Rear-ended by another car...but we're OK

Hey,
Thanks for the emails. Sounds like its going to be an exciting week. Good luck at BYU, AB. You are going to love it! Write me and tell me all about orientation and your first week. Rach, where are you living this year and with who? Erin, that's so awesome to hear about the story for LDS Living. I'm glad you got the offer and you were able to have time enough to prepare for the article. It's crazy to think that another school year is starting. So weird, I would be starting year number 5 and would have already done an internship probably. Wow, I can't believe how different my life would be right now if I wasn't on a mission. No regrets. The mission is awesome.

Well sorry I wasn't able to write last week barely at all. No worries, after the car accident we are doing okay. Still a little sore in the neck and in my back but i'm good. It could have been much worse so I'm glad we are okay. I'm not going to lie it's been a few rough weeks. There have definately been some highs and lows. But I have learned a lot and have had some really amazing experiences. Last weekend we had the amazing experience to have Elder Vinas who the area 70 over the carribean visit Puerto Rico. He was present for our stake conference and a zone conference that we had on monday. Wow, amazing! The spirit was really strong and I learned a lot. It was a hard weekend for me. I was feeling really down because we haven't seen progress with some of our investigators and we have lost contact with some of them as well. I was feeling down because Jose hasn't been coming to church and madeline moved to the states with her uncle and we've lost contact with her. I have no idea where she lives and I don't think she knows where the church is we've been trying to find out but with no luck yet. I was feeling really down but it was an amazing experience to see members from the Bayamon ward on sunday. I was able to see Emma! Wow, it was so great to see her. She looks so happy. She's going through some really hard things right now but it's amazing to see the difference in her countenance. She is already planning to go to the temple when she passes the year mark of her baptism. Her daughter is not a member but came to Salt Lake on a business trip and visited temple square. They are planning on going next summer, when I'll be home! I also saw another family who got baptized a year ago in June. They are moved to Tampa Florida next week and are going to be sealed in the temple. The wife gave me this huge hug and wouldn't let go. She was so happy. Her story is amazing and after all the trials she has gone through she deserves to have the blessing of being sealed in the temple with her family. Monday came and during our zone conference President shared with us that he had been in the recent convert meeting that they had with all the recent converts in the last two years. They had this meeting with Elder Vinas sunday morning. He shared with us, and looked right at me, and told us how Emma had born her testimony of how she has changed since she came in contact with the missionaries and how she felt that as a woman she had no value but how coming to know the gospel her life has changed completely. I lost it, I was crying really hard. It's really hard sometimes as a missionary, to see so many people not accept the gospel and to see the things that so many people struggle with. But it makes it all worth it when you hear about the difference that is made in the life of even just one person. Anyway, I just thought I would share that with you. Even though being on a mission is really hard sometimes, there is nothing better in the world.

We've had a few hard weeks but heavenly father has really blessed us and we have been able to come in contact with a few amazing people. One is named Nicole, she is 17 and she found out about the church through a friend on facebook. This friend talked about the church with her through facebook, sent her videos and she has been looking at the church website and mormon.org trying to find out more about it. She looked up the address of the church and showed up on friday to the mission office and talked with a member of our ward that works in the seminary and institute office. She referred Nicole to us and we taught her the first lesson saturday morning. She is amazing! She has a lot of good questions and she is excited to learn. She came to church sunday and loved it. She had some really good questions too.

We found another really amazing family whose names are Josue and Charlene, they have two little boys. We had a really great first lesson with them and they were going to come to church on sunday we called them afterwards to find out what happened and Josue said that his wife didn't feel comfortable because she didn't have a shirt with sleeves. We are really excited about them.

Anyway good luck this week with starting school, and with your story Erin, and I'm excited that you are working in the temple, Mom and Dad. I know you will have some amazing experiences there. Tell everyone hi for me!

Hermana Barker