WHAT A WEEK. Seriously. I never knew it was possible all the things that happened this week.
Where to begin?? We will start with the sweet heart from Honduras. Beverly and her two sons Jason and Walter.
Beverly was taught by the boy missionaries a couple of months ago, but it never really went anywhere. Right before I got here Sister Harris and Sister Picuasi knocked on her door and she didn't even get up from the couch when her kids answered, she just said, no thanks, not really interested. Then a couple weeks later she just so happened to be at her friend Digna's house while we were teaching a lesson. We continued to teach her, she is AMAZING.
Her boys are also amazing, well, it depends on the day. They are either super good or SUPER BAD. Satan is to rediculous, like seriously redic!!! When ever a person is about to do something good in their life that is when Satan tries the hardest, the hardest! Either right before or right after. That doesn't mean he never stops trying, he just tries extra hard when we are about to make a big deal decision like getting baptized, going on a mission, going to the temple, deciding to come back to church and change our lives, before we get married. You know, he's just a punk like that. Anyway, we felt it super strong for sure this week. We were in a constant and bloody battle with the adversary.
So going into this week our ultimate goal was getting this whole family baptized, Beverly wanted it to be a family decision, so it was either all or none. We have a lesson with them on Monday night and the boys literally started a fire in their room during the lesson. Their two friends were over and they were just being boys, yelling at their mom, swearing, all that jazz. So they finally get calmed down and their two friends are twins, one is chubby and one is skinny so they literally call the gordo y flaco. Super funny. Flaco is such a bad influence and Gordo is such a sweetheart. So Gordo is only 8 but he was talking to me and was like hey, why don't you guys ever go visit my mom? You should go right now, she's home not doing anything. That ended that night.
The next night we go over, the lesson was great. We made cookie dough and had them shape out their favorite scripture stories and we talked about them but they also said they no longer wanted to get baptized cause they were scared of going under the water and just didn't think it's what they wanted to do. Next night, mission presidents wife came with us, we get there and Walter will NOT come out of his room cause he is glued to hs video game. His mom tells him to come out, sister johnson tells him to come out, he just won't. Sister Winn, never even met this boy, walks back in his room and just says, how do I push pause on this game? He just stops the game immediately, then she said, now their are messengers from God here to talk to you so do you mind coming out to listen to them? He came right out. The lesson was about the Holy Ghost so we hid candy bars and had one voice be the Holy Ghost that they had to listen to and the rest of us were trying to lead his astray. They were blind folded and it was so fun. They loved it, probably just cause they got candy. But we taught them about just like they couldn't see anything it was important that they tried really hard to listen to that good voice, so we just asked them in their prayers tonight to see what the good voice is telling them and if being baptized is something they really want to do and if it was the right thing to do. Next night the other sisters went over there and they were the worst they have ever been. They were being so rude to their mom, they listed to the lesson for maybe 2 second and just ran off. They got home and we were just like, what are we going to do? Their baptisimal interview was the next day and we weren't even sure if they wanted to be baptized or if they were ready... So we decided to fast. And oh my gosh did we pray SO hard. Just that whatever was supposed to happen would happen and that we would know what we were supposed to do. Their interview was at 7 the next night (friday).
