Hey Everyone! Forgot to mention last week, but Brenda Gamboa asked me to baptize her (How I could forgot that?) so she was baptized this past Friday, and received the holy ghost yesterday morning!
Anyway i'll start with the beginning of the week. We got 2 new investigators, and 1 sorta new investigators. We have another investigator family!!!
Simon is one of our new investigators, he is a family guy, has a wife and 17 year old daughter, he invited us over for dinner on Tuesday night, and it went really well.
Simon and his family we had dinner. We had such a fun dinner, and got to know them a lot better for sure. It was awesome, anyway we found out Simon works with Johnny P, Juliannas (recent convert in Fremont) old boyfriend, and that was weird. Then we shared a message, and they loved it. We invited them to take the lessons, they said of course (but the mom was leaving for Minneapolis this weekend) but yes! I got to know the daughter Melvina (yes kinda weird name) and she asked me to look at her writing assignments for her college apps, she's a really good writer.. like really good. They asked me to come over and help with her college apps this weekend, so we're going over again Saturday. Pretty sharp gal. She's planning on going to school on the East Coast.
On Wednesday:
Eason is like 20 or 21 years old. He said he was interested in meeting with us to learn more about our faith, so we did.
It was a good meeting, and he started out really well, he was willing to learn, and willing to accept some of the things we were saying. He said towards the end of the lesson "Oh I gotta go, I have class at 1:30..." and so we ended really quickly. He said the reason he wanted to meet with us is to get to know our church more and be friends with us. I thought that was pretty cool for sure.
After that we were supposed to have another lesson with a guy named Irving, but we ended up just sitting down with another Chinese guy named Steven from Shanghai, and talking to him for a while and just getting to know him. He was cool, and we weren't sure how interested he was, but we were just trying to develop friendships on campus so that we can teach later as well. So Helena came up to us and talked to us, and so Steven left and Helena sat down and we talked for a little bit, and taught a lesson.
On Friday!! Brenda's Baptism!
This was the highlight, we went at 4:30 today visit Helena since she was also coming to the baptism, and I had studied for her that morning, and I had gotten some answers to some prayers for her, I feel like they were inspired, and I still think they were and are inspired. I read Enos, and then the Institute manual with it about receiving answers to prayers, and I looked and studied, and it seemed like that situation was perfect for her to receive an answer. So we went to the General Conference talk, it was about receiving Personal Revelation in our lives, it was talking about going by previous answers that we had received, instead of just asking Heavenly Father again and again. I bore my witness to Helena of the truthfulness of the things, and how I know she will see a miracle if she sets that date.
We waited for Brother Li to come pick us up, and he eventually did. We headed up and just talked, and we got there, and I got dressed, and was waiting and waiting...7 oclock came, not many people showed up, and Brenda hadn't gotten there yet. 7:15 or so came, President Watkins showed up, and Brenda had barely gotten out from changing, we got picture, and everything else, I practice the baptism twice with her (she was good to go) and we sat in there. They got started, we sang "When I am Baptized" and really brought the spirit there, Darien with the opening prayer, and Sister Montalvo had the talk on Baptism and the Holy Ghost. It was a really wonderful talk, and I really felt the spirit. I know Brenda felt it too. It was a great.
Brenda and I stepped down those steps into the font after that, and she said to me "Do I really go down?" haha. I told her "Just come down" and got in position. Said "Brenda Gamboa" and said the prayer. The water was really a lot lower than usual, and so it was a rather difficult baptism, but I got her the first time. She was so excited, like a kid in a candy store when she got back up. We both went to change, came out at the exact same time, and then the Sisters and Elders Woodbrey and Butcher had a musical number that they wanted to do, it was "Come thou Fount of Every Blessing" it was really really good. Brenda was excited to hear it.
After that, Brenda bore her testimony. It was amazing, she told of a story where she was working one day at Wells Fargo, and there was a lady that wanted 3 thousand dollars in a withdrawal, and so she didn't had enough cash in the drawer to do that, so she bought 10K from the vault, and she was having an off day, so she gave the lady her money, and didn't even blink, the lady was gone. She noticed that she was short 2k on her balance, so she was freaking out, and knew she was going to get terminated. Later that day the lady came back and handed the manager 2K saying "The Teller gave me 5 thousand instead of 3 thousand. I don't need to extra 2 thousand, thank you" and so at that point Brenda knew she was in trouble, but her boss said something profound to her which was "God is really watching over you, you must be doing what's right" and so at that moment she really felt like that was true. She felt an overwhelming love that God was looking after her. She said she went home full of thanks, and got on her knees and prayed to thank God for everything she said and in her words "My job, my money, my schooling, my education, my shelter, my family, my life, my smartness, and my beautifulness, I promise i'm not conceited or anything" and she said after she had said this prayer she felt an overwhelming spirit over her. She felt of the peace and joy that it brings, and that ever since that day she had never felt the same. When she woke up in the morning she was happy instead of miserable.
She said she has been so happy to be baptized, and to receive the Holy Ghost, she knows this is the best step she can make in her life, and that she is so excited to go forward. It was an amazing baptism for sure.
President Watkins and Sister Watkins drove Helena and I home after the baptism. President Watkins really likes Helena a lot and had asked her a lot of questions. Helena might have been a tad intimidated, but I think she got used to it. It was just nice being there at the baptism and with Helena too.
That was the week!
It was an awesome week!
Elder Sanchez
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