Wow, well life refuses to get any less exciting or wild for us. We have had quite the week and we think it's so interesting that from the very second Elder Johnson got here, everything's been so incredibly chaotic. We definitely know the adversary's working super hard on us and our investigators but we're keeping super optimistic and just loving it. My companion has the best outlook on everything and I love how he just always has a smile on his face and is just excited to be here. It really is an adventure with the two of us together - every day is exciting and to be honest, we wonder how much more can go wrong! His bike has been falling apart like crazy this week and he's gotten into at least 2 pretty solid bike wrecks as well as almost getting run over by a truck at least 5 times. It's been pretty out of control. We had to start out the week fixing his tire and then on Sunday his pedal straight up fell off!! It's been wild.
But one thing that was SUPER cool this week is that we had a baptism, and what made it cooler was that there was a wedding too! It was quite exciting. But it was also pretty nerve-racking because we didn't know it was all going to go through until about an hour before the baptism!! We had planned it all out and gotten him interviewed, but he (his name's David Limones) was nervous about some legal issue and him owing child support from his previous marriage. He was seriously considering waiting and not doing it, and I was getting all kinds of calls from them, from the branch president, and the branch mission leader because I guess they couldn't get ahold of each other - my head was spinning as I was trying to understand all of it, all these unfamiliar terms, in Spanish. But we prayed way hard Friday night and Saturday morning, and sure enough got the call that they were going to go through with it all and we were so happy! He's been waiting for a way long time, and we did not want him to wait any longer. When you put the Lord first, the rest will work out. That's all there is to it.
So it was really cool, because I got to watch Elder Johnson baptize him. I'm such a proud "father"! He was excited to be Elder Johnson's first baptism. But yes, prayers are definitely answered and we were so lucky to be involved with it all. It was kind of funny, because it was also our branch president's first wedding, so he was about as nervous as my companion. It all went way good though, and he had support from a lot of the members here in the branch.
My legs are still 100% destroyed from all this bike riding and then running sometimes in the morning. I'm starting to get worried that some of my slacks won't fit because my legs are starting to get big from biking! But we've definitely been needing the exercise because people have been feeding us way too much lately. I'm pretty sure yesterday, I've been more filled than I've just about ever been in my entire life! We had this massive dinner with carne asada and I was totally filled. Afterwards, the member took us to a hot dog stand (that was owned by some members) to support them, and got us a massive hot dog and stuff. We visited the Barraza family afterwards and helped out Cesar Sr. with his yard. He was so grateful that guess what he did? Took us to another one of those stands and got us all these hot dogs and sopes and drinks. Oh my goodness, I don't know if I've ever felt that huge in my entire life. But I think I might finally get some hunger sometime later today. Good thing we're on bikes! Hopefully the Barraza's will finally get baptized here in the next couple weeks - he had been waiting to finish baseball (since he's the coach and feels obligated to his team) so it might have to wait a little bit. It's so frustrating when people keep postponing something this important! The Lord needs to always be our #1 priority and we shouldn't let anything ever stand in the way.
We've been making more progrsss with Francisca Amparo, and apparently her husband has been in the way of baptism too, but she always feels the Spirit and knows it's true. Make that leap of faith!! We're praying and trying so hard with all these people - I know that they will get baptized, I'm just not totally sure when.
We picked up some new investigators this week, people that we had just talked to out in the streets. It's so nice and rewarding when people will actually let you in and teach them. They all seemed genuiniely interested and are starting to read the Book of Mormon. We visited this one girl who we talked to on the street a couple weeks ago and we will hopefully be teaching her whole family next week! We gave her a Spanish Book of Mormon and found out that her dad stole it yesterday and was reading it! That was way exciting. So there's a lot of potential we've been finding lately - we just hope it all works out!
Also this Sunday, for Stake Conference there was a broadcast and we got to listen to Elder Cook and President Monson!! I totally wasn't expecting it so it was a pleasant surprise. President Monson really focused on reaching out and rescuing the less-active people, inactives, widows, and people who are struggling. He told this really cool story about the Lost Battalion in some war and how we need to really reach out to those people that need us. That's definitely what our members here need to hear. We've been spending a lot of time with less-actives that just need some visits and help, and it needs to be the members here that do that so we can be focused on finding, teaching, and baptizing others.
But yeah, we're loving life - Elder Johnson and I are ridiculously similar (even down to having 4 boys and 2 girls in the family!) and we get along so incredibly good. It definitely makes missionary work enjoyable and we love just getting out there, talking to people and teaching. So life in Yuma is good!!
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