Hello Family!
It's been another great week here in Passaic, and this week could potentially be my last week in Passaic. I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Right now I'm sitting in the area I loved so much, Union City as we just got done playing some volleyball. The snow has fallen, and the streets are wet, but the work continues moving forward. I guess just the quick update on my hives... I'm Healed!!! I went to the dermatologist, he scratched my back with a stick, watched the reaction, and then told me to finish the medication I already had, and then I was on my own. Finally!! I was super happy to hear that I could finally be finished with taking that medicine.
Here's a quick update on the status of our Investigators.
Jimena: Jimena is doing pretty well. She is still planning on the 5th of February to be baptized. She knows the church is true, and knows she needs to be baptized. She said that at the beginning she didn't care about any of this stuff, and then her desires changed to do it for her mom, and now her desires have turned back to her wanting to do it for herself. She has slowly converted as she has been reading in the Book of Mormon. We were really happy to hear about that. The sad part is, we taught her about sacrifice, and how we needed to be willing to sacrifice in order to keep the commandments. She said she was willing to sacrifice, but then when we invited her to church she said not this week because her mom wouldn't be able to go and that it was going to snow. We found a ride for them in everything in hopes that she would make it, but she had to stay and babysit her nieces. So who knows? We might have to push the date back further. We tried moving it up so that I could be here for it, but she wasn't too willing to do that, so I guess it's for the best.
The Hernandez Family: Things were going well with the Hernandez family, but things kind of came crashing down as we sat there teaching, and followed up on her Book of Mormon reading. She hadn't read, so we continued talking about Joseph Smith, and about faith. We talked about how faith is like a seed that we need to plant, and in order to plant it we need to have a desire. I asked her if she desired to know if Joseph Smith was a prophet, and then she said no. She was very honest and said that she's catholic and doesn't really like our church. It was kind of a dagger to the heart, but it's good that we found out now. She still came to church on Sunday on account that she lives with 3 members that are returning to activity, but we'll have to see if we can spark some desire in her.
Amaya: Still haven't been able to contact, she doesn't answer the door or our calls... .
Angie: Angie (Ana's friend) is actually doing really well. We had a great lesson with her this week. We really had to rely on the spirit of discernment because she was going through some hard times. We talked about repentance and forgiveness, and it really helped her out. We committed her to come to church, and she Came!! She even got there early and she was reading in her Book of Mormon before the meeting started. We have a lesson with her tonight that should go well, we are going to soft commit her to baptism!
Julio: We started teaching the boyfriend of a convert named Martha Lopez, who actually lives in Maryland. He seems super cool, and he comes here to visit on the weekend. He came to church last week, but couldn't make it this week. (probably because of the snow) . He said he was willing to read in the Book of Mormon, and hopefully he'll be able to make it back to New Jersey next week so we can follow up.
Katherine: We also started teaching another member referral named Katherine. She's a 17 year old columbian, and is the niece of a member. It's been kind of weird teaching her and her friend because it's in English, and we haven't even met her parents yet. Elder Erikson and I seem to find new investigators that are teenage girls between the ages of 17 and 22. We don't teach very many guys.
So those are the main people that we are working with, but Elder Erikson and I had our best week that we've had for the two transfers that we've been together. The Lord truly blessed us, and I'm happy to see things rolling forward. If I do leave Passaic now, and can feel better that I didn't leave it struggling as much as it was at the end of last transfer.
We had a cool experience with the Mejia family this past tuesday. About a week ago Elder Erikson and I decided to use the cell phone and the fax machine to call all the former investigators to see which phone numbers worked and see if we could set some appointments. We called Oscar Mejia and set up an appointment to pass by. Tuesday it was getting late and I thought we were going to have to cancel the appointment with Oscar as we had previously pushed it back to a later time. We called them and said that they were expecting us and so we went anyway. It turns out that they really needed a visit from the missionaries, because the next day Oscar was to find out if he was being deported or not. We shared some quick scriptures, said a special prayer that all would go well with the court the next day... and everything turned out to be alright. Oscar got his papers and gets to stay in the US. Hopefully that experience will have softened his heart even more, and we can start teaching him this coming week.
We also started teaching the mother of a less active member named Paciano who moved here from Texas. It was an interesting lesson as Alicia is hard of hearing, and is probably one of the oldest people I've ever taught. We shall see how she progresses, but we talked about Jesus Christ, and committed her to watch "Finding Faith in Jesus Christ."
Things are going great and I'm excited to see what the new week has to bring. Am I staying or am I going? I should find out Sunday night if not sooner. I love being a missionary, and I love the members here in Passaic a lot! Thank you for all your support!
The Gospel is True!! I Love you all so much!!!
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