I have never had a baptism service go perfectly so I was wondering what was gunna happen when I woke up on Saturday. We had to go with the assistants to do one last baptism interview Saturday morning in that red sandy place called Womey, the place where Martial and I got lost. That place gets really muddy after it rains and it had been raining for a while. So, as we were driving though the jungle up there we got stuck in the mud. We tried to dislodge the car and put it into four-wheel drive, but the tires kept spinning and sinking further into the mud. All sorts of kids and mamas around there started coming out of their little houses crowding around and yelling things saying lots of stuff about the “yovos”. It was the talk of the whole village; they brought us some hoes to try to dig out the wheels but after trying for an hour we left the car walked the rest of the way to the interview and did it then walked back to the car to try to fix the problem. We had one man from the village that came to help. We dug more holes, put down rocks and weeds to try to get traction. Try after try we could not get out of the mud. We were all in white shirts and ties and we all got super dirty, especially Elder Naneon who was behind a tire at the wrong time and got a face full of mud flung from the tire. However, what I loved about this experience is we were all laughing the whole time. We never got angry or frustrated we were just so happy that the mission is always so exciting and unique. I love it.
Time ticked away closer and closer to the baptism finally we decided to pray for inspiration. We prayed, then got the car jack out, lifted each tire up out of the mud and put a wood plank under each one. Then we got all the men around to push the car and we got it out. The whole crowd of people cheered like crazy. It took four hours of work total. After that we then had a couple other mishaps along the way but we made it to the baptism only five mins late. There were some minor problems with baptism clothes and one candidate for the assistants had malaria and couldn’t be baptized. But other than that, it turned out pretty great and I got some awesome pictures.
Another cool thing that happened where I got to see the fruits of my labors is Hevie just became its own branch. It is now totally separated from Cococdji, which is so cool. The work is progressing before my eyes and I know my converts are playing a role in that.
There has been another miracle in the sector. We have an investigator named Damian who is the father of the young women’s president here. He has been taught for a while but became more and more incredulous. He started insulting the church and us and saying we did not know the gospel but every week he kept coming to church. Back when I was with Martial he said we would never go see him again because he did not want to understand. But when Kerr came, we went back to teach him. The first time it was the same thing, but after a time he started having a change of heart with our efforts and the branch members and even people from the stake. Now he understands the importance of the church, left all his bad habits, and is making a huge sacrifice to get married this month to be baptized. He went through a huge change and it was only the Lord that could have done that. So, he and his wife will be baptized soon. We will work on them.
Pictures with all the baptism candidates.
Kerr and I had 5; McKrola and Naneon (the assistants) had 6
Me, Sister Joana, Kerr
Serge's family
With Sister Cecile - a great member of the branch
Car in the mud pictures courtesy of Elder McKrola
Kerr and I pranked the Assistant's apartment with a cereal that looks like mouse poop. We scattered it all over.
