Avalon Week 8

Too bad for the Steelers.... It's a gloomier day here in Pennsylvania. Nobody is smiling, and outside, you could hear men, women, and children crying on the streets after the game, fanatics yelling at their TV to help the defense out. But sadly they lost the Super Bowl XLV. Well maybe next year. Last night the mission President asked us to be inside by 6 pm. because of the super bowl. He didn't want us out doing stuff while
the Pittsburghers are watching their form of General Conference.

Alrighty! So this week was a great week! We had a great time at church yesterday because 3 of our investigators came out to church! 2 of them missionaries have been working with for a long time and they are
progressing slowly. They've come out to church many times before and they're doing okay. The third one though was way awesome! His name is Chris M and he's a great guy. He's married to a less active member of
the church, and we've been meeting with him for a while. I don't know if I've told you about them before or not. Anyway We've been trying to get him out to church for the past 7 weeks or so and he hasn't come, each
time he promised to come too. Anyway, the whole family showed up! Chris, his wife Charmaine, and their little kids! The ward did a great job friendshipping them and being way nice to them. And another thing that
was way awesome that happened this week! I want to share an experience that really strengthened my testimony of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. We have an investigator family called the A... family. They are from Egypt and moved here to America about a year and a half ago. We tracted into them and found that were very receptive. Since they are Egyptian they don't speak english very well. It's broken and we can somewhat communicate but there is a barrier there for sure. The hardest part was that they couldn't read english well at all; one line per day is what they said. So we called the office and had them get us a copy of
the Book of Mormon in Arabic and it just so happened that they had one on hand in the office. We got it and delivered it. On Saturday we went to see how their reading went. Mona (the mom) expressed to us that she
read the introduction, testimony of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and 16 pages of 1 Nephi. She said that she felt in her heart that the book is true! Though we have a language barrier, the Spirit speaks in all languages and testified of the truthfulness to her. It was a wonderful experience! They promised to come to church this next week and I'm positive that they'll progress and eventually enter into the waters of baptism :)!!!!!!!

So for my year mark, Elder Taylor took me out to eat at Applebees! He's a great guy and I really enjoy serving with him! It's a wonderful blessing to be able to have a companion that cares and has great faith. We're having a great time together and are positive that we'll see some great things happen this transfer. Not much else happened this week. I've been out for a little over a year now! How fun is that! It has been a great first year! I have learned so much when I look back on it and I have experienced a lot too while I've been in the few areas in my mission. I love it very much! Serving a mission has been the best decision I've made!

Love,
Elder Benjamin Serrano