Dear Family and Friends,
Well there is a lot of people at the library today so I am going to have to be quick because a lot of people are here waiting for computers.
Help From The Members
Things are going! haha I don’t know what that means. We are still finding and teaching new people. I think we are starting to bite off a little bit more than we can chew. maybe this sounds wrong, but for the past couple of weeks I have had the mindset that we can do this without the members and their help. And true, sometimes the members can make the work a little harder, but truly we can’t do much without them. So, yesterday in our branch council we set up some good plans. we have so many people to teach right now it is ridiculous. it is impossible to keep up with all of them by ourselves. especially with such a huge area. It’s pretty unfortunate. but we have a good plan set up with the members. Our branch president asked us to put every investigator and family we are working with that seems to have a decent amount of potential and interest on the progress record, and then in our meeting on Sunday he assigned 1 or 2 people to each person. they will be responsible for coming on visits with us to visit those families, as well as fellowshipping them and visiting them on their own as well. I think it’s a good idea. we will see how it goes.
Many Investigators
So really I could go through all of them but there isn’t enough time. but we have found I would say four or five families recently that we are starting to get through the message of the restoration with, and they all seem to have a decent amount of interest. It’s pretty funny, one of the families that we taught last night who is “catholic” but never go, asked us if their children can be confirmed in our church because it’s too complicated through the catholic church. Of course they can 🙂 tonight we will explain how they will need to be baptized again too!
The two biggest priorities right now is daisy Torres and Manuel Virreyra. We taught Daisy on Saturday night with President Crawford. The lesson went until 9:35 (but hey, if you’re gonna be disobedient with anyone, do it with the pres, right? haha) We asked her some really good questions. She told us that she does want to be baptized, but before anything else, she wants to feel something. So, we talked about what she expects, what the spirit feels like, all that jazz. She knows what to expect. So we said, that’s valid. you should feel something before you get baptized. What are you doing to feel that? Reading, praying, coming to church. What are your prayers like, how do you feel? Are you doing it sincerely? Yes yes yes. How do you feel about the 18th? It’s coming up. If you feel like God has answered your prayers by that day will you be baptized on the 18th? Yes. “Well,” president Crawford told us, “I think we accomplished everything we can do elders.” We just need to put faith in God’s promise that everyone that sincerely seeks for the truth will receive a testimony. So please pray for her.
Then, there is Manuel. he is the little brother of Elder Sorenson’s (one of my old companions) fiancee. He is ten years old. We have started teaching him, and we set a date for the 25th of may. That’s the last Saturday of the transfer. We are pretty sure one of us will be leaving then, so I really hope these two baptisms go through so that we can have a baptism together. Also, I don’t want to leave this area without baptizing in it. I have baptized in every area on my mission so far.
Elder Sorenson (aka Troy)Â is in town visiting his fiancee for the month and getting everything ready for their wedding in August. It’s been pretty fun to get to have dinner with him and go to lessons with him and teach with him, but not as a companion, as a normal person. Pretty funny. I like him. He is a good guy. Shout out to Troy when he reads this #iloveyou Troy, I’ll see you and Manuel tomorrow at four. Make sure he is doing his reading. haha. See, everyone? it’s awesome!
Turtleman
Anyway, my knees still hurt really bad. but missionary medical stinks because apparently it’s not bad enough for me to get it checked out. What else happened? We caught a turtle! he lived in our bathtub for a few days swimming around. It was pretty fun. But then we realized we were being disobedient when we read in the white handbook that we can’t have pets so we took it back to the river we got it from. That’s pretty much it. I’m done now.
I love being a missionary! I can’t believe that time is going by so fast! I never want to leave! Our district is doing a lot of bonding. it’s crazy having the biggest district in the mission. But it’s fun too. I love everyone in it. Even though it’s drama central.
Love y’all! the church is true!
Elder Viitanen
P.S [Editor’s Note] To understand the title (turtleman reference) see:Â
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDh1AxD8J_c&feature=youtu.be
