That is so sad about Sam. He was such a hard working guy and he knew the importance of family, but you know what? It's true that we are blessed with knowledge beyond understanding. Even though we don't have to understand all the deep doctrine of what is going on in the spirit world as long as we stick to what we know through the scriptures and the prophets we know that all will be well. Sometimes we have missionaries here who get caught up in the deepest doctrine and worry about the stupidest things and it causes them to forget the simple doctrine that makes the gospel of Christ so beautiful. Please give Uncle Dean and Aunt Marsha a hug for me.
(Presten was quite the story teller this week... some of his analogies really crack me up!)
Yay guess what? Elder Beatty just got his first baptism. Whoot!! Party!!! And yes, it was a party! Braulio Ramos was baptized. He is a great guy and of course one of the best converts I have had so far :D He was such a great learner and was ever eager to gain the knowledge that we were so eager to give him. He was the best because we never had to drag him to the font. From the beginning, when we asked him to be baptized he nodded and said “Yes, I will.” From then on we led him hand in hand towards his first step to God. What a great moment it was when he came out of the water and I could see the look on his face as he knew that he was clean. As we climbed out of the font he asked me. “How can I get that feeling again?” I told him that he could have that feeling every week on Sunday when we partook of the sacrament. A huge grin overtook his face as he tried to explain to me the feeling he had at that moment. He was speechless. As he stood there searching for words I put my hand on his shoulder and looked him in the eyes and told him that the feeling he has now, he can continually feel as long as he did all the things we had asked him to do. Keep the commandments, come to church, etc.
Not everything went off without a hitch. You will notice the pictures of the melted bowl. We attempted to make a cake for his baptism. We forgot that we were making a cake in a plastic bowl over the top of an oven that was heating up. After a while, as I was mixing it all together I noticed that the bowl was sliding to one side. The bowl was melting to the top of the oven. I thought, oh the bottom is melted; but I can just pull it up. But as I pulled up the bowl the whole thing just fell right out alllll over the oven and floor. Great..... Me and Elder Hewitt just looked at each other and laughed. It’s ok because we weren't going to eat any cake anyway. We of course had other problems. As we were prepping to get everyone to the baptism, the phone stopped working. We couldn't get a hold of the bishop to buy empanadas for the baptism or get a hold of the ward mission leader. We also could tell that Satan was at work the day before when we had Braulio's interview. His sister who is very close to being asked to be baptized said that she wanted to come but can't because she has work. We only told her every day for the last 3 weeks that his baptism was at this time, this day and she needed work off. All she would say to us is that "Oh that’s way too far in the future I don't know if I have work." Ahhh, then just ask for it off. So we ended up changing the baptism to 2 hours earlier than it was planned and so not any members could come. But it was actually really spiritual. Braulio's sister and "special ed" brother could come. She was crying during the baptism. I hope it was tears of joy.......... But after all the stresss.... (I can see why missionaries come home with less hair) Elder Hewitt said that this was his easiest baptism. AHHHH hahaha...
I also had to give a talk this last week and I thought I would just share some funny insight about what I was talking about. I was giving a talk about hope. If we have hope, we believe that God will fulfill His promises and that through faith AND hope we can receive blessings of the commandments and such. I saw everyone was confused so I gave an example of the bus system here. It is very, very unreliable. So I began that all of us have spent time waiting for a collectivo (bus) and sometimes it doesn't come and so what do we do? We get mad. But let’s say that the bus driver is God and the bus is blessings. That bus is always going to come, we just have to be doing what we need to do to wait for it. I don't think that it helped out my talk very well. I’m sure translates kind of funny. (LOOK OUT! God is driving the bus and the blessings are COMING........ :D)
We have changes this week. I am sure excited to get a new comp but still nervous as any guy would be. It’s like when you’re planning on changing your toothpaste, you never really know what’s going to come out of the tube; but you sure hope it will make your teeth clean. It most likely will, in some way or another. Elder Hewitt and I have had a great run together. He is a good missionary who has taught me to teach the people just being myself and to teach the needs. It’s not worth it to baptized people only for the sake of getting a number. We baptize because it’s going to change people for the better. We teach because it’s going to make us better teachers and its going to help the investigator understand what our purpose is. Not to drag people to the font to brag about how many baptisms we get, not to become a leader and show off to people, but to actually see the change in people in that they are happy in the choice that they made to be baptized. Those are the people who will go to church no matter what happens. It’s great to see this kind of change. I have seen missionaries who are good missionaries but they think they are fulfilling our purpose in just purely baptizing people and never seeing them again. We need to work hard enough so that the people know what they are doing. Knowing the importance of the steps they are taking towards God and eternal life. We have used a good example of enduring to the end. Our first step is baptism. That is like buying a house. But if we don’t continue to go to church and keep the commandments it’s like buying that house and never doing anything with it. You don't have water, light, beds, food, nothing. You’re better off living in a tent in the Jungle.
We all have taken that first step. Some have taken more steps than others. I hope that we are taking our steps with our eyes open and not blindly being dragged by someone. The more we understand what we are doing the more blessings we will notice that we receive and the happier we will be.
I love you all and hope you have the best in all you do.
-Elder Beatty
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