A few weeks ago we ran into this older woman (like 70 or 80) in the street and she was like, "You look like the Mormons...." and we were like, "Yeah, we are the Mormons!" It turned out she was baptized in Cali in 1999! And went to church for like a year after that but moved and didn't know where to find the church again, and hasn't been for like 15 years. But we just visited her for the first time, and she literally cried when we showed up because apparently the Jehovah's Witnesses show up every Friday to teach her husband. She said they hate her and make the house feel bad. She still has her baptism photo and showed it to me and was really excited to come back to church (she did!), and I talked to her while my companion tried to teach the JW. He'd obviously spoken with the JWs, before, and seriously, what those guys teach don't make any sense. First he was like, "OK, let me see your Bible," and the guy gave him the bible, that said "A modern translation of the holy scriptures." My companion was like, "This isn't a Bible, show me where it says Bible." (it doesn't) "Sorry sir, but you're not studying the bible." Then the old man said something about Jesus, God and the Holy Ghost being the same person and my companion read Matthew 3:13 - 17 and was like, "Let me get this straight, Jehovah was baptized, then while he was in the water, the heavens opened, and the voice of Jehovah came from the heavens, EVEN THOUGH he's standing in the water, and then Jehovah came down in the form of a dove, upon himself? Tenas, man." Then the man said that we didn't live with God before this life, and my companion read Jeramias 1:6, and a ton of other stuff like that. But at least the woman came to church!
I also cried this week, and I honestly don't even know why. We were teaching an investigador named Paulina. She's really cool, but she's like 50 years old and acts like she's 5, her husband too. We were teaching the plan of salvation and I knew that she wasn't understanding, and her son who was there didn't understand why marriage is important. So I started to explain to her temple marriage and the sealing and eternal families and how this was only possible through the church and my voice just broke and I couldn't finish my explanation, and I had tears in my eyes all of a sudden. Elder Vaca had to finish for me. But after she was like "Oh, now I understand." I don't know why that happened, but at least she understood in the end.
Also on Sunday we were trapped in the apartment, because it was raining and thundering and lightning and hailing and we were not about to go walk around in that.
I like the way my new companion thinks and plans, but I don't like how he teaches. Like, this week we made THE BOARD, that has the names of literally everyone we know and where they live so we can plan more effectively.
But I don't like how he doesn't really let me talk that much. Like he just kind of takes total control of the lesson, but I assume we'll get better as time goes on.
To answer your question, ours is a ward, but it's really small. Like, when people visit from Cali they comment on how small the chapel is. There are about 400 members in the ward but only 150 - 200 people show up every week.
Love you guys!
No comments:
Post a Comment