HELLLLLOOOOOOOOO everyone!!!
first off talking to the family was absolutely LEGITTTT! Man what a blessing it is that they let us do that :) I feel just so dang good!! even though i did cut us off before we officially said "goodbye" but I personally think its better that way because had it not I probably wouldn´t have been able to hang up without loosing my manly composure. haha. not that I care about that at all but it does make it a lot more difficult. I gotta admit the last time we talked at Christmas I got ridiculously homesick for about a week. the only time in my whole mission, but this time no. of course I miss you all a TON but I can kinda see the light at the end of the tunnel and stuff and I don't feel nearly as far away as I did the last time. I'M PROGRESSING GUYS!! haha. (tear).
alright, heres a short recap of the two stories I was going to tell you on the phone. ready????? GO!
ok. story 1)
we found a new family this week who is progressing like crazy! they are great. the story is about how it is that we came to be teaching this family.
so we went out with the new elders quorum president to visit people. we somehow decided, contradictory to our plans, that we were going to visit a non active ex-branch president named Brother Flujencio (fluhensio). While we were visiting him and the EQP was talking his ear off while I was listening to what Flujencio had to say trying to think of something to share with him that would actually benefit him some random dude came from out of nowhere and started talking to the other workers (we were in a brick making yard and Flujenciowas making bricks while we were talking to him) on the other side of the lot. he was talking loud and swearing a lot and kind of annoying. THEN he decides to come over and talk to Flujencio while we were talking to him. totally distracting him from our convo and swearing up a storm and being super rude so I got the impression, "contact the dude and he´ll be out of here faster than the spirit that just left when he came over!" (contact means like give him a door approach) so I did! but to my surprise he was actually interested!!! so we passed by his house on Tuesday and he was there in his house about to eat what was going to be his last supper with his wife because she was throwing him out of the house that very night.
well, so far they are still together and are seeing the power the gospel can have in their lives. the wife and kids came to church yesterday and they loved it!
story 2)
The other day after a return contact fell through we decided to contact to fill the time gap. we knocked one door and after the contact I was feeling pretty crappy because they gave us some half spoiled meat for lunch/dinner and it was NOT sitting well so I literally said "dah forget this lets go home so I can rest for an hour or so before the appointment [with the above mentioned family]." well, while cruising back to the house we had walked about 100 yards when I looked at a house that was across the street and as we were passing in front of it I just randomly stopped walking. my greenie comp who was in his own world at the time took a few seconds to realize I wasn´t by his side anymore and kept walking a few more steps while I waited for the cars to pass so i could cross the street and contact this house. He caught back up to me as we crossed the street and I yelled in the open door "buenas tardes!" and a guy who was on the couch gets up (about 30 years old and pretty big for a oaxaqueño) and greets us coldly. I gave him a door approach and he proceeded o explain to me that he was atheist. I asked him why that was and he started going into a whole bunch of stuff about how he lost his faith but before believed a lot. I directed the conversation to the Doctrine of Christ and when I mentioned baptism he started arguing with me about how we need to baptize in only the name of Jesus Christ and not in the name of the father, the son, and the holy spirit. I saw where he was coming from because it says in the bible AND the book of Mormon that we need to be baptized "in the name of Jesus Christ." but showed him that the detail he was missing is that nowhere in the bible does it instruct us in exactly what to say for the baptism prayer. like word for word. it just says the above mentioned. so I showed him in 3 Nephi 11 where Jesus himself says "and these are the words you shall say:" and afterwards at the end of the prayer says to mention the three. well, he didn´t accept that for some reason so I spent the next hour and a half listening to his theories about how Jesus is the father son and the holy ghost and offering examples from the bible in how that was impossible. example after example after example and his answer to the first one which was about the three manifesting themselves at the same time at the baptism of Jesus was that "nothing is impossible for God." I was like... well, even if we take a crazy pill and accept that hypothetically for a sec, what would be the point of doing that? why couldn´t he just testify of himself and call it good? to confuse us? anyone who understands the nature of God knows that would never happen. I gave him more and more examples of like, when Jesus resurrected Lazarus he first thanked some being that was not him for having "heard" him. then how he mentioned to the Pharisees that he learned everything from his father who sent him, then several other examples of Jesus praying to the father during realizing of the atonement. we stayed calm, cool, collected, and confident the whole time offering evidence after evidence while he squirmed and went in circles and changed his story and started getting frustrated but at the end I focused on how it is that we know what we know so specifically about the godhead and thats by revelation to living prophets and explained the book of Mormon and how its how he could know if this revelation we have is true and invited him to read it with an honest heart and pray about it and he was very interested! He was like a different person at the end of the conversation and i think its because the spirit touched him at some point in the conversation and i´m confident that it was when i was testifying of the book of Mormon. It was such a cool experience :) the truth is always right and the spirit will always testify of it to those who truly want to know.
well, I gotta go!! I love you all and wish you the best this week! thank you again for all your prayers, love and support :)
love,
Elder Spencer Henze
