Happy Late Valentines day!
This week was pretty fun! Tuesday we had a mini miracle, all thanks to Heavenly Father's perfect timing. We have this member, Cristian (18 yrs) that introduced us to his friend Jordan and we've been teaching them. We went to Cristian's house, but his friend had cancelled, so we just decided to visit with his parents. His mom loves the missionaries, a lot, and has had some drama with the members, so decided to take advantage of the time and try and help her out. The drama was that her and her husband have been taking the sacrament (they're still not members because they're trying to finalize the wife's divorce with her ex in order to get married) and the bishop had asked them not to and some members had said stuff too. Long story short is, they felt bad and had their minds set on not returning until they would be able to get baptized (they've already waited 8 years!) and mean while would go to other wards. Well, we'd asked for the Bishop's help with them, and without even planning it, he showed up while we were still there visiting them. Right as he got there, some people showed up to install some stuff in their house, and there was A LOT of commotion, but we were able to sit down and the Bishop explained the sacrament and how he was trying to help them. He said very lovingly how he needed them to progress towards baptism because it's so crucial, and without plans and goals, that privilege had to be taken away. The parents did really understand, especially when the Bishop put it into the perspective of eternal families and the temple. It was neat because the wife is a really stubborn person, but the spirit pricked her heart ! :)
A few days later, we finally had our lesson with Cristian and his friend Jordan and the lesson melted my heart. The two are really good friends and Cristian is a really faithful member and wants more than anything for his friend to accept the gospel. Jordan isn't closed off to it, but he also feels a pull to the catholic church because that's what his family and ancestors were, yet he's not active in that church either. Christian spent a pretty big part of the lesson just sharing his testimony and love for his friend and how he'd felt prompted to share with Jordan right now. One thing Cristian said that I really liked, is that really soon he'll be leaving to serve a full time mission and he said he couldn't leave to share the gospel without having shared it with someone really important to him. That's really the spirit of missionary work! Sharing something that's important to us, with people we love and care about.
This week we also found 3 people with tons of potential. A member in another ward gave us the reference of a less active in our area (who just moved here a few months ago), and from this less active we received the reference of his friend Gabriel. Gabriel is divorced with 2 or 3 little kids and he's pretty sad. He's a radiologist at the little hospital in our area, and he says when he can't distract his himself with his kids or work he turns to drinking, and he hates it. He says he feels like he's doing all these dumb things and knows they're dumb but something pushes him to do it. He says he wants something more wholesome to replace the drinking. He believes in God and is willing to make whatever change is necessary. We barely talked to him, so we'll see where he goes. He would have gone to church, but the member that introduced us to him didn't wake up to go with him. :(
The other new investigator is Rodrigo, who DID go to church on Sunday. His mom is less active and I've been trying to get her to go back to church pretty much since I got here. Rodrigo has been really busy with school and stuff, but all the sudden decided that now he's ready to listen and see if all this is for him or not. Our ward mission leader was super impressed by him because he's really engaged and really sharp. In gospel priciples class, he was answering all the questions!
The last is Felipe. Hna Pitcher contacted him on the bus, and he's willing to listen because he's had a lot of problems with his wife leaving and kids too. He wants his wife back more than anything, and is worried because he feels like his wife's family is against him. Its looks like the wife still loves him though, but she wants to see a change in him. We explained that that's what the gospel does and how we are positive that if he trusts God, he'll get his family back because families are really important to God. That lesson was intense because the spirit was so so strong. I felt like my companion and I always knew what to say and when, and that it was really what he needed to hear.
Our Valentines together was fun :) We bought ourselves a balloon with candies from an investigator that was selling them. Then we bugged a member that helps us a lot to get us flowers, and he did! That morning we also made pancakes- which we always do for special days haha. And that's about it!
Love,
Hermana Harper
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