I´m two months into my mission. You might ask what my feelings are. Nervous, excited, apprehensive, joyful. It´s a "mesclavo" or mix. It´s weird. Tomorrow, I will go to Barcelona. I´m about to begin my real mission, and I´m excited for that. It´s going to the best. Let me tell you about an experience I had on saturday. I got to go to the park, and they put me with another American. They trust me to speak Spanish. Weird. So we go out, and we got rejected so much! Some woman told us to forget her, because she was Catholic. You tell a lot of people to have a good day on the mission, let me tell you. So then, we found the guy, who last saturday, told us that he wanted to meet us at the same bench and discuss the Book of Mormon. He was there! And he had read! He didn´t pray though. It made me sad, but we had a good 45 minute talk about the Book of Mormon and the gospel, and we got his information, and passed it onto other elders in the Madrid mission. We also invited him to come to church at the stake center by the temple, and that we would go with him, and he said he would go and we were so excited, and we didn´t show up. It was really sad. I guess I´m just getting prepared for more and more rejections. It´s all good though. I got to talk to him for 45 minutes in Spanish. IN SPANISH. I´m basically native. Not quite, but I´m working there. I put in my work, and the Lord will take care of the rest. I love this work. It´s really a privilege to be able to be a missionary. I learn more and more about how awesome this gospel is everyday. My testimony is constantly growing, I take a lot of gospel notes. It´s hard to write in my journal, just cause I´m so busy. It´s okay though, I´ll get around to it.
Sometimes I feel down, but then I remember the missionaries that came before me. Heber Kimball went on how many missions? Followers of Christ have to make sacrifices, that´s the price. The reward? Glory in the kingdom of the Father. There is no rest right now. There will be rest later.
I´m excited to get to Barcelona. I will take some pictures of my first area for you. I´m excited to meet President Hinckley. I´m excited to preach the good word. I´m just very excited. I love this gospel, I love my family, and I love Spain. Look at Romans 15:24. This isn´t the first time the gospel has been preached in Spain.
-Elder Pericle