June 21, 2010

Here we are again!

Finally! I have some decent time to write a decent post. The past couple weeks have been a little squirrly but hopefully this week will make it up. To get the max amount of detail I'll be going day by day (journal style almost). Strap yourselves in!

Monday: A typical P-day: Fast a Furious. We were able to get all of our stuff done and have a little bit of time to play some indoor soccer. We also had a couple of awesome lessons that evening that, really, made it a great start to the week.

Tuesday: We had our Zone Conference up in the Phoenix North Stake. Can I just say that it was INCREDIBLE!!! We had a massive study of the Small Plates of Nephi in the Book of Mormon in relation to teaching the Restoration. Holy smokes it was just awesome!! I seriously love the Book of Mormon. Not only that but we were able to practice teaching ALL of Lesson 2 in 10 minutes. Can you imagine that?? The entire Plan of Salvation I 10 short minutes. I can tell from experience, it is a super powerful tool. To be able to teach something like that in 10 minutes has just brought our gospel knowledge to a whole new level. After the conference I had the opportunity to do an evening exchange with one of our spanish assistants. It was an AWESOME night. We had a shortened dinner because of so much street contacting, went to check on a referral but we ended up tracting the street. We tracted for 2 hours and found nothing. It was starting to get dark and there was a couple more people we wanted to check up on before we had to go in but we felt like we should knock the first door again. As a result, we taught all of Lesson 1, at the door, in 10 minutes. She is now a very solid new investigator. To end our night we felt, again, that we should go check the referral from before one more time. They were home, they were interested, and man are they searching. They have tons of promise. Heavenly Father blessed us with the opportunity to really witness his hand in the work. It was just an incredible night.

Wednesday: A pretty normal work day all in all. We were able to find a couple of awesome potentials that we are excited for and (as a bit of a segue into Thursday) we stopped by another potential to close off part of our night. Their names are Blanca, Bianca, and Jose. We found them a little over a week ago and they are just solid. They have heard the missionaries talk before but have never had a chance to ask the questions they had. When we found them they were extremely receptive ( for being young [Bianca is 20 and Jose is 19. They with with her mother]). Anyway, Wednesday we met Blanca for the first time and had an extremely powerful door lesson. She was very excited for us to come back and told us to be at their house at 4:00. We wrote it in our planners and prepared for the lesson.

Thursday: As usual, we took our time to do our weekly planning. At 3:45 we took off to our appointment with Blanca, Bianca, and Jose. We were riding as fast as we could (safely) in order to get there on time but, as we hit the corner of 7th Ave and Baseline, I look down south to see black smoke. Immediately the spirit told me "*That is their house on fire*". I knew that it was there house before we even showed up. We hit the corner of their street at 4:01 and...their house had a fire truck out front, firefighters trying to break in, and smoke billowing out of the place. Long story short, nobody was home but we stayed until everything settled to offer our help. When I recapped the story to Blanca she just looked at me and said "How...How did you know it was ours?" Then two seconds later answered herself "God sent you here...I know he did." It was quite an experience. We are currently doing all that we can to help them get on their feet. I am pleased to say that they are very excited to have us in their home when they finally get themselves all settled.

Friday: I had a split with another missionary in our district. Long story short, we tracted a lot and found a couple of great potentials. The highlight of Friday was when our investigator Maria Flores (aka Maria Mendoza) passed her baptismal interview. It was such an incredible feeling of joy...I can't even describe it. We found that lady tracting doors, on a Sunday afternoon, in the middle of a Phoenix dust storm. She was the last house we hit....but she will be the first baptism I have with which I found the person tracting. Her baptism is set for 7:00 this Saturday and we are looking forward to it like nothing else.

Saturday: We had our baptism for Oscar and Stacy Mendieta. These kids have been taking the lessons for 2 years and, finally, entered the waters of baptism. The service was great and well attended and I was given the opportunity to both baptize and confirm them members of the Church. It was a great day to say the least....We put a lot of work into that family. That and the 11 other missionaries before us :)

Sunday: Another great day. The highlight however came at the very end of the day. We had a lesson with Maria and Jesus (The same Maria with her baptism this Saturday). Maria is just so....humble and excited for this Saturday. I cannot even begin to explain the change of spirit that has happened in that house. Every time we enter we just feel the spirit so strong....The first time we talked to them we thought...you know, this one might be interesting. As a whole, this experience has taught me to forget judgment and just give people the chance to listen. Anyway, at the end of the lesson we wanted to set up a time to meet with Jesus to try and prepare him for his baptism. We wanted to do it Tuesday but he had a couple of futbol matches to play. But, we we brought them up he just told us, "That's OK. I'm not going to them." I asked "Why not?". He simply told me, "I read that talk from the Elder who talked about how we as jovenes need to prepare ourselves for our missions and that we should prepare by getting ready to give everything up for him. So, I decided that I need to go to the church to mutual on Tuesdays than play soccer because I need to start preparing and give somethings up." My friends who know me know quite well that I have a big passion for futbol. I love it. I KNOW how hard it is to give up something like that. I KNOW what it took him to make that decision. I was...almost brought to tears when I heard him say that. This 17 year old, non-baptized joven deciding to give up a piece of his heart to start preparing to serve the Lord. Talk about incredible.

Well everyone, here is my re-cap for the week. I hope that you all know that you are loved and missed. I hope that you enjoy the pictures and, until next time, iQue les vaya bien! :D

 

"That is their house": A picture of the firefighters at the front of our investigators house. Not the most pleasant experience but, everything is turning out alright.

"The ninos": These are the two kids, Oscar Jr. and Stay Mendieta, who we baptized on Saturday. The service was really good and we have great hopes for the family!!