Dear Family,
This week was great but also very crazy.
This week I was running around doing baptism interviews and
marking interviews for our baptism, but in the end all went pretty well.
Last Tuesday we had an awesome miracle. So two weeks ago we
started teaching Cesar, he was the sisters’ investigator but he ended up moving
to our area. The sisters passed the reference and told us that he hasn’t
accepted any baptismal date and that he has problems with smoking. Our first
visit to his house we discovered that it takes over an hour to get there! but
it was all totally worth it. As we arrived we met a very humble man, tall,
skinny, and dark. He showed us his house which is very small with almost
nothing in it. He introduced himself that he was Cesar and we started with a
prayer and got discussing, as we were discussion we got on the topic of
baptism, and then my companion decided to invite him to be baptized! Cesar then
responded saying that he doesn’t feel ready and that he has too many problems
that keep him from such a commitment. He said that he was very addicted to
smoking, smoking more than 20 cigarettes per day. I then gave an example of the
apostles that before being apostles they were normal men but when Jesus said
´´come follow me´´ they put down their nets and followed him. We then invited
him to put down this addiction and follow Christ, we set a goal for the 19th to
be baptized which was two weeks away, we explained that we will help you with
your addiction but most of all you have our Savior if you go to him with
prayer, he will help. He ended up accepting the date and throughout the week we
called him and checked up on how he was doing, he always responded that he was
in the fight, still smoking quite a few but that he was smoking less and that
he had a headache. Our next visit with him was Tuesday the 15th, when we got
there he said that he has been smoking 7 cigarettes every day and that he can’t
get passed that number, we knew that if he didn’t stop now that he wouldn’t be
able to be baptized until the following week. We had a very spiritual message
with him and I said to him ´´you aren’t doing this for you wife (who is a
member), you aren’t doing this for us, and you really you aren’t doing this
completely for yourself, but you are doing all of this for Him´´ showing him a picture
of Christ Cesar starting to get really determined, he said `´I’m stopping
now!`´ he grabbed his box of cigarettes and started to rip each cigarette one
by one. We then got the impression to also give him a blessing of comfort and
strength, we gave him the blessing and the moment that we all said ´´amen´´ the
phone rang.
Cesar responded "hello...yeah I already invited the
missionaries over.....yeah we just finished doing that...bye".
"that was my wife" he said, she had just called to
tell me to ask for a blessing. Cesar then said to us "that blessing, that
was very...different" I thought to myself, ah great he thinks we are a
cult or something because she just finished putting our hands on his head and
blessing him.
But then I noticed that he was getting emotional,
"never have a felt something like that in my life, I can’t even put into
words the feelings that I felt" HE explained that he isn’t one to get
emotional but that he never has felt anything like that blessing. afterwards I
left super super drained and we had a ton to walk still, for the next couple of
days me and my companion got sick and I’m still a little sick but I’m getting
better ha-ha.
We continued checking up on him and calling him and he
stopped smoking! 4 days later we
baptized him on Saturday the 19th
It was a miracle this week, I know that all the prayers that
you guys have been saying has blessed him and that the priesthood of God his
real.
After getting sick and almost not being able to work this
week, everything was all worth it.
Sounds like everyone is having a good week,
wish Conner luck with football and all,
miss everyone,
Love
Elder Toma
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