So this was probably one of the most difficult weeks of my mission.

I started by getting really sick on Monday night.  A fever and everything.  Turns out that the cold that I had had the week before went away and then I got sick from a bacteria.  It was all in the throat and it was super miserable.  So we didn't work Monday or Tuesday cuz I had a fever.

Wednesday we worked a bit in the afternoon, I still didn't feel great but we honestly had to get out of the house.  The bad thing that happened on Wednesday is that we found out that they had tried to kidnap Alexis (El Chino).  They hit him a few times, loaded him up in the car, and when they were going to start beating him up again he got away and made it back to his house.  So he is staying in his uncles house and we still have no idea where that is. He also lost his Book of Mormon so he wasn't reading.  But now we are going to get going again with him.  That's 2 weeks without a good lesson.  He didn't come to church this week. So we'll get that figured out.

Antonio and Laura... well for all of the illness we lost touch with them a bit this week but we hope to start it up again with them this week.  They didn't come to church either.

Thursday was a normal day...kinda.  It was just a weird week and our time didn't go as we had hoped on Thursday.  I had had a dream that night that I was going to be bitten by a dog, and then we saw more dogs that barked and chased us on Thursday than my companion or I  have ever seen in our lives.  We saw 8 dogs in the last 2 blocks to get home.  But we were able to get away without any problems.  

Friday...We went to Tampico.  We had to take a baptismal record from some sisters in the zone and they weren't at the meeting place on time, they were in the bus central, so when we got there, we were going to go on the bus but it left 5 minutes early that time.  THEY ARE ALWAYS LATE!!! Except that time.  So we had to wait.  And we got to the meeting more than an hour late.  So that was really embarrassing.

The Christmas devotional was great.  I love all of the talks about love.  I hope you are all lighting the world in these days.   There are people that need your help.   We even picked up garbage yesterday looking for some way to light the world a little bit more.

So it was a rough week.  This week we are going to work hard and we are going to talk with literally everybody that we can.  We hope to have a lot of success.  I'm going to try to be more diligent this week.  The mission is great but it makes you realize all of your weaknesses.  I hope to be able to overcome all of them soon, but I think it's a life long practice.

Christ is there to help each of us.  If we honestly want to change then he will help us out and we will be able to do it.  I've seen many people.  Those who want to change do it, and those who don't, don't. And there are those that only want to change a bit, and they change a bit.  But God wants to change us completely, and if we are willing then He will make us what we were intended to be.

I love you 

Elder Brady Allred