Elder Turner's 1st Letter from the "Field"

Hello Mother and all :)
Well this is day 5 in the field and im happy to be writing you all. I, from here on out will be emailing on Mondays so maybe you could just have an Elder Turner email reading time for family home evening :)

Wow!! this week is has been crazy and i cant believe im almost done with my first week in the field. My companion assures me that the time will only go by faster the farther i get into the mission. My companion and trainer is Elder Hatch and he is from Plain City Utah. This is his last 6 weeks of his mission, so i have been blessed with a trainer who really knows the ropes here, not to mention he has been working in the mission office for the past 6 months as an Assitant to the President. He is amazing and i learn so much from him each day.

So the moment we have all been waiting for, to know Elder Turners location!! My area is called San Cristóbal in the stake of Mariscal Zone 8. We are opening this area as the first Elders for about 5 years. The Sisters moved because they thought that is was dangerous but Elder Hatch was shocked to see that this area is the safest area he has ever been in on his mission. Every house here has a fence about 10ft tall with razor wire around the top and to enter the communities you have to get thru security. I feel pretty dang safe to be honest!! Safer than being at home considering the house has razor wire all the way around.

We've spent alot of these first days getting to know the ward leaders and gain the trust of the ward memebers because that is how the work is going to get done here. Its difficult to contact in this area because of the security and also because everyone here drives so we are really counting on the ward to support us and help us out. The ward is pretty big, yesterday there were 180 people at church and one of the families the sisters we're teaching made it too!! it was so awesome to see them there and when we called to see if they were coming to church they were already getting ready. We visited them after church and they are a super pilas family. (pilas is a word here that means great so if i ever say a family is pilas, it means they are great) We commited them to pray for a baptismal date of Nov 7th and we will see how they progress.

The work here is amazing and the people are amazing to too. I love the blessing i have to serve the Lord each and everyday with every ounce of energy i have. Its crazy how tough it can be to work with all you can physically and spiritually but the blessings are abounding!!

A little info:
Mondays are district meetings and after we write emails
Tuesdays are Pday
Everyday is a blessing

Serve the Lord with all your hear might mind and strength

Elder Turner