Another Wonderful Baptism

November 25, 2013

Hello, my family and friends

It's American Thanksgiving on Thursday!  I hear Benji is going to make a nice feast of a turkey.  What else is on the menu?  I certainly hope mashed potatoes, spaghetti squash, Dad's Dutch oven pies, and rolls.  Then I assume on Friday the family will be going to chop down the ole Christmas tree and watch Home Alone.  It's weird to think that this is my 2nd Thanksgiving without doing those things!  For Thanksgiving Sister Martin and I will be eating some authentic food from Peru at a Peruvian family's house!  

A couple of weeks ago Sister Martin and I decided to start a new approach to have members jump into missionary work.  Whenever we meet with them we give them a little paper that has 2 of our investigators that we would ask them to pray for and in return we pray for someone that they are working with or someone they know that need a little boost.  It's a non-threatening way to help the members get excited about missionary work and have the courage to act when the opportunities come.  They know we are praying for them and we've seen some amazing results!  Yesterday a member brought her friend to church and she stayed for all 3 hours and came to our "gospel essentials" class.  We hope to meet with her this week!  Another member has invited us to come for dinner this week.  They invited a non-member friend.  We've doubled our referrals!  

This week was Susana's baptism and confirmation.  It was a very nice experience and we made sure the whole family was involved.  Her sisters even sang "I Love to See the Temple."  The spirit was very strong.  They had several nonmembers at the baptism and confirmation.  They're not interested yet, but a seed was planted!  

Ken O'Donnahue came to church!  It was a miracle.  He's a less active, recent convert (of about 3 years).  We've been working with him since the first week I got here and it didn't seem to be going anywhere.  But he finally came.  He received such a warm welcome from the ward that I'm sure he will be back.  Gordon Miller taught the lesson in high priests and everyone came up to me and said that I taught him well because the lesson was amazing. (I only started teaching him after his baptism.  I'm sure I didn't have much to do with it.  He was a minister for 35 years.)  He also got his temple recommend and Delfino should be getting the priesthood on Sunday.  So hopefully Sister Martin and I will be able to go with them to the temple to do baptisms!

We met a super friendly Christian lady that was from Australia.  She gave me her card and said next time I'm in Australia I can stay at her house!  :)  Man, I feel so loved!

Well family, it's been an amazing week.  It's incredible to see this ward grow and progress and their desire to share increase!  How did I get so lucky?  

I love being a missionary.

Love, Sister Crystal Gardner