Hola Hola!!!! I never thought the day would come so fast! The change has officially come to an end. The news is..... I´m.... Staying!! in La Ligua for at least another change! haha. That means that I will be spending at least 1/4th of my mission here. And what a blessing is has been and will continue to be. Happy Birthday to the best Dad in the world!!! Congrats Tiffy and Aaron on Reiman James!!!! He is a beautiful little baby! I also have some news that has to do with babies. I am officially giving birth to a child in the mission!!! The Assistants called me sunday night and I am going to be training this next change!! I am super excited for this new challenging opportunity. The wierd thing is, I still feel Super young in the mission. It seems like yesterday I was in Tierras Blancas being trained by Elder Mace, now here I am on the other side of things. I will do my best and the lord will do the rest.
So this week was quite eventful, I must say. Lets start off with the results of this imfamous meeting with Pastor Vergara and Presidente Gillespie. To review, the purpose of this meeting was to converse over the issue of Pastor Vergara getting bapized to recieve the authority of God and to recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost by the laying on of hands by someone in authority to administer in this ordinance. Lets just say, the spirit did most of the work. In this meeting, the spirit was so strong. We came to the conclusion that this really is a huge decision. He has a congregation, lots of responsibilities and duties. This is not an easy decision. He is doing so much good and helping alot of people. But, President related it to a keyboard. In your church, you have lots of great doctrine and a lot of truth, but not all the truth. Its like having a keyboard with not all the keys. What we have today, thanks to Joseph Smith, is the full gospel, the whole keyboard. He now understands a little bit more the whole picture and has new desires to read the Book of Mormon. Nothing is too sure yet, but with time, he will gain a testimony of the true Gospel of Jesus Christ. In the meantime, we will be planning activites with our branch and his congregation. My new comp and I will be putting together a musical talent show or something in that ballpark. Help show them not just the fullness of the doctrine that the gospel brings, but the culture as well. The temporal and social effects that it has on families.
So this weekend was spectacular. On friday, Sebastián was baptized by his cousin Emilio Gallardo. This baptisimal service was one that I will never forget. The whole family of Sebastián came to see and support him. There were over 100 people there. After the baptism was realized, there came a nice little surprise for Elder Huamán and I. For some background, earlier on this week, we had a fun little activity in the plaza where we had one of the sisters in the branch who is an artist, paint the plan of salvation on a big piece of paper. Because of this, we had a nice big drawing. Since there were so many investigators here, President Palominos exhorted us that we could use this big drawing, take advantage of the situation, and teach the plan of salvation to all the people present. It was intense, but it was super successful! We had everyone interested. Following this improv presentation of the plan of salvation, there was an incredible musical number given by the Gallardo family. I could hear throughout the whole congregation, sniffles, due to the spirituality of the moment. After the service was over, we had a few relatives of Sebastián come up to us and ask us, "what do we have to do to be baptized?" They want us to go visit them. "The field is white all ready to harvest."
The next day, on Saturday, was the next unforgettable experience. After many stumbling blocks, emotional lessons, spiritual experinces, and work, the familia Collao Fres finally entered the waters of baptism. As you all know, members of the branch supported them by dressing up in white. It was a marvelous scene. Everything was perfect. I was trying so hard the whole night to be a man and not cry haha. I try to think of other times in my life where I was as happy as i was this night. They did it. They reached their goal. They recieved their testimonies that they are in the truth. They have hope and faith that through living the gospel, they will be an eternal family. They have their visions set on the temple. They have planned that in 1 year exactly, they will be going to the temple in Santiago, to be sealed for time and all eternity as a family. It is their desire that Elder Huamán and I are there with them. It will be right before I leave! I will thank God forever more for putting this incredible family in our path. I really don´t know if happiness like this exists outside of the gospel.
Well that will be all for this week! I love you all and pray for you often.
Que estén bien! Chao
Elder Millard
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