We are teaching a couple of twin 12 year old girls who are the daughters of an inactive member. It´s been tough because although they have an impressive gospel knowedge and want to go to the church and the activities, one of them wanted to get baptized and the other, no. We had trouble finding out why, especially because ther mom, who turned away from the church because whe didn´t want to give up drinking, wasn´t helping us either. After trying many times to talk to her mom and getting rejected, we found her raking the grass and offered to help. She told us "no." After trying unsuccessfully to talk to her about her daughters or help her rake, we turned around dismayed and started to walk away.
"Elders!" she yelled.
"Yeah?"
"Do you really want to help me?"
"Yeah, of course" we replied.
"I couldn´t sleep last night, I was so worried about all the things I have to get done. Here, take the rake and I´ll go get another one"
We helped her rake the grass and she still didn´t want to talk, but asked us to help her with some other chores. We then moved a pile of wood in her yard and found an killed a rat that was in her shed. After 2 hours of helping her she opened up.
"I want my daughters to get baptized," she told us. "I want them to get baptized, but I want it to be the both of them, not just one. Florencia wants to get baptized, but Victoria´s brother told her that if she gets baptized her dad (who lives in the US) will stop sending her money."
We were able to talk to Victoria, and she´s now going to talk to her dad, who we hope won´t have a problem with her baptism. It was amazing, however how much raking some grass and killing a rat really helped her mom - who came to church yesterday for the first time after years of inactivity.
If you really want to help somebody and don´t know how, go to their house and rake their grass. He´ll open up and start to help himself.
Elder Casdorph
We had a bit of a crazy week this week. The highlight was a couple of baptisms on Saturday. Saturday morning we found out that the baptismal clothing that we thought that ward had had somehow been lost, so we called a bunch of other missionaries to find someone with baptismal clothing. We were able to find the needed clothing, but the other Elders couldn´t give it to us until 7:00, the same time that we had planned to start the baptism. We had to go the houses of a couple investigators from at about 6:15 and later, go to the house of the two girls that were getting baptized at 6:30 to go to the church prepare a couple of things for the baptism at 7. We were running late and didn´t go to the 1st house until 6:37. We arrived at the 2nd house at 6:51, but they weren´t ready to leave until 7:09. We then went to wait for the bus that would take us to the church, but after 7, there are very few bus drivers that are still working. We waited unit about 7:20, and a few, buses passed by, but they weren´t working anymore, just going back home to rest. We thought about taking a taxi, but we hat 10 adults and a couple of kids with us and there was no way that we could all fit in 1 taxi. I said a small prayer that we would be able to find away to get to the baptism. About 30 seconds later, another bus came. This bus driver was headed home as well, but since we were so many people, he was willing to not only take us, but also to take us directly to the church rather than take the normal bus route because nobody else was in the bus.
