Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Discern, Dont Decide

Buenas tardes mis amigos y familiares,

Well, this week was strange but it passed by very quickly.  With all the interviews and meetings that we had to catch up on this week flew.  We have been on the go and havent caught up with our sleep so Elder Apaza and I both have a cold :(

Lets start with the good news!  Hans got baptized!  We werent able to announce the baptism on Sunday, so we were running around all week trying to invite people to the baptism.  Not many people showed up but it was a great experience.  The baptism was supposed to start at 3:30 but to Ecuadorians that means 4:15.  Hans was also the LAST person to show up for his own baptism haha.  When I asked him how he felt after the baptism, he replied: "Well Elder, when a person gets baptized......they feel good."  It was funny.  The next day in the confirmation, they announced that we were gonna confirm him.  We look around and Hans is NOWHERE to be found!  We both jumped up and starting looking around the chapel like maniacs.  We found him quick though and it all turned out well.  And just so happens that an Area Seventy was there to see the whole thing.

We are also working with Cristian.  He changed his baptismal date for the 12th instead of the 19th of September.  He just needs to finish the lessons and he is golden!  He even has the goal to baptize his son who is 9!  To keep the relationship with him and us good, we go running with him every other morning.  We thought it was gonna be easy, but after day two, we could barely walk.  We only ran like 4 miles and it killed us.  Dont even ask how much it hurt to kneel to pray.

We were also privileged to have that Seventy come. Elder Calderón is an Eucadorian native, but is in one of the lower Quorums of the Seventy.  He got up in his sacrament talk and there was a group of women talking in the back.  He stopped his talk and totally chewed them out for talking!  IT WAS SO FUNNY!  Only a Seventy would do that. 

Elder Calerdón also talked a lot about being self reliant and the importance of families.  He said that being self reliant frees us to be able to serve in a better way.  We cannot enter the kingdom of God without being self reliant.  He also counseled us to live to satisfy our NEEDS, and not our pointless desires.  One last thing he said was that there are no "gifts" in this church.  Every blessing is EARNED is some way or another.  That last quote is what impacted me the most.  Let us try to do everything in our power to recognize that our blessings are always earned by our righteousness.

My companion and I are doing well.  We are with a cold and sore from running but we are happy.  We laugh tons.  He has helped me a lot to not judge people too quickly.  He says that we need to discern their needs and not assume them.  There is sometimes a legit reason as to why a person doest fulfill with an invitation we extend.  So,.....DONT JUDGE QUICKLY!

I love this Gospel and I hope that we can all appreciate it tons everyday! Have a great week!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ON SUNDAY MOM!  I LOVE YOU AND ALL YOU DO!

Elder Lomeli




Hans´s Baptism

Hans and his mom

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