March 30, 2015

hola

 

this week was pretty great. it's starting to get a bit colder, and a lot of this week was cloudy with light rain. there was transfers this week, but i didnt get transferred, and i'm still here in Kennedy with the same companion. this will be our third transfer together (which is pretty rare). at first i was a bit disappointed but now i'm fine. wednesday was Elder Paredes' birthday, and i was hoping to be freed from any obligation to give him something by transfers, but i wasnt, so i made brownies. also this morning i made pancakes, and the majority werent too badly burnt.

 

Natanael went to church yesterday. he continues progressing really well and is gonna get baptized this sunday in between sessions of General Conference. this week we've been teaching him the commandments and it's been pretty fun cus every time we teach him a commandment and invite him to live it, he eagerly responds yes. it's pretty incredible to see how he's progressed, because the first time we invited him to church, he didnt go, and when we went to see why, he said he wasnt going to have time to go to church or get baptized, but now he's reading the Book of Mormon an hour every day and goes to church alone without problem. also, when we ask him who he wants to say the prayers to start or end lessons, he almost always volunteers, and says both prayers. yesterday we went over the questions for his interview and we got permission to do his baptism this week from his mom. she committed to going to the baptism, and maybe to general conference as well, and expressed that she wants Natanael to be like us someday too.

 

we still havent been able to teach the Villalba family at all - last week the time was changed an hour, so now it gets darker a lot earlier. before the time change, the window to be able to arrive at their house to be able to share with them was quite short - we had to get there after they got home from work and before it got dark, or they'd be tired and would ask us to go another day. now they're working later and it gets dark earlier, so it's almost impossible. luckily easter (and ''holy thursday'' and ''holy friday'') are holidays, so we'll hopefully be able to find them home. if we can teach them and if they can go on saturday and sunday to the conference, they'll be able to all get baptized on sunday, with Natanael.

 

on thursday i went to Paso de Oro (the biggest area in my district) and did five baptismal interviews. they were widespread across the whole area, so we started at 4:30, and between all the walking and interviewing, we finished at 8, and then it took us another 50 minutes to walk back to my area 

 

we also have an investigator, Hugo, who's an older gentleman. his wife died a few weeks ago and we've been visiting him since. we recently discovered that he and i have the same birthday, and he invited us to go eat pig head with him on wednesday.

 

today with my companion we were watching a talk by Elder Holland and he was talking about how the missionaries need to be. he put a comparison, and asked if we would rather have Elder Nelson or Elder Ballard operate on the heart of one of our family members, and said that obviously if we have any choice and if we know anything about them, we're going to choose Elder Nelson, because he knows what he's doing. he then said that as missionaries (and applying to all the members as they help in missionary work) that we have to study and practice to be able to know what we're doing. thinking a little bit, and considering that there are people here that i promised in the pre earth life that i would find and baptize, the idea came that maybe those people got to choose too, they got to see what missionaries would be in the area where they live and choose who they wanted to get to them, and those who would maybe be a bit tougher in life would choose able and powerful missionaries, in whom they could trust that they would arrive, teach well with power and authority, and do everything necessary to take those people to baptism and conversion in the gospel. thinking in that, and talking with my companion, we realized that we need to make an effort to be that class of missionaries, to not let the people who are counting on us down.

 

i know that this church is true and that Jesus is the Christ, and our Redeemer and Savior.

 

Elder Woodfield