[Brooks didn't have time to upload photos this week as he had to finish up his college application essays. Not a fun thing to do while serving your mission!! But we're done! :-) ~K]
Hello family!
This week has been so rewarding in a lot of ways. First off, in explanation as to why I'm emailing on Wednesday this week instead of Monday, we have a follow up training for the July arrivals tomorrow and since coming down the mountain twice is too much of a burden on our proselyting hours we moved our P day [preparation day] to today in Bacolod to make more use of our schedule.
I just want to talk about the three baptisms that we had this last Sunday, being the baptism of *L and the two elderly sisters in Siwahon.
L has been an investigator of ours since I was with Elder Peralta, and the way we found her was through her friend which is a recent convert. She told us that she wanted to try to come to church because she wanted to change the way she's been living her life.
She is a young single mom with a young boy that was the result of a teenage pregnancy, and when we met her she had been pregnant for 3 months with another child that was the result of someone taking advantage of her unwillingly. One of the first things she asked us was how big of a sin it was to abort a baby, as she was considering it at the time. But she changed her mind after the first few lessons we had with her and the difference I've seen in her from the time I met her to now is incredible.
In her testimony after her baptism she talked about how she was having so many bad things happen in her life and so many dark thoughts enter her mind before she found the true church, and now she has completely changed around and has a direction in her life.
There is much more I could say about L and a lot more to her conversion story, but time presses.
Also, directly after the baptism and confirmation of L, we went to Siwahon and held the baptismal service for Sister Jamera and Sister Lapid. It was such a sweet experience. A lot of the branch was there to support, and the two elderly sisters walked down to the river (which was quite a feat for them) with the help of the members and then got into the water (which was an even greater feat) with the sweet help of Frederick's mother, who actually got all the way into the river, skirt and Sunday dress and all, to help position the two women so they could be baptized. (Pictures will be attached next week.)
Afterwards at the special sacrament they were both confirmed into the church and they couldn't have looked happier.
They both told us later how they just felt so light and good afterwards and how they want all of their family to be able to know what they do now. Sister Jamera said that "in all my years and to this old age I've never really understood or lived the gospel until now, and from now on I am never going to have my chungee (little store she runs from her house) open on Sunday ever again."
I love you all!
Halong kamo pirme!
~Elder Butler
*Not her full name for privacy reasons
No comments:
Post a Comment