Elder Zach Taylor - Obligado Week 10

 

Well, this week has been one of the best so far in Obligado. I guess I´ll start out with a cool experience we had Thursday.

On Thursdays, we usually go to Hohenau, which is another city close by where our branch president lives. We go there to eat lunch with him, and then usually visit a few people around there. Since it´s a little far, we always have to take a bus to get over there. So that morning, we went over to the station to wait for the bus to come just like we always do. My companion, Elder Hemenway, was a little hungry, so we went over to this little store in the station and he bought an empanada from the lady there. Well right as he handed her the money, the bus we usually take pulled up to the station. I don´t really know what the problem was, but the lady was taking FOREVER to get the change out, and, since nobody was getting on the bus, it left. Needless to say, we were a little upset. We sat down for a second, and then after a few minutes noticed that another bus, which had been parked on the side of the street, was starting up and about ready to leave. We don´t usually get on that one, but it goes by the place we needed to get to so we got on. A little bit down the road the bus pulls over and this guy gets on. He smiled at us, walked over and sat down, held out his hand and said ¨how´s it going?¨ We got talking and found out he´s a member of the church,  inactive for 10 years. He had been in Buenos Aires all that time, but was just barely coming back to Obligado. He said we could come over this week to meet his family. I was surprised, but thankful that we had missed the first bus. I don´t know if anything will come of this, but I was thankful to be shown that there are always people in our path who may need our help.

We also had a couple baptisms this saturday. One of them was Gabriel, who is the son of one of the members but hadn´t been baptized yet. The other was Virginia. She´s 8, her family are all less active, but she asked me to baptize her. That was a really cool opportunity. There were a lot of people who came to the baptism, not only from Obligado but from Trinidad and Hohenau too. We had 37 people come to church the next day, which is the most since we´ve been here. Virginia and Gabriel both got confirmed that day too. It was a really nice weekend, one of the best of my mission so far. I loved seeing everyone show up and be in the same place. All the people we´ve been visiting were finally together, and that was our goal from the start.

I´ve been learning a lot in these weeks. My companion has taught me how to be happy and friendly with people, how to be open and make connections. Being in this area has taught me about patience. I grow to love this place more and more when we have weeks like this one. I´m seeing the purposes in sending me here. And I´m so thankful that I have a Heavenly Father that knows me and knows what I need better than I could ever know myself.

It´s been a good week.

Elder Taylor