Cody's Mission Blog: Baptisms and fire trucks

March 20, 2017

Hello Fam!

We had a great week! It was kind of busy because me and Elder Lunt had to run all over the zone doing baptismal interviews for the DL and we had to go look for a house in another area that is going to get opened this week. But we found the house and did the interviews and still found some time to work in the area.

On Monday some members set up a family home evening with a reference family they gave us. So they set everything up and we just kind of showed up. It was awesome. The lady has cancer so the members taught about faith and tried to encourage her. She had a chemotherapy treatment on Wednesday and still felt sick yesterday and couldn't go to church. But she is a new investigator. Her name is Damaris (or something kind of similar to that). Her family is really busy all the time and so we've really only been able to teach her since Monday.

On Wednesday night we had a meeting with President Brown, the stake president, and all of the bishops from the stake to discuss how we can work better with the members and how they can work better with us. It was good. The best part is that one of the members of the stake presidency works at Papa John's and they got pizza for everyone at the end. YES!!

We were talking with Arecelly this week (that's how you actually spell her name) and she straight up told us that she was completely ready to get baptized and we agreed. So we asked if she just wanted to do it with Myra and some baptisms for the sisters this week in the same baptismal service and she was fine with it. So we baptized Myra and Arecelly this week. It was awesome because I'm sure that In about a year both of them will get sealed in the temple to their husbands (both of which are active priesthood holders). We were a little stressed before the baptism because Masaya is notorious for not having water. So to be prepared the ward filled up the font a couple days early. And sure enough, on Saturday there wasn't water. So we had water in the font but it was only about 70% full because some water had leaked out. And it was clearly not enough water for the baptisms (and to make it worse Arecelly is pregnant). So we started brainstorming with the bishops to see what we could do. So we suggested that they call the fire department because occasionally they've helped other missionaries in tight situations with water. The bishop said that the fire fighters would never come just to fill a font another 8 inches and even if they could it would take too long. But we convinced them to call anyway and try. And well, within 8 minutes the firefighters were here helping us out. And they did it for free. Great guys. I ended up baptizing both of them. (Myra and Arecelly, not the firemen) I lost my baptismal pants so the only ones I had were big which is why they look funny on me. Sorry.

On Sunday Arecelly and Myra got confirmed. Arecelly got confirmed at 10:30 church because she is from the boundaries of the Monimbo ward. And at 2:00 Myra got confirmed because she lives in the boundaries of the Cuatro Esquinas ward. So we got double church again. Yay!!! But we have changes this week and we'll be assigned to one ward or the other so we can go back to normal. Which will be very nice.

That's about all that happened this week. Nicaragua is in mourning because their national pride, Roman "Chocolatito" Gonzales, light weight champion of the world, lost this week, lost his title, and is no longer undefeated.

I'll let you know what happens with changes but I think I'll still be here with Elder Lunt.

Love you!

Elder Smith