Elder Caiden Brown New York New York North Mission: The spirit of the resurrection and loved friends!

My amazing family and friends!

I definitely procrastinated this email today, and so I am writing it kind of last minute. I just don't want it to end... it's been a little difficult I am not going to lie. I've cried a couple times, but I do still have two weeks and I'm dedicated to make sure my mind is in the right place to make it the best.

This week was awesome though! I guess I will start off with a miracle. So, we had gotten done with a lesson a little bit early and Elder Munoz and I have made a goal to at least spend 30 minutes either knocking doors or street contacting, because we have been busy and so we weren't really setting aside time to do those things. So we thought this would be a perfect chance to be able to do it. We offered a prayer that God would sanctify the few minutes we were going to knock doors and that we could find someone with a situation prepared to accept the gospel. So we start knocking, and we start talking to this one lady... she was really going through a hard time. She had just lost her husband like a month before and was still frantic about that, she had lost her leg in a car accident and that was prohibiting her to do a lot of the things she wanted to do and her mom was in the hospital sick. She was devastated. We shared a message of hope and the resurrection with her and tears were just streaming down her face. We shared with her the Book of Mormon and her tears turned into a smile. We were able to kneel down and pray for her and it was just a tender experience for me. We are excited to continue to help Omyra!

I told y'all about Antonio last week, right? Well, he is doing great!! The first hint he said to us this past lesson we had with him was that his daughter had called him from Mexico and told him that she wanted to be baptized. He asked why? She said that all of her friends were getting baptized and that she wanted to do so as well. He told her that that wasn't a good enough reason and that she needed to study and think more about it and then get back to him. He told her that he would do the same. So we had a great lesson about baptism and he ended the lesson saying, "well, maybe me and my daughter can get baptized on the same day"! Hearts are changing!

Junior is doing good! I really hope he makes it to his date on the 29th. He is progressing so much! He willingly accepted the word of wisdom, even though he smokes and drinks coffee all the time. He promised that he would live it and change his life. Hopefully he can stay true to that promise and that he can receive those amazing blessings of baptism!

But there was a baptism this week! I don't know if y'all remember me talking about Jorge, but he was a guy that Elder Frei and I found in New Rochelle like a month before I left. He was doing really good and we gained an amazing friendship in that short little month. But then I had to leave. ISN'T THAT JUST THE SADDEST THING IN THE WORLD?!?! But, he kept meeting with the Elders and he had to leave a lot of things behind but he progressed towards baptism and this past Sunday he got baptized! I was invited to go to actually baptize him, but things didn't permit with the schedule of both our wards and meeting on Sunday, but I heard that it was a great service! I'm so grateful Jorge took that step and hopefully someday he can have an eternal family!

Well, thanks so much for all your support and love. I have seen myself change over the past two years and I hope y'all have seen that change in me. I hope y'all are ready to meet a new and improved Caiden Brown, 😂😂 and I am ready to keep on changing!

Con amor,
Elder Brown