Not quite Colombian...June 29, 2015

What a wonderful week that we had with President and his wife here in Valledupar.  We had interviews with all the missionaries and it was fun to spend some time with each of them individually and listen to hear what our President has to say!  We ate crappy Chinese food with way too much oil two days in a row for lunch (it is President's favorite) and got to review houses with Sister Searle!  She is a real sweet lady but I would never want to be on her bad side!!  She has a lot of tact!!  Makes you feel real dumb when something isn't right haha :)  We also had some meetings with the Stake President (Pte. Varon) so that we can clean up the attitudes of some of the missionaries in their ward councils and how we can work better together!  Besides that we have been scrambling to work in our area.  We had 6 Baptisms a week or two ago but now we have to find new people to replace those who were baptized.. it isn't as easy as it sounds.  We had a zone meeting Saturday where we talked about reaching our potential.  Most of us in the zone are just fine where we are at and with what we are doing but I know we could all be doing much more.  I realized who I am and who I can become by studying a couple talks from our Area Presidency and one from Elder Klebingat,  ¨Approaching the Throne of God with Confidence¨.  It has changed my perspective on what I do.  Sometimes I would love to just go and change things for other missionaries so they see what they are doing and how they can change to work more productively but then I look at myself and my area and find lots of things I can do to improve.  We also worked a little with a member named Alfredo Quintero.  He is a deaf member (we are teaching a couple of deaf people) and so when we teach someone he bears his testimony, we translate, and when one is teaching the other is translating for him so he understands.  I can communicate very basically in sign language which has been pretty fun!!  We had an amazing experience with him giving a blessing!  We had asked him to help us with a sister who didn't feel so good and while I was giving the blessing my companion and I felt him shake and I thought he was having a seizure.  After we asked him what was going on and he told us that he literally felt the power of God while helping us with the blessing!  It was amazing and I took a better look and the tiniest of things I am doing that would keep me from receiving the power that comes with our authority.  Definitely a learning experience that went in the journal!!  Hope you all have the best of weeks.  Love you all!

Love, Elder Slack