2 Little Miracles

Hey friends and family.

So this week we had two pretty sweet things happen.

First, Omar got the Aaronic Priesthood!  He specifically asked bishop to give it to him (hurray for member friends!)  This upcoming week we will be talking to him a bit about passing the sacrament then in a few
more weeks we get him blessing the sacrament.  Sulema (the wife) bore her testimony in church.  I don't know if I mentioned this, but she bore her testimony the day of her baptism at the pulpit.  She is fearless.  The ward is doing a baptisms for the dead trip next week and we need to get the Lopez family ready to go!  We found out
yesterday that Sulema's mom died after giving birth to her, so she never met her.  We really hope we will be able to get all the information needed to help her be baptized for her!  So ya, they are still doing super awesome.

Next, we found a part-member family not on the ward list this week. This is probably my favorite type of people to work with.  So the mom, Vicky, was baptized about 20 years ago.  She was attending the El Monte ward which is about 20 minutes from where we are.  She then started moving around a lot to avoid some death threats and in the process she lost contact with the church.  3 months ago, she met a member of our ward, Carol.  She didn't know that Vicky had been baptized.  Now, we'll rewind a second.  Last week, we started teaching one of Carol's friends at her house.  We set a return appointment for Tuesday morning. On Monday, the friend cancels the return appointment through Carol, but she forgets to tell us.  So we show up and are initially disappointed not to find her there.  But Vicky was there. Carol was doing some stuff in the kitchen so she told Vicky that she
should sit down and talk to us for a second (Carol at this point still didn't know that she was already a member). We start talking and she has forgotten most of what she had learned before, but never forgot how she felt.  She has a 9 year old daughter Terry that we are now teaching and she is the sweetest, most prepared 9 year old ever. They came to church yesterday and loved it.

The work is picking up in our area!  We were able to hit the standard of excellence in every category this past week. We're having a good time.  Hope that all of you are well.

Invitation:  I get home at the end of September.  For all those that read this email, I invite you to look for 1 person to bring into the church or back into to the church.  If you are needing some ideas to get started, check out Elder Ballard's talk from Oct 2013 conference. When I get home, I would love to hear your stories!

Love you all!

Elder Christensen

NOTE: When I asked Tanner if he was for sure coming home on the September transfer instead of the November one (because his 2-yr mark is in October), he said he'd love to ask for an extension, but it's highly unlikely he'd get it. He said no one is getting them. I didn't tell him this, but I am totally okay with that!  :)   ...4 1/2 months and trying not to count!!  :)  

Thank you all for your love and support for Tanner!

--Sheila