Elder Dallin Beck California Long Beach Mission: Oh. My Goodness. What a flippin good week!

Beck Family!

Oh. My. Goodness. What a flippin good week. To start, the 4th of July was awesome. God Bless America. It was crazy again here, just crazier than anything i had ever seen at home. For real, all the mexicans just know how to out party us, even at our own holiday. Everybody and their dog buys illegal fireworks, and a lot of them. Like enough to shoot down an Apache and still have enough to impress the dos equis man. So many fireworks. And on the 4th of july, we still found 2 new investigators,and tuaght 3 lessons before the fireworks ruined our night, or atleast our teaching. WE go hard right up to the buzzer. I was on exchange during the 4th with the AP T. The ap's are like the 2 best missionaries in the mission, they are the big shots, and so it is really cool to go on exchanges with them as a ZL. And so that was agood day. At 8:30, when all of the fireworks had gotten in full swing, i just started trying to drive out of this neighborhood we were in. it took us all the way until 9. just to leave this neighborhood because there were so many fiireworkds in the streets, and people out and about stumbling cause they were so drunk. It was one of the craziest 1/2 hours of my life. Constant explosions, our car was just full of smoke, you could taste the gun powder, and i had to yell at my companion to communicate anyting. And we had the windows rolled down and i would just yell "America!' to anybody that we passed by. Man that was a great night. Once we made it home, we planned and then watched the fireworks from our balcony until 10:20. They caught on fire and burned down one of the large pine trees on our street that night, the whole thing when up in flames, it is just a naked trunk now. The flames were huge, police and firemen everywhere. it was just that kind of day. And i also bought american flags for every elders car in our district, because gosh dang it we are in american and we are gonna be darn proud of it.

But that was that. here is the real good thing that hapened this last week. Even better than the 4th of July.
B got batpized!!!

yes, we finally beat satan on this one. After 3 1/2 months of the most adversity i have ever seen the devil through at one of my investigators, we won and got her baptized. It was so good, it was such a good baptism, it was the best attendence i have seen in a long time to a baptism. It was super spirutal, and she cried the whole time. She got interviewed on tuesday evening, and since then we were just in full out war to make sure she got baptized. That is why i pulled out all the big guns and asked mom to call her just to give her a little bit more encouragement. I think that the devil opposed her so much because he knows how much good she is going to do and how strong of a member she is going to be. for real, she is solid. None of her family came to the baptism, not a single person. And that was really hard from her. But when she saw how the whole ward came out to support her, and how she even got a call from a stranger (mom) to support her, she said she really felt like this is where people come and stick together. and that helped her a lot. I'll send lots of pictures of the baptism, it was really good. Elder W got to come back to baptize her, he goes home in one week. And she asked me to confirm her this upcoming sunday, it will be another great experience.
And this morning we got to go the temple again, that is why you are getting this letter on tuesday. It was great as usual, and i feel like the better i get as recognizing the spirit the more personally rewarding temple trips are becoming.

Anyways, i love you family, you are all the best. Thanks for the B-day wishes,.

Guess what i'm gonna go do tomorrow for my b-day? i'm gonna work myself to exhaustion, cause that is what i love doing, i dont need a day off, an even better present would be more days added on to my mission. But i dont think they will let me have that. but for real, thank you everybody, love you!

Beck out,
Elder Beck

This is a response to some questions Shawn asked him

20 is pretty crazy. I'm like officially not a teenager any more. And its crazy to think that i'll be 20 when i come home, no more mission birthdays. What da heck. But yes, i reflect often on why i am still here and what i still need to accomplish. I realize that i still have so much to do and become, and that i certainly cant stop working hard now, if anything i have to keep finding ways to kick it up. I am not going to ever slow down as a missionay, just keep getting faster and better right through the end, cause anything else would be a waste of time. Its something that i have kind of learned, God doesnt expect us to be perfect, but He needs us to always be moving forward. I apply that with never being complacent with where i am at. Man, that all sounds like coach Wilson philosophy, he said that all the time that we practice to fight off being complacent. We dont always practice cause we are no good, but we all practice cause we can get better.
Anyways, thanks for everything dad, have a good week.