She was having some problems because her eye was swelling up really bad for no apparent reason, and she had to miss a lot of work, so we gave her a blessing. Two days later we came back and she was completely healed. She said that her eye swells up a lot and will usually last for a few weeks, but as soon as we gave her the blessing, she said the swelling went down!
I can't believe how fast time is going here. It seems like just yesterday that I arrived here, and now I only have a month or so left. We have Zone conference tomorrow, and I get to say my departing testimony! Also they should be sending you (mom) a letter from President Miller about my departure.
Well. I hope everything is well. Is it snowing up there yet? I am definitely acclimated to the heat. It got cold here for a few days; in the low 60s. I had to put on my sweater and turn on the heater and everything, so I am definitely not prepared for a cold winter. I don't even think I have any winter clothes. Love to all, Ryan

Ensign Magazine Features McAllen Mission

This week was great! General Conference is like Christmas for missionaries! Unfortunately the satellite gave out right before the Saturday afternoon session, and again before the Sunday afternoon session, but luckily we had a member who had the BYU channel and so we were able to watch it at their house, and didn't miss much. We have transfers on Wednesday. Please pray that I don’t leave Sinton! I really want to finish here, and this is my last possibility of getting transferred. I can’t believe that it’s already October. This week was pretty routine. We were really excited for conference, and so that was pretty much our whole focus this week. We recently had a sister move into the branch from Tijuana Mexico. She said that she went to the San Diego temple a lot, and we talked a lot about California. In this month’s Ensign there is a feature on member missionary work, and it features our mission. There are a lot of missionaries from the mission that were interviewed. I saw a copy that a member had and it looked really cool. I didn't even know that they had come and interviewed a bunch of people. Apparently they wrote the article about a year ago when I was in Brownsville. Things are going well here, and the weather is cooling off just a hair. Tell everybody that I say Hi.

Ryan