Man, I can’t believe another week has already
past. Time just seems to go by so quickly it’s ridiculous. Thanks for the
emails! It’s nice to know what’s going on at home. Is Orlando doing good at
least? Sounds like you guys have been pretty busy at home. I bet it is nice to
have a break this week. Our Easter wasn’t really all that different than any
other day. We had pancakes for lunch in our house. Nothing really exciting. I
do kind of miss basketball. We only get to play soccer here, which is fun, but it’s
just not the same. I wasn’t born to play sports with my feet. Also dad thanks
for the parts of that book that you sent me. I used one in a training that me
and my companion did a couple weeks ago in District Meeting. We talked about
using the Book of Mormon with our investigators and how they need to have real
intent while reading and praying about it. It worked really good. I think I
want to read that book when I come home. Other than that, not much else is
really new. Easter here for most people is really not what it should be.
Everyone goes to church, the Catholic Church was packed, but afterwards it is
just a big party. It’s really unfortunate how a lot of the holidays that have
real significance, have just turned into another excuse to party.
So we had two baptisms this week, and six in
total for our zone! So A was baptized this week. She has really grown since
we first started teaching her and it has been really good to see the influence
the gospel has on our lives. The other guy that we baptized is named O.
Man this guy is a stud! He’s a reference from a recent convert and he is the
smartest guy I have taught. Everything we taught, he understood perfectly! He
told us that he had two dreams that confirmed everything that we were teaching
and has had a testimony for over two months. Something was holding him back
though and he never wanted to commit to a date. We kept trying and praying and
on Saturday before Conference, he came to us and told us that he would be
baptized on April 7. So we got everything ready, he was baptized and confirmed
and then just after his confirmation, they announced that he would receive the
priesthood and be called as Young Men’s president! He’s super excited and I
know he is going to do a great job. His counselors are two recent converts who
we have been working a lot with. One of them was the guy who introduced us to
O and the other was a less-active that we helped return to church. It
was a really good feeling seeing the changes these people that we have been
working with have made because of the gospel.
We did have one other cool experience this week.
A couple weeks ago, before N´s baptism, we came to N´s house to teach
her. While we were waiting, there was this lady who was getting water from the
well by N´s house. She had a lot of buckets of water to carry and they were
pretty heavy, so we helped her carry all the buckets to her house across the
street. After that, we didn’t think much of it and went to teach N. On the
day of N´s confirmation, this lady came to church with N and then asked
us to come teach her. This past week we finally had time to pass her and so we
went in and the first time just talked to her. We kind of just asked questions
and got to know her a bit better and she told us how important Heavenly Father
has been in her life. She told us about the day we helped her carry water to
her house and how she was exhausted from work and school and it was late and
she just didn’t want to carry water. She said we were and answer to her prayers
and that as soon as we had finished helping her, she knew that she needed to
talk to us. So we left her a pamphlet on the Restoration with some questions
and marked our next appointment. When we came back, she basically taught us the
Restoration!!! We hardly did any teaching, and she had already prayed and
received an answer. So we marked a baptism date and set up a plan and she’s
doing really good! She came to church yesterday and is really excited! It just
really showed me that we really are being led by the Spirit, even if we don’t
recognize it at the time.
That’s about all that is new. They will organize
the first stake here in Cape Verde at the end of the month in Praia. That is
going to be really cool. Assomada will become a ward and we will get a bishop.
The church is growing more and more every day and I’m right in the middle of
it. We went to Praia for a wedding of one of Elder Fonseca´s old investigators.
After, we went and ate with the new married couple. I can now say that I have
tried something foreign. Goats Blood! I’m not exactly sure what they did with
it, put some sort of spice in it or something, but it was disgusting!!! They
eat it like ice cream!!! Elder Fonseca wouldn’t even try it, but one of the other
missionaries that we were with tried it and loved it! Weird... Anyways, I love
you all and I hope you guys enjoy your Easter Break!
Love, Elder Dola
No comments:
New comments are not allowed.