The inevitable...

Well my followers I hope that your doing great and enjoying life! Miss you guys but I know that you guys are doing great. Miss you all tons, But, I am doing great here in the furnace ( it’s soooo hot here). This week was full of some exciting stuff! So here we go. ..

First, CONGRATS BRO! You’re a stud man! Happy that your hard work payed off and you made the basketball team, I wasn’t worried one bit cause I knew you would make it. Like I have said my whole life, get after it and good things will come. Hard worky ALWAYS pays off in some sort of fashion. Always give it your all, on and off the court. You earn playing time during practice-always remember that. Also mom, enjoy CHI TOWN and the chill - have a BLAST with your sisters and Ellie- make sure you hit up all the food places that I love and take pictures there too! Ellie kill it there, you go girl!

So este semana was full to say the least! We had zone conference with President and his wife, it was very good . VERY long though. Started at 8 am and went until like 3:30... so long. But the spirit was good and we learned a lot. The theme was centered on the atonement of Jesus Christ. It was wonderful. The spirit was so strong, the zone conference was held at the chapel at the temple.

We have the people working like crazy here and we are getting after it. This area is much, much harder then Ojojona. Money sometimes brings problems and difficulties, but that’s not stopping us and we’re moving forward and getting after it, having fun along the way! So having more lessons with members and working hard with the menos activos. There are close to 250 less actives here… for many different reasons. But, we’re doing our thing and trying to make it happen!

Well everyone is starting to talk about Semana Santa.... so what does that mean? That means that it’s going to get BLISTERING hot.  It’s at the end of March and first week of April. It’s starting to heat up a ton already and I got sun burned through my shirt and had backpack tan lines... yea that’s how hot it is. And the people say that this is nothing compared to Semana Santa... so one month from now I might die of heat LOL! But it’s all good, all about the experience right!

I’ve been helping a new sister in my district that has two weeks in the mission. She has had her hard times just like all of us in the beginning of the mission. It’s all good though and she is doing better and we are helping her out. She’s a great missionary and is just in the beginning of a great part of her life. The mission is great- wouldn’t want her or I to be anywhere else at this time in her life. So I helped her out and gave her some different perspectives and let her know I was pulling for her. We’ve all been there and it is super difficult.

SOOO..... it took about 7 months before anything would happen. Well, that streak ended Sunday night around 7pm. We were walking down the street and we turned this corner and saw a man walking about 50 yards in front of us. He had a machete but that’s not a big deal because literally every person here that works in the fields or other types of jobs carries a machete so that was nothing new. Well, when we got about 40 yards from him my companion and I looked at each other at the EXACT same time and in the exact same words said to each other, “We are going to get robbed by this man¨. I can’t tell you how strong the spirit was at this moment, probably one of the strongest feelings that I have EVER felt. I was told that everything was going to be okay just to keep walking. I didn’t question the spirit and we kept going and knew all would be okay but we were going to get robbed. The President of the Rama was with us too. So it was us three and just this man. Well, we got within about 10 yards and he put up the machete and told us to stop- so we did. We first thought that he was drunk, but he wasn’t drunk at all, he was just a thief. Well, he was like, “I am ¨guarding” this area of bad things, put your hands up¨. So we did. He started to pat me down first. Started with my backpack and then my entire body, socks and all. He was looking for cell phones and money but we don’t keep it on us for this reason. Then he started searching my companion. At this moment I saw the gun that was sticking out of his pants. But everything was good because we knew that we would be okay. So we calmy let him search us three and then told him,  ¨You see we were not lying when we said we didn’t have anything¨ We were like, thanks and you have a great night.  We were calm the entire time because we knew that the Lord had our backs and the spirit already testified that we would be okay in this moment when this was going to happen. The Lord lives. The Spirit is REAL. This was such a strong learning moment for me. Always listen to the spirit, it never leads us in the wrong direction, when we listen to the spirit in all aspects of our lives, we will always be lead to make the right decisions. I am grateful for the spirit and the guidance that it is for us in our lives. Always do what you have to do to have the spirit with us in all moments of our life.

Thanks for all your love and support you guys are the best! I am doing great here. I am loving the experiences that I am having in the culture and more importantly spiritually. THE SPIRIT LIVES. It is a compass for us in our lives. Thanks for your love and support, make it a great week. Aim High in all that you do and put your best foot forward always! Go gettem’ tigers!

Con Mucho Amor,

Elder Long