Letter from October 17

Well this week has been yet another great week!  Although we did have some difficulties and everything didn’t quite go as planned, I still feel pretty good.  As far as Milagros and Sergio, he got back from work on and we did everything we could to excite him for marriage and baptism. He wants to do it, but with some of the problems that he has been having he wants to wait a little bit longer.  It was hard to hear, but we really did all that we could to help him. We prayed, we fasted, we introduced them and taught them to members, but in the end he didn’t want to accept this Wednesday.  I learned that we also need to remember the will of God.  That we can’t always have what we want.  I just hope and pray that they overcome some of the problems and make the right choice and I hope they do it soon. I just worry a little because they were the ones that set the date as this Wednesday.  We will continue to help them. So when we left their house we were a little bit sad, but we had an experience to show us that the Lord is always there to help us.  We went to another appointment and were teaching Jaime who is 19 and his mom, (we recently baptized Jaime and his mom was baptized a little before that)  well after we taught them we were leaving and ran into Jaime’s sister.  About two weeks ago we went to say hi to her and after we said "How are you Sister?¨ she returned with, ¨I’m not your sister¨ then walked off a little angry.  Well the Lord softened her heart and she came to us in the precise moment when we were a little discouraged about Sergio and Milagros and she said to us that she was having some problems in her family. She is a single mom with 2 kids and she wanted us to teach her and her kids, she wants to attend church with them and be baptized as well. WOW, what a miracle!  She is going to travel for a month, but she wants us to teach and baptize her son and when she gets back she said that she wants to be baptized as well.  That was a great experience for me.

Also during the week, we were teaching a girl that recently moved here.  She has attended the church about 4 times, but still hasn’t accepted a baptismal date, but we taught her Saturday night and she felt the spirit so strong.  She didn’t want to be baptized the 22nd of this month because she really wanted her family to be there.  She moved from Italy, and her family isn’t planning on coming here any time soon.  I shared an experience and my testimony about how important my family was to me, and how much I would love them to always be with me too, to see all the great experiences I am having.  I explained that I am really close with my family and that I would always be close to my family. However sometimes I have to be far away from my family, like now, I wouldn’t pass up the wonderful opportunities that i have had and will have in my life.  I explained that you guys have supported me a ton and that her family would support her in this decision as well. I noticed that as I shared the story her eyes began to water and she felt the spirit so strong.  It was awesome.  Its experiences like that that keeps a missionary going.  Love you all!

Chau,
Elder Riggs