Week 21 - A Rainy Week with a New Teaching Perspective

  Elder Schaff's email came through late in the day on Monday. His email time was cut short because his companion needed to take care of some things at the DMV. So that was unfortunate, but Elder Lopez passed his test, so they won't have to worry about that going forward. Sounds like Hayden had a more productive week and that things were going well, despite the rain. This is what he wrote-

  "This week has been rainy! A big storm came in from the sea or something like that, we wouldn't know since we don't watch the news! Well, I'm not a fan of the rain. If I had my way, rain would be confined to over the farmer's fields, but that's another story. This week had some fantastic moments, and some frustrating ones as well. Fortunately, both of those experiences contributed to a main lesson learned from this week: Make every lesson count, build people's desires to be baptized. 

  So bad news first yeah? Matilde's sister, (M) is never home. We'll probably have to drop her. We found some good potentials near her, and an investigator as well, over in that area, but they might be out of our boundaries. It seems all the Spanish people that are interested are not in our boundaries, but those boundaries go to the outskirts of Ventura, and it's likely none of the missionaries will venture (ha!) that far, so those people will just be sittin' tight because of boundary lines.... annoying!

   Good news: on Thursday we had exchanges and I was with our district leader. During the exchange we found two new investigators that were interested, and the one was super excited to read the Book of Mormon to find answers to his questions. Then, when we went to visit (A), a small miracle happened. She was in the back of the apartment when we were let in, so she entered the room shortly after our entrance. She came in and said she had something important to tell us, and couldn't suppress a smile. Elder Del Carmen and I looked at each other and nodded, knowing exactly what the "news" would be. Then (A) declared she had prayed and decided that she needed and wanted to be baptized. Even though I anticipated that from her expression, I was still in shock. She's had doubts for so long, I wondered if she would ever consider actually being baptized. She is unfortunately traveling soon, until the end of the month, so that will be a baptism set for February. The problem with that is, I'm almost certain I'll be transferred by then, because I'm still in my training area. If so, my legacy appears to be adding up to finding people for other missionaries to baptize. It's all the same team I guess.

   

 Anyway, the lesson of this week is that teaching needs to be better. I've reached the point where I can get through lessons in Spanish no problem, but now I need to make lessons powerful. Our mission President instructed us on teaching faith and repentance, especially repentance, to build the desire of investigators to be baptized, so that they will want to be baptized when we extend the invitation, and they won't feel forced. I'm going to see how I can get there. I'll report next week! I'm out of time, but that's what's happening! Hopefully next week I'll have the full email time! Elder Lopez finally passed his driver's test to renew his license, so the DMV will no longer reap my time on my preparation day.

  My cooking is getting pretty good. Elder Lopez and I have made some pretty good stuff!

(The computer is rejecting pictures this week so sorry everyone.)  

--Elder Schaff