holaaaaaa...this week was a week of ups and downs
we met with our branch president last monday night to talk
about "the work". he wants us to focus more in the city of
crevillente and not go to our pueblos as much. crevillente is hard to work in
but i agree because we're baptizing everyone in the pueblos and its annoying to
travel there anyway. he wants us to go visit members constantly, and not to be
knocking on doors 24/7, which i can kind of agree with. he says we should be better
friends with the members, but at the same time we need to be finding people to
teach. the members have to do their part. i think it's a good idea, but it will
be rough numbers-wise for a few weeks.
monday-wednesday we had 13 lessons which is really really
good, but then after we did horrible. thursday we had to go to murcia for an
area conference. we missed the train so we were an hour late, but it was fun to
see everyone and listen to the president.
when we got back to crevillente that night, we went to go
visit a deaf couple in the word. elder vosters knew sign language pretty well
but he was gone, so it was really difficult to talk with them. we just showed
them a scripture passage and they read it, and then wrote down some questions
and they answered in sign language but we didn't know what they were saying.
they were really happy that we came though so that was good.
Friday night we did exchanges because the district leader
had to come and interview nissa for her baptism. her interview went well and
she was really excited for her baptism the next night.
ok so i was freaking out all week about this baptism. we had
to do it on saturday because nissa's mom had to work sunday, and a lot of
people in the branch work saturday nights so no one was going to be there. me
and elder leon got the chapel in elche at 3 to get everything ready. i was
expecting like 10 people there, and felt really bad for nissa because she would
have no support from the branch. we told everyone the baptism started at 6:30.
at 6:45, the only people in the capilla were the 8 missionaries in our
district...i was freaking out. at 6:55 nissa calls and said they were lost, so
we had to go walk around the city to find them. we finally get back to the
capilla at 7:20, and there were like 20 people from the branch there, and
people had brought food for after and everything. at 8 we started the baptism,
and actually had to bring in more chairs, and people only had room to stand in
the back. i was so excited it was such a miracle. elder vosters came back to
baptize her and it was really good. nissa had said she didn’t want to bear her
testimony after, but she ended up doing it so that was cool.
the next day at church we did her confirmation. i just
assumed our branch president was going to do it. right before sacrament meeting
he told me i was going to do it. i freaked out because i didn’t know the prayer
in spanish or how to give a blessing afterwards. i was super flustered and
because of that i didn't have the spirit with me at all i felt. they whispered
the words in my ear, and then i gave her a really short blessing ( like two
sentences) that i don't think made sense. i was super embarrassed and mad at
myself. i should have wanted to give the blessing and prepared myself for it.
its ok though she said she liked it.
we had testimony meeting and nissa went up and bore her
testimony again which was really sweet. i went up afterwards and gave a
testimony saying thanks to everyone for the help with the baptism and saying
that it’s amazing we've had 3 new members in 5 weeks. i wanted to say "the
work of the Lord is hastening" but i didn't know how to say that in
spanish, so i said "la obra del Senor esta iendo adelante muy
rapidamente" which means the work of the Lord is going forward more
quickly. i think they all understood though.
o it was super funny at church, so we have this old
investigator who’s a woman from ecuador, and i've only met her twice, but she
told us she was coming to church sunday, but then we called her sunday morning
and said she couldn't. in sunday school this woman walks in and sits down alone.
i was super glad that she came and i went and sat next to her and said i was so
happy you came and blah blah blah. i explained to her the priesthood because
that’s what we were talking about in sunday school. and then she was telling me
about how she knew spanish was difficult because she was from brazil and had to
learn spanish when she moved here. and i was like wait, isn't this woman from
ecuador?? and then she told me she had two married kids, when i knew this
investigator had 2 little kids. so i figured out that this wasn't my
investigator. and i found out after that it was a member visiting a friend.
luckily i didn't call her by the investigators name or anything...
that's it for this week. something spiritual i guess: during
priesthood meeting we were talking about the temple, and i was thinking to
myself about how i wanted to go to the temple now, but as missionaries we're
not allowed. and i thought about how temple work is a sacred work, but so is
missionary work. and that working in the temple is a way we can sanctify
ourselves, but i think also that when we share the message of the gospel and
participate in the missionary work we can sanctify ourselves.
FOOD FOR THOUGHT
love ya
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