Dear Family,
Thank you for you letters! I wasn't aware that it was Thanksgiving—I'm
not sure if it is celebrated in Argentina, but I suppose that the
American one might be. However, today is a holiday of some sort, and
so we're heading off to play tennis with President Salas and his
family this afternoon.
The week went quickly, as usual! In the office we spent quite some
time running around downtown in the van, managing the sudden travel of
a missionary to Buenos Aires for visa issues, and helping with a
multi-stake service activity on Saturday.
We were in a lesson this week teaching about baptism. Thought: By
being baptized, we promise to God that we'll do everything that He
desires that we do, and upon making this covenant with Him, He
promised to give us the Holy Ghost, which will "show unto [us] all
things what [we] should do." It's an act of faith and demonstrates the
trust we have in Him and His requirement that we "offer [our] whole
souls as an offering unto him."
We've been working a lot with two long-time investigators, Zenon and
Estela Mari. They've been going to church for a year, and they're
waiting for Zenon's Bolivian documentation to arrive so that they can
be married and baptized. Zenon has been referred to as the
Investigator's Quorum President, and this week we've been working with
some of their acquaintances. One is Ruth, who is 18 and living
together with Hector, who is also eighteen, and they have one daughter
and another child on the way! Ruth wants to be baptised, and we met
Hector this week—the first thing that we taught them was about the
Atonement, then we talked about how we need to keep the commandments,
and then, to use a latin phrase that is commonly used in Spanish here
in the mission, ipso facto we taught them about chastity and invited
them to get married! Ruth came to church yesterday, and Hector, not
yet, so we'll be continuing to work with them. Ruth has a baptismal
date for the twenty-second.
We were in a lesson with Julio, a friend of a recent convert, and
Julio asked us, "So Elders, how is baptism done?" He wants to be
baptized on the 29th, he's been reading the Book of Mormon, and prays.
We met the mother-in-law and grandmother-in-law in this appointment,
and both also seem interested, so hopefully we'll get to teach them
this week too.
Thank you for writing to me! I love you all,
Elder Schlachter
