Finally! Baptisms!
We had a pretty good week because some of our investigators FINALLY GOT BAPTIZED! Unfortunately, Diana, the woman who gave us ginea pig to eat that I mentioned last week, wasn’t one of them, but she’s still a possibility and the other two, Yeferson and Camila, are awesome!
We found them when I was with Elder Marino, about two months ago, and at first they didn’t want to listen to us. Whenever we were close by we always went by their house to see if they were there (And for a while we had no idea why — something just told us we should pass by! Turns out it was the Spirit!), but they didn’t have any interest — Yeferson later admitted to us that he’d hidden and had sent his wife, Camila, to go tell us that he wasn’t home or that he was really busy!
But we were persistent, and it paid off! Finally, Yeferson decided to listen to us and see why we were so determined to share our message (He told us later that he’d only done it out of obligation!), but we did something right and set another appointment, and in the next appointment he felt something, and that Sunday came to church! I wrote about this a few weeks back, but it was all in Spanish, so I’ll put it here again, but in English:
This week we only had an INCA (Investigador con asistencia (Investigator with attendances)) in the chapel, but how he came to go is the miracle: We taught him (Yeferson) Monday and asked him if he would be willing to go to church, read the Book of Mormon, and pray every day. He told us he found it a bit difficult and didn’t want to, but the Spirit led us to say, “And what would you do to be with your family forever?” He was silent for a second and then said, “When you put it like that, yes, I’ll go to church and read! (Miracle part 1)
Well, Sunday came without us having found him again and he didn’t answer his phone. After the sacrament, we went outside to call him and found him outside the chapel with his mototaxi. He told us that he’d come earlier, but he saw all the people with ties and pants and he only had jeans and a t-shirt, and he thought, “I can’t enter like this!” and went to work as a mototaxi driver. While working, a family of members (dressed in jeans and t-shirts!) flagged him down and asked to be taken to the chapel! He thought, “If they can come in like this, I can too!” and he came and found us. He told us that God was calling him here, because God led him to the chapel twice so he could attend! (Miracle part 2)
From there he kept progressing! It got to the point where he asked us when we could come back to teach him, and he invited Camila, his wife (Who actually wasn’t his wife at the time) to listen with him! From there they decided to get married (Here’s a picture of them outside their house — we passed by in the night to congratulate them: )
… And get baptized! (Here we are the next night, but with Yeferson’s uncle and their oldest daughter, too: )
Their baptism was really great because they really had to fight to make it there! The entire week, from the 20th to the 26th, they had a lot of things happen! First, they had a bunch of things to do for their wedding — finding papers, sending them to the municipalidad, signing the stuff, finding witnessess (They weren’t able to come at the last moment!) — and then, the night before their wedding, a spider bit Camila’s ankle and she became SpiderWoman!… (Nah, but that’d be pretty cool!) No, actually it ruined her wedding! She couldn’t stand up for very long because it hurt, so she didn’t stand up much or pose for photos, and that night, during their party, she developed a headache and a fever! They ended up going to the hospital after we’d passed by to visit them and found that the poison from the bite had eaten a hole in her ankle, almost to the bone! The next day — the day of their baptism — she was OK because she’d taken some pills, but then the next day, Sunday — when she should’ve been confirmed — she was sick and couldn’t come! She’ll end up getting confirmed next week, but I felt so sorry for her! She was crying when we came to her house on Friday because she was too sick to enjoy her wedding, and all the stuff that they’ve had to do has made it so they really earned a break!
Aside from this, not a whole lot new. I’ll include some photos of stuff that’s happened lately:
My companion decided to try the french toast I made for breakfast, but he accidentally ate the one I’d just taken out of the frying pan!
Here’s Elder Gutierrez Friday night. We accidentally left the keys in our cuarto and the landlady wasn’t home, so we had to wait until her daughter could find the copy (We ended up waiting until 11:00pm)!
And, to finish, here’s my zone, Comas:
At least, it was my zone! We have cambios today, and I could leave, and at least some of these others are leaving as well!
Until next week!
— Elder Schroeder