Week 52 One year!!!!

Well it was another great week!  It went by really fast. It is crazy how fast the time goes by. We found a lot of new people this week and they all went to the church. We ended with 6 people in the church and of the six, 4 of them have baptismal dates. In total we have 5 baptismal dates in total. We also had a lot of less active members at church. I think we ended up having like 13 of them at church. It was pretty fun to see so many people in the church.  We have about 150 in the ward so it is still growing. We are trying to get to 210 which was the most the ward has ever had at church.

One of the kids we are teaching is Jordan. He is 13 and went to church this Sunday. He also went and played soccer with the ward Saturday. He liked the church alot and wants to be baptized August 22

There is also Elizabeth. She is 11 and is a cousin of a member. She went to church aswell and liked it. 

We are also teaching someone that can´t talk. She only says si or no. She can understand everything, she just cant talk. She has been to the church 2 times now, and really soon she could be baptized.

Also Joseph (after Joseph Smith) went to church. He is 9 and is parents are members and his brothers and sisters, they just have not been going to church lately so he has not been baptized. He likes the church and the 22nd he should be baptized aswell. 

We are teaching Mercedes. She has gone to church 2 times but she could not go this week. She ended up working, but hopefully this week she can go and be baptized the 18th. 

We also have a 14 year old kid named Jordy. He has gone to church 2 times aswell, and we are waiting for permission from his parents to baptize him. He really likes the church aswell, and could be baptized the 18th.

These are the people we are teaching right now. It was a great week. I am loving the work here in Diamante and the members are helping us a lot. We had 41 lessons we taught this week with the  members.  I hope that everyone has a great week! 

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 51

Hey!

We had a great week! We had a training with President Torres this week. We also had to move houses, so we are now living in a new house. Elder Munoz also had transfers  and I am now with Elder Del Pino. He is from Peru and has 15 months on the mission. We have had a good time working and found some new people this week. We also had the baptism of Rodrigo. It was a pretty eventful week and it went by fast.

We had 8 investigators in the church yesterday. It was nice to see the people there after a lot of work this week. We had Mercedes an older lady that has now been to church 2 times. We has Justin who also has been to church 2 times. Jordy a 14 year old that has went for the first time. Andres another 14 year that is friends with Jordy. It was cool to see the 2 friends there. We also had some people that are not married so we have to wait a little bit before they are baptized. 

On Saturday for the baptism it was pretty crazy. We got to the church at 2 to fill up the baptismal font, but for some reason the font did not want to fill up. We started to fill up buckets and put the water in the font using water from the bathroom. That still was not working. We talked to someone in the ward and he told us the water tank was empty. There was a big acitvity for the Relief Society in the morning and they used all the water. We found that out at like 530. We were stressed and had no idea what to do. In the end we called some other missionarys that had a baptism, and we had the baptism in their church. It ended really well, and there was like 25 people that went. We had  cake and soda and everything went really well. 

Well that was the week. It went by super fast and we worked pretty hard. Hopefully we can get the same people to church and find some new people to teach on top of that.

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 49

Hey Guys

Well it has been a pretty great  this week! We worked really hard to find some people and in the end everything worked out. We ended up having the 3 baptism!  We had 9 investigators and 9 less active people at church. The ward missionaries were pretty happy to see that all their worked paid off. It was really cool.

The people that got baptized are Yajaira, Johana, and Dalenber. They are a family. Their mom has was also at church Sunday, so maybe pretty soon we will be baptizing her. She plays a lot of bingo which is a pretty big thing here, and so she usually can not go to church on Sundays.

We will not be having any baptism this week, but the next week we should be having 2 more. They are named Rodrigo and Ediin. Rodrigo is 18 and his mom and sisters are members, he just never wanted to be baptized until now. Ediin is 12 and his cousins are the family who got baptized and he too would like to be baptized.  

We were busy working to teach a lot of people and thats about all we did this weeSorense
nt to find a bunch of people and had quite a bit of success in the end. We are going to have another great week and it will be fun to see who gets to church this next week. I hope everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

 

Week 50

Hey  guys!

Well we had another great week here in Diamante. We have been working hard to find some people to teach. It is pretty cool to see how some people are put in our path because it is their time to be baptized. We will be baptizing Rodrigo this week. We are pretty excited and his mom is too. It should be a great baptism. We have a family home evening with them tonight to get him more excited. Justin went out of town so he was not able to get to church but he should get baptized the next week.    

One thing that was really cool this week is the ward went to the temple. We were getting everyone of the converts excited to go, and in the end all of the recent converts were there. It is pretty cool because there is a lot of young men and young woman that are helping and getting their friends to church and they are starting to see the success of doing it. 

We also have another investigator names Mercedes. She is seems to be really interested and she went to the temple too. She just was outside of the temple, but she told us that she liked it alot. She was at church last week, and liked it too. It is pretty funny because as we were teaching her, one of her grandkids walked in, and it turns out he is a member that just has not been going to church.   

 Well that was pretty much our week. We worked hard and are starting to see the success of our work. I hope that everyone has a great week!

Love, Elder Sorensen

Week 48

Hey! 

Well some big news! I was transfered last week. I got the call Monday night at like 9 that I had transfers and had to be in Guayaquil in the morning at like 7. So I got my stuff packed and left. I am now back in Guayaquil in the sector Diamante. My companion is Elder Munoz from Hondorus. 

We will be having three baptisms this week, so I am pretty excited. There are 2 other people that could also be baptized we just got to get them excited for it, so in all we could have 5 baptisms this week if we work super hard. I am pretty excited about it. This ward is really cool. We have some ward missionaries that help us alot. They leave with us to help with visits every day for the entire day. It has been nice and they have helped us alot. We have a lot more people going to church in this ward too. There is 130 active members right now. My companion tells me that last month when he got here there were 70 people attending, so it is on the rise. 

Oh, and when I got here there was some other great news. Elder Williams is in the zone too! So I will be able to talk to him on Tuesdays and Saturdays. So I am pretty excited for that. Christmas was the last time I saw him. We had 8 people at church yesterday, and a bunch of less active people too. There is a lady we did not think was going to go to church because we went to her house and she was not there. We got to church and then like 20 minutes later she walked in with her kids, so that was pretty cool. 

It is very hot all week long. I forgot how hot it is here. The heat you can not leave it behind! The shade is just as hot as it is out in the sun. Everywhere you go is just hot! I am starting to get used to it again. 

Well that was my week, we have worked really hard and it was worth it because we had 8 investigators at church.  I am excited to see what we can do here in Diamante!

Love, Elder Sorensen