It Was A Very Good Week

Hello Friends!

We baptized a family this week.

The dad is already a member but invective. He joined the church in 1999 in Iowa when he was homeless and found a job working in Denny's. His boss and later roommate was a
member of the Church. The father of this family, we’ll call him Daniel, kept asking his roommate how he can be so happy all the time. His roommate remarked that it is because of his Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and he said that anytime he wanted he could find out more.

Eventually, Daniel was baptized and moved to Utah where he lived for a year. Later,
however, Daniel fell away from the church. The mom, who we will call Mary, had met with missionaries before and had attended church several times but did not join because of an abusive ex-husband.

My companion and I first met this family when an appointment had fallen through, we
decided to knock on some doors. When we knocked on this door, Mary answered and stated she has just put her baby down to sleep and asked us if we could come back later. She stated that she attended another church currently but that she has attended our church before. We asked when we could stop by again and she was really vague with us.

However, a week later we were talking with a member and he asked if we would stop
by this person’s house. When we looked at the address we stated we have met them already but that we would stop by again. This time when we passed by the mom let us right in because we said we have come to visit your daughter and your friend Brother Trigos sent us by. From there the rest is history.

This baptism was one of the best I have ever been to. Everybody was touched and uplifted and everyone felt the spirit more after they left. I am so grateful for the opportunity to have worked with this family, as they will always be in my hearts.
Please keep praying that we find families and especially a Spanish family.

I love you all and miss you so very much. I have especially missed the students from my class last year this past week. On of our new investigators, Melinda, brought out her little miracle child who was only a few ounces at birth but now after much therapy is alive and
well but cannot talk or walk. When I saw her I began to cry and told her that just as God had answered her prayers by sending us to her door, he had answered my prayers by sending her little daughter to me. :)

Con Amor,
Hermana Zani

Week of 2 April

Hello my Dear Sweet Friends!!

I just loved General Conference this past week. I think it was just the best ever. I loved all the talks, but I especially loved President Uchtdorf's talk on forgiveness. If you have not listened to the talk I urge you all to do so now. Go to this website www.lds.org and click on the link to General Conference and listen to the amazing works of this man called of God.

I think often of forgiveness especially here in the mission field. I think about a family that we are teaching that came to see General Conference this week. I think about the struggles that this family has and how so many of their problems could be fixed
by applying the principles of being slow to anger and quick to repentance. I think about the times in my life when I have done this and how much happier I have been and how much peace I have had in my life.

I also think about the need for repentance and how much you need this on your mission, how essential repentance is for every person. There was a comment made by one of the Brethren this weekend who said this about missionary work "Missionaries come into the field as excited anxious people and leave the missionary feel as mature individuals ready to handle any task placed before them."

 I believe to some extent this is what a mission does; it helps us to grow to really love people to really become like Jesus Christ to see through his eyes and hear with his ears and to say the things that he would say. This
does not come all at once but comes over time each day.

I urge each of you to look for ways to become more like Christ to really represent him in your actions and in your life.

Con Amor,
Hermana Zani