Alright! We're crankin' things up in the
mission!!! We've raised the bar and almost DOUBLED all the mission
"standards of excellence" which are lessons with member present,
monthly baptism goal as a mission, and other things of that nature! So things
could get a little crazy around here!!! Other than that, it was a pretty normal
week!
Tuesday we were cruising all over the
place and just UNLEASHING lessons with members the whole day!! Around 12:00 a
joven came up to us that we knew. His name is Andres and he's super cool! His
brother is a member and Andres was listening to us. We finally had to drop him
a few weeks back because he wasn't progressing. So when we saw him we didn't
expect much more than just a friendly "How do ya do?". But he slapped
us in the face with a big brick of "good morning" and told us that he
had received his answer, wanted to be baptized, and was going to have his
baptism this Saturday at 6:00... Well Alrighty Then! It doesn't get a lot
easier than that!!! Pretty awesome day!
Wednesday not too much happened. Several
lesson plans fell and we were just huffin' around all day.
Thursday was average. We did however
have a lesson with another joven that has wanted to be baptized for a long
time. But his parents won't let him. Bunch of chumps. So we have a plan and
he's going to talk to his parents again! His name is Rodrigo if you'd like to
send a prayer his way.
Friday was a good day! We had a lesson
with Juli about the plan of salvation. We left the pamphlet with her the last
time we saw her so she could read it and understand it better. When we got
there, she had filled out a bunch of questions out in the back of the pamphlet!
I haven't even seen a missionary do these questions, let alone an
investigator!!! Once again she excepted everything really well!!! It was just
one of those moments when you need an Angus Young guitar solo cause you've
been... THUNDERSTRUCK!!! Normal day after that.
Saturday. Without fail, every Saturday
we have a baptism, something goes wrong. WITHOUT FAIL!!! First, we got to the
church at 10:00 that morning and couldn't open the door to the font. Not, a big
problem. We brought in a hood rat to jam a couple knifes in the lock and he
popped 'er right open! But what we saw next gave me the idea that they hadn't
had a baptism in this ward for a while. There was about 3 inches of water at
the bottom of the font and an orange/black residue on the floor and a stench
that I'm sure was toxic. It's a miracle we're alive. It’s bad enough I’m
attaching pictures. But you do what you gotta do and get 'er done!! Personally,
I would've eaten off the floor of the font after we got done with it!! So now
it's water time! We flipped on that switch with all the confidence of the world
and... nothing... We don't got AGUA!!! What do we do? We stay calm. We called
up the stake president and he called us a water truck to fill up the pump. All
is well. As we wait, we grabbed ourselves a cold pop which we haven't had in a
while and sipped on that ‘til the water guy got there. When he arrived, we
filled up the tank, and that was that. We started up the water and off it went
filling up the font. All systems are a go, captain! So we went to eat and left
everything at the church. We headed back after eating to check on the font
around 5:15. Keep in mind that the baptism is at 6:00. As we arrived, we see
that the water has stopped and the font is not even filled to the first step...
So what do we do? We stay calm. We grabbed some buckets and filled up one of
those yellow mopping containers with water from the tank that the guy just
filled up. And as I ran that thing in to the font and dumped it out, my comp
was hurling water through the window into the font with his bucket!!! We had
our ties ripped off, sleeves rolled up, and were sweating like hogs!! But we're
not here to mess around. Members of the ward began to arrive and I thought to
myself, "Free at last! Free at last! Thank God Almighty we're free at
last!!!" We thought we were going to get help. But NO! There was no
helping. There was only judging! We literally heard one sisters say, "look
at the elders. Why on earth on they not wearing ties?!" The first
counselor hounded us for not filling it up earlier that day... we started at
10... And as we were leaving for the stake center to have the baptism there, a
sister sees that we have empty coke bottles in our hands and stops us. She told
us, "Elders. I don't appreciate you setting a bad example for the youth by
drinking Coke." Now, I've always been told that if you don’t have anything
nice to say, don't say it at all. So I looked into her eyes, nodded, and walked
away. The only good part is that we got Andres dunked. Other than that, I think
I would've rather taken a crowbar to both my shins.
But yeah. Nice week full of the good,
the bad, and the ugly. You can't win them all. Thank you for all your prayers!
I really do appreciate it!! As Always!!!
Stay Classy,
Elder Johns
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