Hermana Webb in Washington: Covenants Are Being Made!

October 13, 2015

Neida and Daise got baptized!!! It was such a cool experience, and the scriptures are true: "Therefore, in the ordinances thereof, the power of godliness ismanifest."

They both shared their testimonies after they got baptized and said "After I came up out the water, I felt like a new person. I felt different." It was crazy because we thought there would be about 20 people so we decided to set up in the primary room. But people just kept coming and coming. Lots of their family showed up and other investigators (including Javier and Hugo :)). So by the time we got started, people were out in the hallway because there wasn't enough room for everyone! Their mom was soo happy and it was neat because during their confirmations, it was said to both that they would enter the temple some day to be sealed. We were able to complete an eternal family and they will both serve missions and help create more eternal families.

And a miracles came out of their baptism. While we were teaching another part member family, a few of their neighbors were over and listened as we taught about the Book of Mormon. They seemed mildly interested, but we didn't think much of it. Later, we found two of the daughters outside and read the book of Enos with them. The next week, we started teaching the daughters again, but this time their mom came out and invited us to come in and teach her too! And that ended up being one of the most powerful teaching experiences of my whole mission. The mom, Maria, told us that she is a single mom raising 4 kids and she just got laid off from her job. As we talked, it was as if the Spirit brought everything to my mind of what to say. We listened with love, and when we taught them about the Apostasy and the Restoration, Maria paused and said:

"I spend so many years searching for the truth. I went to so many different churches, but it never felt right. So 20 years ago, I gave up. I stopped searching and I distanced myself from all of them. But THIS, this is right. This is true." I felt prompted in that moment to invite Maria and her kids to be baptized. Maria looked at us with a new light in her eyes and said "Could I do that? Could I be baptized again?" We testified of the priesthood authority that has been restored to the Earth and she accepted it without question. She is amazing! And her daughter, Cynthia, is actually in the same class as Neida at school. So Cynthia found out Neida was getting baptized, and she came to the baptism. Afterwords, she kept asking "when can I get baptized!?" And then the next day, she came to church and loved it. This family is so prepared!!

So a good week- super busy. On an exchange this week while working with English sisters, Hermana Bagley and I came to a new appreciation for our call to work with Hispanics. We went tracting with them and got some very rude responses, some threats thrown our way from the Americans we met. But seriously, I can count on one hand the mean Hispanics that I have met! The Hispanic culture is sooo loving and accepting and have such open hearts. They are good neighbors and actually know their neighbors. They live like one big family. And I don't feel like I belong to my own culture anymore. Haha. I want to work with these people my whole life!