My First Baptism

My daily schedule: wake up at 6:30, work out until 7:00, get ready. Then personal study starts at 8:00, companion study at 9:00. And then for my first twelve weeks there´s a training program that we work with so we do that at 10:00. Then we leave at 11:00. We have lunch with someone at 12:30 then we work until we have to be home at 8:00. Then I have an hour to study Spanish. At 9:00 we plan for the next day for a half an hour. Then we have from 10:00 to 10:30 to get ready for bed! It´s CRAZY!

We walk everywhere. We counted, it´s 14 blocks to our area from our house. Sometimes we use the bus…but it´s not super reliable, there´s no real set schedule and during the Siesta it only comes like once every hour.

I haven´t gotten any mail yet.

Monday we had an awesome Family Home Evening with the Familia Falcon and a recent convert of the Elders, Jorge. It was awesome we watched the Restoration and everyone loved it. Jorge bore his testimony and I think that everyone was blown away he is definitely one of those people that was prepared to be baptized long before he met missionaries.

We had another Family Home Evening with the Familia Guzman, again AWESOME! They invited their neighbors (like 10 of them) that are non-members and we shared our Christmas message with them. I will talk more about that later because it’s the coolest thing to happen in missionary work!

I went to the clinic on Friday for some medical tests and the clinic is all the way in the Center, which is like 10 blocks the opposite way of our area so we used the bus to get there and we used the bus to try to get back to our area, what an adventure. We didn´t really understand the instructions that we got so we just decided to get back on the bus where we got off because it has to go in a circle right? Nope, wrong. It took us all the way through the Center then all the way the opposite direction, then we reached the end of the line and had to get off and wait for the next bus in 5 minutes, and we had to pay again, we were on the bus for over an hour but we did a lot of contacting which was way cool, but it was hilarious. We definitely saw some Elders from our zone, but in a completely different area and we were laughing so hard on the bus and everyone just thought we were crazy, we tried to hide so they wouldn´t see us…haha.

This week we had an AWESOME service project we got to help one of our investigators build a house! Never thought I would be able to say that. I attached a picture and there´s not a whole lot more to say about that.

SATURDAY WAS MY FIRST BAPTISM!!!!! Oh my gosh, it was amazing! Oscar is like a 73 year old man. He was taught by missionaries 28 years ago and went to church for over a year and was never baptized and stopped going, Hermana Zubeldia and her previous companion found him but didn’t teach him everything. It was so cool to see the change in him! He was an awesome investigator and now he´s going to be an even more awesome member! So we had to fill up the baptismal font and we didn´t really know how. We definitely filled it will scorching hot water and didn´t realize it until like an hour before the baptism, so we almost cooked the poor old man alive. But we fixed it and it was beautiful. The Branch President when he went to church 28 years ago came and surprised him, he definitely cried and he was crying when he got in the font, oh it was just so cool! I wish I had more time to tell you more about Oscar.

So transfers are this Sunday. So next Monday I could be in a totally new area! How cool!? And Scary!? Oh and I will definitely have a new companion!!! AHHH!!!!

Okay so this week we have been working a lot with an AMAZING tool the church has given missionaries this Christmas. It is a 2ish minute video called ¨He is the Gift¨ I love it. I wish I could watch it like 100 times everyday, but for everyone who is reading my blog, member, nonmember, active, or not, please watch it. Christmas is the time to remember that we have a Savior. Not just Mormons and Catholics, but everyone. Christ is the Savior and Redeemer for the world!

Along with the short video there is a talk that I read this week that I really liked that I would love if everyone read it. It is called ¨Come Join with Us¨. I get the opportunity to have a front row seat to watch how the spirit touches and changes lives. I know it can because I see it happen everyday.

I´m so happy to be a missionary and to be sharing the gospel with these people I don´t even know and I want to share it with all those I do know too. I know this is the church of Jesus Christ and there is a place for everyone here!

Always,

Hermana Barker

 My first baptism - Oscar

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