Monday, June 29, 2015

A Great Week and a Great Baptism

Okay this is Elder Petersen's last P-Day here, so we have a lot to do and not a lot of time. I am going to apologize in advance for making this really brief! 

Alright, so we went to the temple on Tuesday and President told us to go as districts and be thinking about what we see in the endowment video in regards to faith. It was interesting having that in mind while attending the session. I learned a lot there. One of the most important things I learned was that I need to be in the temple regularly when I return home. Like weekly. I haven't been in almost a year and it was killing me. President Mortensen changed the rules about going and ever since he did that I haven't had the opportunity to go because we have to go either with a recent convert or a less-active member that we reactivated and are taking them back to the temple. Anyways, if you haven't been to the temple in a while and are able to, GO. 

Wednesday, we met with Orion and just went over some of the Laws and Ordinances. Then we met with Julie and Madison Stewart. We went through 1 Nephi 8 with them and it was a solid lesson. They realized that they need to hold to the rod EVERY DAY! It was good. 

Thursday, we picked up Corban Wooldridge and he went to visit Orion and Trey with us. Still just continued in the Laws and Ordinances lesson. Corban had some good insight for them! Then we went over to Horace's house and he took us out to dinner. He is so nice! After dinner we went back to his house and went through 1 Nephi 8 with him as well. He is a big reader so when we asked him if he had read since the last time we came he said "No, not really. I am only on page 81." To which I responded "WHAT!?!?! That is AWESOME Horace!!!!" It is usually like pulling teeth with people when we try to get them to read half of that! He is eager to learn, still just a little hesitant about the restoration of the priesthood. 

Friday, we went and saw Orion and Trey again! So sweet. I wish we could meet with all investigators 3 times a week. It makes a huge difference. We read from the Book of Mormon with them and we also had Corban with us again. He is a stud. Corban said to us in the car, "This is great preparation for my mission." Do you know how much that means to me? I love that. I seriously almost shed a happy tear. Those are the recent converts every missionary wants to be with. ones who are truly converted. I loved that he said that! 

Saturday was the day! We had Orion's baptism at 11:00am that morning. He had so many people there to support him. When they got there, there was a line of people walking in with all of his family that came to be there. It was so sweet. Petey did a nice job with the baptism and the talks were great. T'was a good service! 

Sunday morning, we had ward council and we haven't been there in like 3 weeks due to other meetings and Father's Day. I felt like a less-active member coming back to activity when I walked into ward council. Haha, seriously it was weird not being there for so long. Then we had a great Sacrament Meeting and I confirmed Orion. I always get a little nervous when performing things of great importance like this, especially in front of a crowd of people! I said a silent prayer before I started and then the words just flowed. It was amazing, to me. I know that the Spirit was giving me the very words I needed to say at that particular moment. 

One thing I have learned from being out here on my mission is that I can do hard things. My personal opinion is that we are all are so much more capable than we give ourselves credit for. We are literally spirits wrapped in our mortal bodies and our spirits are so much stronger. I know that Heavenly Father will help us with all that we desire in righteousness. I love you guys and I hope you have a great week! 

Love, 

Elder DeLuca



​This is Brother Ure Sr., a.k.a "Grandpa" and I at the temple. He drove us down on Tuesday. He's one of the best men I have ever met. He is so close to the Spirit it is incredible. Love him! 


This is Elder Faaso. He is one of the district leaders in our zone. They are in a bike area and he didn't have a helmet so a member bought this for him. It is a legit motorcycle helmet! I thought it was too funny to not get a picture of! 


​I saw Elder Hegemann and French last night at a mission president's fireside. They are both doing really well! That is Fasso in the background. I just noticed that! Haha!

Monday, June 22, 2015

We Are Set for Saturday!

