I'd like to start this week by sharing some scriptures that have been very significant this week then I will talk about everything. By the way, sorry for the monologue you're about to read.
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"24 Yea, and from that time even until now, I have labored without ceasing, that I might bring souls unto repentance; that I might bring them to taste of the exceeding joy of which I did taste; that they might also be born of God, and be filled with the Holy Ghost.
25 Yea, and now behold, O my son, the Lord doth give me exceedingly great joy in the fruit of my labors;
26 For because of the word which he has imparted unto me, behold, many have been born of God, and have tasted as I have tasted, and have seen eye to eye as I have seen; therefore they do know of these things of which I have spoken, as I do know; and the knowledge which I have is of God.
27 And I have been supported under trials and troubles of every kind, yea, and in all manner of afflictions; yea, God has delivered me from prison, and from bonds, and from death; yea, and I do put my trust in him, and he will still deliver me.
28 And I know that he will raise me up at the last day, to dwell with him in glory; yea, and I will praise him forever, for he has brought our fathers out of Egypt, and he has swallowed up the Egyptians in the Red Sea; and he led them by his power into the promised land; yea, and he has delivered them out of bondage and captivity from time to time."
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This week was hard. For the first time in a long time I had a panic attack and we passed through a lot of trials this week, but it was all worth it because Candela and Franco got baptized on Sunday!
To start this week we had a pday traveling to Necochea and passed the day there then tuesday we traveled back to Tres Arroyos and met right up with Candela and Franco and their mom. We put their baptismal date for Sunday and the only day they were free to do the baptismal interview was Thursday so we agreed that on Thursday the elders would go to do the interview.
Without them passing the interview we weren't sure if there would even be a baptism so we mentioned to only a couple pf people we were thinking that there might be a baptism on Sunday, but we still had things to confirm.
Wednesday night we recieve an angry text from our ward mission leader asking us why he is just now hearing that we're going to have a baptism of Sunday when it's already Wednesday. We apologize, because he's right, even though we don't know if the baptisms going to happen we should have informed him sooner. We explained to him we were waiting to do the invitation until we knew if there was even going to be a baptism, so we didn't invite people to something that wasn't going to happen.
He complained about us doing the interview on Thursday and we explained that it was the only day Candela and Franco could, but that didn't satisfy him. Well there was nothing we could do so we went on Thursday so Candela and Franco could try on the baptismal clothes, do the interview, and the second the interview was done we sent the flyer.
Then began the other problems. We needed photos of them for the baptism but Candela is very shy and she didn't want any photo thah showed a lot of her face, so she picked a foto of herself with one of those dog filters. We tried to get her to pick literally any other photo but she only wanted that one.
So we put the photo in the invitation and sent it to the group of leaders and the leader of young women complained about the photo, telling us that Candela wasn't taking her baptism seriously if she wanted to use that photo. We explained that Candela was very serious about her baptism and had been praying, reading the book of mormon, and was ready for this commitment.
We didn't get a response and that night there was a reunion of leaders and the next day after we put the invitation in our WhatsApp story we recieve a text from the Relief Society president saying not to upload the invitation because last night they agreed they were going to change the photo, and also they weren't going to hold an after-party.
How are they going to change the photo when there literally isn't any other photo? And how will there not be a little after-party when a lot of non-members will be coming to see how this Branch welcomes their new members?
By the way, we're receiving all these messages in the middle of being in the streets being rejected by literally every single person we talk to in the middle of one of the coldest, windiest weeks in Tres Arroyos (It never snows here and the weather says it will snow tomorrow).
Anyways after a lot more passive aggressive messages from more members we go to our weekly coordination meeting and before the reunion I was already crying from stress but I pulled myself together to be ready for the reunion. The reunion is all normal and everything is going smoothly until the very end where the ward mission leader begins to criticize us in front of all the other missionaries, the second counsler of Relief Society, and the first and Second Counslers of the Branch.
He tells us we planned the baptism way too late, we didn't inform anything, we always screw up the baptisms, bringing up the mistakes we made in the past, telling us we can't be disorganized and the Saviors Church doesn't run this way. Anyways I start sobbing and within seconds I'm in a full fledged panic attack and I have to leave the room to calm down.
(By the way, knowing this might happen we had called him earlier in the day, explaining pur thoughts and feelings, and giving him a chance to be kind and express his thoughts and feelings personally, but he chose a different route)
It takes me 10 minutes to recover and then the first counselor calls us in for a personal interview and is basically like, "the only thing I want is to calm you down." We explain everything, he apologizes and tells us we're doing a good job, but it's a little hard to believe that after being publically shamed. We asked the elderes for a blessing which helped a little then we went home and just crashed.
The next day we were like, okay, forget everything that just happened, we're going to focus on the baptism so everything is perfect. So we spend the day cleaning the font, buying food for the after-party that the first counsler and Branch President approved, inviting people to the baptism, and cooking up some plan B's. This day was again filled with passive agressive messages but we ignored them and focused on what we could do.
The next day the baptism went perfectly. There literally wasn't a single problem. It was the smoothest and happiest day. We had 6 friends who came to church then stayed after for the baptism, one of said on the spot that she also wanted to be baptized, and Candela and Franco were so so happy.
So much of their family came and they loved the little after-party and it was an opportunity for them to get to know a lot more members. It was literally the perfect day.
Pensamiento EspÃritual
Anyways sorry for the rant, it really was a hard week, but in the end I really saw the fruits of our labor. I know that the scriptures I shared at the beginning are true. When we labor with all our might, God supports us in our afflictions and the joy we feel when we see the fruits of our labors is in measurable 💕
Also this week I hit a year in the mission! 🥳 we didn't celebrate so there's no proof, but I promise it's true haha
