Oct. 20, 2014
Hello Family!
Today I actually get a regular P day! So that means this email and the last email are only going to be a few days apart, so this may be brief since I may not have as much to report today as I usually do.
But the happy news is that the baptism of Sister Mary Joy and her daughter and two other young women went through and all had a great experience! [Picture above]
Other great news is that this morning one of what we call "our most active investigators" came to our house and announced while leaping into the air "MY DAD IS LETTING ME GET BAPTIZED!!!" (English translation).
Jeylou, the person mentioned above, is nine years old and has been coming to church ever since I have been here and even before I've arrived here, which makes about 9 months, and is the nephew of our branch president. His sister was baptized a little over a year ago, and for the last six months he's been wanting to be baptized as well, but his parents did not. His parents are wonderful people and have great family values but their father's family, like our branch president, came from the person who started this "Divine Colony" and church so they felt pretty obligated to stay with it, especially the father who was the main one who didn't want Jeylou to be baptized.
The other week we came by and brought it up with his parents about how he has been asking us if we could baptize him and if they would be OK with it and eventually they said that they wanted to wait until he was older and more accountable before he makes that kind of commitment, like his sister who they allowed to be baptized, because they don't believe in forcing their kids in what they believe. So the verdict came that he needed to be 15 before he was baptized, and of course we respect the parents and didn't feel prompted at the time that we should push so we left it at that.
Jeylou afterwards talked to me and asked me to convince his dad to let him be baptized, to which I told him that if he really wanted to be baptized he needed to show his parents his desire and commitment to it even in his young age (while he is young he acts much older than he actually is).
So the next Sunday after church he had another talk with his parents and even cried when he told them how much he wanted to be baptized, and his father finally said yes.
This baptism has been a long time coming, and I know for certain that this child is going to be a future missionary and a future leader of the Church here in Colonia Divina. Just more blessings that I am being privileged to see.
Also Sister Andong was interviewed this Sunday for her baptism and is really going full steam ahead with her conversion, asking us questions about the temple and such and really wants her husband to be taught. Heads up to mom for a facebook request from Sister Andong :)
And in closing, the reason why this is kind of rushed is because I was able to talk to the owners of this computer cafe and restaurant for a few hours about the church and the Book of Mormon. The husband is from Holland and the wife is from here and they've known the missionaries for 10 years. In fact the reason their restaurant started was because of missionaries seeing her husband eating a hamburger he made himself and asked him to make them one too, since good hamburgers are hard to find here, and thus a business was born.
But after having a long talk with the wife on Saturday when we were down for conference I found out in the ten years they've known the missionaries they've never tried going to church, so I invited them to try out church in Sagay the following Sunday and they did!
Today I just followed up with them and talked about things from eternal families, to obedience, to prophets, to the Book of Mormon and so on. They said they are willing to keep trying going to church so we'll see where that goes.
Anyways, I love you all! And sorry this email was kind of straight rambling, but I hope you get something good from it. :)
Next week I'll be emailing on Tuesday night for me here instead of Monday since we have zone conference here next week on Tuesday.
Take care!
~Elder Butler
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