Elder Spencer's Mexico Mexico City North Mission: Joselin's Baptism!!!!!

Hola Hola! This week was really good! Joselin finally got baptized! More on that later. After p-day ended on Monday it was pouring rain so we started calling people from our Area Book until it lightened up. Then we went to an appointment with Joselin. We didn’t get permission from President that day to baptize her, but you’ll see we worked it all out later.

Tuesday in district meeting we talked about using our time more efficiently, then we had intercambios after district meeting and I was with Elder Parke. I really admire him because his Spanish isn’t the best right now but he gives it his best and doesn’t care if he messes up when contacting or in lessons or with anything! He knows how to work hard and have fun. We had a good day, even though at one point it started pouring cats and dogs.

Wednesday we finally figured out what to do with Joselin for her baptism. After talking with the ZL, the DL and the bishop, we decided to have her baptismal service on Sunday after church. That way she can get her third attendance and then get baptized and confirmed after church services. We had to hurry and get things ready like the paperwork and what not so she could have her interview Wednesday, and she passed with flying colors. It was such a relief!

Thursday in weekly planning we decided to drop 3 investigators because we haven’t been able to get a hold of them or they haven’t come to church for 3 weeks. It’s hard and it sucks but it’s necessary. Later we were able to go visit Joselin and talk with her about the baptism clothes, when the baptism would be and who she wanted to invite. The little stinker didn’t want more than 10 people to be there, really only those who need to be there, but we had already been trying to let members know so they could be there to support her. I knew she would be happy whatever happened though.

Friday we didn’t have many appointments so most of the day we were contacting. We had some success knocking on doors but were able to contact more people in the streets that day. At one point while we were knocking it started to rain and gradually got worse. We knocked on one door and an old man answered. Unfortunately, he didn’t want to talk to us but was kind enough to let us into his garage to take refuge from the storm and thankfully, because a huge hail storm passed over us that lasted about 30 minutes, then it rained more after. There was a river, like a big river, flowing down the street that we were by! When it started to calm down we left his house then we heard someone yelling and saw a young guy yelling for us to go talk to him. He told us he is a member who moved here a couple weeks ago and has been looking for us so he can start coming to church and prepare to serve a mission! His name is William and he’s really cool. He is the only member of his family. His parents are separated, and he came here to live with his mom. He wants us to start teaching her because she is interested.

Saturday we went back to visit William and his mom but unfortunately she wasn’t home. We talked with William for a bit though and he told us he would love to join us to visit and teach people to help him get ready for a mission! We had a lesson later with a woman named Julieta who we found the week before. She has a lot of interest in the church and wants to improve her life and her family. She has some problems and although she does want to change, she thinks that because of things she’s done in the past that we won’t be able to help her or want to help her either. We explained that nobody is perfect, we’ve all made mistakes but thanks to Christ we can be forgiven of our sins if we truly repent. We also invited her to be baptized and she accepted! She is separated from her husband and has 4 daughters that she would really like to take to church so they can go to classes to learn about the gospel and scriptures because there’s some things she doesn’t know how to explain.

Sunday Joselin was baptized!! We went by her house early in the morning so we could go to church together and everything went well. There were about 20 people there and she was nervous; but in the end, she was happy and it was a great experience. It started raining a lot in the late afternoon which made it really difficult to contact people so we ended up going back to the casa and calling former investigators. It was a really great day!

It’s not fun that it’s been hot there, yeah here it’s been hot and cold and sunny and rainy here. Thank you for those thoughts you sent! I really liked them! My thought is one you guys have most likely heard before, "venga lo que venga y disfrutalo!" or in other words, come what may and love it! No matter what experiences we have in our lives we can always find joy, even out of the bad or hard ones. We are in this life to learn and grow. If we are positive and press forward with faith in Jesus Christ and love for others forgetting about ourselves and our problems and needs, we will be so much happier!

I love you guys and hope you have a great week!