This week went by pretty quick but I'll spill it out for you. Tuesday, we had 3 solid lessons. We had our usual visit with Brother Mason and Elder Petersen shared Helaman 5:12 with him. After that we met with a former investigator and he was prepared to bash with us. Not cool, man. Haha....we taught the restoration and it was a sweet lesson and then he was like, "Well, I have a few questions." And we were like, "Sweet! Lets hear um." He was very slick with how he went about this. He started out in the Doctrine and Covenants 9: 8-9 and he was like, "I love this scripture and as I have studied from the Book of Mormon I have had some questions that contradict my belief of the Bible." He had 3 different scriptures (which I am not going to waste the time to share), all of which were in completely different parts of the book. We addressed his concerns and I could feel the Spirit starting to leave the room and I had a thought to share something. I said, "Listen, there are many questions that we do not have answers to and it is really easy to Google contradictions in the Book of Mormon and see what you can find. If you are sincere with your questions, that is one thing, but what is really comes down to is the promise found in the Introduction of the Book of Mormon. If you read, ponder and pray you WILL receive an answer that it is true and all of these little concerns will not be as big of a deal because you know that the book is true." We kinda left it at that and we left on a good note, but if someone is going to try to bring up some anti with me, I am not about that. At the end of the day, it all comes down to our own personal testimony with the Book of Mormon. That is literally the keystone of our religion. I have told missionaries that have asked me what to do to prepare to make sure first and foremost that you have a testimony of the Book of Mormon. It is crucial for us all. If we do not stand firm in our belief, we cannot withstand the blows that come. I know I couldn't. Missions are tough! If I didn't know what I know, I couldn't do this. But guess what? I am here because I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God. I know that it brings me closer to my Savior, Jesus Christ. I know that an evil man could not have written this book. I am so grateful for Joseph Smith and all that he has done for this world. Oh yeah, and we met with a part member family that evening and it was good. :) 

Wednesday was pretty good! We went to TEAM as usual and then met with Sister Harthan (Orions Grandma) and talked about Orion and how he was doing in regards to his baptism. He was on the high adventure with the young men from the ward all last week. Then we saw the Castillo family and the Morgan and Brenda Mertes! It has seemed like a super long time since we have met with them, but they are doing well and we went over the Restoration as a new member discussion with them at Panera Bread. It was so good to see them. We then met with a brother from the ward who just recently moved back in with his parents so we haven't ever met with him. We had planned to share Alma 7: 11-13 with him and talk about the Atonement, but that changed about halfway through the lesson. He started talking about temptations and how he doesn't believe that we are never tempted above that which we can bear. We shared a few scriptures and did our best to explain to him that we can overcome certain things on our own however, there are things that we NEED the Savior's help with. He kept on saying "Then why do people kill themselves? Obviously they were tempted more than they could handle." He was saying things like that and just wanting to argue so I did a nice job at biting my tongue, to the point to where I thought I was going to bite it OFF! At that point I did my sign language that means "time to go" to Elder Petersen and then we had a prayer and left. We have picked up that sign from the ASL Elders that live above us. It is really helpful when you want to get out of somewhere that could turn ugly. 

Thursday was a good day. We had a last minute dinner with the Cannon's. They tell us every time we go over there that if we ever do not have a dinner, call them and they will whip something up quick. I hate to do that to members, but we did because we were going out that night with their son who is about to leave on his mission to Japan. We had a nice dinner and then headed out to get to work. We had three appointments and they ALL fell through. We had planned on attending a young adult worship/bible study that night. We tracted into a guy who was so nice to us and then told us that we could come check out his church the following Thursday and we could meet after. We showed up at 8 and when we got upstairs they had a bunch of food at the back table and people were gathered around talking to each other and the music was bumpin'. I thought I had walked into some sort of a party! We probably look so nerdy to everyone there....hahah!! I just smiled. I was talking to Brandon at the doors so I didn't look too awkward. :) After about 5-10 minutes of me trying to say anything that I could so I didn't have to stand in the back with Elder Petersen and Jordan Cannon they finally announced that it was time to take their seats. Everyone sat down so fast and the only place that was left was the front row, where no one was sitting!! Oh my goodness. I have never felt so out of place my entire life! I just smiled really big and walked right up to the front and we took our seats. Everyone was staring at us, but I really didn't care that much. We started out with a prayer and then we sang some songs. Have you ever been to a non-denominational Christian church? They play like rock music. I don't know about you, but I cannot feel the Spirit when I am jammin' out. After like 20 minutes of me being Bon Jovi, the sermon finally started. It was some younger guy who was reading out of the book of Job. The topic was why does God give us trials. I learned some things that night. First, he never answered the very question that he posed. He danced around it for like 30 minutes by sharing personal stories which were pretty crass when talking about our Father in Heaven. Second, and perhaps the most important, there is so much more that we know as members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We literally have answers to everything. Obviously, I myself cannot, but there are members who have so much more knowledge than I do and I can go to them for answers. We can listen to our beloved prophet, Thomas S. Monson, and the Apostles and obey their council. We are so blessed as members of the church and the really sad part is that more than half of us take it for granted. Third, I learned that we as missionaries and members of the church literally carry a light with us. People see that and they desire to have it. After the service we felt like movie stars. There were so many people coming up to us asking us questions it was crazy. We talked to a guy that I met back in January at the Lone Star College and he was really excited to come talk to us and he said, "I know a lot about you and your church. I know that you took time out of your evening to come check out our church and I really respect that and because of that, I would like to come see one of your services if that is okay!!" Is it okay?? Dude I'll get you a ride there!! Haha. These two girls came up to us and they asked us if we knew so and so and we were like, "Nope!" and then they asked if we knew some more members and we didn't. Then they asked us if we knew Mr. Mortensen!! I was like, "Uhhhhh, yeah. That is our mission president! How do you know him??" Well it turns out they went to school with one of his daughters that just graduated and one of them was texting her right then and sent a picture of us and sent it to her. It was pretty funny. We thought we were going to get a call from President and have him chastise us for being at another church...haha! No, not really. He actually tells us to go there and offer service. The last thing I learned is that this church has really good fellowship. Most of the leaders came up to us and talked to us. They were genuinely interested in us and that is what people want. They want someone who will listen to their story. They were great about that! They also do really well for what they have. They worship God with the knowledge that they have of Him, and it is much greater that what some of the members of our church do with the knowledge that they have. I liked this church and we met some really great people there.

