Noviembre 30

How is everybody doing?

How was Thanksgiving? Did anyone battle Black Friday?

This week was super neat.

I included a picture of the Lighting Ceremony held at the VC on Saturday. The Mormon Chorale sang and Pres. Keyes spoke and they lit all the Christmas lights at the VC. We brought an LA and it was sweet! Afterward, we stopped into Subway for dinner and met C. He's a young dad who lost a baby boy a little while back and who just recently lost his wife due to complications in childbirth of their 23-week preemie baby girl who is currently in the NICU. He was upbeat, however, and talked about how God was helping him through these hard times. He agreed to let us teach him! We're excited to see him again--he seemed very receptive and prepared.

On Monday we met with G, one of our investigators, and we set a date for him to be baptized! He's preparing to be baptized on Christmas Eve! What a perfect gift to give and to receive from Heavenly Father. He has attended all 3 hours of church for the past 3 weeks and likes the way he feels at church, wants to have this for his daughter, loves that there is a prophet and that he will be able to hold the Priesthood, and likes learning from the Book of Mormon. He's a very good guy. He's the kind of person to run across the street to help his neighbor out with his elderly father. He quit drinking alcohol, tea and coffee and quit smoking a while ago and doesn't use illegal drugs. iPerfecto! But we still have lots to teach him. I think sometimes missionaries feel like the only mountain is getting them to feel that this is right and to set a baptismal date and get them there, but really there are many more things an investigator needs to understand before they are baptized, not just "The Restoration", "The Plan of Salvation", and "The Gospel of Jesus Christ" as outlined in the pamphlets and PMG. Being baptized means you are promising to come to church and partake of the Sacrament every week. It means you are promising to serve others in your future callings. It means a high level of commitment to priesthood responsibilities. Etc. That's what's so exciting about G to us. None of that seems like too much of a stretch for him. He has a faithful heart. And it's neat because we found him completely on our own. We had 5-10 minutes before our dinner appt and so we went around the neighboring apts and a lady was coming out of an apt and we tried to talk with her but she just directed us to knock on the door, which we did and G was behind it. He was talking about it to us and how he could've just said no, not interested, but how something told him not to, but to listen. So neat.

We've been seeing miracles with our other investigators as well. I don't remember whether or not I told you about the man we taught last Wednesday, which lesson was spiritually exhausting but so good. He asked to be removed from the Church's records about 30 years ago because he realized he couldn't say he knew it was true. He always kept the commandments, but felt hypocritical saying he knew it was true when he didn't. Fast forward years and years and a whole lot of family drama... We saw him again at the Lighting Ceremony and learned he's the great-grandson (great-great-grandson?) of George Q. Cannon. Anyway, he is a miracle because he now knows it's true. I remember our first mtg with him. The scriptures I needed to assign him came so clearly to me. And he called a few days later saying it was like reading them for the first time and that he really knew they were true, that we were servants of the Lord inspired according to his needs, that the Book of Mormon is true and everything that goes along with it. His mountain, however, is something else entirely now... which I won't go into... but that whole experience was very interesting.

Sister V and I just finished planning our last Thursday Morning Training for this transfer. Crazy. I emailed President asking what the possibility was for extending my mission.... Extensions are rare and so that's why I asked what the possibility was, but it's weird to me that the other sisters I came out with will stay in the mission until April and May, since we were in the MTC for so long. Spanish/VC sisters have 11 transfers in the field; English/VC have 12; English full-pros have 13. We'll see what he says.

I'm currently reading in Ether in the BoM and I've been learning a lot. The whole so-and-so rebelled against his father and stole the kingdom gets a little tedious, but when it talks about prophecy and what unbelief causes (Ch 4) it's very insightful. I loved Ether 4:11.

Anyway, I hope that you are all enjoying the beginning of the Holidays and gearing up for Christmas.