March 16, 2015
Before I jump into all the great things that are happening
in our area and all the success and miracles we are finding I just want to tell
you guys, I love getting my shoes shinned..... ha ha there is a place in our
zone where we meet up with other missionaries to do switches and for a dollar
there is a guy who shines shoes SO well, Ill be sure to add a picture.
Ok, to get back on track this week, especially
yesterday, was really great. My companion and I have been finding miracles like
crazy while working our butts off. First off, last week we met someone named
Fernando. He came to church by himself with his whole family. He was up in
Huston for a little while for work and actually found the missionaries, he has
gone a few times to church up there and loves it. He wants to be baptized but wanted
to bring his family to church first. They have now gone 2 weeks in a row and
the wife has lots of doubts and questions, but they are progressing really
well. Secondly, we found a guy yesterday named Brian, who showed up to church
for the first time. He had been talking with Sister missionaries over the phone
and skype for the last month and they told him he should go to church, SO HE
WENT! We have an appointment with him this Wednesday but we are
really excited!
This week we also had 2 baptisms. The first one was
Laura.... again. Funny story…Laura was baptized by her husband about 2-3 weeks
ago. Her husband had the priesthood to do it, but it never got put in the
church system. He spent a while trying to get the letter he needed to validate
his priesthood but he couldn’t find 2 witnesses, just the person who ordained
him. After having an interview with the bishop he actually has to wait a little
bit to receive the priesthood again. So I had the opportunity to baptize Laura
so they can enter into the temple a year from now. I also had the chance to
baptize Brenda; she is an 11-year-old daughter of a less active member that we
found from one of our recent converts. Gabriel just got baptized about a month
and a half ago and talked about his Sister being a member of the church also.
He gave us the reference and we found her and her daughter. Brenda is really
awesome and loves the church. She has lots of friends, loves the primary and is
going to be a great anchor for her mom.
Lastly my companion and I found a family of four (mom,
dad, 11 year old daughter and 10 year old son) who went to church for the first
time yesterday and are AMAZING!!! I love this family so much and it was another
miracle the way we found them. We were actually looking for someone else that
we had met in the street and knocked the door that we thought was hers. A man
came out speaking English and we soon found out that he was a Jehovah Witness.
He was really nice and let us in for a glass of water and shared to us about
how he lived in the US for a few years and learned English that way. We were
talking with him and were just about ready to go, because as nice as he was he
didn’t want to listen to what we had to say, when all of the sudden two kids
run out of no where screaming, "look dad, they are like us" but in
Spanish. Carla and Edward are the children of Eduardo (brother of the Jehovah
witness we were talking too). We started talking with Eduardo and he actually
lived in the US for a while (illegally) but his two kids were actually born
there, and even though they don’t know English they consider themselves US
citizens (because they are technically). We ended up visiting Eduardo and his
family later that week and they are AMAZING!! Eduardo ended up saying to us
"Good thing you never found that other girl you were looking for, because
if you had, you probably never would have been able to share this message with
us". The family has a baptismal date for the 12 of April and
loved thier first time in church yesterday. Eduardo is sure that he has already
found his answer to if the church is true or not because of all the great
things that have been happening to him. HE applied the teachings he heard
yesterday in church and said that he had one of the most peaceful afternoons
with his family, and an afternoon without contention, something he hasn’t had
in a long time. He also recently lost his job and was really excited to hear
about the self-reliance classes the church was offering and actually went to
the first class last night. HIs whole family is great and my companion and I
love them so much!!
Well I love you all and I hope you all have a great week
like the one my companion and I just had. Here are a few pictures from the
week:
