Weekly Letter: August 17-23, 2010

Wow, what a week! I don´t even know how to start this off! First of all, it rained....a lot! I had thought that the rainy season would be finishing up right now, since it started in well in June, it should be ending right now, but basically like clockwork, every afternoon, it rained a ton! it was pretty cool, except that our house didn´t like it too much. Our apartment complex, like many others here in DF, has an open center where we can hang our laundry to dry. It was way cool because we literally had to go down a waterfall to get down stairs! Then we opened the door and the street was basically a river! But being DF, the traffic was heavy as usual, it was way cool to see the cars passing through knee-level water. The small cars literally looked like boats because you couldn´t see the wheels!

So yeah, this all happened while we were waiting for the Zone Leaders to do a baptismal interview with two of our investigators. They had already been interviewed before by Elder Steed, but that was two months ago, so Elder Cardenas and Elder Cabrera wanted to check that everything was good. When we arrived at the house of Uriel and Gabriela, Gaby basically chewed me out. She said that some of her friends in the church were saying that they weren´t being fair to us as missionaries, that they kept saying they were going to get baptized, but never followed through. She told me that she had told me when Javier left, that this month was going to be difficult to be baptized because it is the busiest time at her work. She then told me, "I told you I´m going to get baptized! Okay? So don´t act all sad and everything in front of the members."

I can honestly say that this was the first time I enjoyed getting chewed out. I can honestly say that I was starting to doubt that I would see them get baptized, I knew they would be baptized, but every week something else would happen that made it difficult. However, after the interviews, they said that this Sunday for sure they would get baptized.

Sunday came, and so did they! Actually, Gabriela skipped out on her work to be there. She said that they were going to reprimand her, but she wanted to get baptized so much that it didn´t matter. She said that because the busy season at her work was now going to calm down that she shouldn´t have problems anymore with going to church on Sundays. Uriel also received a job that is only Monday through Saturdays everyday from 9 am until 6 pm. That may not sound very ideal, but here in DF, that´s a real blessing.

So the Lord provided the way that the two of them could be baptized. Elder Childers was able to get permission to be there for their baptism, (because Gabriela had made him promise to baptize her). So it was a beautiful experience, and the two of them were really happy and excited. Even the cold water didn´t deter them....even though Uriel gave me a hard time about the water. He told me afterwards "You didn´t even give me time to prepare myself you just dunked me as soon as you said the prayer." I told him it was better to get it over with and get out of the cold water, and, shivering, he laughed and agreed.

Well, I was only able to write about this experience, and although it was the crowning experience of the week, it wasn´t the only thing I wanted to write about, but right now I am out of time. So I´ll have to close with that and save the rest for next week.

Thank you all for the love and the support. It really means a lot!

Cariños,

Elder Blackham