This week was all over the map. Nothing went right, and every experience was so different, it is hard to decide any specific theme to talk about. What's funny is that even the weather wasn't right. Here it's hotter than ever, even during the winter, and there at home, it's "rainy season." (as told by one of the members here) Of course I didn't know exactly what that meant until ten minutes ago. Thanks for the pictures Mom.
But all of you are already caught up on the news there, so I'll get straight to the news here. As I said, this week had absolutely no theme, unless that theme was "random." We visited jokesters, suicidals, true believers, dreamers, hiders, lazies, crazies, and all sorts of people. We've been excepted with open arms, avoided, praised, and even ejected from homes. However, rather than talk about all that, I'll talk about the man who is truly progressing this week, and therefore, the one true success of the week.
Arthur was an investigator we found a few weeks back. We started teaching him after contacting his nephew that lived in the same house. In the first lesson, to be honest, I thought Arthur had ruined the whole lesson because as he looked through the pages of the pamphlet and the book of Mormon, he was chanting to himself "Profeta Profundo." (Profound Prophet) This was truly wrong of my part, but I had officially labeled him as mentally challenged. After the second visit, I was truly repentant, and still am. When we returned, he tried to express to us how he had read the part we marked three times over, and that it all truly touched him, and he had a great desire to follow. What I'd taken for mental illness had turned out to be a simple difficulty of expression, and the man I thought to be a simpleton turned out to be a professional engineer. This goes to show two things. First, we should never judge people by their cover or even by first impressions. Second, God knows those who are prepared to receive his word a lot better than we do, so we must be willing to do all that he asks of us and help everyone we can. Arthur visited church with us this week, and loved it completely. He is now preparing to be baptized on the 28th of this month. I hope it all goes well.
The other cool experience we had this week is the opportunity to do visits every day with the young men in the branch. There are very few young men, so this week we used practically all of them. I remember that when we arrived in the house and asked who wanted to do visits with us, everyone shot their hands in the air. It was good to see them try to help in any way that they could. Even though they aren't full time missionaries yet, their testimonies are just as powerful, if not more so, than ours. What truly inspired me, though, was Jackson, a young deacon that has partial cerebral paralysis on his entire right side. We weren't able to work very fast or as far as normal that day, but to me it didn't matter, because as I saw that young man give it his best with every step, I knew that even a little would already make him happy, and me as well.
If there is anything truly inspiring to learn from this week, I'd say these two examples will teach it. As for any other words, I'd like to challenge all those who live where the floods happened to help everyone they can with whatever free time they have. As well, for my family and the ward, take advantage of this time to share with all of your friends and neighbors the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, to help them better overcome all the difficulties in life, just as much spiritually as physically.
I love everyone of you and hope that you all might find the happiness that carries me each and every day. Thanks for all your help and support. I'm trying to find time to write letters, so I'll try to send them out as soon as possible. But as for now, until next time!
Word of the week:
Super (soo-pur) Alright, this word was uninspired, but let's just say that Super-Duper is the same in probably every language, I think.
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