Now that's a missionary title if I've ever heard
one. Lamanites vs. Nephites. That's
the game we played today for our Zone Activity and it really shows what nerdy
missionaries we are. Our Zone Leaders
must have spent hours and hours putting it together, but it was a huge
success. So much fun. I don't have time to explain the whole thing,
but basically, we had to get the brass plates from one base (The Land of Helam)
to the other base (The Land of Zarahemla) without being killed (by a flour bomb
or pool noodle.) So funny, and so much
fun. At one point in the game I was even offered as a ransom
to the Lamanites. They said they needed
someone, "young and innocent" of which I am neither, but I guess I
qualified more than the Elders did.
Also, this Zone Activity carried on the tradition of
hitting Sister Welch in the head with something, but this time it was only a
soccer ball and didn't hurt as bad as the flour bombs..or the Frisbee...or the
football. Haha.
As for the rest of the week, we've seen quite a few
unexpected miracles. My personal
favorite happened on Sunday. A couple of
days before Sunday even came, we were checking on a less active, but he wasn't
home, so as we were walking back to the car, we saw two Latinos talking by
their car. We thought it would be a good
chance to practice our Spanish and they looked like they needed the gospel,
(well, I guess everyone looks like that to me) so we went over to talk to them
and discovered that they both spoke English very well. They opened up pretty easily, and we asked
them if they'd ever had questions about life that hadn't been answered. Pedro pointed to his friend, Gilberto, and
said, "He does. He has lots of
questions."
Gilberto looked a little sheepish at first, but started
telling us some of his questions which all related to the Plan of
Salvation. He was hungry for answers, so
we set up an appointment for Sunday, gave him a Plan of Salvation pamphlet, and
went on our way. The rest of the week
was difficult because almost all of our appointments with members fell through,
Tracey's health is getting worse, and we feel such a responsibility for these
people, but we kept going. Our
appointment with Gilberto was for Sunday night at 8: the last appointment of
the week. We had a member from Nicaragua
coming with us, and we were both praying that he'd just be there. Well, he was there. And he was ready. He kept telling us, "I want to
change. I need more spiritual change in
my life. I want to change." We taught him the lesson, which he soaked in
like a sponge, and at the end, Sister Gros challenged him to be baptized. He said, "Yes" without
hesitation. She followed up with the
baptismal date commitment and before she could even finish saying, "We're
holding a baptismal service on April 28th.
Will you prepare your--" he interrupted, "Yes! 150 percent yes!" It was incredible. It took everything I had to not start
laughing and jumping around and dancing because I was so happy for him. This gospel is true and I love these ready
hearts who recognize the light they feel when they hear the truth. I am strengthened by them and will always be
grateful for these elect souls.
Another part of the week that was more entertaining than
anything was our lesson with Anthony.
The Zone Leaders, Elder Rodriquez and Elder Kerby, came with us, because
we thought it would be good for Anthony to see what he can become, and because
Tracey needed another blessing.
We had the
blessing first, then Tracey went to go lay down and we taught Anthony. Well, he outsmarted us all. We were talking about Sabbath day and asked
him to name some things he could do on Sunday. He listed 'pray', 'go to church', and then he said,
"Go to school..." and Elder Kerby stopped him and said, "Wait a
minute. You don't have school on
Sunday." Anthony just looked at him
and said, "Ya-huh. Sunday School!"
We all laughed pretty hard. He's
too smart. Later, Tracey told us that
her husband was trying to cook dinner that night and went to put olive oil in
the salad but Anthony stopped him. He
said, "Dad, you can't do that!
That's what they use to bless people!" We'll have to clarify that, but at least we know he was
listening.
-Sister Welch
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