Our Halloween we spent with Hna. Aguilar, we read the Book
of Mormon to her and sang her favorite hymn and she sent us home with a huge
tray of AMAZING brownies. our week was off to a good start....haha.
we did a LOT of service this week...17 hours! but a fun new
service project that we will starting to do is called Lunches of Love.
There is a local church here that packs sack lunches for families that don't
have enough food on the weekends. The kids get free lunches at school, but on
the weekends they don't have food. So I spent a couple hours putting goldfish
into ziplocs and we met a ton of people! We are trying to find a local food
bank too because we want to use our Spanish :)
On Thursday, we had about 3 service projects! We helped one
of our favorite ladies in the branch, Hna. Montalvo, clean out her kitchen and
she doesn't mess around when it comes to food and appliances. So we got a ton
of food and some really nice appliances for our new apartment! (by the way we
are moving on Wednesday...we are saying bye to all of the cockroaches and
couldn't be happier!!!)
On Friday we saw an amazing miracle. A couple weeks ago we
were leaving a less-active's house and saw a man on the stairs smoking. He said
"hi! how are you today?!" and nothing else. We said hi and a couple
seconds later he said, "Wait!!" so we turned around, expecting to be
Bible bashed, but he puts out his cigarette and just says softly,
"What do you guys do? What does your church believe? How do I learn
more?" We gave him a little summary and he said we could come back the
next day. Well we went and he wasn't there. But on Friday we decided to go try
him again with a member, Hno. Torres. We got there and he and his wife were
sitting on the stairs. We asked if we could share a message with them and they
let us in. His name is Jorge and her name is Angel. Jorge went on to explain
how his life has been involved with lots of drinking, girls, drugs, you name
it. He has multiple kids with multiple women. He said he has been in 4 deadly
car accidents and wonders why he is still here. We explained to him that God
has an individual plan for him and that he is still on the Earth for a reason.
We talked to them about baptism and how it is a fresh start to everything. It
is a new life after we are baptized. We usually don't invite people to be
baptized without explaining the Restoration of the Gospel, but the Spirit was
so strong at the moment so I invited them to be baptized on November 26 and
they accepted! We explained to them that is a life-long commitment and this
involves complete change. We asked them if they are willing to do that and they
said yes. It will definitely be a process with them, but we are excited for
them to have a fresh start.
the next day was Saturday and we finally saw this
less-active 18-year-old girl that we haven't been able to contact in forever.
We gave a powerful lesson about the sacrament and how Heavenly Father wants her
to keep her part of the covenants she has made. She said that lesson changed
her and is planning on looking for another job so she can come on Sundays.
also, we had a meeting with Presidente (president
of the congregation she is serving in) at his house about our area and
how we can help him with his calling. We talked about the things we needed to
and then we talked about how he and his wife met, it was the cutest thing! I
took a picture of their family so you can see!
Our miracles started on Friday and didn't stop until Sunday.
After the meeting, we went over the Ortiz family's house. This week we had
really good lessons with Kayla about sacrifices that she has to make to go to
church and be baptized, things like that. We were very bold with her because we
want this for her family soooooo bad. So on Saturday night around 8:30ish, we
just went over to their house to check and see if plans for church were all
okay. We went over, knocked on the door and Hermana opened it. Her eyes were
all puffy and she just hugged me. I asked her what happened and she said their dog
ran away. She is an animal-LOVER so this really hit her. We went inside and
their family was there from El Salvador, they are here right now and they are
super active in the church. So awkwardly I said, "soooo church tomorrow?
are we good?" and the family said, "Oh yeah! We are going to all 3
meetings right?" and looked at Hermana Ortiz. She was like
"...yeah!..." after that, we left and just hoped and prayed that they
would come the next day.
Sunday after our meeting, we came out and the Barrios family
(with the twins) are there AGAIN! This is their 3rd time at church! Apparently
the little kids looooove Primary and they are going to be in the Primary
Program next sunday....how awesome! So they are coming next week too! We are
going to have a family night with them next week and hopefully get them on date
to be baptized. they are so awesome and love coming to church! So after we see
them, some guy introduces us to a lady who wants to come to this church. So we
take her to sunday school, Relief Society, sacrament, the whole shebang. We
have an appointment with her next week and we are excited to teach her! In the
middle of me playing the piano in Relief Society, Hermana Ortiz and the lady
(family member) walk in and sit down. They loved it and Hermana Ortiz grabbed
my hand and said "Leo (their dog) came back!!!" with the biggest
smile on her face. It made my day. Then we walked into the chapel and KAYLA WAS
THERE. This girl has been taught by the missionaries for 4 years and this is
her first time at church. She met president and she is stoked to be baptized in
2 weeks. We love her!
We are seeing soo many miracles. I know I say that every
week, but missionary work isn't missionary work without miracles. Our November
goal for baptisms is 3 and we have all of them lined up.
We asked ourselves this week why we do this. Why do we keep
on teaching Kayla if she doesn't go to church or why do we walk the streets? It
is because we want these people to be with their families forever and have the
blessings that we have from being an eternal family. We are so thankful for
this knowledge and want to share it with everyone! I love the Gospel and I love
sharing it with everyone I see! We cannot wait for our baptisms coming up!!!
love you all and thank you for everything!!!
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| our car is having issues and we have had to get it jumped about 5 times and now it is in the shop. so this is a picture of us in a dead car. |
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| we ran out of dishwasher soap and decided to do regular dish soap....never again. |
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| we helped Hna. Regalado with her family history this week and she had a "BYU-Idaho Grandma" t-shirt on and it couldn't have been more perfect! |
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| this is the Solis family, Presidente, his wife and daughter asleep. They were all snuggled together with Barbie blankets and I loved it. |
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