Week 52 - The Week of Opposition in all things

Well unfortunately this week was not quite at the level of miraculous as last week if I'm being completely honest.

This entire week we weren't able to find S, who was supposed to be baptized on Saturday, but we never found her and could never do her interview so that was a little rough and she didn't come to church either so we're going to try and pass by a little more during this week to see if we can figure out what happened. Here's hoping.

M. and Y. are still doing pretty good. We had a charla with them on Tuesday and planned another charla with them on Friday. Well I don't know what we did, but we forgot to give them a reading assignment somehow.  Nonetheless, we showed up on Friday and it turns out they had just opened to a random spot in the book and read anyway which basically never happens. They are really awesome and we're super excited for them, but they didn't come to church either yesterday, so we're going to have to talk about that a little more during this week.

H. is still accepting the charlas really well, the only thing is that he still doesn't feel comfortable coming to church by himself. He has a less active family near him that are in the process of reactivating, but its not the most sure option that we have of helping him come to church. Yesterday this family slept in, so even though H. was all ready to go he didn't come because this family didn't go, which is a little rough.

The highlight of the week though was a family night that we did with President Wilson and all his extended family. N. and J. were there! They are still progressing well also, but we weren't able to have a charla with just them this week due to circumstances out of our control so they still don't have a baptismal date planned, and they had a trip to Rivera planned for yesterday so they didn't come to church either.

Sometimes the weeks happen where there's not a whole lot happening but that's fine with me, because sometimes the things we want don't come immediately. We have to have hope in the blessings that come in being diligently obedient even when things aren't easy. This week I gave in talk in church about that actually, and I wanted to share one cool thing that was impressed upon my mind as I studied for that talk. My talk was mainly based on this Scripture (Moroni 7:41)

   "And what is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise." 

After reading this scripture, a question came to me, "What does it mean to have hope in the Atonement of Christ?" I thought of 3 quick answers:

1. Trust in His power to Forgive. Which means that we can't be so hard on ourselves. There's no reason to hold on to the pain of mistakes we make. (Alma 36:17-19)

2. Trust in His power to Refine. The purpose of the Atonement of Jesus Christ is not to just give us forgiveness of sins, but it is an opportunity to overcome weakness. (Ether 12:27)

3. Trust in His power to Comfort. The other purpose of the Atonement of Jesus Christ was to be able to experience our pains and sicknesses. He knows all of our problems and can "succor" us. (Alma 7:11-13)

Well that's all! Love you all! Nos vemos!

-Elder Martin

One year mark today!