Hey everyone!
Happy Easter.
The following e-mail contains:
1. A sweet turn out in the Sacrament meeting, 9 investigators!
2. An encounter with the fire cheif here in Olanchito.
3. A new family that we were blessed to find.
4. Other stuff.
Well, this week was pretty sweet. We had 9 investigators at church!
Nine! YAY! Two complete families and 1 mom of a big family!
YAY!!!!! We found a new family that lives a block away from the
church. They hadn't ever come to
the church because they thought we worshipped Joseph Smith. Guess
what all the lessons talked about yesterday? Jesus Christ and His
Atonement, Fasting, Agency. So they heard and saw first hand that the
negative things people say about the church isn't true.
The dad was in prison for 14 years and just barely got out 5 months
ago. He's so humble and willing to learn. You can tell he's not
proud of being in prison for so long. He read the entire pamphlet we
left about the Gospel of Jesus christ and is reading the BOM. Reading
is a pretty rare commitment that people keep in Honduras. And they
are keeping it!!!!! They have 2 sons as well. One is 17 and one is
22. One block from the church!!!!! We have keys to the chapel and we
had a lesson in the room with the baptismal font 2 days ago. It went
really well.
We found a gigantic size Book of Mormon for one of our families. She
said she always reads the gigantic Bible we gave her but can't really
see the words in the BOM we left. So we are going to give her a
gigantic BOM. Now she can see! They are kind of reluctant about
reading the BOM because it's something new. That is a little
frustrating to me because we had such a sweet, powerful experience
with them in the very first message we had. Right from the get go.
And we were solely talking about the BOM in that first message. God
wouldn't make us feel peace and happiness about something that isn't
true. Four of them came to church last week! They invited us to their house to eat Baleadas
yesterday, an invitation which we didn't hesitate to accept.
Another lady who came to church. Her son is a member. I
borrowed him pants and a shirt to come to church with us last week
because he didn't have clothes for church. And he was pretty
inactive. But he said he'd go with the clothes. Guess what happened?
We went to their house on Sunday in the morning and she told me her
son had gone to SPS and had taken my clothes with him! haha. Oh
well, at least he can go to church in SPS. Berta came and
participated and everything. She wants to be prepared to get
baptized.
Guess what else happened this week? We met the fire marshall here in
Olanchito. The chief. They have a pretty nice fire truck in
Olanchito. He gave me a fire-fighter sticker from the station and
showed me all his badges. He is way cool. We gave him a BOM and
invited him to read it and pray about it.
Turns out, he is one of the 7 founders of a "great an abominable
church" called the Gran Comisión. He said all you have to do is
believe in Christ and you're saved. We invited him to read the BOM
and he started arguing with us about it. Saying that we have the
Bible and that Jesus Christ didn't come to the America's. We said
that God loves us all equally so that's why He sent His Son to the
America's; so that the people in America knew about the terms of
salvation as well. So that they could live the Gospel and return to
live with our Heavenly Father. He said he'd read it and see for
himself. Hopefully he reads it.
Our Branch President asked the congregation a question that really got
me thinking. "What mother from the Olanchito Branch would sacrifice
her son so that the Olanchito Branch could be saved." And all of the
mothers agreed that none of them would. God has sacrificed His son
because He loves us. He did it so we could return to live with Him.
Not alone. But with our family!
The kingdom of God wouldn't be the same alone. Sure, it would be
great everything we would ever want: peace, joy, happiness. But there
would be something missing if we weren't there all together. But how
sweet it would be if we were all their together. Imagine all of our
ancestors who endured faithfully would be waiting there to give us a
great big hug. And our father in Heaven would be there waiting to
tell us, "Well done thou good and faithful servant." Difficult? Of
course. Worth it? OF COURSE!!!!!!!!!!! What more could we ask for?
Jesus Christ already did His part. He gave us a PERFECT example to
follow and laid down His own life for us. Now it's our turn to do
ours. His Atoning sacrifice has no effect in our lives unless we live
according to His Gospel. We will be sad and God will be sad if we
choose not to live the Gospel and we fall short of His kingdom. We
all are placed in circumstances and places where we CAN live the
Gospel. God didn't put any one of us in an impossible circumstance so
that it was impossible for us to return to live with Him.
The church is TRUE!!!!! LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!
Sé que la igesia de Jesu Cristo de Los Santos de Los Ultimos Días es
verdadera. Es la unica iglesia verdadera sobre la faz de la tierra.
Es la unica iglesia con la autoridad y poder de Dios. Yo sé que José
Smith fue un profeta. Yo sé que él fue llamado por Dios. Se qué El
Libro de Mormon es evidencia convincente de ello. Se que este libro
es verdadero.
Jesucristo vive y dirige esta iglesia. Él nos ama y quiere que
volvamos a vivir con Él. Sin embargo, eso no depende de Él porque Él
ya hizo su parte. Ahora nos toca a nosotros hacer nuestra parte. Sé
que las familias son eternas. Espero tener mi propia familia eterna
un día. Quiero agradecer a mi Padre Celestial por la misión que he
servido y quiero agradecerles a cada uno de ustedes por apoyarme.
Gracías. Dios vive y contesta oraciónes. Les quiero mucho.
Elder Goodwin
Happy Easter.
