This week has had its ups and downs. Perhaps I was just too confident after our success last week, but this week we had a harder time finding people to teach. We spent three whole days trying to make second contact with the previous contacts we had made, to no avail. Everyone was either busy or didn´t answer their doors. We would spend 5 - 10 minutes biking to our next potential appointment, park our bikes, knock the door, wait, knock again, wait, knock a third time, and finally give up and start heading to the next name. It was pretty discouraging. After a day and a half, we started wondering, ´what are we doing wrong?´ No immediate answers were available - we should have been having success. But I decided to press on and try to keep a positive attitude, because if you let your spirits fall, you can´t accomplish anything. I figured that maybe this was part of my test, a test to see if I would continue with a happy attitude when times were tough, or be a grumbler. I don´t want to be a grumbler! So I trusted that if I kept my efforts up, things would get better. The lack of success lasted for another day and a half. Then, after the tribulation came the blessings, and things got a bit better!
We are teaching an investigator. And, as sometimes happens, she was listening to our lessons but not keeping commitments. She wasn´t reading, she wasn´t praying, and she wasn´t coming to church. When an investigator doesn´t keep commitments, you eventually have to leave them, because they won´t get a testimony unless they put forth their bit of effort. We had a lesson with her about a week ago in which we explained that if she wanted to really know whether the church is true, she would have to start really investigating. When we came back for our return appointment later, she wasn´t home, and we figured, ´Well, I guess that´s it. We´ll come by next Sunday to see if she´s started reading the Book of Mormon. If not, we´ll have to leave her.´ We had even practiced what we were going to say.
Well, we passed by on Sunday. We talked for a little bit, and then she surprised us by volunteering to say the opening prayer. Afterward, we asked her if she had read the chapter we left her in the Book of Mormon. She had read, and she remembered about what she had read and told us about it. (It was 3 Nephi 11, a particularly powerful part of the Book of Mormon.) I asked if she prayed after reading to know if the book is true. She told us that she had prayed, and then proceeded to describe how she felt. She said, ´I had this feeling. It was strong, and it´s hard to describe... but it wasn´t fear.´ When I asked her to try and describe the feeling, she told me it was like ´peace´ and ´calmness´. I offered her a description of how I feel when I feel the Spirit testifies to me, and she said that yes, that was how she felt. Then I asked her whether she believed that the things we had been teaching her were true. She told us that, yes, she did. And she went on to say that we were the first other church she had ever listened to, and that she thought that God must have sent us to her.
It was very good for me to see an investigator get past the beginning stages of investigating and start to gain a testimony. Very refreshing. It reminded my why I am here, what I am working for. So, that was good!
Other (quick) news:
I ate kumquats, I think. They were sweet on the outside, sour on the inside, and very tasty.
I taught Gospel Doctrines class yesterday, and that went pretty well. We had 48 people in church after the temple open house - more than have been in attendance in years! ( Buenos Aires Argentina temple )
We´re seeing ´popcorn popping´ on some of the trees here! Seems like we´re just about out of winter.
I saw a stuffed (real, stuffed) dog on a stand in a lady´s house. That was kinda gross.
That´s all for today! I love you all, it´s great to hear from you. Take care! Have a great week!
Love, Elder Stockton
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