rushed

The other day my companion and I were walking home from the chapel at night (in a rush, as always, because getting home at 9pm happens to be one of the most difficult things about being a missionary) when we saw up the street a little ways a guy standing right in the middle of the street. Hermana Niño and I have this weird habit of always walking down the middle of the street, but this guy was just standing there. We got a little closer and Hermana Niño got all freaked out. I tried making a b-line for another route, but she kept walking directly towards this guy. A few steps later we were right in front of him. 

He started talking to us, telling us that he needed help. He wanted to change. He wanted to quit drinking. He threw down his cigarette and said he was sick of his life and wanted to fix it. We told him he could never smoke or drink again. He said fine. We didn`t have much time to talk, so we told him we`d drop by the next day.

Fast forward. The next day we passed by with a recent convert to visit our drunk friend. He was drunker than the day before and had a cigarette behind his ear. We told him he`d never change if he kept doing those things. Blah blah blah. Then out of the blue he gets this crazed look in his eye and goes, "I read minds, you know. I know everything that is going to happen." 

So please, just imagine this for a second. We`re standing on the side of the road under a mango tree...a drunk man who reads minds, a colombian, an american, and a freaked out convert. I said, "Okay, read my mind. I am sending you vibes. What am I thinking?" We stood there staring at each other for a good 2 minutes. He kept massaging his temples, trying to catch the signals I was sending. 

Finally he stopped, looked at me and said, "Well your mind is in a different language, so I can`t even understand it. But I can tell you that you`ll be going to a far away land very soon. I know everything."

I suggested he join a band of gypsies to read people`s fortunes.

This week was full of weird adventures like that. Like when we contacted this lady on the street and went into her house, only to see this big picture of the Guayaquil temple hanging on her wall. When we asked her about it she just said she liked the way it looked. And this other lady we met who wanted to be a nun, but is getting ready to be baptized in January. And then when somehow we found this kid at church who has come for the past two weeks by himself, just because he likes it. 

This upcoming Friday we could have up to 5 baptisms, if God decides to work a very very large miracle. We had 4 set baptisms for this week, but suddenly on Saturday the "husband" of our investigator decided to move back in. He`s a drunk and they`re not married, so it`s making things sort of complicated. Martha (the wife) and her 2 kids were supposed to get baptized this week, but because of this unexpected arrival she didn`t come to church on Sunday with her kids, so her baptismal date got pushed back a week. On Saturday we thought we were making good headway helping her find a solution, but Sunday night presented yet another issue.

We showed up. Alejandro (the hubby) was there sitting in a hammock with his tattoos all showing and his gut hanging over his pants. The kids were all excited, as always, because they adore us. Martha was on edge. Alejandro complained when we asked him to turn off the TV. We talked of giving an example to our kids and how obedience to God`s commandments is necessary to have a good life. Then we talked of baptism. 

Suddenly Martha got all mad and said that it was too rushed to get baptized this week. She went on and on about how she felt like she was being rushed into things and that she didn`t feel like she knows enough. Funny...because the day before she was super stoked, not just for herself but for her kids too. It´s really frustrating when Satan attacks investigators like that. Argh.

I sat there in the lesson thinking about this excuse. "It`s too rushed." "I want to learn more first." "Let me look into a few other things first." And any other variation of the whole "rushed" issue. Okay, let me make this clear...it`s important and necessary to know enough to get baptized. But the most important thing is a a willing heart and a testimony that it`s true. To have that, and then to say that it`s too rushed seems completely ridiculous to me. It`s so easy to rush to sin...to watch a movie we shouldn`t see, to flip off the guy driving the car next to us, or to drink a glass of wine when everyone at a wedding is pressuring you. But it`s hard to rush to follow the Savior. We "forget" to kneel down in the morning. We procrastinate making an appointment with the bishop to dig ourselves out of a hole. We put off reading the scriptures because we don`t have enough time right now. And we say we`ll get baptized further down the road because it`s just too soon. 

Shouldn`t it be the opposite? Shouldn`t we want to run towards the Savior, begging Him to get us out of the horrible trap of bad habits and misery? When He calls us, shouldn`t we drop everything else we`re doing and follow Him? We SHOULD be rushed to follow the Savior. We SHOULD rush to get baptized. It`s the only sensible thing to do.

This week is Christmas. We plan to make enchiladas and play uno. I wish Santa was real so that we would wake up and have a million presents under the tree. Or under the broken bunkbed frame, considering the fact that we don`t actually have a Christmas tree.

Love you all more than eggnog and figgy pudding. 

Have the most cheery week of your lives.