A Perfect Baptism

Hey everyone! We had the baptism yesterday instead of Saturday and it was perfect. We held it on Sunday so the members didn´t have to adjust their schedules to attend. It really was amazing though. I have never been so stressed in my life! I wanted everything to go perfect for her. The only thing that could have been better was the temperature of the water. I filled up the font a little bit too early and by the time the baptism rolled around the water was a little nippy. Not too bad though. I´m just glad she didn´t gasp or anything like that haha. (I´ve seen girls pretty much scream). Overall it went extremely well. I will send my mom a picture of it for you all to see. She was so excited but so nervous haha! I was sitting next to her during the service and she kept sighing out loud so I could tell she was nervous. The best part was after her baptism when she bore her testimony. She bore a simple testimony of how she knows this church to be the church of God and the Book of Mormon to be true. It made me so happy. She is excited to share the gospel as well! Her boyfriend was there and he loved it to. I want to push them to get married in the temple in April of 2011 so I can be there haha. That would be amazing. Yesterday something else really good happened too. We went over to the second counselors house and talked about his mom. He had just gotten back from her house and she said she wants to be baptized in December before I leave the area! We don´t have a fixed date but I hope it really happens. I put a scripture on Vanessa´s baptismal program just for Silvia (second counselors mom) and I think it worked. Mosiah 18:10. We still have some work to do with her though. Earlier this week we had our conference with Elder Kopischke and it was great. When we asked questions, he went into some serious depth! It was amazing. Elder Awerkamp actually came and stayed with me in my apartment the night before the conference! He is serving a couple of hours away from Barcelona so he came in the night before for the conference. I hadn´t seen him for 6 months. It was good to see an old friend again. I hope Thanksgiving was really good for all of you! I got a package from my mom the day of thanksgiving and I laughed my head off. Turkey jerky, dried cranberries, potato pearls, and gravy mix with stuffing. That was pretty creative mom. Anyway I love you all and I´m so thankful for this opportunity I have been given to serve a mission for the Lord. It has blessed my life so much. I love you all and I hope you have a wonderful week! Love, Elder Langston

Baptism Coming Up. Yee Haw!

Hello everyone! How are we doing? I´m doing just dandy and I´m so excited for the baptism this weekend. We asked Vanessa who she would like to baptize her and she chose me so I´m pretty nervous. I hope I don´t have to triple dip her or anything haha. I´m happy I get to finally step in the water though. Its going to be an amazing experience. Yesterday I felt the spirit so strong when we were teaching Vanessa and her boyfriend bore his testimony and told us how thankful he was for the missionaries that brought the gospel into his life. Vanessa put her arm around him and gave him a hankerchief to wipe away his tears haha. Usually its the other way around. It was a really cool experience though. The secretary in the ward pulled a fast one on me again and asked me to speak in sacrament right before it started. Of course the subject was missionary work. I whipped something up in Sunday school and it actually went pretty well. I talked about how we can apply the Book of Mormon to our missionary work and used chapter 18 of Alma to do it. I just talked about the things he did as a missionary step by step and applied it to us today. I don´t know how I came up with it because I was already really stressed. We didn´t have the greatest week teaching wise. We mostly taught in the street and knocked doors. I actually love knocking doors so I was happy. This week Elder Kopischke from the quorum of the 70 is doing a tour of the misson so we have a conference with him on Wednesday. I´m really excited to learn from a General Authority in person. I think thats about all the news I have for the week. I hope you all have a great Thanksgiving (We don´t celebrate here) and get full and fat. We have an eating appointment that day and we always get full so no worries mom. I love you all and thank you so much for the support. Oh! And congratulations on your mission call to Japan Blake. You are going to be an amazing missionary. Talk to you next week.

Hello everyone! I´m still doing just fine out here in Barcelona. It is getting kind of cold though. Good thing my grandma sends me ankle length underwear haha. As for news in the past week, we had a baptism in the ward. It was weird because Elders from a neighboring town were teaching a man that lived in our ward because a lady that takes care of him is a member and goes to their ward. So he was baptized on Saturday and it went really well. It was pretty stressful though because it felt like I was in charge of everything and I had to make sure it went through smoothly. I had to run to the mission office and make programs for his baptism, run to the church and fill up the font, and prepare a message for his baptism all on Saturday morning. It was really fun figuring out how to fill up the font when nobody knows how to do it and the instructions for turning on the water heater are in spanish. I figured it out though so I guess that proves I understand spanish haha. It was a pretty crazy day but it all worked out really good. Vanessa is still excited about being baptized on the 28th. Just like everybody else that is investigating the church, she is having problems that keep coming. People at work are telling her lies and things like that. It seems that Satan always finds a way to throw obstacles in our paths. She is strong though and it really helps that her boyfriend is a member. Just as a side note, the dominican ladies invited me and my companion over to eat with them again on Saturday. They love us for some reason. They aren´t progressing so I wasn´t really expecting much when we gave the message. I started off by saying that all I had on my mind was baptism and explained how it is an essential saving ordinance and that Christ said it himself. I then read her some verses out of the Bible about baptism. Afterwards she kind of just sat there and said "What you have read has touched my heart and I think I need to let you baptize me". It was crazy! I wasn´t expecting it at all. It was an amazing experience because we hadn´t planned baptism as the lesson. It was keeping the sabbath day holy. I know the Holy Ghost directed that appointment. So as of now she wants to be baptized but she can´t come to church because of work. I explained to her before baptism we have to keep certain commitments and show God that we are ready to take upon us the covenant of baptism. We have a little bit to work with but I think she can overcome some of her obstacles. Thats about it for the week. I love my mission! I know this church is true. The small little miracles I am seeing on the mission are strenghtening my testimony and changing my life. I love you all and I hope you have a great week! Love, Elder Langston

Another Great Week!

Well hello everyone. This week was great as usual. It seems like this whole transfer things have just been going really good! I remember I was worried too because I had to take over the area and schedule everything but I guess there was nothing to worry about. Anyway, Halloween was just great. We dressed up as missionaries and went out and taught people. Vicente wasn´t baptized though. I talked to him and he just doesn´t feel prepared to make that covenant. We did take a step forward though and got him to pray specifically about the Book of Mormon and its truthfulness. Another thing, we set a baptismal date with Vanessa!!! She is the one who has the boyfriend that is a member and bore his testimony the week after we found him and invited him to church. We thought they were married but they aren´t. Usually that is a problem because when people are boyfriend and girlfriend here, they live together. Buth they don´t! So we taught her after church and set the date for the 28th of November. I just hope I´m here to see it. Working with her boyfriend is going to be key. It will be such an advantage for her to always be around a member. He is a great guy and really trying to make changes in his life. I also finally got a rope around the second counselor of the bishopric and told him we are going to need his help if he wants to see his mom baptized soon along with his nephew. We set up a meeting for all of us for the next Sunday. If things go good I will see at least 3 baptisms here pretty soon. I just hope I stay! I can´t believe I have already been in this ward for 5 months. Things are going really good in this mission right now. At the end of last year they set a goal to get 400 baptisms this year. Last year they got 307. We are at about 330 I believe with a few weeks a left in the year. President Hinckley did the stats a little while ago and we needed to baptize 11 a week in the mission to reach our goal. So our mission did a special fast and I think we saw 15 or 16 people enter the waters of baptism! I am so excited! I hope I can contribute to the mission here soon. Well thats about it. I hope life is just dandy back home haha. I love you all. Love Elder Langston