¿“CANÍCULA”?

In which Elder Max recounts another (6!) in a string of record-setting encounters with our avian brothers. Also: He still loves his mission.

20 July 2014

“Canícula” is the word here that applies to the dry season, and it’s hot.

Basically, it doesn’t rain for 40 days, the sun gets amped up like crazy and you can feel yourself getting burned, and with dry streets, the dust gets kicked up in the wind and into your eyes and mouth.

Actually, it feels a lot like summer at home.

I got pooped on by a bird again. That makes 6. Once in San Diego, once in Washington, DC, and once in each of my areas on the mission.

In one of the pictures I sent, I’m with a bunch of niños sitting on the sidewalk. They’re really great kids, and I think 4 of them are going to be baptized this Saturday! Now, I say they’re great, and they are, but the lessons there are really hard to control. To give you an example, I’ll explain what happened in about 30 seconds the other day:

Elder Webb: “Who knows the story of Adam and Eve?”

Carlos (13 years old): “They were the first people on the earth! And God gave them a commandment not to eat the apple. But actually, we don’t know if it was an apple.”

Davit (11): “Yeah, it could have been an apple, a banana, a pineapple, a mango, a pear, a tomato...”

Tomás (10): “Tomatos aren’t a fruit”

Tony (4): (and turning only to me) “I don’t like tomatoes when they’re cut up. I only like them when they’re round.”

It was really hard to get them back on track, but they’re good kids.

It would take a week to describe everything I’ve learned in the last 7 days, but I’d like to share one thing that I thought was really important: We don’t have to be perfect today. Or tomorrow. Or in 2 weeks. Or in a year. Or in this lifetime. When Jesus Christ says “Be ye therefore perfect”, He doesn’t mean that we can’t be imperfect. He knows we’re imperfect. His invitation is to come unto Him. Like everything, perfection is a process, line upon line, precept upon precept. Feelings of inadequacy, or discouragement, or low self-esteem do not come from God, and therefore, they come from the enemy of all righteousness. God wants you to be happy. He wants you to be confident. He wants you to feel good. He knows that you’re not going to be perfect. He knows that he asks a whole lot of us. But he asks us because he knows it’s possible. Because he wants to see that we’re trying. That is when he blesses us. That is when we can know that we are right with God: when we know that he is happy with our efforts to be perfect.

So try to be perfect. Please try. And fail. And learn. And become better. And have faith. And repent. And keep your covenants. And endure to the end.

And then you will be happy.

I love you all.

Élder Webb