Hey everyone,

We've had another busy week as always. We have a lot of people getting baptized next week so we have been really focusing on finding new people to teach after all our current investigators get baptized. We've been doing that the last couple of weeks with a lot of success, but after the first or second lesson they stop investigating. This week, however, the Lord really blessed us in our efforts. We found a family who is currently looking for the true church; so I'm really excited and have high hopes for them. We also have an elderly couple who we have been teaching for about six weeks now. They really want to get baptized but the husband has a problem with cigarettes. He was able to quit smoking most of the time, but no matter what we did he had to have three a day. I didn't know what we could do to help him other than pray. He had a stroke about a week ago but is doing okay now. That in itself of course is a bad thing, but the doctor told him some things he needs to stop doing to keep his blood pressure down. One of the things he was told to stop doing was to stop smoking. I didn't pray that he would have a stroke, but I think that event helped him because he is no longer smoking.

We have one investigator that we have been teaching for over a month but he won’t come to church; he always has some kind of excuse. He said he would come this week, but to be sure, we should stop by his house an hour before church. The night before, it rained for about 10 hours but I didn't think anything of it, because there was no flooding by our apartment. We were almost to his house when we saw that the whole place was flooded. My companion was ready to just go to church but I'm kind of stubborn at times. I knew our investigator wouldn't show up if we didn't go to his house, so I took off my shoes and socks, rolled up my pants and started walking. After a little bit, my companion realized I was serious and reluctantly followed. The closer we got to his house, the deeper it got because he lives right next to the ocean. We were up to our knees in water but we made it to his house.

It's a pretty cool story but he didn't come to church. He said he would go at 2pm with the other ward but he didn't show up there either :( Our investigators that have a baptismal date, however, did walk through the flood to come to church; so that’s the happy ending. I know this church is true and I love you all and you are in my prayers.

Love, Elder Smith