Letter Home - Week 71

Dear Family,

This week I want to talk about Enrico. Enrico has been progressing really well. He is reading all that we leave him and he came to church the past two weeks. Last week he felt really uncomfortable as it was his first time in a church in a really long time but by the end of church he said he felt good. Yesterday was fast and testimony mtg and Enrico leaned over to Elder Tye during the testimonies and said that he wanted to share his testimony. This is something he would normally never do. It was way out of his comfort zone and he was super nervous but he and Elder Tye got up anyway and went up to bear their testimonies. He shared one of the most beautiful and powerful testimonies I've ever heard from an investigator. Everyone really enjoyed his testimony. I was so happy for him for doing something so great. The whole time he was up there I had the biggest smile on my face. He shared with us after that it made him feel so good and so happy doing it. It was the happiest he's felt in a long time and the most he had felt the influence of the Holy Ghost. He enjoyed the feeling of knowing that he did something good. He did it as an action to confirm within himself that he is changing his life. He knows that he has a distance to travel but he is moving forward. This was such a big step for him in his life. He has been thinking about baptism and he said that one day it will hopefully happen. He knows that repentance comes first and when he is ready that he will. 

The beginning of the week was slow for us. We had 3 lessons in 3 days. There were a lot of fall through appointments but it turned out to be a blessing because we were led where we wouldn't have otherwise been but where we needed to be by the Lord. Monday was Pday and we only have a few hours of proselyting so it wasn't a shock to only have one lesson. Tuesday there was more rain than there was during the Hurricane! It was crazy how much rain we got. It literally rained all day and it was a down poor all day. We went out and worked hard anyway and had a fun time doing it. We accepted the circumstances just got soaked biking around from appointment to appointment. That was the coldest day of my mission thus far. I was actually shivering and needed a jacket by the end. We did get some relief with an appointment with Thelma and Fred. We taught about continuing to learn and grow through CPR and enduring to the end. They committed to have daily personal and family prayer and scripture study. By the end of the day Elder Tye and I were ready to go in and for some reason at the beginning of the week we decided to buy hot chocolate and we were so glad that we did because it was heavenly after a day like this. Wednesday was their Independence and it made it tough to have lessons. We did have a good lesson with Patrick that day where we watched the restoration video and it was really good. He is praying to know the truth. It was at this point after teaching Patrick that we were led by the Lord. It was only 7:00pm and we still had two hours of proselyting left in the day but we had gone by everyone that we could think of for the day and had no one to go and see. We didn't know what to do so Elder Tye said we should say a prayer and so we did. No one was coming to my mind except to go and contact the referral we had gotten a long time ago and he was never ever home when we would try to contact him. So we biked over there to go and see if he might be home but he wasn't. We felt like we should just start contacting the homes around there and so we did. Nothing was really coming from it and no one was really listening to us or interested at all. But we kept on trying. We ended up knocking on a less active member's home that we didn't even know. She used to attend a different branch but moved and that's why we never heard about her. She lost her book of mormon in the move and accepted another one but as for right now she isn't ready to meet with the missionaries. It was still cool that we found her. We continued on our way knocking on doors late at night and it was getting close to time to head in for the night but we had a few more minutes so we knocked on one last door. A lady named Chedrian answered the door. She was so interested. She had a close aunt who passed away who was a member. We left her with a family and temple track about how families can be together forever. We came back the next day and had an awesome lesson with her and she accepted to be baptized and was very excited when we extended the invitation. She was going to come to church but she came down with something and is very sick right now. From meeting with her you can tell she is really prepared. I'm happy that things didn't go the way we had planned and expected with our appointments falling through so that we could contact into Chedrian. 

Patrick and Lewis didn't come to church this week. I'm not sure exactly why yet. We did have another couple come that we just contacted into this week. We contacted into them on Wednesday morning when our appointments fell through then too. We taught the husband John once and it was great. He knows his life isn't where it should be and he wants to come closer to God. He hadn't been to church for the whole year so far but after extending him the invitation he committed and he came. I don't know his wife's name yet. We barely met her and they left right after Sacrament. He wants to come again and stay for the whole time next time. They are from New York and visiting family for several months. He is originally from Barbados and is planning on moving back sometime. 

The rest of the week our appointments started picking back up and we were able to finish off the week well. It was a good week. We haven't watched the Christmas Devotional yet this week. We are going to watch it next Sunday when the branch is rebroadcasting it. I'm excited for it. 

I love you all! The gospel is true! 

Love,

Elder King