Viva Las Vegas!: Another Awesome Week!

THIS WEEK WAS AWESOME.

So let’s go back to last Monday. P-day was awesome. Our district decided that we wanted to go on a hike. We all got in our cars and followed Elder Rogers... Who said he knew where he was going... When we crossed the Arizona border we didn't really believe him anymore. Hahaha, it was so funny. So, we finally found the place where we were going - it was right next to Lake Mead. We were going to find the trails that took us to the tunnels and abandoned railroad tracks. We again followed Elder Rogers and we ended up hiking around in the wilderness for about 45 minutes until we hiked up to the trail. It was quite an experience, but it was so, so, so fun. We went on the trail that took us through really cool tunnels. It was a really fun day!

After the hike, we went to get our groceries. A man from the Black Mountain ward paid for all of our groceries! It was so nice! We went to the church to email after that and put our groceries in the church fridge - and of course we forgot them there. So we had the Elder's meet us there to let us in at 8:00 p.m., but we had so many lessons that we forgot to go at 8:00! They called us at 8:20 and asked where we were. We rushed over to the church. When we got there they were acting all weird and were making us hurry. Apparently they thought that someone was in the church. Kind of creepy. It was a great Monday though!

Tuesday was District Meeting. It was Elder Latu's birthday, so we decided to bring a "Happy Birthday" sign that we had in our apartment to hang up for District Meeting. He loved it. He got up and said that no one had made a big deal of his birthday since he was 10. It was so awesome. Sister Cook and I looked at each other and instantly knew that we had to make him a birthday cake. We felt like we should cancel our lesson that we had with a less active member. It was so weird. But we did it, and made him a cake (the rest of this story will be finished in Thursday's description). That day we had 6 lessons with investigators - we were running around like crazy. That night we had 2 pass-off lessons in Boulder City with Elder Fuller and Elder Knight. We got 2 new investigators from it! The first one said he couldn't make the lesson, and then we saw someone walking, so Elder Fuller ran over to street contact him, and it ended up being the investigator! Hahahah! It was so funny.

Wednesday was interviews! Everyone really opened up during them – all of our district told really cool and spiritual stories. I love getting to talk to President and Sister Neider. We had a lesson in Boulder City with one of the new investigators. It went really well at first - we met with him on the Elder's porch. Then at the end when we were trying to set up another appointment, he got realllllly awkward and he bowed down and backed down the stairs - it was so funny later.

Thursday was great!! So, the day when we were supposed to meet with the less active member and we cancelled the lesson, Thursday we found out why we did that. We went that morning and he sat down and totally opened up to us. He told us that he wants to use the Atonement in his life and get his life back in order. He has made a few mistakes, and he really wants to be clean. He told us that he was glad that we cancelled on Tuesday because he wasn't ready to change that morning. It was awesome and we knew that we were inspired to cancel the lesson because he wasn't ready. It was really cool. He met with the Bishop at church that night. When we were there, we saw a Sister that just got off the plane from Costa Rica and she had come to the church with her family to be released as a missionary. It made me so sad! I can't believe I have been on a mission for 11 months - almost a year!

Friday we went and read scriptures with the less active member. He really is trying to change, it's awesome. A member cut our hair during our lunch time. We had a few really awesome lessons.

Saturday was a little off, we had a few lessons fall through. Then we went to do weekly planning. We wanted to do it outside, so we moved our outdoor table to our back porch, and got the things we needed. For whatever reason, I locked our front door, and as soon as I closed the back door - I realized that we were locked out. We had to be at the church in 2 hours and we didn't have our car key or house key!! We were frantically running around the house, taking the screens off our windows to see if we could climb in a window - unfortunately all of them were locked. We were outside for about an hour, and Adrian came and broke into our door with a knife. The home owner was on vacation, so he couldn't have helped us - we were freaking out! It was crazy! We ran inside, changed, and went to the church.

We had THREE baptisms on Saturday! Nicole, Ivanneth, and Alainya. It was really awesome. We were at the church for so long, since they all had their own services. It was a really spiritual evening!

Sunday was EASTER! We got to go to Bishop's house for breakfast and some fun. We had church, and then we went to the Why I Believe fireside. Then we had Easter Dinner at Adrian's! Great day. I love Easter. I am so grateful for my Savior and all He has done for me. If you get a chance, visit easter.mormon.org and watch the Because of Him video! It is amazing.

Today for P-day we went on a hike again with some of our members. It was really fun!

Our area is amazing! We have such great investigators:

Nick Tellas: Really excited to be baptized on May 3! He is so receptive to the Spirit.

Nick Twist: Also amazing, and really funny.

Jeremy: Baptismal date on May 17.

Ken: We had an AWESOME lesson with Ken this week. He basically taught us the Plan of Salvation. He read a Word of Wisdom pamphlet and then started to live it on his own. He can already tell the difference in his life - he is amazing.

Eddie: He has been sick lately, but he loves to read the Book of Mormon, and he loves to feel the Spirit.

Steve P: He is fun to meet with. We have had some good lessons with him, he doesn't talk much, but when he does, he totally shows that he gets it.

There are some more, but we haven't met with them recently.

I love it here. I love my companion and my calling. I love being a missionary.

Seriously though, if you haven't already, go to easter.mormon.org and share the Because of Him video on your Facebook or Twitter! Share the Gospel :)

Have a great week! Love you!

Love, Sister Coltrin

P.S. Sorry there are not more pictures today, it's hard to send pictures from these computers.