Hola Familia y Amigos!!
This week's had it's ups and it's downs I guess. The biggest up was that we got to go to the Temple this Thursday!! It was an amazing experience and I really got a lot out of the session. The biggest thing I think that I realized was that Adam and Eve, exactly like us, felt ashamed, guilty, unclean, and "naked" for having disobeyed the commandments of God. They wanted to hide themselves from the presence of God for their "nakedness". Often we feel like that after having disobeyed God's will. But we can't hide, Adam and Eve couldn't. They had to face God and admit to him what they had done. They had to accept the consequences of their actions. But "O how great is the Plan of our God"!! (2 Ne 9 various verses) What wonderful news it was to Adam and Eve to know that a Savior would be provided!! And what great joy it is to us to know that we, each and every one of us, have a Savior! All we need do is turn to Him and accept His teachings and His Sacrifice in ourselves and follow Him. While in the Temple this truth and this great joy overwhelmed my soul. I'm so grateful for the Temple and the blessing that it is in our lives. I encourage all of you to spend as much time as you can in the Sacred House of the Lord.
Otherwise, this week has been alright. We were able to bring Rodolfo, a recent convert, and his wife, Esmeralda to a lesson with
Salvador with us and they really helped him out I believe. We are really hoping to have that lesson with him and them be a consistent occurance that can help both Rodolfo and Salvador a lot. Although he basically will not be able to be baptized anytime soon due to his probation, I really would like to see him progress to the point that he's in a constant state of readiness, that he and his family are all living the Gospel, but it seems like it will take a lot of work to get there. Salvador's a really great guy who wants the blessings of the Gospel, but is in a pretty tough situation. His recent convert wife is less-active, and seems to be sort of against coming to church for whatever reason right now which makes it really hard for him to follow the Gospel. She's nice and seems willing to meet with us, but we haven't been able to get that meeting with her so far. We've also haven't had much luck with other investigators this week and even seeing many of them even just to set up a return appointment has been hard. But we keep going, weeks like this are bound to happen and we must push forward to embrace the next week. We were able to have a lesson with a former investigator, Max, though. He's one of those former investigators that you kind of wonder why the missionaries ever stopped going by. He is very, very nice, and is open to listening and open to changing his views. He struggles to read sometimes because of his eyesight, which might make it hard for him to read the Book of Mormon, but he read at least a little in the pamphlet between appointments and he committed to reading in the Book of Mormon and praying about it, so we're very excited to teach him.
We have a number of investigators that have a lot of potential, but it's very hard it seems like to have return visits. We make return appointments, but as we know, those often fall through for whatever reason. And then it seems like we can't get ahold of people for weeks at a time. We have another lesson after 2-3 weeks, and maybe a second one that week or the next, but then they get lost for another 2-3 weeks, or even more. And every time we have to backtrack and cover the same ground over and over with them. I've been kind of concerned about that because it's difficult to have progress with them like that. If y'all could pray specifically that we can have consistent lessons with our investigators we would appreciate that a lot.
I love y'all and appreciate all the prayers y'all already send my way. I'm sure there are many, many blessings that I receive because of your prayers. Keep them coming! :)
-Elder Whitaker
This week's had it's ups and it's downs I guess. The biggest up was that we got to go to the Temple this Thursday!! It was an amazing experience and I really got a lot out of the session. The biggest thing I think that I realized was that Adam and Eve, exactly like us, felt ashamed, guilty, unclean, and "naked" for having disobeyed the commandments of God. They wanted to hide themselves from the presence of God for their "nakedness". Often we feel like that after having disobeyed God's will. But we can't hide, Adam and Eve couldn't. They had to face God and admit to him what they had done. They had to accept the consequences of their actions. But "O how great is the Plan of our God"!! (2 Ne 9 various verses) What wonderful news it was to Adam and Eve to know that a Savior would be provided!! And what great joy it is to us to know that we, each and every one of us, have a Savior! All we need do is turn to Him and accept His teachings and His Sacrifice in ourselves and follow Him. While in the Temple this truth and this great joy overwhelmed my soul. I'm so grateful for the Temple and the blessing that it is in our lives. I encourage all of you to spend as much time as you can in the Sacred House of the Lord.
Otherwise, this week has been alright. We were able to bring Rodolfo, a recent convert, and his wife, Esmeralda to a lesson with
Salvador with us and they really helped him out I believe. We are really hoping to have that lesson with him and them be a consistent occurance that can help both Rodolfo and Salvador a lot. Although he basically will not be able to be baptized anytime soon due to his probation, I really would like to see him progress to the point that he's in a constant state of readiness, that he and his family are all living the Gospel, but it seems like it will take a lot of work to get there. Salvador's a really great guy who wants the blessings of the Gospel, but is in a pretty tough situation. His recent convert wife is less-active, and seems to be sort of against coming to church for whatever reason right now which makes it really hard for him to follow the Gospel. She's nice and seems willing to meet with us, but we haven't been able to get that meeting with her so far. We've also haven't had much luck with other investigators this week and even seeing many of them even just to set up a return appointment has been hard. But we keep going, weeks like this are bound to happen and we must push forward to embrace the next week. We were able to have a lesson with a former investigator, Max, though. He's one of those former investigators that you kind of wonder why the missionaries ever stopped going by. He is very, very nice, and is open to listening and open to changing his views. He struggles to read sometimes because of his eyesight, which might make it hard for him to read the Book of Mormon, but he read at least a little in the pamphlet between appointments and he committed to reading in the Book of Mormon and praying about it, so we're very excited to teach him.
We have a number of investigators that have a lot of potential, but it's very hard it seems like to have return visits. We make return appointments, but as we know, those often fall through for whatever reason. And then it seems like we can't get ahold of people for weeks at a time. We have another lesson after 2-3 weeks, and maybe a second one that week or the next, but then they get lost for another 2-3 weeks, or even more. And every time we have to backtrack and cover the same ground over and over with them. I've been kind of concerned about that because it's difficult to have progress with them like that. If y'all could pray specifically that we can have consistent lessons with our investigators we would appreciate that a lot.
I love y'all and appreciate all the prayers y'all already send my way. I'm sure there are many, many blessings that I receive because of your prayers. Keep them coming! :)
-Elder Whitaker