Sister Christine (the wife to Kalisto) has accepted the challenge to be baptized. She bore a nice testimony on how the gospel has blessed her husband. And as soon as she started to participate in the challenges we gave her, her life was blessed as well. She will be baptized on November 8th. The reason it is so far out is because we can only meet with them once a week because of their work schedules. However, this is not a problem. She is committed and loves the gospel. All will fall into place soon enough.
We had another baptism. This was cool baptism because Sister Moreen Akullu chose Elder Whitworth to perform the ordinance. I wish you could have seen how excited he was. He was just smiling and glowing with excitement! Moreen bore a nice testimony. She talked about how grateful she is for Joseph Smith because he restored the gospel. She also mentioned how grateful she is that she has found the church.
This past week Elder Whitworth and I fasted to find families who were looking for the gospel and the truth. It has been remarkable watching the Lord guide us to different families. The best of all was a family that we found with a father named George. He is awesome. He really takes care of his family. He actually owns his home! He is very permanent and successful. He has four children; two of which are over the age of eight. This week we found and taught him. Then he agreed to an appointment for the first lesson.
After the first lesson, he gladly accepted the baptismal challenge. He then followed up his commitment by coming to church and participating in the second and third hour. This was awesome! He was really excited to have us come back again. He then told us that he wanted us to start teaching his children as well which will be awesome. Sadly his wife ran away some time ago, so there is no mother in the home.
Another really cool thing that happened this week is about Elder Whitworth. He asked me about transfers and how they work. I explained about it and then he said something that really showed how aware and even anxious he is about the work. He said "You better teach me all the parts of the area really well and help me really understand the location of all the people that we teach so if you leave, it will be okay". I was so happy. What an awesome elder! It doesn't matter if I leave or don’t because he is willing to do what it takes to keep the work moving forward.
Here is the odd moment of the week. We were teaching a family that we had just tracted out. While we were teaching them about the Plan of Salvation and specifically about how our actions really matter here on earth, the father’s phone rang. He pulled the phone out of his pocket, looked at it, stood up and went into a pitcher’s stance throwing the phone as hard as he could at the wall. Needless to say everyone went silent and stared at him. We could not figure out what had just happened and what was going through his head. He then sat down and starting ranting for a bit and then said, “Okay let us continue.” Of course, we finished the lesson but looking back I cannot imagine what was going through his head. It’s hard enough to save up the money to buy a phone and then to just chuck it full force against a wall seems crazy.
Since the beginning of the mission, I have gotten really good at changing tires. On average I probably change at least one tire a month. Since the roads are covered in trash and pieces of metal, I am a master tire changer! For example just two days ago, I walked outside and there sat the pickup with a flat tire. I tried to think how it had happened because I had not driven the truck in quite some time. I even began to think that someone might have slashed the tire. I then realized it didn’t really matter and I hopped over to the truck and changed the tire. The first time it took me about thirty minutes to accomplish the task. But now days, it takes about ten minutes! Things do get easier when you do it a lot.
Things are good and we have a solid teaching pool. Have a great week everyone!
Elder Bitter
P.S. Just a shout out to Grandma Bitter! Happy 92nd Birthday, Grandma.
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