Friday morning the zone leaders call us and say we just had a really strong impression that Elder Montgomery (this super funny elder that is great with kids) needs to do the interview with the boys tomorrow. This elder isn't in our area but we are going to bring him in for this special occasion. Great, we said, anything you feel you need to do just do it cause at this point we need ALL the help we can get. So we pray all day, go to her house at like 6:50, her sons are there, BUT SHE ISN'T. We were like, hey where is your mom? Oh she went to the store with Digna (by this point Digna does not want Beverly to be baptized because she couldn't get baptized). Oh my word. The Elders show up to do the interview, but we can't because she's not home. The Elders are like hop in our car and we will go to the store to look for her... but we can't get in their car cause we need 3 sisters. So the sprint to the end of the apartment complex to the member they just ate dinner with, this super week spunky bright colored makeup 80 year old runs back with them, and jumps in the car with us. We go to the store to look for her, not even there. But we do meet this black guy that flagged us down cause he wanted to go to church. So that was a blessing. We go back to Beverly's house and she's not there, so we call Digna cause Beverly doesn't have her cell phone, she lies to us and says that they aren't together. Then a couple minutes later Beverly calls back and says, sisters, so sorry I will be home in like 3 minutes. Perfect. One prayer answered. She gets home, we go in the house, now it's 8 pm and her sons are gone! We have NO idea where they are and they don't have a cell phone. By this point their is us and 4 other Elders are waiting to do this interview in their house. We were like Elders, what should we do? Could we do the interview tomorrow or what? They say, um... no... we have to do it tonight. We have to! So we say, okay. you guys go do the interview and we will look for the boys. Before we departed we all said a prayer together. I can't even explain it, but during the prayer I just saw and felt the power from Heaven pour down and knew something would work out. While they were doing in interview Sister Harris and I ran around to all their friends houses looking for them. They were no where. So on our way back, I felt like we should go a different way then we came. I see a group of kids so we go over there and start talking to them, lo and behold, Walter was there!! One down one to go. He said Jason was going to be coming back soon so we hung out with them and played soccer in the street, that was fun. But we just wanted to make sure he didn't run away again. Like 5 minutes later, Jason comes running up and is like, Walter you have to come home, the coolest guy is there doing magic tricks! Perfect, we didn't even have to convince them to go home. We walk in, this Elder Montgomery is sitting on the ground with gordo, flaco, walter and jason, doing magic tricks. It was amazing. After a while he was just joking around with them and was like alright which one of you guys want to be baptized tomorrow? They said they were thinking about it. He was just like well before you get baptized we do this crrrrrazzzzzy thing called an interview, do you care if we do it right now? So they did the interview, once again they were stoked on being baptized. Great, left the night feeling good about the baptism the next day, but we did have to change the time from 7 pm to 1:30 pm to gordo and flaco could be there cause they really wanted them to be there but they had to go with their dad at 3. So we got it done.
Saturday morning we get a phone call for Beverly she said, sisters, I think it might be better if my sons are baptized today and I am baptized another week cause I am having some lady problems and I don't even have any white underwear. Don't even fret, we went and got her some white underwear and I even explained to her how to use some certain lady products used in water cause she is latino so she's never used them before. Problem solved. BUT.... she was sitting on the couch, pulls out the underwear and was like HERMANAS, we look over and they are HUGE!!!! So big. We just started laughing SO HARD. It was hilarious. Funniest thing of my life.
Running out of time, but need less to say, even once we got to the baptism we faced so many challanges, they were serious about not wanted anyone to see so we had to baptize them with the doors shut, the Elder Montgomery had to come back over so he could baptize them, we had to get her some underwear that fit, we had to confirm them after church in the bishops office, the list goes on and on and on.
While we were laying in bed that night, I just said out loud, So He really means it when He says, "After ALL you can do, I will open the doors." We were really tested this week from the adversary, but it just showed me how strong Beverly and her kids are, and how important it was so the Lord that they were baptzied because He knows how amazing they are going to be, when they go on missions and baptized little hellians like themselves ha.
And we may or may not have had a nice photo shoot with the large underwear, so hope you enjoy the pictures.
I have seen SO many other miracles this week and seriously wish I had time to talk about them all. All in all, I know the Lord hears our prayers. I have never prayed harder in my life, but he was just seeing how hard we would try, and how much this really meant to us. You have no idea how amazing it felt to see walter and jason smiling and swimming in the font after their baptism and to see Beverly crying when her and her sons got baptized. It was incredible.
I love you all and hope you all NEVER forget the power of prayer when the adversary is pushing temptation to the limit. He always tempts us to doubt ourselves, do doubt our faith, and especially do doubt our Father in Heaven. But never do it. Never. The LORD ALWAYS WINS.
Love you all,
Love Sister Marshall
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