Friday, we had district meeting and President showed up part way through and he threw it down. He is so inspiring. When talking about our door approaches, he said when you get turned down from someone that you knock into ask yourself "Would you let you in?" That is a sobering thought. It is a pretty big pill to swallow if you know what I mean. After district meeting we went to Subway with our district leader and his companion then elder Petersen and I had exchanges with the assistants. I went to the Woodlands with Elder Louder and Petersen stayed with Elder Barlow in our area. We had a really good exchange and I learned a lot. We practiced door approaches in our companionship study and I felt better about mine. 

Saturday, we saw Orion and we asked his uncle if he wanted to start meeting with us and he said yes. Trey is 11 years old and he is the son of Sister Harthan. He is pretty excited to start talking the lessons. We saw the Castillo family that night and invited them to come to church again after we explained the importance of the Sacrament. We did not see them at church. Sunday was a good day. Happy Fathers Day to all you daddies. We had a dinner with the 1st Counselor of the Young Mens Presidency and it was really good. We started talking a lot about how Orion did on the high adventure and there arose a lot of doubt in me that he may not be ready to be baptized. We then got a ride over to the Ure's house because Brother Clark picked us up on account of us forgetting to get gas on Saturday evening. We didn't want to get gas on Sunday so we relied of the members to help us out. When we got to the Ure's we had a second dinner with them. It looked too good to decline! We were full, but Sister Ure knows how to cook. We had some of the best salmon I have ever tasted, a really good salad with homemade poppy seed dressing, and a home made chocolate pie. Would you turn that down? That's what I thought! So we talked about Orion because the Ure's were on the trip and Brother Ure was just released from being the Ward Mission Leader so he knows a lot about Orion. I don't know why but something just didn't feel right. I thought that if it were possible for us to teach Orion some more before his baptism, then he would be better off in the future when he is on his own. We ended up going over to Bishop's house because he holds keys over the missionary work in the ward. We talked to him for like 30 minutes and decided to go talk to Orion ourselves. We wanted to ask him how he was feeling about his baptism. He first asked if we announced it in priesthoof because he had to leave early. We told him yes and then asked how he was feeling, He said, "Pretty good." We then said, "Pretty good about what?" "To get it over," he replied. "To get what over?" Then he said, "Well, I just really don't like people holding me under the water, so I want to get that part over with." THE TRUTH COMES OUT may I add, (and it always does). He was nervous the entire time about the actual baptism itself. He was worried about the water. We explained that it would be really quick and that he need not worry! We asked him if it something that he really wanted to do and he said, "Yes." We asked if he was feeling any pressure from his grandma or us and he said, "No." After this visit, I felt way better and we both knew that he was sincere. We are going through with it. He is going to be baptized this Saturday!! I want you to know something about me. I will never baptize anyone just to baptize them. That is the last thing I want to do. I am not an overzealous missionary. 

