Happy and working hard

September 20, 2010

We’ve been having lots of success and lots of people have been coming to church. This past week, my companion and I and the District Mission Leader met with all of the Branch Presidents, their branch mission leaders, and their missionaries. We did it all in one day, and also had to work in between. There were four meetings. It was pretty crazy. Plus riding everywhere on bikes made it all the more interesting and crazy. I feel like I’m finally able to keep with my companion. He goes crazy on a bike!
We have found some really interested investigators this past week, but of course there is always opposition. But I’m trying to change my outlook on opposition. I’m trying to see it more as an opportunity to work even harder. I don’t think I’ve ever worked harder on my mission than right now, and I don’t think I’ve ever been happier. We are trying everything we can think of to encourage the missionaries, our investigators, and the members. We have seen great progress, but still haven’t seen great fruits of baptism. San Ramon, a small town, had a baptism last week. A really great woman that I got to interview. She was so humble, but so pleased to join the Lord’s church and accept the gospel. It was a reminder of the great effect our work has on the lives of others and how much we truly can connect and rejoice with them and with the Lord. This really is a great and marvelous work.
We are teaching this guy named Robert. He has gone to a number of other churches and has doubts, but we are helping him to read the Book of Mormon. He is SUPER intelligent. He came to church on Sunday with his whole family. Wife and two kids! It turns out that he is good friends with Branch President Leal. He was pretty excited. The members are too. They have seen us up the ante as it were and have been more willing to help us out and support us. It’s been really fun and I hope we can really continue this. Everyone is so great when a new family comes. They get really excited. I love the church. It helps us so much to follow the example of Christ and apply His teachings. We are also teaching a number of other families. One guy who is a less active and his wife, who has intention of getting baptized. They came to church last week, but they couldn’t this week. Oh well, just gotta keep working and moving forward!
Also the woman we were going to baptize this week Silvia got super sick. We aren’t sure what is going to happen, but we pray and continue to do what we can. I’ll let you know what happens next week!
Anyways, so we keep working hard and trying new things. The District seems really excited. All the branch presidents are stoked and the missionaries are working super hard. This zone really has transformed.