Week #46

Bazinga!

Random Thought: I met Scooby.

Great week!

Wednesday we finally got electricity!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This week we have been working a lot with one of our investigators who was baptized on Saturday! Larissa! She had been an investigator for months and finally decided to be baptized!!! She asked that Elder Paredes baptize her and that I confirm her. Everything was done this weekend and now its up to the ward members to keep her going! They are going to do a great job!

Because Larissa was being confirmed on Sunday, her mom and grandpa came to church with her and now have questions! One question her grandpa asked me was about people who died without being baptized. So we talked for a bit and I taught him about baptisms for the dead and how everyone will get a chance to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ in Heaven and to choose for themselves. Well he knows the bible very well and I expected a little bit of argument from him or maybe just more questions but he just nodded and said,"That makes sense." Then we walked to sacrament together. The other Elders are going to start teaching him now because he lives in their area.

This week we have been having a bit of trouble motivating people to go to church and such. I may have mentioned this before but I was thinking about missionary work and I remembered a talk I heard by Elder Jeffrey R. Holland that talks a lot about why its hard to do this work and he is exactly right! Why isn't missionary work easy? I came up with an answer in my own words. Imagine the following situation:

Elders (or Sisters): Hi! We are missionaries from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, and we have a message about the Gospel of Jesus Christ that will change your life for the better if you live it! BUT living the gospel will be harder than anything you have ever done, or ever will do!
Person at the door: No thank you!
Elder Holland's talk was very clear that missionary work is hard because what we offer is salvation and salvation WAS NEVER AND WILL NEVER BE EASY. YOU HAVE TO EARN IT! For some people that is just too hard and the Lord has to prepare them. So I was talking to Elder Paredes this morning and we are going to experiment with any kind of way to contact that we can think of and see what happens with each one. I know we aren't the first missionaries to do this but we are excited to see what happens.

Sunday was my birthday! Thank you to everyone who wished me a happy birthday!!! It was a good day and I even got cake!! I like cake. Especially birthday cake!!

The rest of the week was pretty normal.

Mosiah 9:17-18

Com muito amor,
Elder Roman Laws