This was one of the best weeks of my mission, and yesterday was definitely the best day of the mission!
We ate lunch with a member at 11, a little early, and then her amazing father in law took us and an investigator to the chapel where they would broadcast conference for our district. We watched the awesome session, and then inbetween sessions we had a baptism! We took pictures, had a picnic, watched the second session and then went home to plan! It was such a great day and the birthday of the church too!
We got to watch all four sessions of conference, the second session on Saturday was the only session President made conditional on if we had a less active or an investigator to attend and Fabio, the less active man living with our amazing investigator Sebastiana, who is a drunk and smokes and avoids any commitment like the plague came to conference! It was awesome to arrive at the chapel just praying we would have somebody there so we could stay and watch the session to see Fabio and Sebastiana there! Second of all I watched all of it in PORTGUÊS! Thats all, its just pretty cool. I watched conference in ANOTHER LANGUAGE. Its not the same, I missed the little cracks in the apostles voices and the influx in their voices during their testimony, but the spirit transcends all languages.
And baptism! It was such a huge miracle. Maria das Graças stopped us on the street last Tuesday saying she needed more God in her life, so we visited with her and found out she had been taught by Elders a few years ago and had gone to church but it was too far and she didnt have money for the bus so she didnt go more than once or get baptized. But her time was now! She accepted both baptism and the word of wisdom the first lesson. We visited her every day, and she was baptized Sunday! She is 59, and lives alone in a concrete house with two rooms. When we teach her we sit on a piece of foam with a sheet convering the holes on the ground. She can't read or even write her own name, but she knows the things of God. Never have I met somebody with such faith and such a desire to change and to do what God desires of them, and right now, not when it is easy or convienent, but now because the blessing of heaven cant wait. It truely was a priviledge to teach her and be there for her baptism. The spirit was strong as conference had just ended. Sister Miller and I sang "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go" and after she was baptized she said she just felt so happy and that it was the most right thing to do.
It all happened so fast its hard to believe but she is such a special woman, it is such a testimony of Alma 13:24-25, which we had talked about in our district meeting that same Tuesday, that we need to find people by the spirit and find people who are ready to accept. The priesthood is a real power, we followed the counsel of our priesthood leaders and found a miracle, and she felt the miracle power of the priesthood at her baptism. After we finish preping her for her confirmation Sunday we are going to teach her how to read and write!
All in all it was an amazing week. We are going to continue working hard and invoking the power of heaven!
Have a lovely week!
Sister Holmes
We ate lunch with a member at 11, a little early, and then her amazing father in law took us and an investigator to the chapel where they would broadcast conference for our district. We watched the awesome session, and then inbetween sessions we had a baptism! We took pictures, had a picnic, watched the second session and then went home to plan! It was such a great day and the birthday of the church too!
We got to watch all four sessions of conference, the second session on Saturday was the only session President made conditional on if we had a less active or an investigator to attend and Fabio, the less active man living with our amazing investigator Sebastiana, who is a drunk and smokes and avoids any commitment like the plague came to conference! It was awesome to arrive at the chapel just praying we would have somebody there so we could stay and watch the session to see Fabio and Sebastiana there! Second of all I watched all of it in PORTGUÊS! Thats all, its just pretty cool. I watched conference in ANOTHER LANGUAGE. Its not the same, I missed the little cracks in the apostles voices and the influx in their voices during their testimony, but the spirit transcends all languages.
And baptism! It was such a huge miracle. Maria das Graças stopped us on the street last Tuesday saying she needed more God in her life, so we visited with her and found out she had been taught by Elders a few years ago and had gone to church but it was too far and she didnt have money for the bus so she didnt go more than once or get baptized. But her time was now! She accepted both baptism and the word of wisdom the first lesson. We visited her every day, and she was baptized Sunday! She is 59, and lives alone in a concrete house with two rooms. When we teach her we sit on a piece of foam with a sheet convering the holes on the ground. She can't read or even write her own name, but she knows the things of God. Never have I met somebody with such faith and such a desire to change and to do what God desires of them, and right now, not when it is easy or convienent, but now because the blessing of heaven cant wait. It truely was a priviledge to teach her and be there for her baptism. The spirit was strong as conference had just ended. Sister Miller and I sang "I'll Go Where You Want Me To Go" and after she was baptized she said she just felt so happy and that it was the most right thing to do.
It all happened so fast its hard to believe but she is such a special woman, it is such a testimony of Alma 13:24-25, which we had talked about in our district meeting that same Tuesday, that we need to find people by the spirit and find people who are ready to accept. The priesthood is a real power, we followed the counsel of our priesthood leaders and found a miracle, and she felt the miracle power of the priesthood at her baptism. After we finish preping her for her confirmation Sunday we are going to teach her how to read and write!
All in all it was an amazing week. We are going to continue working hard and invoking the power of heaven!
Have a lovely week!
Sister Holmes