Jesus Christ Can Carry Our Burdens

Heyy fellow family of La Narizona,

Man! The Ward family is all over the world right now! Connor went to Missouri?!?! I think I thought the same thing as the subject heading of his letter "What the?!." Anyways, that’s awesome though that he’s already in the field, and I’m sure that the Lord has a few people that are waiting for him there.  Dad, I’m super jealous that you went to those church history sights, and by the way, it’s never too late to keep that promise to take the rest of us there. :) I’m glad to hear that everyone is busy doing lots of good things right now.

This week was full of a lot of awesome experiences, and usually when I say that I refer to the couple of hours that we spend in our area every day (going to Pricesmart and buying ridiculous amounts of food for missionaries aren’t necessarily) (Wow, my English is horrible too now, don’t know how to spell that) awesome! Anyways...lots of good news. This next Saturday, we are going to baptize two families and a lady that is super awesome! We’re seriously so stoked, especially because we know that the Lord is the one that has been helping us so much in the work. Glenda is amazing.  She is 27 and is a single mom with a baby of 6 months.  Her mom is a member and she had never really had interest in the church before.  She has told us that for about 8 years she had wanted to have a kid more than everything, but she couldn’t.  She said that she’d pray every night and that one time she prayed with the missionaries and her mom.  She said that the day she figured out she’d have Marcelito (her baby), changed her life.  She gave up smoking and drinking, the parties, everything.  She loves the church and is super excited to be baptized.  The two families are super awesome also but I’ll have to tell more about them later.

In just about every neighborhood in Nicaragua there is a group of little kids that run around together, usually playing soccer or baseball.  It’s pretty funny because we drive the truck into our area and the kids come running after us saying, "Woooo this truck is awesome!!!" and sometimes hop in the back and tell us to turn on the air conditoning so they can feel it. Sometimes I’m still amazed by the poverty here in Nicaragua...but anyways, they were playing baseball with a stick and a rubber ball, so we played with them for a bit.  I don’t want to brag, but I think I’m somewhat of a baseball legend there now.  I lost the ball like 3 times...which means I was batting super good I guess.

Alright, one more story...last night we ran into one of our recent converts who is one of the nicest people ever. She said that she was coming back from looking for the police because her lame husband sold everything in their little tin house to buy drugs.  She told us that she just couldn’t handle everything: her baby just getting out of the hospital for being sick, not having work, not even having milk for the baby, having a husband with serious addictions, everything.  We took the Book of Mormon out right there in the middle of the street and read Mosiah 24:13-15 with her.  I think that one thing I come to realize more and more every day of my mission is the healing power of the Atonement and the gospel, that Jesus Christ truly can carry our burdens. 

Well, that’s all I have time for right now, but I love you guys a bunch!!! 

Love,

Elder Ward