Miracle Stories

August 3, 2015

Missionary payday week:) This week was great. We definitely had the sweetest spiritual experiences that I have had in this area this week. 

The first came from one of our progressing investigators, "M.".  "M." is Canarian and your typical non practicing catholic. We had our lesson with her this week with a couple of my favorite members ("C." and "T.") and "M." testified that when she read the BoM she felt something, she went off about just how much she loves church, and the best part: when she took out 3 pages of notes that she had taken on 2 Nefí 31 and (even though we had been planning to teach her about The gospel of Jesus Christ) she began teaching us! The Spirit was so strong. We invited her to be baptized and she accepted. She doesn't want to rush into anything so she then fasted with us Sunday to help her recognize her answer and know the date she should be baptized. 

We also had a couple great experiences with "P.", Hna Santiago is a literary genius so I´m just gonna steal her words for the first story: 

"Remember "P."? the Cuban!?  We had brought a member with us that, in this one lesson, basically taught all five lessons for us! His name is Hermano "C.", he is from Uruguay, and was the former president of this ward when it was just a branch. (I also would love for y'all to just picture the type of spanish conversation we had going on here.  Picture: a couple of Cubans, a man with a thick accent from Uru-J-uay, and a couple gringo hermanas with a Madrileño accent. It was great.) Anyways, we got to this part in the lesson, where "P." starts expressing his doubts about whether or not miracles still occur in our days. We shared a few scriptures from Moroni 10. Then, I have this thought pop into my head ¨share an experience from when I had a blessing when I was sick or had a surgery or something, wait NO my companion totally had brain surgery, and that tops it all! Have her share something¨ So she shares her experience, (it was perfect, (she also has a great scar she promises them they can see later) WELL, next pipes up Hermano "C.", who had to have a surgery to remove some super rare something that he had in his stomach area. Something that almost no one survives from. He tells a story about how the doctors told his wife and daughter he would probably not live past the surgery, and how he received a priesthood blessing, and then ....he POPS UP, lifts his white buttoned-up-tucked-in-to-his-dress-pants-dress-shirt and shows us all this wicked cool scar. Then talks about how he survived, and how that was a miracle due to the blessing he had received and the faith he had. Well this started "P." off. (He was a surgeon back in Cuba) He then jumps up and says I know what you mean man! Look at my scar, and then he proceeds to lift up his shirt! I'm not going to lie, the scars were impressive, though I just feel like maybe next time we could arrive at the same conclusion and testimony that miracles do exist, just maybe with less nudity! Anyways, "P." continues reading in the Book of Mormon DAY and NIGHT, and we can't wait to see him enter into the covenant of baptism."

Hahaha! It was pretty funny! But now "P." understands: Miracles do exist. We ended up meeting with him again on Sunday and he accepted a baptismal date after hearing the lesson of the Restoration again. Such a powerful lesson. I think what really hit him was the reality of the Apostasy. Really did happen. The literally power of God to cleanse us completely from sin was taken off the earth. No man could be saved. (Another great reason to do family history! Our ancestors need us!) Then that power was restored. It really is incredible. I´m so happy for "P.".

CPdE:  Happy thought of the week. We were sitting on a bench in a park teaching our recent convert. In the middle of teaching him about priesthood blessings an African father hollers out to his son who is climbing a fence: "Daniel, I will cut off your ear! Get down from there!" But with a super think African accent! Hahahaha! I was laughing so hard! Especially cause the African man and his wife had been visiting with a Spanish lady in Spanish. The earlier warnings had all been in Spanish and then I think he changed to English so nobody would understand when he said "Daniel, I will cut off your ear!" Bahahahaha!!!! But I did. ^-^

Sorry this letter is so all over the place! My head is in a million places today! I love you all and I love emails! ;) 

Have a great week!

Love, Hna Finch

Our favorite recent convert that's not ours! Hipstering it in the guagua (bus)!

And then that happened! :)

The day of dirt roads and ditches:

From Hna Santiago:  "They changed the bus schedule on us. We pull into the pueblo we needed to be at for a lunch appointment. The bus normally pulls in, passes by about 5 or 6 stops. We normally (when I say normally, I mean to say EVERY TUESDAY) get off at the last stop. Well, the bus pulls in, stops at the first stop, then swings around the round about and goes out of the town. . . . I start slapping my companions leg. . . ¨Hermana! hermana! hermana! The bus is leaving! ITS LEAVING! as in leaving. Adeje.!¨ So we casually get off at the next stop, and what walk a mile to the stop that will take us back into the pueblo, then wait a half hour or more for the bus to even come? NO. we just hike right back up this mountain that separated us. Yeah that's right! We even sang that cute primary hymn.. ¨something something something and walked and walked and walked and walked¨ Then we get to the top and realize... Oh there´s a fence. That´s nice! But hey look at that view though! Right? Okay long story short. It was actually the fastest way! Hermana Finch tried to jump the fence (turned out to be the wrong one.. that actually led into a different fenced in area of the local catholic church. A lady came out, we quickly ran along and TA DAAA I found that the fence had an end, and it landed us just exactly where the bus would've let us in the first place! Well, that happened just two more times I think, but hey! those views though!"

Master the tempest is raging, but only in Guía de Isora