Sunday, July 2, 2017

Baptisms, Parade Distractions and Elder Smiley

Hello Family and Loved Ones!

Well this was quite the week!  We ended up having 2 baptisms this Saturday and it was incredible!  I got the opportunity to baptize the Brother, Jimrex and then my companion got to baptize the other 2 Sisters.  They all had great amazing testimonies afterwards and my companion and I were very grateful for the opportunity to be a part of their first step towards coming unto Christ and working on their progression towards eternal salvation! :) 

So this week, our town had a fiesta, so when it was night we had trouble find appointments because EVERYONE, and I mean everyone was at the Carnival haha, but at least they were having fun!  So I don't know if I told you guys or not, but every morning I go jogging at the church, well I do liners.  And so one morning I just finished doing my liners and we were walking back to our apartment.  As we were doing so, there was a parade going on.  Haha, honestly all of the people who were participating in the parade got distracted by me.  Haha there were actually marching bands who stopped playing their instruments to look at me hahahaha.  It made me feel like I was the parade!  Overall, there was a lot of parties and fun activities going on in our town, and I wasn't complaining because there were a lot of food stands!!!  

Anyways, work continues to progress over here in Angadanan.  Right now we are focusing on getting these other investigators to church, because they really do have strong testimonies, but we just haven't quite gotten them to come to church yet!  But Elder Panton and I will continue searching for ways to get them to want to come to church.  

One thing I have started to do while I am out working, is I look for anyone who isn't smiling and I make it my goal to make them smile.  Everytime I get someone to smile at me, I just feel that more satisfied with my purpose and the service that I can give as a missionary.  Literally, all I look for now when I work is smiles from everyone I pass.  And let me tell you, this is no easy task for me.  I have never been that good of a smiler, mom can testify to that!  When I first started smiling at people, it was seriously awkward for me.  Like I just feel like a look goofy when I just smile, and the worst is when the people don't smile back, but I just keep pushing myself to smile at strangers because I want those smiles!  In a way, I feel like this will be really valuable to me in the future, so I just keep on pushing myself to smile at someone, even knowing that most likely my face has turned red from embarrassment, more so when they don't smile back!  But I feel like the more I smile, the easier it becomes so I will continue to do it until I no longer feel uncomfortable!  

On Sunday, we went to one of our areas that requires crossing a broken bridge to get to it.  Well yesterday, there was a lot of debris along the side of the bridge floating in the water, and I didn't want to pay to be pulled across the broken bridge on a boat, so I walked on the floaties!  It was so awesome, and soo many people thought that I was going to just fall in and the floating debris would sink, but because there was so much and my faith was sufficient I did it, twice!!!  I got a lot of smiles and laughs for that!  Haha I figured I need to make my last 3 months as exciting as possible so why not?  

Anyways, I continue to do really well here and the work is going great!  I couldn't ask for anything more in my mission! :)  I love you all and here are some pictures!

Love,

Elder Zach Warren














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