Jehovah´s Witnesses, Splits, and Victorino's Baptism! - April 21, 2014

This last Saturday, Victorino was finally baptized! He was super ready. He is a super humble man with a great amount of Faith, Elder Bautista and I talked to him in the Street near the beginning of my mission, and now we baptized him together! He is defiantly one of the Lord´s Chosen. 

Even though he has bad knees, he has tried to walk to church on his own on two occasions (it’s pretty far, luckily he was picked up by members!), and he is already in Mosiah! We have never had an investigator so excited about the Gospel. And now he is a member! 
HIs family that came with him the service could feel it too. They hadn’t been interested before, but I hope that after attending the baptism and church when he was confirmed a member will help change their mind. His wife was starting to tear up with his testimony. She just says she is happy that Victorino is happy, but I hope that the way will be opened to help her learn the Gospel as well. 

I feel blessed to have been able to help Victorino find the truth, and am so grateful for the Spirit that was able to touch his heart and bear testimony that this message is true.

Best Easter birthday / Easter gift ever!  

The Baptismal Service was super awesome! There was a really strong spirit there. Our Ward mission leader was the one to baptize him, so he asked me to conduct the baptismal service! You know me, I was super nervous, and apparently red the whole time... and I almost forgot to announce the musical number, and I DID forget to announce the closing prayers and went straight to the closing prayer after Victorino shared his testimony. But it turned out to be super spiritual. His testimony was so strong when he shore it. I know that he is a convert and not just a baptism. 

This last Monday night (14) instead of having family home evening, we attended the Jehovahs Witness annual meeting where they bless the sacrament. Our Mission President has authorized that we should try to form friendships and offer service the minsters of other religions in our areas, for the which Elder Bautista is super excited, so we and another companionship attended this meeting. It super sad to the Apostasy in action. We didn’t hardly do anything but attend, but it was supposed to be a gesture of friendship. I don’t know it if helped anything that we were there. It made me so glad that I know the truth, and helped me see that need to preach the Gospel. I realized how much Hope is offered by this message, and by the Atonement of Jesus Christ, through which every single person on earth can inherit the Celestial kingdom if they will just put their part in. 

On Friday, we had splits with our district leader. It turned out that he went with Elder Bautista in our area, and I went to his area with his companion, who is being trained. Which meant that he didn’t speak very much Spanish. Which meant that we would be relying wholeheartedly in my own ability to speak the language for a day! It turned out to be a super good day though. I took charge of all the lessons, as was able to understand almost everything. It is great to be able to see how far I have come in the language, and also in being a good missionary. I still have a lot to learn though :)  At the beginning of May I will have 6 months in my mission! That is crazy! 

We have been challenged to invite people to baptism when we contact them for the first time in the street. It felt super weird at first; we would start a conversation with someone, talk about the example of Jesus Christ and baptism, and ask them if they would follow his example and be baptized. Few people actually accept; I think that they are a little shocked to hear the question too so soon, but our leaders promise us that it will help us find the Lord's Chosen, and it really does help us to have better and more meaningful contacts with people in the street. And now we have the goal to contact 20 people a day. We have not yet reached that goal, but I really want to, and I am going to do what I can to do it this week! 

But yes, Victorino, our chosen investigator, was baptized this last Saturday! I have written more about in it the other email with the picture attached. It was so wonderful! 

He scared us a little when he didn’t arrive at the chapel for church on Sunday, until after sacrament meeting. Thankfully the Bishop allowed him to be confirmed just before the speakers gave their talks. It is official; Victorino is a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints!

The Church is so true!

Thank you so much for your e mails and prayers! 

I send all my Love,

Elder Redford