1/26/10
Hola Familia!
How has your week been? Things are going just great here.
I guess I’ll start with the big news. We had four baptisms this week. We had six planed but one decided he was going to move back to his old area and I’ll tell you about the other one in a sec. Danilo Arredondo, Miriam Vasquez, Sofia Gonzalez and Guadalupe Pedrozo were baptized this week. Miriam wanted one of the elders who found her to baptize her, and it just so happens that he was in town on Friday for zone conference (he is one of the assistants now) so it worked out perfectly. My comp baptized danilo, 20 years old and married, and Guadalupe, a hermano baptized Sofia and I was going to baptize Leo. I felt so bad for him. He’s nine and deathly afraid of water, so when he got up to his chest in water, he freaked out. We are going to be practicing in the coming weeks and we will probably find a shallower place to baptize him. Any ideas in overcoming fear of water for kids? Anyway, it was a really cool experience. I was very happy to have participated in the teaching of these people. They all got confirmed by members, so it was a real treat just to sit down and listen and feel the spirit. It’s fun to participate in the ordinances but it’s better to see the members participate, especially since they are the ones doing the long term fellowshipping. I am very content.
We got a bunch of our goals this week. We got that super standard that I told you about last week and we also got a thing called the district standard, which means our three companionship district averaged the old standard. It was pretty cool. Things are going good right now.
So yesterday I came to realize that the Lord taught me SOOO much stuff when I was a kid, I just didn’t recognize it. All the major experiences of my life like track, scout outings and school and stuff like that has dramatically changed who I am and how I understand the Gospel. It’s been really cool to think about some of these things. One that stands out in my mind came to me yesterday as we were teaching a less active family. They got baptized, went to the temple and had callings, but then they lost steam and have been inactive for quite some time. I started to tell them about that time that we climbed Shasta for our high adventure thing. So we woke up super early and started to climb. We climbed all day, working for what I thought was the summit of the mountain. I was crushed when, upon arriving and the top I saw that it actually continued. I had my sight fixed on a false summit and got really discouraged when I realized that I was going to have to keep going. I was really tired, discouraged and had a killer headache, so I quit and waited there for the others to come back. Interpretation: I think a lot of new members have their sights fixed on the temple and everything like that, which is perfect and right! They might, however, feel discouraged when they come to the realization that there is still quite a ways to go, and it’s not going to get any easier. That’s when everything takes its toll and they decide it’s time for a vacation.
This helped me to understand better how this couple felt and made me more able to help them set goals to go back to church. Enduring to the end is so key. Anyway, I’m going to start writing this stuff down.
We had zone conference last week, this Friday we go to Rosario for mission counsel, then we have zone conference again, mixed with divisions and keeping track of investigators and stuff makes for a busy week, but I love it so much. There’s no way we could do it all alone, and when I try, things go wrong. I’m just grateful for the Lords help and for everything that he’s teaching me right now.
I love you all a ton and will be praying for you all. Send greetings to all the rest and let them know that I’m thankful for the letters they send (specifically this week from the Laytons, Briggs and sister bean).
The church is true and God has called prophets to guide us in these last days. I know that this is true!
Elder Rau
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