Well that is pretty much our week. We have some Sister missionaries from our zone that came here to email and they were like, "Is that your email home?? It is so long!" Haha.....it takes me so long to type, but I want you all to know all of the little details! Hopefully, I am not annoying. I want to send my love and prayers out to the Rasch family. I love you and I do not know or understand what you are going through, but I know Heavenly Father does. I know I love you guys and I have been praying for you. I know that we all can receive a tremendous amount of comfort through our Savior. Congratulations Jaden for serving a serving a full-time and honorable mission. I look forward to seeing you in January. I love you guys and I love my family. I hope you all have a wonderful week! 

Love, 

Elder DeLuca



​I am going to miss this guy next week. Sorry for another lame picture! We have been too busy to be taking pictures. :) 


Elder Stone and Elder Rock! We are going to pass these around the different families in the ward and, for the week they have one, they have to share their missionary experiences with us. They belong to our ward mission leader, Brother Small! 

Tuesday, June 16, 2015

Bill is Coming!

As I am sure some of you have heard, the tropical storm 'Bill' is coming our way. I don't really know how bad it is, but I have faith that we will be safe. We have a sufficient amount of water and food that will not go bad and we just filled up on gas so we will be fine! Don't worry about us! 

Tuesday morning, we were able to go help out at SOS since we have had something come up the past 3 weeks. We were supposed to go on exchanges with Magnolia 1 but Elder Chatwin was not feeling good as he was passing a kidney stone so we postponed that. We went and visited Brother Mason that afternoon and talked to him about the prophet Joseph Smith. After that we went finding without much luck, and the appointments we had that night canceled. That is just part of missionary work! It ain't all fun and games! 

Wednesday, we helped out at TEAM again and then after that we went to the temple because Petey (Elder Petersen) was asked to do a temple ground tour this past Sunday. They role-played going through the script and then we went and had our alignment done on our car. We went to see Orion that evening and guess what!?! He set a date!! Fasting and all of those prayers were answered. The date we set is for June 27th. His grandma was there and she was the one that was master teaching him and made him realize that he just needed to go ahead and go through with it. We are feeling good about it, but not 100% sure if Orion REALLY wants it. We will see. 

Thursday was sweet even though we had a bunch of appointments lined up throughout the day and 4 out of the 5 appointments bailed on us. We used that spare time to stop by Orion and teach him the 10 commandments. After Orion, we had dinner with Horace, the older gentleman that we knocked into last week. We went over and he grilled us some burgers and he had me cut up some tomatoes, pickles, and lettuce. Guess what? I actually eat tomatoes, onions and pickles now!! For those of you that know me well, this is cray. I used to thoroughly dislike all of the above. I like them now, though!! Horace is such a nice guy. He told us to come by if we ever needed somewhere to go. After dinner we taught him the restoration. He said that he didn't have any issues with Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon but there is some hang up that we aren't quite able to pinpoint, so we are going to keep going over and find it!  He has expressed interest in attending church too! We are excited. After that, we went and met with a less active member named Kirk. We talked to him about prayer and he felt more confident in praying and when we left, he closed us with a prayer.  

Friday, we saw Orion again with Ryan Hiatt and went over the first few commandments in the commandments lesson. It went pretty well and even though he seemed a little bit hesitant with his baptism, his grandma was able to help him overcome some of those concerns. 

Saturday, we saw Rick and Corban for a little bit. Corban was getting ready to go on high adventure so we didn't stay too long. It was really good to see them though. We then went to see Horace again and we brought Ryan Barnett with us. We read from the Book of Mormon with him because he hadn't read since we were there on Thursday. Later that evening we had dinner with the Smalls and we asked Brother Small if he was our new ward mission leader and he said the he would have to be sustained before he could give us an answer, so we knew then that he was! HE is awesome. Brother Ure was called to be the stake young men's counselor. We are going to miss working closely with him. We went to the Castillo's house after dinner and Brother and Sister Small came with us. We invited them to come to church again, but they didn't come. 

Sunday was a good day. We had stake coorelation with the new stake presidency and President Mortensen. It was a good meeting. I always come out of those meetings feeling full of the Spirit. The Spirit is matter. After dinner that evening we went to the temple for the ground tours. Petey was the one doing one of the tours and I was the shepherd making sure everyone was getting to where they needed to go. He did a nice job. There were 5 tours and 301 people showed up! They are really successful! 

Well, this past week was pretty good and we have an exciting one coming our way. Thanks for all the love! I love you guys and I hope you have a great week! 

Love, 

Elder DeLuca




​Elder Chatwin went home two weeks early for school and left this week. I'm gonna miss him!! 


Here are Petey and I at the temple last night! 


