Logan - Barcelona Week 6

Dear Family,

Well I already sent a written letter home that contains a lot of what happened at the beginning of the week, and you should receive it today or tomorrow. Last Monday after our meeting with President we zipped to the train station and headed down south to Valencia. We ride the trains so much that I now recognize the all the workers on the train. We actually missed our train though because the meeting with President went late. We were talking about transfers and who is going where and before we knew it we had been in talking for three hours. During that meeting he also asked me who I wanted for my next companion. It was crazy looking at the board of missionaries and trying to decide who I wanted. In President's office there is a huge board with pictures of all the missionaries that shows where they are at in Spain and who they are with. A lot of our Monday meeting is spent sitting looking at the pictures and talking about the needs of those missionaries also reviewing the numbers for each missionary of the previous week.

The Valencia trip went well and I got to do an intercambio with Elder Jensen. He is who I have chosen to be my next companion, but he still doesn’t know. We had a good time and went to eat with an American family who lives on the beach. The dad has actually been taking kite surfing lessons and while we were there we watched a few kite surfers. I definitely want to get into it after the mission. It was frustrating that I felt awkward speaking with the family in English. I had to think about what I was going to say and everything came out funny. I say the most ridiculous things in English now. Like¨ we played all the day long¨ because in Spanish "todo el dia" is how we would say it. I need help when I get home.

I told you about Jazel last week and this week she has been super busy and it has been hard to get in contact with her. I said a prayer specifically for her and yesterday when we left the office she was walking up the road and we were able to talk to her for a minute. It sounds like she had read bad stuff on the internet about us and I explained to her that if you want to know something about us and the church then talk to us and not anyone else. It’s amazing asking God for things and feeling completely worthy and confident that he will give you those things which you asked for. When we are being good we can ask God anything with confidence and then plan on receiving it. "God you know me I am doing all I can and am being the best I can and I need this so please give it to me." Our will becomes his and we receive what we want and what God wants.

We will be baptizing a man named Moses this weekend and he is from Peru. We honestly haven’t taken on a huge roll in his conversion. He has been prepared by angels. He has already made all the changes necessary and just showed up to church. We talked to him and basically just made baptismal arrangements. He is worried about his family in Peru and is worried that his wife who is less active in the church. We gave him a chapter to read in the Book of Mormon and told him to think about the questions he wants answers to about his wife and family and in the following visit he told us how God told him exactly what he needed to do. It has been amazing to see the change in this guy’s life. He said he has no feelings of hate locked up in side anymore and he feels so much better. He has truly been converted by the spirit.

Biggest news is that our mission is taking over the Victoria stake of Bilbao and the mission of Bilbao is being dissolved. Madrid will be taking over the other part and Malaga will be taking our southern stake of Elche which is really sad. We will lose all those missionaries to the Malaga Mission. This will take place in July. It was pretty exciting to get the news. The Hinckleys came down into the office late last night at 11:30 and then we just sat in his office and talked about it till 12:30. He seems to have mixed feelings but is excited about it. I am talking him into doing a tour of the new part of the mission so I can go with him and we can scout it out.

This morning we will be having our Monday meeting and its going to be wild trying to decide who we will put in the Elche Stake because they will be changing missions and we will lose them. Well I have already written too much. Love you guys. Have a great week!
Love,Elder Gogarty

Oh I also met a Mexican from Beremejillo and he knew all the same people I did his name is Thomas Flore we talked about the Junkyard and everything it was great.One more thing, Do you guys know who Ricky Shrouder is? He is in our ward and was in some older movies.