The Spirit Is So Important In Our Lives!

Hey how are you all? Hayden -  super excited for ya buddy! Congrats on making the freshman team! You will have a blast of a year! I’m jealous that you are living this time in your live...live it up and enjoy it to the fullest! You will have fun and grow a lot.  Mom, it looks like you had a fun time with all the Missionary Moms downtown. How is it being a missionary mom? I’m glad you were able to experience that!

It POURED this weekend. Okay it wasn’t that bad but it was the best rain I have seen in a year here in TJ. It started Friday morning and was on and off all weekend until Sunday afternoon. We had a lot of fun-well I had fun walking around in the rain all day. I dunno but I am a fan of working in the mud and wet.  It’s not everyday that we get to work in the rain and mud :) And yes mud. Ha there aren’t many paved streets in my area so it made for a fun weekend and a messy house after! 

It was another slow week of work this week. We are having a rough time finding people. Finding is the key being a missionary. If you find, you have success. But if you don’t, you don’t have success. So we are really focused on that right now. Getting the members to present us to their friends and family, and talking to everyone in the streets.

It’s always so interesting to see how Satan changes people after we meet them. They are almost always interested in why there are so many churches today so they accept a visit in their houses. But after the first visit they start hiding from us, or changing the appointments and what not. Ha we went and hunted down one of our investigators and finally found her home. She told us she wasn’t interested anymore because she thought she had to be in the chapel 7 days a week and after her baptism she was going to be a monk, etc hahahaha. We had to sort things out and the point of the story is that she accepted another date, now that she understands everything. Needless to say Satan always toys with our investigators and if we don’t see them everyday or every other day he makes them fall. It’s fun though! We have 5 dates on track for the last week of March that I hope get baptized so we don’t blank this month. The Lord will bless us though :)

Dad I have to tell you, We are on the same schedule for the Gospel Principals class. And I enjoy it just as much as you do. I have been through it quite a few times now and I learn something new every time through. I remember switching into that class before my mission and it helped me a lot. We have had 2 really powerful classes these past 2 weeks. Its been because it helps the investigators see that normal members can teach with the Spirit as well.  This week we talked about prayer as well...when, why, how, and all that jazz. Remember my convert Cynthia? The one that received her answer in a super cool dream? She shared her testimony yesterday of how she had received an answer to her prayers and how she would always have a testimony of prayer. Super cool!! We were all crying - the Spirit was that strong. Cynthia's mom has since started coming to church every week as well as her brother, Jose Carlos. He is 19 and on date for the 27th.

Then last week we talked about the Holy Ghost. Again, who, why, how and what not. The teacher, Hno Dany, asked us to share an experience we had had as missionaries with the Holy Ghost. Every Thursday we are teaching Hno Dany's brother, Oscar. Oscar met the missionaries about 3 years ago. They told him to pray and what not. So Oscar prayed sincerely to know the truth. And the dumb Elders never went back to his house...ha so Oscar took that as his answer that the Church wasn’t true.  Fast forward 3 years to Elder Estrada and I. We met with him about 6 weeks ago. We told him that we weren’t going to miss the next appointment and to keep praying. Needless to say we missed the next appointment due to interviews that I had to do in another part of the city. So he took that as another answer that the Church wasn’t for him sadly. But we have met with him for 2 weeks straight now and he is really progressing. When Oscar was 15, he was in a Christian church and preached in the streets and everything. So he has ALOT of questions. He has asked the same questions to his brother. So 2 weeks ago Oscar asked us the same exact questions to see how 2 Mormon Missionaries would react. Because we had the Spirit with us, we answered the questions in the EXACT same week Oscar's brother answered them. Dany told us this after the appointment and it blew me away. The Spirit is so important in our lives!! Oscar won’t accept a baptismal date because he doesn’t want to rush anything, but he told us as soon as he gets his answer he AND his wife will get baptized. I sure hope I am around for that baptism because it will be great!!

Lets see . . .  what else has happened?? Another sister asked me to baptize her this upcoming Friday. She and her husband contacted me in the street about a month ago. They don’t live in my area and the sisters have taught her and prepared her for her baptism, but she wants me to baptize her because I was the first missionary she had met in her life...ha talk about being in the right place at the right time!

I love and miss you all! Sorry for the lack of pics! Double next week :)

Elder Roper