Sweet Week
Hola…what is everything up to today? Working…going to school I bet. Well, I’m here in the Wilson County Library, writing another e-mail. It’s fun, I always look forward to P-day to recieve e-mails. I got a few cool ones today, hearing from some people. Anyways, we had a good week. As I stated in the last letter, we had a record 4 people at church. I can honestly say, we broke that record this week with….6 investigators!! It was sweet…I’ll give the story for each one:
Guadalupe Mendez: She is a part-member, the aunt of Michel (our recent concert). This is her 3rd time at church, 2nd in a row. We are kind of teaching her right now (through messages shared with the whole family), but we are going to start focusing more on her, and at the same time, not focus too much on her to scare her away. But she is really humble and she knows it’s the right thing to come to church. We always visit them on Tuesdays, but since it is Haloween, we cannot be out past 7, we will visit them this Wednesday
Berto Valdivia: He is also a part-member…is the partner of Anamaria…only problem is that they are not married and are living together. As I have stated in previous e-mails, he would be baptized if they could just get the IDs to get married. He’s been coming to church for a while now. Marraige is the only thing impeding him…we’ll probably stop by to visit them later this week. But, it’s crazy to teach them…they have a 10 year old boy, a 6 year old girl, a 3 year old boy who never stops and a new-born baby who cries alot.
Sergio Guadalupe: He is a old investigator, who showed up at church last week (see previous weeks email). We got up with him this week, taught him and he came back to church, I went with Angel Lopez to pick him up, and we missed the sacrament..but oh well…it’s his 3rd time. He had a baptismal date before…actually when I arrived here to Wilson (but then he got baptized in another church first). So…I would like to set another baptismal date again soon. We’ll see how it goes. We have an appointment with him on Halloween…
Genova Diaz: We have been visiting her and her mom (Sumara) for a few weeks now. They are from Honduras, and their friendshippers are doing everything right (Another Honduranian family, Family Garcia). They have invited them to activities, to church, to dinner, family home evening and give them rides. In fact, we have a family home evening with them today. They are probably the two closest to baptism. Although Sumara hasn’t been to church yet because she works every other Sunday. But Genova went for the first time yesterday and it appeared that she like it.
Rafael and Yareli Ortiz: Now, this was probably the surprise of the day. Back in July, Elder Christensen and I contacted Rafael outside, and we started going by their house. Rafael was always super cool but he wasn’t progressing, so we dropped him. A little later, I took Elder Guerrero over, and we started working with them again. Yareli, who previously always left, started listening, and they started to enjoy it. Rafael came to church a few weeks ago, and yesterday…both of them came to church. We invited them the day before and Yareli even invited us to eat some food she had made!! Although, I added too many jalapenos, it was really good. Rafael is so cool, he is a soccer maniac, he has got me hooked to Cruz Azul (soccer team in Mexico). We visit them Saturdays, and he is always watching the game…it’s hard to tell him to turn it off.
So, there you have it, our 6 investigators in church. We now have 5 investigators who are progressing towards baptism. I haven’t seen this many investigators at church, not even in Raleigh. I just wish we had the member support of Raleigh, we would be able to baptize like crazy. To see what is going on with Sumara and Genova with their friendshippers is special, because they are progressing super fast. The other investigators really don’t have friendshippers, because of the lack of members. But, hey…that’s why we are here..to create more members!
Anyways, sadly but truly, these next 3 weeks in Wilson will probably be my last. We had our interviews with President Wallis and they will probably be a change made just because I have been here for a while. But, who knows, this all works by revelation..right? It’s been frustrating at times in Wilson for lack of things to do…but with the people we are working with…I might be able to stick it out for another 6 weeks…but I don’t think I will.
We are going to the temple this next Friday and we already have a sweet week planned. I hope everyone has a good week and keep up the good work….
!Hasta la proxima semana!
Elder Hardy