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| Brazilian family baptism |
August 12, 2013
Training is going well. My companion is super awesome! I love her :)
There are 9 full time sisters here (with one who was called for six weeks and just got her actual mission call to Santos, Brasil .... and so nine sisters here with nine more coming in. Which means the sisters who just barely got here will train even before they finish training! And... since I´m the sister leader trainer, I´ll be there to help them and train the trainers... haha. But I really hope that he calls at least one more sister leader!
August 5, 2013
I am doing GREAT. If I had remembered, about two weeks ago, I would have written something to the effect of : "Tonight we´re gonna teach a pastor!!" And so... let me fill you in on the story. Sunday - A member brought a family to church - mom dad and three kids. That was the first miracle. And so we marked to go back and visit them Monday night - and someone told us that he was a pastor in another church. We went there Monday night with the bishop a little nervous, but it went over perfectly. It was a perfect lesson and they accepted everything easily - including the baptismal date for this Sunday the fourth. We left super excited and happy. Tuesday night we went back - and thank goodness that we took a family to go and teach with us! Everything was off when we got there and we quickly discovered that they had been fighting and well... they continued their fight in front of us. But yeah, the family that we brought helped them to resolve these conflicts that they had been having and we left them with the spirit. We kept teaching them during the week, but when we went there Saturday night, A didn´t even want to receive us. She pretended that she was sleeping and we just talked to T on the front porch. And so Sunday, only T went to church. Needless to say, we were bummed and not sure of what happened - I think it was just problems such as the church that she had been going to was a lot closer and easier and stuff like that and also another member that may have set a bad example, BUT the members in our ward are PERFECT. They went to visit them on their own and talked with her and helped her to see the blessings of the restored gospel. We could see a HUGE change when we went there next. We left a message with her and re-invited her to be baptized which she accepted with more conviction. It was awesome. So we continued teaching them and preparing them to be baptized. We also discovered some past problems that T had, but he also has a HUGE desire to change his life. Saturday.... the day of the baptismal interview...... was a funny day. Fist of all, pretty much everything went wrong for us and then when we finally go there with the elders, Elder S started interviewing them and well.... Then a group of women from the Pentecostal Church arrived - the church that T used to go to. And well... it was a funny sight. Four missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ and these four women (this moment definitely strengthened my testimony as to the authority that we have as Christ´s true representatives). They conversed with T during the other interviews and then the elders left and we decided that it would be better if we stayed until the ladies left. And so... we stayed there and listened to their message. It was a good thing that we did. They made a lot of side remarks that were meant for us and to deter them from being baptized. The most interesting part was whenever they prayed. They had the family kneel down and the four of them prayed at once, talking in loud voices and citing scriptures and praying, putting their hands on the family´s heads and such - it was a huge difference from the quiet manner that we´re used to praying. It was funny because in the middle of this, the youngest daughter - A - ran out from the middle of it and came and clung to us. She definitely noticed the difference in the spirit. And then they left and we stayed. We sang with them and then bore our testimonies, trying to help them notice the large difference in the spirit. A and the kids were firm in their choice to be baptized, but T started to remember the way that he had done things in the past and what he was used to and was a little less firm. Sunday came and T got there first and said that the others were on their way, but we started to worry a little bit when they arrived late to church - but it was just because there was a water outage and it took a little longer for her to get all of the kids ready. T wasn´t baptized on Sunday, but he´ll have another interview this week and we´ll help him to prepare so that he can enter into the waters of baptism. But I, A and Y were all baptized yesterday. Their baptism was beautiful :) The spirit was strong and they felt it as well. I love them SO much!!! But yes, a lot of fervant prayer and fasting went into it. I could definitely see the Lord protecting them, but also the other side trying to mess everything up.
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