Daniel

Dear Family,

How incredible, I loved that story so much! Next week when I am on a faster computer I will print it and keep it with my other ¨´special letters´´ 

(Here is the story Cameron is referring to:

It is super hot here, too.  Summer just decided to show up with a vengeance, no easing into it at all!  Yesterday, there was a thunder and lightening storm here.  Between 3 and 4 am there was enormous claps of thunder...I have never heard it so loud!  Along with it there was a fierce show of lightening.  Then Saturday morning, we were getting some things done around the yard before the heat of the day set in.  The clouds rolled in and the thunder started.  I was watching the lightening show over Badger mountain thinking that the antennas might get hit.  The thunder and lightening were pretty simultaneous.  Then the lightening struck the side of Badger Mtn.  The fire spread quickly across the moutain.  Then another spot was struck and it merged into the first fire.  Thunder and lightening all around us....we were all standing in the yard watching the hillside on fire and counting how far apart the thunder and lightening were when there was one at the same time.  We could almost feel it in our bones.  I screamed and we all ran inside.  Chika was the only smart one that was found hiding under Melissa's bed!  I guess it wasn't so smart to stand in the middle of our open back yard to watch the storm, but that was the only spot we could see the mountain on fire.  Within about 10 minutes of the mountain catching fire, the rain began.  It rained soooo hard.  We couldn't even see Badger.  It flooded the cul de sac and pounded the house like a thousand hooves.  Then just as quickly as it came, it left.  And the fire was completely put out.  Now there is just a black eye on the side of the hill. It was a miracle.  The rain never even touched Richland proper...just around Badger mtn and where the lightening had been striking,near our house.  It made me realize how powerful the forces of nature can be.  It also made me think of when the Savior was crucified, how terrific the thunder and storms must have been.)

Most of my internet time this week has been spent in waiting for it to load. I drew the short stick this week and have to use the notorious slow computer. Just a quick story and then I will answer all the the questions I can before times up.

Daniel this week told us Thursday that his dad forbade him to be baptized, or required that he would be baptized Catholic first and then Mormon. Daniel knew better and wasn’t having any of that (ps he’s 15) and because of this conversation he had with his dad, we weren’t able to contact him all week for his final interview. his phone was turned off and we couldn’t get anything through to him. Then on Friday we finally found him leaving his apartment to go to school and he told about what had happened, he was in tears. This baptism has been his dream for 4 years and it finally looked like he might make it because his dad hadn’t said anything about it for a while. Well, we told him that his member mom had signed the paper for his baptism and he could get baptized but really only if he wanted to deal with what his dad decided later. Very much like Casey Garland or Bridgette. Well he showed up for the baptism twenty minutes late with tears in his eyes, but when he came up out of the water I felt his relief pour into me. He came to church in time to be confirmed by his member uncle with terminal cancer and I just felt the love His Father has for him even if his earthly father doesn’t understand yet.

I love Lima mom, I couldn´t think of being anywhere else right now. The jungle is pretty, but it’s more of a vacation than a mission for me, so I’m stoked to be right here. The 100 stakes has all happened in a little over 60 years from one branch, that isn’t mentioned, but it’s incredible. One companionship from each zone went, but not me and Elder Gaibor, it was in a huge soccer stadium with Elder Christofferson.  (*They celebrated 100 Stakes in Lima this past weekend.  We saw it from Braden's former companion who is in Peru on his facebook page and asked Cameron about it.)

I love you all, and will send photos and a much longer email next week.

Love, Elder Nelson