You are my only one! Here I go! There´s just no one who gets me like you do! You are my only, my only one"
Do you remember when the band played that song? I sure do love it! I was in our house and Elder Medeiros was playing the guitar (he bought a guitar) and he knows a lot of American music. He played this song. I love it! He also plays more good music that I just love!
So this week has been absolutely awesome! I wish I could tell you all of it but I don´t think there is enough time. Let me start you off with last week. Last week after the leadership meeting in Paranaguá (which is a 2 hour bus ride from our house) I did an exchange with the elders in my district to do 2 interviews for them. SO we went and I cut up my feet horribly (cuz I used shoes I haven´t used in a long time with very thin socks) and it was super painful to walk. Until today they were still cut up but it was totally worth it. Missionaries have a little saying engraven in their hearts, "Do everything to baptize." So we had 2 baptisms. One passed and was baptized on Saturday and the other one will have another interveiw tomorrow and probably will be baptized on this Saturday. It was really neat and a privilege to do the interview and get to know more people. It is truly awesome, everyone has a story.
So the next thing I would like to tell you about is the fantastic zone conference that we had on Monday. We only have ten elders in our zone and because our zone is so far from others, it is only our zone at the conference, so I thought, oh great, this is gonna be interesting, because with 10 elders it´s alittle more personal.
President asked us all to prepare 4 talks at 3 minutes each, one about faith, the other about repentance, the other baptism, and the last about the gift of the Holy Ghost. I knew I would give a discourse. I dont know if you would say revelation or the fact that I know President, but I knew I would talk. I had NO time to prepare a discourse. So Sunday night, I looked up scriptures that I could use for each topic because with 3 minutes you can´t do much, a scripture, an experience, and your testimony.
So when we got to the church in Paranaguá and the meeting started, we started off with the discourses. I was asked to give a talk on faith. I shared a scripture in Matthew when Christ taught that with our faith nothing is impossible and shared an experience I had where I learned that through faith we can do hard things and I left my testimony. Just a little bit over 3 minutes. PERFECT! Then afterwards we heard great talks about repentance, baptism, and the gift of the Holy Ghost. The Spirit was super strong.
Sister Cordon gave a remarkable discourse on a lot of different topics. She showed a picture of the world and said, "It never ceases to amaze me that the Lord is so awesome and powerful that He could create this earth and universe but so loving and private that He knows me personally and answers my prayers." What an interesting insight. She talked about how there is a law in heaven, the law of justice and mercy and about how we need to live our lives through obedience to receive the blessings that God has prepared. We looked up some of the blessings. Then she said that we had the right (if we were living worthily) to live with angels every day and they would walk with us and protect us and guide us. She told a story, (I´ve heard it a few times but I love it.)
When she was younger, her father was an orthodontist and the head of the orthodontist society in Idaho. That year, the orthodontists and their families were going to Hawaii and she wanted to go super bad. She kept asking and asking and her dad kept saying no. Until she changed the question to, "What do I have to do to be able to go to Hawaii with you and mom?" So Her dad said that she had to pay the way there and back and that she had to buy her food and the things that she would want to do there and she couldn´t use the money she had in the bank. She was heartbroken because she couldn´t raise the money in time. But her father said "If you are willing to, you can get up at 5 every morning before school and pick corn and sell it and you can raise the money in time to go."
So the first day she woke up at 5 and was super excited. She went out there and worked hard, she picked the corn and put it in a sack and she ended up getting all wet and muddy and dirty and by the time she had finished, all the corn was smushed. She was sad because she couldn´t sell smushed corn. The next day, her alarm went off at 5 and she stayed in bed and said I will not get up to pick corn. She then heard a noise in the garage and realized that her father was down there getting ready to work and she knew she had to get up and work too. She got ready and went down there and grabbed the sack to put the corn in. Her dad said, "What are you doing? This will be much easier." He turned on a tractor for them to put the corn in. She went out there and she and her father worked together. In one morning she picked and sold 5 more times than the day before.
She said we can choose to leave the house alone and do it our own way, and get some of the work done or we can get up and work with our Father and reap more than we could have alone.
Then President Cordon got up and gave a wonderful discourse about accompanying our investigators every day and said, I promise you that if you don´t accompany your investigators every day, the devil will. Which is so true.
After lunch we watched a training video which was awesome and did some training and Presindet Cordon gave a discourse on Alma 26:22 which is one of my favorites. He talked about the "millions of souls" that we will convert. He said just think, you baptize one person and they do the work for all our their ancestors. You will have helped thousands of people get baptized. It was a wonderful discourse. After the meeting I had a wonderful talk with Sister Cordon and she asked about Elder Paiva and everything. It was wonderful. She said "Elder Askins, I love the change that I have seen in you. You have grown up so much." It was really nice.
Then this weekend we are having 2 BAPTISMS!!!Yes!!!! I am so excited.
When I first got here, Elder Medeiros was talking to me about our investigator and then he got to this one woman and said, "Well she has pretty much cut us. Her brother was possessed and we couldn´t get the demon to leave. Some pastor from another church came and the demon left." So we went to her neighbors house 2 Sundays ago to invite them to come to church but they weren´t home. She came out and we invited her too and she said she wasn´t feeling well. The next day we went back to her neighbor's house to teach them and they weren´t home and she came out and asked us to leave a message. We went in and taught her about authority and then she told me her story.
She said the night she prayed about the Book of Mormon, she had a dream that she was in a huge church with a staircase (she actually described the inside of the Curitiba temple almost perfectly) and the missionaries and some friends were on the top floor and called after her to come back she wasn´t able to. She was confused by the dream. Then the Sunday that we had passed by to invite she and her neighbors to church, she had a dream that Jesus had come to her and said "Go to church and hear the word of God and the Holy Spirit." It just so happened, that last week's lesson was on the Holy Ghost. She woke up from this dream to the clapping of hands. Our hands and we invited her to church but she wasn´t feeling good and declined. So we asked her to read the parts of the Book fo Mormon again and pray.
We passed by again and asked what happened. She said she would come to church this weekend and she thought she received her answer, then the next day we went to her house and taught her the plan of salvation and marked a date for the 27. She accepted. We started passing by every day. On Sunday she woke up and got to church before we did! She loved it! Afterward she said that it was the best meeting and she felt like singing and crying all at the same time. She knew the church was true and that she would be baptized this Sunday!
That Sunday afternoon, we went to the neighbor's house, who also came to church. She came in and said "Elders can you come teach my daughter today?" So we went to her daughter´s house and taught her and marked a date for this next week. She told us about how Sunday was the best day she has had in a super long time and how she loved it and everything seemed to go perfectly that day and she knew it was because she went to church.
Last night we were teaching and her youngest daughter walked in and we started teaching her too. Our investigator bore to us and her daughter a powerful testimony of the restoration and now her daughter will also be baptized with her this weekend. It has been a wonderful week.
I know that the church is true. It is the restored church of Christ here on the earth. I know the Book of Mormon is true and as Joseph Smith taught, a man will get closer to God by living it´s precepts! This work is true! Christ lives!
-Elder Nay
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