So I started running consistently again. I have to get rid of some of that extra love I have! I have just been doing 3 miles every morning. It is crazy how fast you lose your endurance! Sweat like a pig to look like a fox! 

Tuesday, June 9, 2015

The Mobile Devices Came!!

Well, 'twas another good week. We found four new gators this week, but not sure how solid they are. Things are moving slowly but surely here in Tomball!

On Tuesday, we had MLC and that was where we received our iPads! It kinda stinks for some though because those that are going home this transfer did not get one and the missionaries who go home between now and November get a used one. As we all know I come home in January so I got a new one. I was pretty stoked about that. I might have had to rub it in to my companion because he didn't get one.....haha!! We tease each other a lot so it's all good! Anyways, the meeting was really good. We talked a lot about finding, putting off the natural man, and then just setting up iPads. We also received the iPads for all of the missionaries in our zone so we could disperse them out at zone meeting on Friday. Not gonna lie, it was kinda cool rolling around with 17 iPads in the car. Haha! After MLC we had to go to the mission office to get supplies and then rush to our dinner appointment with the Giffords. They have 5 children who are all pretty young and it is so cool to see how excited children get when we come over. It makes me feel like someone loves me! Haha, jk, but also neat to see how eager they are to share the gospel. I love it! 

Wednesday, we did exchanges with the ASL missionaries that live above us in the same complex. I stayed in our area with Elder Hendrickson. We did our weekly service at TEAM and then went to Chick-Fil-A. Yeah baby! That is my weakness. I am always down to go get some Chick. It is so good. If you haven't tried their peach milkshakes, I highly recommend it. Then we went and taught Orion and had a good little lesson with him. I shared a video on the iPad. We went finding that night in the trailer park neighborhood. It is Elder Petersen and I's fav! We talked to a bunch of people and had some solid potentials. It was a good exchange. It is always nice to work with other missionaries to see how they do things and learn from each other. We switched back that night after planning. 

Thursday, we had our weekly planning and then we visited the Green family in our ward. They are an elderly couple who always love having us over! They are so sweet. We also saw the Gallipeau family that night as well! 

Friday, we had zone meeting. President was planning on coming to meeting but then the assistants texted us that morning and said that they were coming instead. It was good to have them though. We felt like the meeting went well. We had the iPads in boxes up on top of a cabinet and it looked just like some random boxes that way we could keep everyone's attention. Haha! They were excited when we broke them out at the close of the meeting. Elder Petersen talked about goals and then I cam up and we both talked about finding and then Sister De La O talked about putting off the natural man. She did a great job! She is our new sister training leader. Then I finished us up with talking about how to be a successful missionary. We received a call from Brother Russell on our way home and he asked us if we could come over to give his wife a blessing. We told him we would be there in 20 min and we hurried over. She has been pretty sick the past few weeks and she hasn't been able to eat much. She lost 22 lbs in 20 days. Elder Petersen did the anointing and then I sealed the blessing. It is amazing to me how the Spirit works when you give a blessing. I cannot describe it. I don't have a deep vocabulary, but when I give a blessing, I always seem to know what to say. It really hit me when we were on our way over there how important it is to always be a worthy Melchizedek Priesthood holder because you never know when you will be called upon to use that priesthood power. She thanked us for the blessing and then we had to leave. We had them on the dinner calendar for Saturday but she was not feeling well so we told them that if she was wanting to rest we could reschedule and Brother Russell said to just call and check in the morning. 

Saturday was a slower day. We had a lesson with Orion again and we brought Ryan Barnett with us. They seem to hit it off every time. We reviewed the Restoration with him and then asked him to pray for a date that he would feel comfortable setting for his baptism. It is SO hard to teach him. He acts like we are a nuisance when we are there, but then he gives a heartfelt prayer thanking Heavenly Father for having us come over and helping him and for the faith that we have in him and all of these great things! It is so confusing. Please keep him in your prayers. He was one of the things I fasted for yesterday because we are not sure what to do. That night we went to the Castillo's house and we shared the First Vision with them and then invited them to come to church. They said they would be there, but that was not the first time we heard that. 

Sunday, the Castillo's came to church!!!! It was so sweet. I have been working with them since I have been here in Tomball and yesterday was the first time they came. I don't know what it was that really prompted them on Saturday evening, but they were serious. That night we were able to go and see Paul Kendrick. We haven't seen him in a while so it was good to visit with him! 

Well, that is was our week for the most part! I look forward to another great week. Thank you all for everything you do for me. I love you guys! 

