Que tal?

Monday we had the Binghams drive us around during the night. We had a couple of lessons that night but both of them canceled on us so we decided to go see one of the active members that we hadn't met with yet. She is super nice and very grandma like, feeding us whatever cookies she had or whatever. It was a very nice visit.

Tuesday we had our last DC this transfer. It went very nicely. We had a funeral for one of the elders in our district that is ending his mission this week. It was a very nice service and we will be sad to see him go. Then after DC we went on exchanges with the zone leader. I finally went out of my area and was with elder Kaufman. It was a little bit of a weird exchange, becuase we are in the same ward, so we went to eat dinner with someone I already knew, and stuff like that. So it was weird to still know what was going on and who these people were that we were visiting while I was on exchanges. But the exchange went really well, we got a new investigator while we were there and we were able to help someone out with their ministering assignments.

Wednesday we exchanged back and immediately did some service for an older widow in the ward. We went over there and washed her dog for her. Then a little after, we went over to this person's house who we offered service to on a door approach, and we went over there and mowed his lawn. After that we went over to the Presteguis' a returning less Actives house. And we were fed there and we shared a little something and commited them to a little something as well. 

Then on Thursday the main thing that happened was we got a call from the sisters in the other ward that one of the less active members that we are both helping to come back fell deathly ill and went in the hospital, and that today was her birthday. So we went and got her a card and brought it to the hospital, but we got there, went to the room that they told us was the correct one, and opened the door, went in there and the person in there was not who we were looking for. So we called the front desk to see where she was, we were on hold for like 30 minutes, and found out that they had no one under that name. So we called the sisters and asked them to figure it out, and then we left. Later though we had the right room number and the right name, and we went and visited her. We gave her the card and gave her a blessing as well. Then we sat and talked until it was time to go to English class. English class was the usual, short lesson and then we played them in soccer, but alas they beat us in soccer this time 😭.

Friday the only thing that happened is we went and met with a less active family for the first time and got to know them, and hopefully we can count on them coming back to church in a few short weeks.

Saturday was the big day this week. In the morning we first helped a member move. And that took a good while, and was quite exhausting since they had the young ones (the missionaries) move all the heavy stuff, and there was a lot of heavy stuff. But it went really well and we were able to gain a lot of good member relations while doing so. After the move we went to the church to help out at a finding activity that the other ward was doing. It was a free car wash/Chapel tour thing. But it didn't work out very well since no one really stopped and the people who did never got out of there car. But it was fun nevertheless. Then after that we helped set up for an after baptism party that one of our Hispanic members was having that day. We blew up a lot of balloons and did some stressful tying of helium balloons and stuff like that. Then later was the actual baptism. At the baptism there were over 100 people that showed up. Over 60 of them were Hispanic, and over 30 of them were less active, and about 15 of them were non members. Then we had the party where we went around and got appointments with every less active there. And invited the non members to church and our English class. The party was a blast, and by every Hispanics surprise there was 3 piñatas there. Apparently, they base how good of a party it is with how many piñatas there are. But is was just awesome to see these less actives that we had tried many times but were never able to see. Then we were able to get appointments with them and everything. It was super cool.

Then Sunday we had church. Sadly none of the less actives that came to the baptism came to church and none of the non members did either. But church was still really good. We had Bibiana and viridriana come. Then after church we went are started knocking doors. We had a goal to find 5 people this week but so far we hadn't found anyone. But later we knocked into a family and taught them the gospel of Jesus christ and they loved it and wanted us to come back. Then a little after that we knocked into this guy from a little island off of Africa, and he speaks Portuguese. And we taught him about the book of mormon and he said that he would love to read it and really wanted us to come back. It's pretty funny though because on Saturday at the move we met a member that speaks Portuguese, and we were joking that if we found anyone that speaks it he would be the first one that we would call. And now we actually get to call him and tell him that we found someone. Then after that we went to someone that we had knocked into a week ago and taught them about the book of mormon as well. So in one day we hit our goal of 5 people. And it was all becuase we never gave up and God blessed us because of that. After that we had a lesson with Bibiana and viridriana and we were able to put them on date for September 22. And that was super cool because it was a huge jump for viridriana who wouldn't even think about baptism when we first got here. But now she's considering it and we think that she is going to really be ready by that time. Then later we had a lesson with Zach and Yasmin, which went really well. We took a member with us and he did a really good job. They even said that they would try to come to church. Something else that happened on Sunday was we got a call from President Innes about transfers. Elder Powell is transferring away to be a ZL in Charleston and I am taking over his spot here as district leader. So it is quite bitter sweet to lose elder Powell this early again, but I'm excited for this calling that I have as well and the chance that I have to learn from someone new yet again.

Elder Bertoch