3-4-08

Subject: Modern-day Pioneers

Hello Everybody!

Well, I guess it was a well kept secret. William didn´t find out that he was supposed to be baptized last week. Each time we went to his house to tell him, he wasn´t there. But some good news is that he wasn´t there one of the times because he had gone with some youth to the temple and he stayed out in the gardens with some of the youth while others did baptisms for the dead. He went to church again on Sunday as well!
Our goal of faith is to baptize William, Evelyn, and Sergio this Sunday. Evelyn is 15 years old (Kristie´s age). Since we´ve started teaching her, she´s stopped drinking tea and coffee, she hasn´t smoked for a week, and she broke up with her boyfriend/fiancé who had previously forbid her to listen to the missionaries and/or go to church. Can you believe someone Kristie´s age with all those problems? Well, they used to be problems, but because of the gospel, she´s been overcoming each obstacle one at a time.
Sergio is the husband of a member. He´s been going to church now and then for some time. Two weeks ago, he decided that he´s ready for baptism, so all we have to do is finish teaching him all the stuff he already believes, interview him, and dress him in white.

Modern-day Pioneers:
I was thinking about all the sacrifices that our investigators have been making to join the church, and it reminded me of the early pioneers when they joined the church. We want to tell people that by joining the church all their problems will go away, but sadly that isn´t the case. Problems will still come. Usually right before and right after something very important like baptism, the adversary is working his hardest to tear us down. But making covenants (like at baptism) we receive help to resist evil and qualify ourselves for peace in this life and eternal life after death.
Ana Claudia (who was baptized a week and a half ago) was kicked out of her choir that she studied two years to join. It was her life long dream to be in this choir, and she finally made it. After her baptism, the choir director told her that she had to choose to leave the ´Mormon´ church or leave the choir. She made the right choice, but it was very difficult and caused her a lot of pain.
Juciane (who baptized two weeks earlier) lost one of her jobs and has said that all her friends do is try to get her to leave the church and drink and party like she used to. But her testimony has been helping her stay strong. She bore her testimony of the Book of Mormon this last Sunday in church and told everyone that being a member of the church and having the gift of the Holy Ghost is worth all the sacrifices she´s had to make.
Everyone that I´ve taught that has decided to join the church has had some sort of really dificult trial to overcome beforehand. But, the miracles come after the trial of faith.

Goodbye for now!
-Elder Jason Morgan Allred