Tuesday, October 20, 2015

Blessings and Miracles

This week was pretty great. Had another baptism. Alexia Avalos, the daughter of Lorena, got baptized on Saturday. The spirit was so dang strong. My comp had me conduct the meeting. I was pretty nervous, and forgot what all the abbreviations I wrote down meant. So I just kinda winged it. Which doesn´t work to well in a language you don´t know. Oh well, I didn´t kill the spirit, and she got baptized, which are what are important. My companion baptized her and I confirmed her the next day on Sunday. It was scary as heck. I messed up 4 times. But, as they say, the fifth time´s the charm. After conducting and the setting apart, both the Hermana´s and Elder Yaques told me that I sounded just like our mission pres. Idk if that´s good or bad. He is from Argentina, so it might mean I´m getting the accent down. But, he is from a part of Argentina where they speak really funny. So idk if I should be happy or try to change it.

Broke bricks for 2 hours this week as service. Our branch president is building a new house, and is gonna use the broken bricks to help fill in his foundation. Not the best construction method, but, it was pretty fun to just smash bricks with a hammer for two hours.

Elder Yaques and I hosted a talent show for the ward, well he hosted a talent show and I stood next to him and smiled. But it was cool to get a taste of the Argentine culture as people danced, sang, and acted.

Had prolly our best lesson so far this week. We went to talk with an investigator, who couldn´t at the time, and I felt like we should try knocking on the door of a family who kept saying "Come back later" and eventually just stopped answering the door, But, we tried anyways. And they let us in. I was kinda wary at first, cuz the whole house smelled like smoke, and there was still a cigarette burning in the ashtray. But, during the lesson, we couldn´t smell the smoke at all, and the spirit was just flowing. One thing the mother said that really stuck out to me, is that her son (who has some special needs and some sort of phobia complex), told her he feels something really special when he sees us, and we are the only people outside of his family and internet friends that he wants to talk to. They accepted a Book of Mormon and the mother commited to read it with her son and pray with her son and ask if it and our message are true. It was awesome.

The lady who we had tried to visit, turned out to be the shortest and strangest visit out of all others on my mission. She is a caretaker for an old lady, and asked us to meet her at the old lady´s house. So we met her there. The old lady has alzheimer´s and her voice sounds just like the voice of Kermit the Frog, except a bit higher. She told us the same story about moving into her house for about 5 min, starting over about every 1. Then, the caretaker told her to go get her harmonica. So the old lady said something to her dog, and went and found her harmonica. While she was looking, her daughter showed up, who hates religion. The caretaker tried to mouth to us to leave, but not before the old lady came back with her harmonica. She began to play it, and stopped about every 20 seconds or so to remind us she was playing for the "perrito", the "little dog". When the daughter left the room for a sec, the caretaker kinda pleaded with us to leave, and so we did. I don´t think we´re gonna be going back any time soon for a follow up visit.

Something I forgot to mention last week. Last week, on Sunday, a lady showed up last minute with her super sick granddaughter. She isn´t a member, nor anyone in her family, but, she heard that the Mormon´s can perform miracles. So she decided to try her luck. Her granddaughter had a really bad cold or something, and couldn´t breathe really well, and basically just spent all of her time crying because she feels so bad (ironically, her name, when translated, means "want miracles"). She asked us for a blessing, and we gave one to her granddaughter. Afterwards, she was fine. I don´t think I had ever felt so much purity in my life as when I placed my hands on her head to give her a blessing. It was so sweet to be a part of that.

Starting to finally feel charity. It is awesome. Charity really is awesome. Loving feels so much better than judging and teasing. I truly love the people here. The men are hilarious and literally always joking, even during super serious moments in meetings, they are still cracking jokes and trying to enjoy themselves. The women are super sweet. Not as funny as the men, but really nice and sweet. I am really grateful for the opportunity I have to serve them and learn to love everone, no matter what. Charity is awesome. I invite all of you to follow the advice of Moroni, and pray "with all the energies of the heart", for the gift of charity, and then work to get it, because it really is the greatest of all the gifts of God. It is truly amazing to feel nothing but love for everyone.

Moroni 7:45-48

Elder Brown

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