Oh Boy...

Okay so a lot has happened this past week and I got a lot to say. I hope everything went great this past week for all of you. Let's get it...

Aight to start off, we are gonna do a little follow up on Jessica, who I talked about last week. Her husband was the one who keeps getting hung up on everything we say and just can't understand/believe anything we tell him for some reason. And so whenever we are trying to share a message with  Jessica to help her progress and  prepare her for the baptism we have set up in a few weeks, we end up only talking to the husband because he doesn't understand anything, no matter simply we explain it. And so the whole lesson is focused on Javier and we didn't achieve anything with Jessica. We got to the point a week or two ago to try to teach her without the husband and just come by earlier so that we could focus on her because she has a date (we said that beating around the bush on it). However, she told us she wants us to teach her and Javier together. And then the other day we decided to be bold about it, and told her we want to just teach her because it isn't helping her prepare very well and be ready for her baptism, and she is now ghosting us so hurray.... We had to be bold or else we would literally get nowhere with Javier in the lesson, so hopefully she comes around, we are planning on stopping by this week to see what's up, so I'll let you guys know what happens next week. ALSO, the last lesson we had with them they were just chowing down on some chicken feet. Literally was so gross, it reminded me of Kaden's (my brother) mission because he had that.... Yuck

This email is coming later than normal because we are headed to the temple today which I'm super excited about!!! We are actually headed there right now, and we are going to stop by XXXTentacions Grave and take a little pic But I'm overall super excited to go to the temple because I always have amazing experiences and feel the spirit so strongly.

I was abused yesterday....by my bike. I got completely destroyed yesterday and I'm not very happy about it. We were riding bikes yesterday, and we were coming across an intersection. There was a ton of people waiting for the cross walk on the sidewalk where I needed to go, and were all trying to move. So I decided I would save them the trouble and just go up the curb and just go on the grass, in between 2 flags, and around them, like a nice person :) Well when I came up on the curb, I went to go between the flags, and turns out it was a full on metal framed signed, I didn't realize cuz I was going super fast and just worried about the curb. So I ended up hitting the very corner of the sign, and it dragged across my shoulder and down the side of my back and ended up tearing open my shirt and cutting my shoulder and back. I'll put pics down here, I was just fine but it cut my shirt which was annoying. THEN later in the day, we were crossing an intersection (my new enemy) and I had my phone out checking where we were and where to go, and I was going one handed, and someone somewhere thought it would be a good idea to put a pothole in the middle of the intersection sho I hit that and it moved my handlebars to the left and I fell, rolling and sliding on the concrete. Fortunately for me, I'm just so skilled at falling I only hurt my elbow (I'm kidding I didn't know what happened), but after that I was not having it the rest of the day lol. I'm okay though so don't worry.

We've been having a rough time finding people to progress. Almost everyone is just too busy working and doesn't have time to either come to church or even meet with us. What the Latinos say here is instead of Estados Unidos (United States), they call it "Esclavos Unidos" (United Slaves).... Which I can see why they say that because most of them work almost every single day, actually everyday in some cases every single day, all day long until late at night. So finding people to progress and keep commitments, and get them to church has been a struggle. We are trying to figure out new ways to improve and find a solution.

I'm really starting to feel the love for the people here. As I am talking with people either in lessons, or in the streets, I just start to feel so happy and a love for them I didn't know I had. It makes me so happy, I am seriously the happiest when I'm in lessons or just talking to people. So even though I'm trying super hard to understand, just being in the room with them and feeling the love for them grows my testimony so much. I have seen many times where I share my testimony and I'm saying things I didn't really know how to say, and it seems to touch them which makes me happy that I can see progress and the help of the Lord in his work.

I know that this is exactly where I need to be, here serving and helping the amazing people here in Florida. I know that I am here for a reason and that God loves all of his children all across the world. My relationship with the Lord has grown so strongly and my testimony is skyrocketing. I love this gospel and all the blessings and amazing things that come with it.

I hope everything is going great!!! Have an amazing week, transfers are this week so I'll email again on Tuesday!!

Elder Harbs