This week, so lets start off with Marina. She is a mom of 2 less-actives. She was supposed to be baptized last sunday, but she hadn't been to church enough. But this week she will be baptized. There was one day, we had marked with her, and decided to bring a member with us. When we arrived, she wasn't there. And in the moment we went to call her, she was in the neighbors house. Turns out....Evanilde, her neighbor, is the mother of 5 kids. Her father-in-law had died that morning from Dengue (a sickness we all can get from mosquitos here in brazil). And she was bawling, because her husband had left her and the kids that week a couple days earlier. And the more we asked, the worse it got. Just in the moment alone, we started talking about the plan of salvation, and how God has something in store for her..blah blah blah. When I looked over, saw a baby, sleeping. I asked, "how many months does your baby have?" She said, "7 days". It was one of those moments where if I had been drinking coke or something I think would have spit it out in SHOCK. How was it possible? I couldn't find words, my companions jaw was on the floor. The member sat there like....what do we do? And out of nowhere, I found Marina, our almost recent convert, invited her to church, and started marking a day for us to return and start leaving messages wth her. So fast forward, we left. Sunday comes around, and where is Marina? We decided to go and get her. When we got to her house, her 2 sons had said she left a little bit before we arrived to go to church. When my companion looked at me, and was like, lets see if her neighbor wants to go. We went there...and sure enough. The children started begging to go to church with us. And we all went. Evanilde, Thayna, Simon, Sophia and our 9 day old Nicholas. It was awesome. The kids loved it. And in this Sacrament it was a sacrament given to us by the young men in the church. And they all talked about priesthood and priesthood duties, talking about how it was their duties to Protect the woman of the church. And then they called all of the men, 12 years old until 110 (or however old that little old fart was), and they all sang a hymn. And Evanilde started crying saying she wanted to see her son there in front when he was older, with the Authority of God. It was awesome. We invited them to be baptized the moment church ended, and they will be baptized not this sunday...but the next. Then we decided to visit them yesterday afternoon. And when we arrived there, there were like 5 billion more kids, and a tired mom. So we decided to gather all of them, and have a fun lesson. We taught them about Nephi, and talked about obedience. And it was fun and interactive and in the end, we taught them all how to say a prayer. And EVERY SINGLE ONE OF THEM, took a turn saying a prayer. Even Sophia, who is 3 years old. It was a super emotional moment for all of us. We weren't able to keep it in. Excited to see what the Lord has in store for them.
Saturday was our hard day. Haha, hard in the sense where we were really tested with our knowledge of the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. We had a total of 2 lessons that day. The first one, was a couple, who we met tuesday and returned Saturday....They asked every single question possible. And even came the moment, where the husband said. "I want to be baptized in this church. And what you are saying is that I can pick any man in the church and ask to trace where he got his authority, and its going to trace back to Joseph Smith, who got it from Jesus and his disciples?" And we simply replied, yes. And he said, "Now that I believe." It was cool, but they need to get married, like everyone else and their flippin dog here in Paraiso. Haha.
Then that same day, we had made a contact with Aline at the start of the week, and marked with her to be baptized in the contact. We returned for her, and she started....well challenging everything we said, and wanted bible verses to back everything up. So we did, haha. It was exhausting....but in the moment she started asking, so you are telling me that if someone, who is good, and serves and loves everyone, and never does any harm, but is never baptized, can't be saved? And we said yes, and she said "I don't believe that." So i opened up John 3:5. 5 Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
And she just kind of sat there like, uhhh....haha. It was a little bit funny. Her mom started to giggle. And what came out of that lesson...uh. Well, she said she would pray. But the point of the stories is that after that day, we returned home with the worlds BIGGEST testimony that Joseph Smith was the Prophet that restored the Gospel. THIS IS THE TRUE CHURCH. I know it, and believe it, and love it. I am willing to say to whoever wants to question it! The Lord knows what he is doing. He is working with every single one of us.
Funny Story of the week: We had just knocked on one door of a contact we made my first day here, and we were waiting like 5 years for her to leave. Waiting waiting waiting, and her little sister was kind of/sort of talking to us. And it was kind of just an awkward funny. When out of nowhere, I looked at my leg, and it was just bleeding. And my companion started laughing, and I started laughing, cause it was like out of nowhere, I had a streak of blood just dripping down. And this girl was NOT anwsering the door, and her little sister was like 3, and doing nothing. We just sat there, and my companion took pictures. And it was funny.
Up until now, I have no idea why my leg was bleeding, but...my companion sure did have a laugh when our leaders called the moment after and she had to explain everything while I knocked on the neighbors door to ask for a wet napkin or something....
Love you all. I can't believe time is passing so fast. Just sometimes I am like slow down. It is harder at night with Sister Forsyth, because...we basically lived the same life before the mission, and we both are returning to BYU Idaho, and everything. We get a bit excited, and start planning things.
Okay, but focus focus focus!
Go study your scriptures guys. I am going to the water fall here in this state that is like famous or something. It is gonna be sweet.
LOVE YOU
TE AMO.
Beijooos!
Sister Craig
Last moment in Palmas, saying goodbye to Irma Mirian.
I am going to miss the heck out of my crazy companion Sister Aparicio.
But I already LOVE these 3 girls. Sister Forsyth, Sister Cortez, and Sister Saez. Yaaaa. Lets gooooo to Paraiso.
Saying goodbye to Presidente Silva and Irma Marli, and their cute boys.
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