gospel bonds

Dear Family,

Hello to all from Bangalore. We just now finished ZL council and it was edifying to say the least. I love hearing the trainings prepared by President Nichols. Sister Nichols made beef stew for lunch and it was incredible, she takes good care of us. I have got to say that this ZLC was incredible. Probably one of the most edifying experiences I have had in awhile. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve in this assignment. There are times when I feel like I am not doing a very good job. I make a lot of mistakes because I have never been a zone leader before. But I am grateful for my mistakes because they teach me a ton. I have learned to take that attitude. Just take the good and leave the bad from them. This experience has also provided me with an excellent opportunity to rely on the Lord.

This past week has been so fun. Elder Ward and I are working hard and doing our best to help the people in Visak. We have this one area called Kancharapalem and it is about the only place we ever go to proselyte. It is a relatively small area, but the population is so dense here that it would never be fair to run through the streets once and move on to another area. Our church moved to 2 in the afternoon, so on sunday morning we were able to visit everyone of our investigators and invite them personally. That helped a lot.

I think I mentioned that family named Kishore Kumar last week. They came to church again and they got such good fellowship. They really enjoy the church; we have high hopes for them. We challenged them for baptism on sunday, the mom and daughters seem willing. Kishore is a bit skeptical but hopefully we will be able to help him resolve that concern.

The biggest highlight of the week was yesterday. Our journey from Visak to Bangalore was through Chennai. We had a 3 hour layover, we decided to go eat lunch and at the last second we decided to catch an auto out to Priya's house. Ha we just walked right up and they were SO surprised to see us. We only had like 20 minutes, but everyone was there and they are all doing so well. Soloman was telling us how he had just finished the book of mormon. I remember that I was sitting on the couch in their home I felt ecstatic. I tried to recall other moments in my life where I had felt that good. I don't recall being able to.

There is such an interesting bond that is created when you help someone come unto christ. It is a relationship and feeling that is very difficult to describe. I can confidently say that if that visit we had with them yesterday would have been the only good experience on my entire mission, the two years would have been worth it. Luckily that is not the case and there have been many more and hopefully more to come. But it was pretty cool. And by the grace of God we were able to return to the airport before our flight left...

Love you all,
Elder Tuscano