Email from Monday, March 16, 2015
Beautiful family and friends!
This
email´s coming to you from a very very happy sister missionary who
seriously LOVES this work. Oh my goodness, I think I love every day more
and more. I love this country, these people, and this gospel so much!
Being a missionary is the best. :)
This week was so
awesome! Madelin got baptized! And it was BUCKETS of fun....yep...it
involved buckets again...not sure why I have that weird luck every time.
But this time, the water was (believe it or not) too hot! So we had to
bring in buckets of cold water because Madelin and her uncle who was
going to baptize her refused to get in! But that was only the beginning
of unexpected problems...First of all, you should know that Madelin is
the greatest miracle ever, she was so prepared from the first day we met
her and all her best friends are members so she loves coming to church
and everything we taught her was just so easy and natural for her. She´s
already going to institute so when we first taught the Book of Mormon,
she was like "Oh good, I was hoping we would get to this because I have
some homework due
on Thursday
and I need to read the Book of Mormon" Like, seriously..such a
beautiful miracle, I love her so much. And then we prepared the baptism
so perfectly. By all measures, it should have been the most spiritual
and beautiful baptism of all time. But Heavenly Father loves teaching us
lessons.:) So it was perfect in other ways. :) Her uncle had a lot of
trouble with the words of the ordinance so after 10+ tries.....the
witnesses finally said it was good. And Madelin left the water sobbing,
she was so upset and embarrassed and then the witnesses weren´t totally
sure if her arm went all the way under the water so they said she had to
go in again and she refused! She was so upset that she didn´t even want
to talk to us. So we did the only thing we know how to do really really
well. We prayed with her. I don´t think I´ve ever prayed so hard for an
immediate answer to a prayer in my life until this moment where I was
literally begging my Heavenly Father to help Madelin overcome her
embarrassment and focus on the covenant and the importance of it being
correct. And God answered our prayers, as He always does, and she agreed
to go back in and try again. So this time, one of the elders serving in
our ward baptized her and it was so perfect and she came out with the
biggest smile on her face and just kept thanking us for everything and
saying that she knew that the final time was correct because she felt so
clean and different. I wish I could replay that moment forever. It was
so AWESOME! :) I LOVE THIS WORK! IT CHANGES LIVES!
And
one more quick evidence of the life-changing effects of the gospel,
Marcelo and Teodora are a part member family that we´re teaching and they
have to get married so he can get baptized but they´ve been having a
lot of relationship problems lately and have lost their desire to be
baptized so this week, when we wrote down our numbers, we prayed to know
if we should plan on his baptism this week and we felt we shouldn´t
because they just aren´t ready yet. Then we had a lesson yesterday about
temples and eternal families and I talked about my family and showed a
picture of us and we just testified of the importance of temples and how
the gospel blesses families and then Hna Ellison grabbed my picture and
was all "THIS is what we want for you guys! Look at this! This is a
family that is happy and sealed!" and it was so powerful and then we
just bore our testimonies. THEN! We get a call from Teodora last night
and she says "The bishop came over and talked to us and we really want
to make our family work so we´re going to get married
this Friday and baptized
on Saturday". I could not even believe it! The Lord works in marvelous ways!
I also had a lot of #justBoliviathings happen to me this week so
- It happened...I finally had to wash my clothes by hand. It´s not as bad as I thought though!
- The
water went out so I literally showered with a bucket of water, and then
I used a bowl to pour the freezing cold water on me. That was...an
experience...
- We contacted a lady that was sitting on the
corner and we asked what she was doing on the corner and she´s like "Oh
my goat needed to eat" and we turn around and there´s just a goat eating
in the little field
- We also went to someone´s house and she
said she has a lamb and Hna Ellison was like "ooh I want a picture with
it on my shoulders!" and the lady´s like sure go look at him and then
this GIANT SHEEP comes RUNNING out at us!
Hope all
is well with you guys and your dependable running water! The scripture 3
Nephi 8:1 changed my life this week and I just want to be so much more
pure and so much more like my Savior so I can be worthy to represent
Him! I love this work and each one of you! Have a great week!
Con mucho amor,
Hermana Gauger :)
Beautiful scenery and companionship
Giant sheep!
Every day is an adventure!
Madelin is 19 and she already wants to serve
a mission
and is planning to do baptisms in the temple in December. :)
And then...the darn goat....
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