Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Car broken.

Hello Everybody!
This week went great.
 
The best day of this week was when I went on exchanges with Elder Torres in Rancho Cordova.  I love Elder Torres and I always have the best days with him.  We taught a lot of people but one of my favorites was this: We taught 2 people about the Restoration and it went really great.  The Spirit was probably the strongest of any lesson I have felt in a long time.  We were teaching in English (which both of us prefer) so we were able to 100% focus on listening to the Spirit, asking inspired questions, and teaching to the needs of the people there.  It was a really good lesson and all of the family there felt the Spirit.  They had a lot of really good questions and really understood everything. The dad came home and they all had to leave with him all of a sudden but we had almost finished so it was still good timing.  We left the lesson feeling great and the family was excited for us to come back.  We visited a lot more people and taught a lot more lessons but that was the highlight of the day.
 
This week we started teaching more of the Lopez family.  We had found the 19 year old daughter Susanna on Sunday and we went back on Tuesday and started teaching her 2 sisters, her brother, and a "roommate" that is living with the family.  It was really interesting how we started out with 2 of them and slowly the kids started congregating because something caught their interest.  We answered a lot of questions regarding the Godhead, the Creation, "Santos" (in Latino culture everybody is Catholic and worships the virgin Maria or a variety of other saints), Baptism/baby baptism, etc and they were all really interested.  We went back on Thursday and just taught the 3 girls outside but we were impressed that they stood outside with us for an hour even though it was really cold that day.  On Saturday they invited us over for a big party they threw at their house.  In the Spanish culture there are a lot of parties, usually for kids birthdays but what they do is rent a big bouncy castle, set up tables and make really good food.  Then the kids entertain themselves while the parents drink and party into the late hours of the night.  We went over there and met their parents (finally) and talked to a lot of their friends and neighbors.  It was a lot of fun and good for meeting new people to teach as well.  Unfortunately the kids couldn't come to church because they were leaving all day Sunday to go visit family but hopefully they'll be able to come this next week.
 
This week I was really happy to get some news about our recent convert Federico.  We heard that he and his little brother are still praying a lot and refuse to eat a meal without praying.  They also read the Book of Mormon too when they can (but they're pretty young still so they don't do that a lot).
 
We met one of our member's neighbors named Mike last Saturday and went back to teach him this week.  His wife is Catholic and usually doesn't let anybody in the house but she let us in and actually stayed and participated.  Mike told us the day after he had a miracle that he knew was because of us.  He had  his license suspended since 2010 because of inability to make child support payments and the day after we came he went to try to clear it up and the person decided to clear him completely and give his license back.  He was very happy with us and was excited to listen more to us.  He came with us to church this weekend and really loved it.  We found a unique problem though that I have never found before: someone who wants to come to church but there isn't a ward to accommodate his needs.  He doesn't speak Spanish very well but his wife barely speaks English.  He can only come to church after 12 o'clock because he has to take care of his wife and the only wards at 1:00 are Spanish and YSA wards.  We talked to our Mission President and determined the best thing for him would be to have him come to our ward and just translate for him.  He didn't understand very much in church yesterday but loved it.
 
Elder Rivera and I sang in church yesterday as well!  We sang "Abide With Me" in Spanish.  It went really well.  We didn't have any time to practice so we just figured out what we were doing 10 minutes before sacrament meeting started.  I sang the bass line, Elder Rivera sang the melody, and our bishop's wife offered her help and sang the alto line.  We did it all acapella and it sounded really good! If I could have recorded it I would have but the ward really loved it so I'm assuming it was good.
 
This next week is going to be interesting.  Today we are up at the mission home and our car decided to break down on us.  It's stuck in reverse and won't switch gears because the shifter cable broke.  Apparently they have to special order that part and we'll be without a car for about a week. That's alright with me except that 1) my companion doesn't have a bike and 2) he's physically "incapable" of riding a bike because of his knees.  We cover a really large area that's an entire stake so I have no idea how we're going to do our work but we'll figure out a way.  I'll let everyone know next week how it went (:
 
I love you all.  Hope everything is well!
Les Quiero!
-Elder Gaskill

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