New Transfer-Breath of Fresh Air

 I love the start of new a new transfer. It is like a breath of fresh air. I have a new companion. His name is Elder Barraclough (bear-uh-cluff). Not one person has been able to get his last name right. He is a nice kid. Very very quiet... But has a strong testimony of the Gospel. He is from Kentucky and was going to school at the University of Louisville. He was studying Mechanical Engineering just like me. So we often have nerdy conversations about Math and Physics. He is a nice kid and I am excited to serve with him. 

      Ward did not get baptized this week. He got kicked out of the house that he was staying at and we currently don't know where to find him. His phone is shut off and has fallen off the face of the Earth. There is more to the story but I don't know how much I can really share, but I think saying that he is gone with suffice for now. On the other hand Beth wants to be baptized on May 18th and she is pretty confident on that date. She says that she took work off for that date and told her family. She has been off coffee for four weeks now and is very proud of it. I am excited for her. Satan has already started to work on her immediately after she set that date. She ran into anti-Mormon literature for the first time this past week, but she seemed to handle it pretty well. Pray for her, she is going to need all the prayers she can get. 

      The members of the Dunwoody ward are pretty surprised to see me stay another transfer. Brother Asper was pretty happy about it. I think the other members are too. When I first came to Dunwoody I never thought that I would be serving here for this long... I have enjoyed it though. I have become very close with the people here. I have made lifelong friends. I am so grateful to have families in the ward that truly love me and care about my well being. Brother Asper and I are going to be lifelong friends. I am so excited to keep in touch with him over the upcoming years. He believes that I am going to be a Mission President one day, but I think he may be shooting a little high with his prophecies. Although it was nice to know that he has such high expectations for me and it really pushes me to live up to them. I am going to miss the people in this ward when I leave. 

      Other big news. The Dunwoody ward has been split into a Northern and Southern areas. The Elders (us) are in the Southern area and the Sisters are in the Northern area. This was a big change. It will be good though. The Sisters are in the wealthier part of the area and I think that they will do better getting into the people's homes than we would. I can't begin to tell you how hostel the wealthy people are to the Elders. I really prefer tracting in an apartment complex rather than a nice neighborhood. 

     Well it P-day. Every P-day we meet as a District and play basketball. I have gotten really good at basketball over the past little while. I dare say I'm the best in the district, haha. But seriously, I love basketball. Well, the Church is true. Somebody asked me this week what the most important thing that I have learned from my mission thus far. I told them that now I KNOW without a shadow of a doubt that this Gospel is true. Of course I had a testimony of this Church when I came out on my mission, or else I wouldn't have come out. What I have now is different than a testimony though. I don't quite know how to explain it. I am converted, I am changed. I just know it is true. I have deduced through my studies that if this Church is not the true church then there is no hope for Christianity, period. The Book of Mormon was the best thing to ever happen to Christianity, but people are still in the cave and choose not to view it that way. Of course the only way to truly know it is through the spirit, and I've had that spiritual confirmation. I don't think that any other of the skills that I have learned on my mission such as being able to work with people, organize, lead, and cross people over in basketball will help me more than knowing that God and Jesus Christ are real, and that they love me. Nothing. 

     Well I love you all. 

-Elder Ryan Romero 

Miracles are just around the Bend

This week was a difficult week, but I know that the next week has miracles waiting for us. Beth and Ward were not baptized this weekend. We still have not been able to get in contact with Ward. We honestly have no idea what happened to him. We've tried everything. His roommate told us that he went on a vacation and came home without his car and that he has been acting kind of strange since. I just don't know what happened. This trial confirms to me how true this Church is and how much Satan will fight against this work. Beth does not feel ready yet for baptism. She says that she is still concerned about how it will affect her relationship with her husband. I know that Beth will eventually be baptized, I just don't know when that day will be. I know God uses trials to give us the opportunity to grow, and I am going to choose to grow from these trials. 
     So many things happened this week. I just don't know where to begin. Elder Greene and I decided that we were going to do a car fast to help the work progress in our area. A car fast is sacrifice using your car for the day to help bring blessings. We decided to go and knock on a house that Elder Greene felt like we should go and knock on. The problem was that that house was six miles away. Well, we decided to walk anyways. During our journey we had the opportunity to talk to a lot of different people. When we finally got to the house and knocked on the door, no one was home. Haha. We couldn't help but laugh. We decided to knock the rest of the neighborhood and found a really nice old man named Jimmy that has been to Salt Lake and loves the Mormon Tabernacle Choir. In all we walked about 13 miles. During the walk I couldn't stop thinking of the primary song, "pioneer children sang as they walked and walked and walked and walked." I couldn't stop thinking about the sacrifices that those pioneers made to come to Utah. I am so proud of our heritage. I know that blessings will come from our little car fast.
     Luckily this week ended on a high note with conference. I want to talk about another little experience that I had this week before I talk about conference. A night this week an Elder from my District gave me a call and told me about an incident that happened with them and their recent convert. Their convert accidentally stumbled upon some anti-mormon literature. Because of her first exposure it caused her to look into it more and more. Well when the Elders visited her she told them about all that she has come across and showed them some of what she has found. Some of the stuff kind of shook them up and that is why they called me. They didn't have answers for some of the things that she brought up and they wanted answers. I told them that it all comes down to The Book of Mormon. Is it true? They will try to attack and attack its validity, and we can come back with answers and explanations. Then they will just come up with more things to attack  it with, and it is just a battle that will never end until Jesus Christ comes himself to reveal the truth. The breaking point is our person wittness of The Book of Mormon. That is the only way that we will ever know that it is true. By the power of the Holy Ghost is how we will know the truth of all things. We all need that spiritual confirmation, because we will all face adversity. If we don't have that firm foundation and testimony, when we are faced with trials like anti-mormon literature we will fall. No one can ever take away, or deny, your spiritual confirmation of The Book of Mormon. This applies to all of us, not just missionaries facing adversity or the new investigator. I loved Elder Hollands talk this conference. We must fan the flame of our faith. We must. If you want to know this Church is true. Read the Book of Mormon, and pray about it. Simple as that. 
      Well that was sort of a tangent... But I love this Gospel. It is so true. I have got to get going now. Peace. 

