Hey fam,
Well yet another week come and gone. Um where to start... we started the week really well just really pushing orselves to open the mouth with everyone because as soon as we baptize these upcoming baptisms were not gonna have anything. Contacting has been really hard here in this area lately cuz it seems like no one wants us to let us in. Early in the week we found 2 new families in 2 consecutive days, only one of them are already married but they are super positive so we will have to see what happens with them. The best part is that the most positive family is the one that the couple are already married. We have been recieving a lot of help from the members and its been showing in our success.
I wanted to tell you all of a really cool experience that we had saturday and sunday this past week. Um we are currently teaching a family that about a month ago the oldest son (18 years old) was baptized by my companion and thanks to a reference in the ward from the girlfriend of the oldest son. We were let know at the beginning of my time here that the dad of this family was baptized when he was 12 years old but hasnt really gone back since. His first words to us were that we could teach his sun and nephew but we were not to talk to him, or his wife about the gospel cuz they do not want anthing to do with the church. Luckily thanks to the great example of this 18 year old son he has been inviting his parents to church and 2 weeks ago they came for the first time and the lord really touched the heart of the dad and the ladies in the ward invited the mom to a baby shower in the ward and she fell in love with the organization and the unity of the ward and has been telling us how much she loves the church. The dad went out of town for work for a while but the mom wanted us to teach her even though he was on vacation and he said it would be fine so we taught her about the book of mormon and some other releif society things to read. She has read and loved everything we gave her. Now this last week we had our first oportunity to talk to the husband and saturday we really wanted to talk to them about marriage and if they are willing to get married. They explained to us that they had never felt a necesity to get married and wanted more time to think about it... but I know what that means and I didnt want the baptism of the mom to fall through our fingertips that easily. Me and my companion challenged them to pray, and then im not sure why but I felt OK promising them they they would recieve an answer to their prayers in church sunday, cuz it was fast and testimony meeting. Sure enough at 8:45 they come walking in and we had one of the most spiritual sacrament meetings that iv had in the mission and the whole time I was trying to just listen with their ears to see what answers they could possible get through the meeting. Answer after answer came and I was just praying that they were listening like I was. So church goes by, they stay all 3 hours and love everything about it. Last night when we decided to go over to their house to visit with them one more time so that they didnt forget what they felt... well my companion was worried about them getting annoyed because we were just there the night before and he is worried about us pressuring them too much but I just told him if we end up waiting till tuesday, the mom, and another sons baptisms will fall. He kept fighting me about going over there cuz the truth is they are kind of heard hearted people and I didnt want to affend them anyways. I just told Elder Wasden to trust me and as we entered the oldest son, recent convert, dragged us in on their couch and said... Hey they are here...they had been waiting for us. As we started with a prayer, the mom wanted to offer it so she gave one of the most humble prayers iv ever heard. We really felt the spirit and immediately after we wanted to talk to them about how they felt and if they had recieved an answer. Suprisingly enough, the dad in a very humble soft voice explained that there was no doubt they should get married, and that the answer was a SI!! Then the mom blurted in... AND THAT I NEED TO GET BAPTIZED. Me and Elder Wasden were just astonished and sooo happy. I turned to him and told him, well sounds like the Lord answered our prayers also. It was just a super amazing experience and so now were looking at a marriage and 2 more baptisms a little later this month.
This week we have been working really hard because we put a goal of 5 baptisms for this month of June. Were having to get to work right now in order to meet that goal because the 11 year old son of one of our investigators named freddy, was gonna get baptized, but the grandma doesnt want to allow him to go to church with us so that baptism fell on us. That was tough cuz hes just a really humble kid and was understanding more then his own dad!! But its all good, we should be fine!!
I love you all very much, this email was a little longer then it should have been. This is the true church, keep us in your prayers so that these marriages and baptisms will go through. We have 2 saturday and hopefully more leter on.
Love you all
MUAH!!!
Elder Gardner
