Jasmine's Baptism

Sunday, December 27, 2009 11:32 PM

This week has been fine, not a whole lot to update on. This week has not exactly been the most productive and we have the lowest numbers of my whole mission, but when I got here my companion was SUPER sick. She felt really bad about being so sick, but the thing about a missionary, is if you go out in the wet and cold when you can't even talk in the first place day after day, it never gets better. Which, is what she'd been doing for 2 weeks and kept getting worse. We went and saw a doctor who put her on a lot of drugs and stuff, and now, a week later, she's a lot better, so next week should be a lot more busy, at least I hope so...I'm not sure what it is, but a lot of times I move to areas that aren't exactly dead, but they are in transitions, so I get there and it's a rare investigator or 2 that are coming to church or progressing.

We supposedly are the sisters for 5 wards. I know we technically go to two, and I'm not sure what our rights are on the other wards I know we at least have investigators passed over at times, if we find someone in those areas we teach them, and the Elders ask us to help with lessons such as the Law of Chastity for their females... so I'd like to find out, and if I'm in this area long enough, if we really have the rights to attend the wards too. At least the Shipai one. With so many different wards, I think a lot of good membership work could be done in this area. I just by no means want to step on any Elders toes. I'd just like to do more finding work through members, which means get to know more members.

It's all not certain how long I'll stay though, and it's going to take a lot of thinking, since all the chapels are in 4 different places of 5, and even the two wards that meet together are at the same time...so we switch off going to Danshui or Beitou every week, so that's already hard to get to know the members, if I'm only here a transfer, they would have seen me 3 times only at church. So yeah, we'll discuss it more at WPS what we can do to pump up such a large area that doesn't have a whole lot going on right now. I see a lot of contacting next week, but if we do things right, plan and stuff, after a week of contacting, and planning we should be able to fill up our schedule with appointments, especially since there is a lot of travel involved, so eventually contacting should be on way to appointments. That's always the ideal, but its just not the case right now. I'm not sure why, but that's how it was when I got to Jilong too. It ended up being built up. I guess every area goes through it.

As for any information of anything we did this week, the news is in Jilong. Saturday I had permission to go to Jasmine's baptism. It was amazing, but quite an interesting experience as well. I felt really self-conscious because it wasn't my area and I didn't want to get in the other sister's way, but they were both really good. They had me introduce her and sit next to her. They sat next to her mom so they could get to know her mother better. I felt the spirit so strongly at her baptism and I know Jasmine was one of the most prepared people I have had the opportunity to meet on my mission. It was actually really not the perfect baptism for her, but she responded positively to pretty much everything. First, the boy she asked to baptize her, has a bad habit of being late. I remember last last week when she asked him to baptize her, she asked if he was going to be late. He even laughed at that. But then, he was honestly late!!! I got up and introduced her after a song and prayer...I got to talk about how helpful she was, from the first moment she met us how she wanted to know if we were lost and help us out, and how she would teach us as she learned to apply the scriptures in her life extremely fast...then I sat down and a new member Yiting gave a talk. I noticed towards the end of the talk Michael was still not there, and told the Elders to call him. They got up and stood in the back. After Yiting, us missionaries did a little musical number from the primary hymn book. He finally showed up in his clothes during the musical number and sat in my seat. Then, it looked messy as we all had to change chairs since he was sitting in one of ours.

Right after the number was the baptism, so he was barely in the nick of time...but he didn't show up early like he was supposed to! So, they never practiced. They get in the font, which was cold, and he baptizes her good, totally under, but then E. Leavitt is like...Um, you are raising the left hand to the square! So then, they had to do it again, but her knee came up, so they had to do it a third time. In the locker, she was cold and was like, OH MICHAEL, it's all his fault, I couldn't breath. But she got over it really fast and told me she was scared the first time, so God gave her the opportunity to do it so she wasn't scared and so that she was extremely clean.

She talked as she bore her testimony about how she was scared and it was really dark so she said a prayer, and before she even said Amen, S. Kunzler and I said hi. Then she talked about how she went to church a lot, but it never felt RIGHT. But, when she met us she was really able to read the Book of Mormon and feel the love of a Father in Heaven, a love she was never able to feel from a Father growing up. It was a beautiful testimony and I was touched that we got the opportunity to teach such an amazing girl! She really strengthened my testimony. I know that God will put us in people's paths who are prepared and willing to hear the gospel if we are doing what's right.

That night we met her at the bus stop, we were just on the way to another lesson. Jesus performed miracles on the way, and I've noticed that us missionaries can do a lot of good on the way as we open our mouths and use the Spirit and faith. The Spirit is so important in our lives! Always live worthy of his guidance. I've learned it is just so important to have the Spirit as our guide. And that's the promise after baptism, is the Spirit. It's so important to us as we do the endure to the end part of our lives.  How blessed we are that Heavenly Father gave us such a happy path to follow his Son. The only way.

I read an article this week that helped me realize that the only intelligent way to do things, is the obedient way in which we give our will to God. I'm in no way perfect, but every day I'm trying to be a little more better. I hope you all can do the same.

I'm excited that I'm still in this area, I should see Jasmine Sunday at the monthly Taibei fireside, so there were no tearful goodbyes like with Sister Kunzler when she went far to Xinzhu. Just a see you all Sunday. We left right away after the service because I did not want to be home late. We go t home in plenty of time.

At church this week, we went to Beitou and the member support there is really amazing. I was happy to meet people who are so supportive of the missionaries.

That's my week here! I love you guys! See you next week!

Sister Flora Bruno