-Elder Ryan Romero 

On the Bright Side

  Another Transfer down, another one coming up. Still haven't received a call from the AP's yet, so my guess is I am staying here. To be safe though I think that until I can know for sure that any mail you send this week should go to the mission office in-case I do get transferred.

     Miracles are happening, the work is moving forward. This week has been a week of what people would call "coincidences", but I'd call it the hand of God. This week has been a really interesting week, but I actually don't have too much time to tell everything that has happened. I will try and share as many as I can.
     This week we had a very good District Meeting. Probably one of the most spiritual ones I have ever had. The Zone Leaders came to my District Meeting this week. They came to report the numbers of the zone. During their report I had the strongest feeling that I needed to completely change what I had planned for District Meeting. I originally planned to encourage my missionaries to work with the Elder's Quorum to find a way to get them more involved with missionary work. I had a feeling that we needed to read the last chapter of John and discuss it together as a District. So that's what we did. This chapter is the one where Jesus Christ asks Peter if he loves Him. We probably all know the story pretty well after listening to Elder Holland's last conference talk. I felt inspired to share this chapter of scripture because I was beginning to fear that missionaries are losing their focus of why they came to do missionary work. I am scared that missionaries are doing the work to gain an accolade, a number to their name. When that is not the purpose of missionary work whatsoever. We should be doing missionary work because we love Jesus Christ, and we want to feed and gather his sheep. If we are doing the work for any other reason, we need to correct our intentions. During the discussion I was so emotional I could barely speak. It was sort of embarrassing but it was something that I felt very strongly about. I fear pride. I am scared of the effect that if can have on missionaries as well as the investigator. It is something that even the best missionaries can get caught up in. In fact, it is probably easier for the best missionaries to fall into pride. It is what destroyed the Nephites, it is what brought down civilizations, and I don't want it to bring down me or the missionaries in this mission.
     Our investigators are doing pretty well. We had three amazing investigators at Church this week. Ward, Beth, and Marcus. I can't quite explain the joy that I feel when I see someone we taught come to Church. It is one of the best feelings ever. I have told you a bit about Beth and Marcus, so I think I'll focus on Ward.
     Ward is a man that Elder Armenta and I tracked into awhile back. We had a prayer with him on his front door step and prayed for his daughter who was having chronic headaches. We had that prayer with Ward and were on our way. After Elder Armenta was transferred Elder Greene and I were visiting a member that lived on the corner of the area, fairly far away from Ward. While leaving this member's home I had a feeling that we needed to go visit ward. It was a strange thought because we haven't seen ward for about a month and a half and he lived far away. When we got in the car I drove straight to his house instead of home for Lunch. When we knocked on the door Ward answered and I barely recognized him. He had a scruffy beard and his head was totally shaved. He seemed very despondent, a totally different person than before. The first question I asked him before even saying hello was, "Ward, is everything alright." My first thought was that his daughter passed away due to something from the headaches, but it turned out not to be that. Ward struggles with a few things and has had a pretty tough life. It turns out that right before us knocking on his door again that things seemed to get a bit more complicated. I won't go into detail, because it isn't needed. We sat in Wards home and talked with him and told him that we are here for him and that our message is going to change his life. I told him that it was no coincidence that we knocked on his door. I know that God sent us there especially for him. I asked him about his daughter's headaches and his eyes got bright and said, "You know what? They're gone. It's a miracle. No medication, no doctors appointments. They just disappeared. After you guys said that prayer, they just left." I told him that God is real, and that he really answers prayers. Ward came to Church this week and loved it. He loves the members and the members love him. I am so excited for Ward and I can't wait to see the Gospel take even more of an effect in his life.

      I had a pretty good Birthday on Friday. It was really weird being away from home for my birthday. The members really tried to make it a great day. A member in our ward passed away this week and his viewing was on the night of my birthday. So things had to kind of get moved around. The Asper's were planning a get together with some of the ward members and the investigators for me, but because of the viewing it got moved to tomorrow. I am very excited to take lots of pictures and share them with you guys.

     That is about all that I have for this week, well all that I have time to share. I love you all so much.

-Elder Ryan Romero