Elder Chad Peterson: Unexpected Changes

Hello Everyone, I am sorry in advance that I was not able to get a group email out last week. It has been a crazy past week and there has been so much that has happened that it feels like everything is going in one big blur. Anyways so last week in Nochixtlan was awesome. We had so many experiences that really showed us that the Lord was working with us once again. One of the greatest experiences that we had was one were we were walking down the street trying to hurry to meet a member to go to a lesson with us. All of a sudden we began to hear weird yelling noises but we kept on walking. Eventually we had to turn around and see what the noises were and we saw a girl in her early 20s running down trying to catch us. We walked up to her and we immediatly realized that she was deaf and couldnt talk. Neither me or my companion knew sign language but we did the best that we could to try to communicate with her. She eventually showed us her house and we communicated by writing to her. She said that she wanted to learn and that she would accept any pamphelts that we had. We put an appointment with her it was amazing to think that Heavenly Father prepares all his children to recieve the gospel, no matter what difficulty that they have. Afterwards we had a lesson and we showed up with a guy named Fernando. He has had a lot of questions and doubts with us and when we got there he asked us why the world was a sad place with lots of problems. We told him it was because they didnt keep the Sabbath Day holy and that if they did that then there would be peace in our individual lives and in the world. We were lead completely by the spirit and as Nephi said, we were lead "not knowing the things which we should do." It was one of the most spiritual days of my mission and one where the spirit was so strong in everything that we did. That night we got home and began to report. I found out that my convert Omar was coming out to Oaxaca to go to the temple for the first time. So I called President Madsen to ask him permission to go to the temple. While I was on the phone with him he told me that I had to pack all of my stuff because I had also recieved a transfer to an area in the city called Casa Blanca. He told me that I had also recieved a new assignment to become his assistant for the next 6 months. I didnt know what to say and asked if I would accept or not. Anyways I was up until 2 that morning packing my bags, we got up at 4 to go to the temple with Omar. Omar was so happy to be there and it was so amazing to see the conversion that he has had in the past 6 weeks. He told me that he had been going out with the missionaries to teach and that he was involved in all of the youth activities. That made me so happy to hear all of that!! Afterwards I reported to the offices and we began working on all of the logistics of the changes and getting trained by Elder Madera the old assistant. It was really overwhelming to hear all that we will have to do during this time. During my first 4 days here we didnt have a chance to go to our real house, we were living in the offices the whole time trying to get everything finished that we had to do. But the Lord blessed us once again by preparing people for our diligent efforts that we were able to put forth. When we finally got back to the area we had an investegator waiting named Eloy. He is 70 years old and has gone through a ton of trials. He has been really accepting of everything and has come to have a strong testimony of the repentance. Afterwards he understood the importance of baptism and told us that he wanted to be baptized in 3 weeks. We were so excited and afterwards we taught him the restoration and there has not been a moment with him where the spirit wasnt present with him. Tonight we have plans to teach him in the temple waiting room, we are excited for that and know that we will be blessed once again and more importantly he will recieve the blessing of the spirit in his life. The Lord has strengthened all of us that are serving right now and recieving his love. My joy is full for this one soul that has influenced our lives this week. I know that this is the work of the Lord and that he lives. Elder Peterson