We talked and talked and talked about Christ

Family Family Where are you!!!!!

Well we had another baptism this week of a 25 year old single mother. She is best friends with the lady that we baptized the week before. We began to teach her more and more as she listened in on our conversations with Bertha. Her name is Paola. At first it was really hard for her to understand the importance of the gospel. We struggled explaining it to her in a way that was simple enough for her to understand, and for her to get excited enough to do. We did finally get her to come to church… when she started to come with us there was a change in her character and she began to accept everything a whole lot easier. In reality it is a great blessing to have people in the church that are ready to fellowship our investigators. We have been focusing on this dilemma in our ward counsels and in our classes that we teach on Sundays. We need to have a ward that focuses on how to help an investigator stay in the church and not just come to church for one week. Paola really likes the church a lot now and she is going to all of the activities that we have and she loves being in the class with all of the young people that we have in my ward so…. She is happy.

I have been doing a lot of thinking in these last few days and I can say that I have learned a lot of really valuable lesson, a lot of really valuable concepts, that I hope and pray I can apply in my life. One of the biggest lessons that I am learning, because it is a process, is how to show love. I think that best way to show love to someone else is through service. I have talked to many people here in Peru, many less actives, many nonmembers that for their reasons and for their misplaced judgments fall away for the church or don’t accept its teachings.  This last week we were talking with a less active member that is a about 25 years old… about the reason for not going back to the church… he gave us a lot of different excuses and we really didn’t arrive at any certain conclusion. About half way through the lesson he had a knock on his door and in enter a very tall, very white person. What I mean to say is one of the very first Gringos that I have had the opportunity to talk to in my mission. She was a girl in her late 20s from Norway. As we began to talk to them both we thought to try to take advantage of the opportunity and explain the gospel… as we asked some basic question to get to know her and him…. We arrived at a startling conclusion. She blatantly told us that God doesn’t exist. My companion and I quickly realized why he wasn’t going to church. To explain what happened briefly we talked and talked and talked about Christ. We told her that he lives, that he loves us, and that he wants us to return. We asked her to pray to know if God existed, and she told us no.

Love is the glue that keeps us all together. I hope that when I come home from my mission that you all, at home, can identify a changed man. Someone with more determination, someone that just doesn’t act but thinks about the repercussions, someone that shows more love for those that love him. I realized in that lesson that we did everything in our power to show HIS love to that person, but it will always be in their hands to make a righteous decision. Likewise it will be in my hands to show a change, a spiritual and intellectual progression, when I come home this October. Know that I am resolute in my objective and firm in my vision. I will go and do the things that the Lord commands…. 

Fighting the good fight (kicking butt and taking names)

ELDER HARRIS