A little known fact about Paraguay: It's almost summer right now. And hot. We came home at around 9:30 a couple of nights ago and my clock's thermometer read 94 F, and it was a humid heat trap inside of the apartment. While that does mean it was a solid five degrees cooler outside, lets consider that the true heat and force of summer has yet to commence. This will be awesome.
In any case, I thank you all for your wonderful emails and encouragement! Hearing from you guys every once in a whie makes me happy. I hope things are going well and I hope that you guys take the opportunity to ENJOY the cold and the snow instead of suffering! I know I'm going to enjoy the summer and the heat!
This week's work has been tough though. For a long while, we've just been doing A LOT of what's called "contacting" which just translates to clapping outside of gates to try and get lessons to try and get investigators. The problem is, while we get plenty of lessons, they lie to us about return visits or they just won't progress or things just keep coming up such that no one actually sticks around as an investigator. Therefore, when there are no plans nor people to visit, you contact. A few years back, this place was the second most baptizing missions in the world. They came to find that the missionaries were baptizing poorly though, just getting people into the water without actually helping them gain testimonies, and they put a fairly solid stop to that. The result? Better missionary work, but plummeting baptisms. In our branch, we had six from July of 2012 to July of 2013. We're hoping to change that, but it's tough because of the situation before described. Nevertheless, we keep going and it's fun to do lots of contacting and meet tons of people.
The most important developments of the week are these: Sofía came to church again! And we had some really cool lessons with her! She has had a life of Catholicism, as a teacher of Catechism and she almost went through Opus Dei, which is apparently some really deep crazy level of learning in the Catholic Church, but she is super afraid of baptism because she doesn't just want to abandon that and leave it all behind. Regardless, she believes the Book of Mormon to be true, and she feels what she describes as peace when she is with us, when she goes to church, and she even just WANTS to go to "our" church in the future (which really baffles her, because she never expected that in all of her life).
So, what do you do when your investigator has all the testimony they need to get baptized but still struggles? You testify and you talk about the restoration like you never have before. We bore powerful witnesses of the Prophet Joseph Smith, and we read throught 3 Ne. 11 with her to talk to her about baptism, and just Jesus Christ in general. The Spirit was so strong. We finally left her with an ultimatum to just find her answer by Friday, when we'll be seeing each other next. She says okay and you can just tell that there is this schism inside of her that has her teetering on the edge of baptism.
One of the most important things about our lesson last night was the effect it had on us. The realization that these moments when we feel the spirit are those moments that make us one with God and all the prophets or those to whom we look as examples. It IS God working within us, and we find ourselves in the uniquely sweet position of being therefore tied to EVERYTHING, because God ties us to that. Right now, Sofía is finding these blips on the radar of times when she really synchs up to that deeper flow of truth, but we are promising the gift of the Holy Ghost, which ties us so permanently to Him.
After that lesson, we realized the connection we make and how important that is, how it is, in the end, the purpose of all that we do. We inscribe ourselves more deeply into God when we do His will, or rather, keep all the commandments He's given us and follow His direction for our lives, and therefore tie ourselves to everything and everyone that is good. It is happiness. It is purpose. It is ancestry and progeny and the beauty that only the prophets come close to actually seeing.
I know that this church is more than "church." More than religion or culture or words or tangibility. It is truth, which is a principle of Godliness. Joseph Smith WAS a prophet of God who was instrumental in the restoration of His power and guidance. The Book of Mormon IS absolutely true and is the instrument of conversion in all our lives. It's tangibility is the intangible fact that we can KNOW of a surety of its truthfulness, and therefore know so many other things. I exhort everyone to do as Christ asks and try Him, feel the marks in the hands and feet of "....the God of the whole earth." You can do this by reading to Book of Mormon, praying to God if it is true, and attending church regularly. Doing so, you will receive testimony of the Spirit and you will know.
I bear this witness in the name of Jesus Christ, as His representative.
Amen.
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