Hello Everybody!
This week has been great!
The best thing that
happened this week was Jorge Guzman's baptism. It went really well and
was a lot of fun. Elder Guzman got to come back and baptized Hermano
Guzman so that was cool. It's been really awesome to see the change
he's made over the past few weeks as we've taught him. Over the
past weeks he has been accepting everything we've been teaching and
making a big change in his life. He and his wife had had marital
problems in the past but now they are very happy and plan to go to the
temple in a year, and he is very happy and grateful for everything we've
helped him do. His son on the mission in Oaxaca, Mexico is also very
happy and grateful. Jorge's wife told us what really made a difference were Elder Martinez and I
which was really cool to hear. When I was confirming him and giving
him the gift of the Holy Ghost on Sunday during church I had a cool
experience. My Spanish happened to be really good in the moment and as I
said everything I wasn't thinking about what I was going to say and I
even forgot I was in Sacrament meeting, but I was just talking and
listening to the Spirit. One of the things that surprised me was I told
him that he would be the means for many more members of his family
coming into the gospel by being baptized. It could be true because he
has 4 other kids that aren't members and all of his family that lives
here in Galt are not members either. Jorge also got the priesthood on
Sunday and so it has been a very awesome week with him.
We also have another family that should get baptized soon. About 2
months ago the Ortega family got baptized and since then his brother and
their family have been coming to church every week. They all
really like the church but have been unsure about baptism and haven't
been able to because the parents aren't married and that dad is still
married to his first wife from 19 years ago. They have been closed to
the idea of marriage and baptism but something happened this past week
and it all changed. Now they are shooting to be married and baptized on
Christmas Day. We are doing a lot of work to find out if he can get
divorced easily through the Mexican consulate or if we have to do it
through United States' courts but hopefully we can get everything done
really soon so they can be married and baptized with their 2 kids on
that day.
We have been doing a lot of cement work recently. On Saturday in the
morning the two of us along with about 10 people from the Elder's Quorum
laid cement in part of the driveway, a side patio, a back patio, and a
sidewalk all the way around the house. The amazing part is that we did
it all in 35 minutes. It was really impressive how well and quickly
everyone works. It's a lot of work and hard to do but we were running
everywhere and working quickly to get it done. The good news is now I
know how to lay cement and I could do it on my own someday if I had all
the tools.
We got our transfer calls last night and I think both Elder Martinez and
I were disappointed. He is leaving to go to the Sac 7 branch and I am
staying here and my new companion will be Elder Hernandez. We were both
almost 100% sure we were staying together since we've been doing such
good work and baptizing a lot but I guess not. Elder Hernandez is a
cool missionary but I would have loved to be another transfer with Elder
Martinez.
Today we got to go to the Pulga (the flea market) because our preparation day was on Tuesday instead of Monday and it was a lot of fun. I bartered
with a couple of the Mexican people there and got a US soccer jersey for
$15 and a really nice Mexican style sweatshirt for $20. We'll get to
go back in a few weeks since we have our p-days on Christmas and New Years instead of the Mondays in those weeks. I might buy some other
cool things to send home too. We were there really early and a lot of
people hadn't set up their shops yet so we'll see a lot more things on
those days when we go back.
I hope everyone is well! Everything's going well out here in Lodi!
Les Quiero,
Elder Gaskill
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