We have a lot of work to do which always keeps every day busy! As of Friday of last week we had 10 baptismal dates but because some people did not come to church we said we only had 4. That was kind of disappointing but it happens on the mission. This means this week will have to do some prayer, planning and sorting out of who we should drop and who deserves another chance to come to church.
Work with our baptismal date people....
We are teaching Gabby and her three daughters Denise, Lily, and Nancy. They are very nice and very interested in the gospel! Nancy and Lily came to church (Gabby had a very last minute call to go into work and Denise couldnt come either) Nancy and Lily stayed for sacrament meeting and all through a rather deep Old Testament youth class...! They also made friends with a YW in the ward who is coming with us for our next appointment!
We are also teaching two other families (the Chuc's and the Ortiz's) . The parents are recently reactivated and come pretty regularly. Both of these have sons that have baptismal dates!
-Alex Ortiz comes to church every Sunday but he his having some trouble accepting the testimony that I know he has about modern day prophets and Joseph Smith. We (and the previous Elders) have tried a lot of different things to help him out. We might drop him in a week if he doesnt keep progressing. We will just give him assignments etc when we see him at church every week.
-Jamson Chuc is a very quiet kid who is progressing very well towards his baptismal date on the 8th of August. We had one speedbump where he missed church this past week for the first time out of three times becasue he was out too late but he will be back on track this Sunday! We are working really hard to be friends with him so that he will open up to us. This will help us discern (not judge) how is progress/understanding and testimony are doing. So far we have made improvement. We teach engaging lessons with lots of real-life examples- from everthing from testimonies to movies/books he has seen. I love teaching that way, I have always used that style of teaching and I got a lot of practice with it in Malibu. Lessons are always more REAL/personal when you do it that way. The downside is they tend to be less focused/structured, but we are learning how to plan for them in advance specifically so we avoid that problem.
Work with Less Actives...
Two of the daughters from the less active Archundias came to church last week so we are excited about them. The two friends of one of the daughters did not come to church and they were two of our baptismal dates.....
My studies in the Old Testament are going well, I am a little behind but I am working hard to catch up!
