Hey
Familia,
This
week we taught P, that lady we helped get to the hospital, a couple more
times. Tuesday we taught her about the Book of Mormon, and she told us she’d
already been reading it because a friend gave her one. Then she told us at the
end that she would never to go church if we invited her. She said there was no
point in going to church and that we should even invite her she’s just get mad.
The last Sunday she didn’t go because she was upset that we invited her to go
with us. We were a little shocked by her outburst and pretty unsure of what to
do with that. We had another cita Friday and we’d been worried every day trying
to come up with something we could teach so that she’d have the desire to go to
church. We were still undecided that day but went over to her house anyway.
After we said the opening prayer we decided to turn to 3 Nephi 11 to help her
with her testimony about the Book of Mormon. We didn’t think that would be too
much help with the church issue but faith in the Book of Mormon pretty much
helps with everything. After we read we asked her what part she liked or
grabbed her attention in that chapter. She said we were bad because we made God
chastise her about not wanting to go to church! In the first verse it talks
about people gathered together to talk about Christ, then that a voice came to
them 3 times and they didn’t understand the first two. As we read it she felt
like God was specifically getting after her for not wanting to attend church.
She continued to talk and teach herself about the Spirit and the importance of
going to church for about 20 minutes while my companion and I just sat back and
listened. When she finished, Elder Hafen and I looked at each other pretty
shocked and kind of just bore our testimonies about the Holy Ghost and personal
revelation and closed with a prayer.
We walked about away thinking that was the
best lesson we’d ever had because we didn’t even teach! The spirit said it all.
My testimony grew so much in the fact that God’s hand is in this work. He led us
to this lady, and He’s not going to let her little uproar about church get in
the way of her salvation. As missionaries, we alone can’t do a whole lot
to get people to follow Christ and be baptized. We don’t know Spanish well
enough and we definitely aren’t very good at convincing. It’s nice to know we
have a higher power on our side that is always willing to help us out. We put
in our effort to open our mouths and Heavenly Father succors His children unto
Him. In the end, Paula didn’t go to church kind of an anti-climactic story. But
that was an experience we will never forget.
We
also had interchanges this week. I went with our Zone Leader Elder Felix who’s
from Brazil. He’s an awesome guy and I learned a lot from him. At every house
people tried to guess where he was from. Everyone thought it was Mexico or
Guatemala or Panama from his accent. I told him every time that he already
sounds like a Latino! At the end of the day he said Brazilians are Latinos. Who
knew?
I got my pride knocked pretty good at church. A little girl in a pew in
front of me turns and asks me “por que usted es tan chele?” or, Why are you
such a white boy? Man. I’ve been getting so tan lately I thought I blended in already.
That was a bummer.
Love
you
Elder
Cook
