Finally a new letter!

Well, things have been pretty busy down here. But that is a good thing, because it means our mission is having success. The more baptisms we have, the more work I get. I love it! I want everyone to know, I absolutely love being in the offices of the mission. As on office elder, I have a cool responsibility. I facilitate the communication between the missionaries in our mission, and the Church. I make it so that all those baptisms we are having "count". I have a scripture that I love that talks about this: "It may seem to some to be a very bold doctrine that we talk of—a power which records or binds on earth and binds in heaven. Nevertheless, in all ages of the world, whenever the Lord has given a ^adispensation of the priesthood to any man by actual revelation, or any set of men, this power has always been given. Hence, whatsoever those men did in ^bauthority, in the name of the Lord, and did it truly and faithfully, and kept a proper and faithful record of the same, it became a law on earth and in heaven, and could not be annulled, according to the decrees of the great ^cJehovah.

I feel blessed that I get to participate in this process. Plus, I get to do all the other officey things that I love to do. I have been working recently with one of the old Assistants who went home about a year ago (we do video chats, and just normal chats and send files back and forth) on redoing the reports President Stapley uses when he meets with Stake Presidents. It is all done in Excel. It actually probably seems really boring on the outside, but I love the feeling of creating when I can take all of these random numbers, and turn it into something that can be used to improve the missionary work. Dan (the old assistant) is coming down here for an internship in a few weeks, and is going to come spend some time here so we can re-do some things and perfect the whole system. In fact, we are going to re-create the entire process of collecting and processing the numbers of the mission. (I actually don´t like when numbers are a huge focus when you´re out in the field, but in here they are a huge part of what I do.) So he is coming and we are changing it all up! I am really excited. He is a nerd like me, and is a mac guy. (of course)

Other than the few hours a week we get out to our area, that is what takes up most of my time right now. This next Monday is transfers, and we have Elders up from the coast staying at our pench from tonight until next thursday! Elder Pepito, my trainer, is going home on Monday! I can´t believe it´s been so long already. He has been down in the coast the last few months, so he is one that is staying with us tonight. That will be fun. He was there my first few months in the mission field, and I´ll be there his last few days.

President didn´t assign a new Elder to replace me for this transfer, so that means I am almost for sure going to be here until my birthday. I´m glad, because it gives me time to master this job and pass it gift wrapped to the new Elder.

Cuídense. (Take care.)

T.G.I.T.

The Gospel Is True

--
Elder Scoty Stobbe