January 26, 2015
Hey everyone how is it going! I hope that everyone had an awesome week like I did. This week a lot of stuff happened to us, sometimes good, and sometimes a little less good. All in all it was a good week, the work is progressing.
So this week hermana Ingrid had her baptism interview and she passed with flying colors!!!! She is soooooo ready to be a member it is incredible, what makes me even happier is that she is a true convert, not just a baptism. She will be a member for the rest of her life, it honestly gives me the greatest joy to know that because I was able to be the mouthpiece for Christ, someone is going to become a member of God's true church and live forever=) Holy cow it really is incredible, haha she isn't even a member yet and I am freaking out! This saturday is her baptism, hopefully I will have the opportunity to baptize her, but even if I dont its ok, I will be just as excited!!!!
This week we had a lesson with Kevin, but it wasn't really a lesson it was just to answer his many questions about deep doctrine. He is so smart, but he doesn't understand that not knowing the answers to every deep doctrine question really is not important in the grand scheme of things. It went well though and we answered pretty much every question, what was cool though is that my comp and I split the questions up 50 50, so I was on my own cross referencing the bible and the book of mormon and explaining the truth!! Holy cow was I nervous, but whats crazy is that the spanish was just flowing, I did not have any trouble trying to express what I wanted to say! My comp afterwords fistbumped me and told me that he understood every word that I had said, and that I sounded fluent, the gift of tongues is sooooooooo real!!! Later on in the week we met with Kevin again and he was interviewed for baptism, but because of his questions and need for scriptural evidence to all things, he did not pass...... I was so sad, honestly I felt like I had fallen off of a ledge, his intelligence is making him naive to the point where he doesn't believe what he can't find in the scriptures as cold hard evidence, we are going to work overtime on him this week to try and get him baptized hopefully by the beginning of February. We are praying so hard for him, he is reading and studying every night, he just needs the spirit to testify to him now.
This week we had another lesson with Amalia. She has been reading little bits of the book of mormon which is good, but we found out that she hasn't been praying. So we had a really good lesson on the Sabbath Day, and being obedient to the commandments. The spirit was crazy strong as she told us that she knew what she needed to do, but that the risk of losing money was too big. We testified that attending church will allow her more blessings in her life than working on Sunday Will, she must have felt the spirit too because she came and attended church with us!! We were so happy that she decided to put her trust in the Lord and not in her wallet. So while the spirit was super strong, we extended the baptism invitation to her. She actually accepted!!!=) She accepted the 14th of February as her GOAL, so it is not set in stone, just a goal, but still she accepted baptism=) Hopefully if she keeps progressing, the next time we meet with her we will set the date in stone!
So this week my comp got a package in the mail from his mom, she actually sent him already made brownies and blondies, haha they were amazing!! Haha my comp literally is awesome, he is a great teacher, friend, and stepdad in the mission, and he shares his brownies with me! Things are progressing between him and I, I hope that I will have at least another cambio here in Salcaja, things are great!
Also this week we taught Hermano Figueroas sisters in law. Hermano Figueroa is the guy that had us make his lawn out of chopped squares of mountain grass!! His wife's family is all super Evangelical, and apparently they have never wanted anything to do with the mormons. To us missionaries this translates out to they can't wait for us to knock on their door. So we contacted the sisters in law on the street and set an appointment with them, but at church Hermano Figueroa told us that they would be leaving early for a party the day that we set the appointment, so they were trying to ditch our appointment!! Haha so we showed up an hour and a half early=) They were pretty surprised to see us at their house so early, but they let us in. We spent a little bit getting to know them, but when it came time we began teaching the Restoration. ten minutes in their countenances had completely changed, they were quiet, they were listening, but not with their ears. We asked them questions, but most of the time they would not know the answers, so we would explain to them the doctrine of Jesus Christ using their own bibles and scriptures to back it all up, they were very surprised. It really is a cool feeling when people who think that they know the bible end up learning new things from us in the old and new testaments for almost an hour=) Needless to say the spirit was super strong, and like our president suggested, we need to extend the invitation for baptism during every first lesson that we have, so that is what we did. They did not accept, but hey that is ok, they felt the spirit, and this week they are going to read and pray about the little blue book that we gave them.
This week was an awesome week, we ended up having 5 investigators at church which was incredible, the work down here is progressing! I love getting to spend my time studying the bible and the book of mormon together, they both testify of Jesus Christ, and of each other! Before my mission, my scripture study really wasn't anything worth bragging about, but now I really love just sitting on my bed or at my desk and just reading and learning new things=) It is great, if any of you have trouble finding time or motivation to read and study the scriptures like I did, tonight before you go to bed just spend 10 minutes reading the bible and the book of mormon and try to find the similarities. It is actually really interesting and cool when I find scriptures in the bible that testify of the book of mormon or of Joseph Smith. I promise that if you just force yourself to do it for 10 to 15 minutes tonight, you will see for yourself what you have been missing out on. I love you all and hope that you have another great week up in the states! Until next week!
Sincerely,
Elder McLeod
