Hello Family!
This week has been great! Thanks for all the packages. I got three of them yesterday. That is very generous of you. We are CRAZY busy today, and so I feel a little scatter brained…hopefully I’ll write everything I need to.
I had my first tamale of the Christmas season on Saturday. Our investigator made some, and invited us to try them. Yay! We were going to try to make them with her, but she got them all finished before we had a chance. But I’m so glad we got to try them. I was getting worried we wouldn’t get any authentic ones!
We got a call from one of our investigators on Thursday, asking what the process was for baptism! We hadn’t gotten a chance to really sit down and go through the lessons with her yet, but she has been meeting with missionaries for years. On Saturday, we went out to dinner with them, and she said she still had reservations about the church, but we invited her to listen to the missionary lessons. (It amazes me that some of the investigators in our teaching pool, which we inherited when we got to Albuquerque, had no idea that missionaries actually teach lessons. We’re hoping to help them realize that baptism is the goal). The thing I love about the Missionary Discussions is that just like Reading Rainbow, “You don’t have to take my word for it”. Anyone who asks Heavenly Father can gain a knowledge for themselves. It’s not really us that’s pushing…we just present the information and invite them to make commitments.
We also had Christmas Zone Conference this week. I love Zone Conference; it is always a spiritual re-boost. It was good to see half the mission. President and Sister Anderson participated in the missionary talent show, and performed their missionary version of, “I’m Gettin' Nothin' for Christmas.” All about how disobedient missionaries have been nothin' but bad, and how they keep gettin' snitched on. It was great! Don’t worry…I made sure to video tape it.
Another one of our investigators decided to try to quit smoking this week! We had no idea, but when we went over on Thursday, he said that he’d been cigarette free for two days. We’re excited for him to get baptized in January!
We’re teaching a 12 year old that does not respond to questions. We try to get him involved in the lessons, but he doesn’t answer or respond to anything we say. He doesn’t even just shrug his shoulders and say “I don’t know,” like most shy people would do. It’s a challenge. But at least we get to teach more now!
The Schoen family has been looking out for missionaries for years, so as part of an inside joke, we’re making a Popsicle stick puppet theatre for them today. We’re getting photos of all the missionaries that served in this area for the past 2 years or so, and gluing them to Popsicle sticks for their Christmas present. It should be pretty funny, I’m hoping.
Speaking of Christmas, we don’t really know what our rules are. So far, we’ve got families offering to feed us all three meals…but we don’t really know if we’re going to be tracting, or if there is a curfew, or if they want us to run the day like we ran Thanksgiving Day…which was mostly just visiting with members. But we do have guidelines on our phone calls.
Oh boy, I feel like there are a million things to do today, and no time to get it all done!
Like my trainer and I did at Easter, we’ve been trying to read the Christmas story in Talmage’s Jesus the Christ. I love this:
“Unto Moses, with whom the Lord spake “face to face, as a man speaketh unto his friend,” the course of the human race, both as then past and future, was made known; and the coming of the Redeemer was recognized by him as the event of greatest import in all the happenings to which the earth and its inhabitants would be witness.”
I love that! This is why we celebrate Christmas! His coming into the world was the most important thing, for without him, none of us could ever have hope of life again.
I’m doing well, and learning a lot this Christmas. I love you and hope all is well.
Merry Christmas,
Sister Waters
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