The following e-mail contains:
1. A sweet turn out in the Sacrament meeting, 9 investigators!
2. An encounter with the fire cheif here in Olanchito.
3. A new family that we were blessed to find.
4. Other stuff.
Well, this week was pretty sweet. We had 9 investigators at church!
Nine! YAY! Two complete families and 1 mom of a big family!
YAY!!!!! We found a new family that lives a block away from the
church. They hadn't ever come to
the church because they thought we worshipped Joseph Smith. Guess
what all the lessons talked about yesterday? Jesus Christ and His
Atonement, Fasting, Agency. So they heard and saw first hand that the
negative things people say about the church isn't true.
The dad was in prison for 14 years and just barely got out 5 months
ago. He's so humble and willing to learn. You can tell he's not
proud of being in prison for so long. He read the entire pamphlet we
left about the Gospel of Jesus christ and is reading the BOM. Reading
is a pretty rare commitment that people keep in Honduras. And they
are keeping it!!!!! They have 2 sons as well. One is 17 and one is
22. One block from the church!!!!! We have keys to the chapel and we
had a lesson in the room with the baptismal font 2 days ago. It went
really well.
We found a gigantic size Book of Mormon for one of our families. She
said she always reads the gigantic Bible we gave her but can't really
see the words in the BOM we left. So we are going to give her a
gigantic BOM. Now she can see! They are kind of reluctant about
reading the BOM because it's something new. That is a little
frustrating to me because we had such a sweet, powerful experience
with them in the very first message we had. Right from the get go.
And we were solely talking about the BOM in that first message. God
wouldn't make us feel peace and happiness about something that isn't
true. Four of them came to church last week! They invited us to their house to eat Baleadas
yesterday, an invitation which we didn't hesitate to accept.
Another lady who came to church. Her son is a member. I
borrowed him pants and a shirt to come to church with us last week
because he didn't have clothes for church. And he was pretty
inactive. But he said he'd go with the clothes. Guess what happened?
We went to their house on Sunday in the morning and she told me her
son had gone to SPS and had taken my clothes with him! haha. Oh
well, at least he can go to church in SPS. Berta came and
participated and everything. She wants to be prepared to get
baptized.
Guess what else happened this week? We met the fire marshall here in
Olanchito. The chief. They have a pretty nice fire truck in
Olanchito. He gave me a fire-fighter sticker from the station and
showed me all his badges. He is way cool. We gave him a BOM and
invited him to read it and pray about it.
Turns out, he is one of the 7 founders of a "great an abominable
church" called the Gran Comisión. He said all you have to do is
believe in Christ and you're saved. We invited him to read the BOM
and he started arguing with us about it. Saying that we have the
Bible and that Jesus Christ didn't come to the America's. We said
that God loves us all equally so that's why He sent His Son to the
America's; so that the people in America knew about the terms of
salvation as well. So that they could live the Gospel and return to
live with our Heavenly Father. He said he'd read it and see for
himself. Hopefully he reads it.
Our Branch President asked the congregation a question that really got
me thinking. "What mother from the Olanchito Branch would sacrifice
her son so that the Olanchito Branch could be saved." And all of the
mothers agreed that none of them would. God has sacrificed His son
because He loves us. He did it so we could return to live with Him.
Not alone. But with our family!
The kingdom of God wouldn't be the same alone. Sure, it would be
great everything we would ever want: peace, joy, happiness. But there
would be something missing if we weren't there all together. But how
sweet it would be if we were all their together. Imagine all of our
ancestors who endured faithfully would be waiting there to give us a
great big hug. And our father in Heaven would be there waiting to
tell us, "Well done thou good and faithful servant." Difficult? Of
course. Worth it? OF COURSE!!!!!!!!!!! What more could we ask for?
Jesus Christ already did His part. He gave us a PERFECT example to
follow and laid down His own life for us. Now it's our turn to do
ours. His Atoning sacrifice has no effect in our lives unless we live
according to His Gospel. We will be sad and God will be sad if we
choose not to live the Gospel and we fall short of His kingdom. We
all are placed in circumstances and places where we CAN live the
Gospel. God didn't put any one of us in an impossible circumstance so
that it was impossible for us to return to live with Him.
The church is TRUE!!!!! LOVE YOU ALL!!!!!
Sé que la igesia de Jesu Cristo de Los Santos de Los Ultimos Días es
verdadera. Es la unica iglesia verdadera sobre la faz de la tierra.
Es la unica iglesia con la autoridad y poder de Dios. Yo sé que José
Smith fue un profeta. Yo sé que él fue llamado por Dios. Se qué El
Libro de Mormon es evidencia convincente de ello. Se que este libro
es verdadero.
Jesucristo vive y dirige esta iglesia. Él nos ama y quiere que
volvamos a vivir con Él. Sin embargo, eso no depende de Él porque Él
ya hizo su parte. Ahora nos toca a nosotros hacer nuestra parte. Sé
que las familias son eternas. Espero tener mi propia familia eterna
un día. Quiero agradecer a mi Padre Celestial por la misión que he
servido y quiero agradecerles a cada uno de ustedes por apoyarme.
Gracías. Dios vive y contesta oraciónes. Les quiero mucho.
Elder Goodwin
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