Love, 

Elder DeLuca



We saw Brother Richter at our church yesterday! He was in the College Park Ward so Elder Petersen and I both know him pretty well. He is a stud! 


We stopped by the temple after zone meeting! 

Monday, June 1, 2015

It's That Time Again!

I really do not understand time. It seems like a day ago that I was here telling you about the previous week! So, Tuesday evening we had a lesson with Cynthia and Dante and we brought Brother Gifford with us. He is the 1st Counselor in the Bishopric. We reviewed the Restoration and it was pretty difficult because Cynthia did not take her medication so she was having a hard time remembering things. 

Wednesday we volunteered at TEAM again and that was pretty fun. We moved around a lot of furniture and cleaned different dressers and stuff that they were moving out to the floor room. We then went to see Brother Mason and he is doing a lot better from when we visited him in the hospital. He is recovering well! We also saw Orion with the Bikman boys and we just talked about the Book of Mormon with him because he had not read the chapter that we left with him. That night we saw the Gallepeau family and it was a very good visit. We haven't been able to get in contact with them in a while but we saw him at Wal-Mart like 2 weeks ago and he told us to come by next week. It is a part-member/ less-active family. They were talking about all of the flooding that has been going on here and how houses were being drifted away and what not so I was like, "There is a scripture about building our foundation." and then shared Helaman 5:12 with them. Everything was going well and then Brother Gallepeau said that he has a problem with the Book of Mormon because it "adds" to the bible. Many people try to use Revelation 22:18 against us so instead of arguing with them about how the Book of Mormon is true, we explain simply that John the revelator was making reference to his book, the book of Revelation. That has nothing to do with the entire bible. Elder Petersen did a really nice job explaining it to him and he said that he liked us because we were the only missionaries to actually use the bible to resolve his concern. His wife is a member and her daughter and her husband are now living there and they are both members that have not gone to church in a while, but they explained that they want to come back! 

Thursday we saw the Costillo family and we played a quick game of pool with Art and we made a bet. If we won, Art had to come to church, and if he won we had to go fishing with him on our P-day. Well, it turns out that we lost....we were a bit rusty because we haven't played in a while! I have only played once in Texas and that was back in the Woodlands over a year ago. We only had time for one quick game so Art told us that we could come back and play best two out of three.  :) We went back on Saturday evening and we shared a message with him as we played. That is not ideal, but you take what you can get sometimes. We had a great lesson on faith and what he can do to overcome temptation. Art won the first game and then then we won the second. The third game started off really well for us and we were sinking the balls in and then we plateaued. We had one ball left and Art caught up! He hit all of his in and then just had the 8 ball left and that was it! He shot and missed then it was my turn. I had a really tough shot with our 3 ball, but I made it and then the 8 ball was even harder so I really focused and then just went for it and I made it! I was SO happy!! Haha....all of those pool games back in Arizona and at McKay's house on the weekend payed off! 

Friday, we went on exchanges with Magnolia and the ASL elders. Magnolia is in a trio so I went with one of them and then Elder Petersen went with the ASL elders. He went down to south Houston. 

Saturday, we went with Corban to visit Cynthia and Dante. It is so cool bringing a recent convert to teach with you, by the way! Dante explained to us that he want to stay baptist and he doesn't want to meet with us anymore. That kinda stunk but we still met with Cynthia. She still was having a tough time with remembering the Restoration. It is really tough with her because we know she feels the Spirit and she knows it too. You can see her light up in her eyes when we teach her and when she comes to church. She just cannot seem to comprehend things. She has read through the entire Book of Mormon, but she can't really say anything about it. We have talked with our mission President about it because we do not want to baptize someone just to baptize them. That is the last thing we want to do. After counseling together we have come to the conclusion that Cynthia should not be baptized because all those that do not have the capacity to fully understand are saved through the Atonement of Jesus Christ. She cannot sin if she doesn't fully understand God's will. We still plan on meeting with her and helping her come closer to Christ and Heavenly Father but we just plan on not talking about baptism anymore unless she brings it up. 

Sunday, we had Stake Conference and our stake presidency was reorganized. President Sam Bikman from our ward is our new stake president and President David Peterson and Matt Strater are his first and second counselors. We are excited for them and know that they will do a great job in leading our this great Klein Texas Stake! 

I love you guys and I hope everyone is having a great summer so far! 

Love, 

Elder DeLuca



Okay, I know this is really lame, but I just did not take any pictures this week. So I just had Elder Petersen take one of me here.  Haha!!