Hey all, hope everyone is well. I am doing good, but time is creeping up on me. Many sisters who came out with me are returning home. There was even a member we met this week who returned home today, who started the same day as me (September 6, 2021).
We had a good week this week. It is the very last one that Elder Roberts and I will be arealess. Being without an area has been hard but we've seen the hand of the Lord in many ways. Members and other missionaries have been very good to us and make sure we're fed and having lessons. But I think the biggest blessing has been Bill. His baptism was this week!
It was a great program. We got there early to prepare, and the font was already full. The Stake had a couple of baptisms earlier that day so the water was room temperature. We had almost an hour so we decided to fill it more with hot water, and we pulled the plug to let out all the cooler water. 20 or so minutes in we realized that the water was emptying faster than it was filling up so we plugged it in again. A little bit later it still wasn't filling up at the pace we needed so we put the cold water on too to put it at full blast. By the time the program was going to start we realized that despite the plug being on, it was actually leaking! At this point we had enough water for the baptism, and we honestly only needed the water to hold for like 1 or 2 minutes for the actual baptism. We decided to let the water run and to close the doors of the font so that it didn't all leak out during the opening musical numbers and baptism talk. Then we decided right before the baptism we would just run over and turn the water off. It went as planned and the water was deep enough, but we had another problem. I guess we never thought about what might happen if you put two 80+ year old men in a baptismal font.
Bill asked Jack, the member who referred him to perform his baptism, so he flew in from Florida for the occasion. Jack said he's performed many baptisms, and that he and Bill had rehearsed the ordinance beforehand, so we trusted that. But then, he missed a couple of things. He had Bill put his hands together like in the prayer emoji and then put his own right hand on the back of Bill's head. The ordinance also has its own words. You're supposed to start "Having been commissioned of Jesus Christ'' but he started "By the authority of the Melchizedek Priesthood which I hold". I guess he got baptisms and priesthood blessings mixed up. President Merritt was there and went over to make the corrections and then Jack tried to baptize Bill. He lost his grip and Bill slipped about halfway down. It was pretty funny and Bill was a good sport about it. As Bill was floating on his back in the water Jack said "Hold on, we gotta do that again" and Bill just said "Yeah, I see that". He's such a champ. The second try Harrington hopped in and basically helped Bill go down and come back up. He was baptized by two people. My favorite other quote was when President came up to Harrington after and said something to the effect of "Good job on saving the day and going commando. In more ways than one".
The night before the Baptism Elder Harrington was preparing a homemade apple pie for Bill. He said he was just going to put it in the oven and wake up when the timer went off. We all went to bed figuring all would be well. I woke up the next morning to the smell of what I thought was pancakes. Before I got up Elder Roberts went into the kitchen to investigate and I heard him opening doors and windows. Apparently Harrington slept through the alarm and the pie had been in the oven for like 8 hours.
My favorite part of this story is that Elder Gudino confessed that he woke up around 4 am due to the smell. He saw the pie was burnt but didnt know how to turn the oven off. He decided he would just open the back screen door for some ventilation. I was dying. It was so funny, like why didn't he just take the pie out? Or wake one of us up? Or push the off button on the oven? It's so funny to me that I can't even be mad about it. Thankfully, despite human error, the Lord intervened and our apartment did not burn down. Harrington made another one that morning.
Other than that this week has been us saying goodbye to a lot of members, both in Ex-Olivenhain, and La Costa people I've met just in the past couple of weeks. There are a lot of amazing people down here. But I finally have the sweet release of being arealess. My new area is in National City in the Harbor ward. The ward is English, but the area includes a Tagolic speaking group. My new companion in Tagalog, but I'm still assigned English. I'll see if I can pick up some Tagalog from him, but I probably won't be a ton of help in our Tagalog lessons.
(Here are a couple of members that we visited yesterday)
For a quick spiritual thought, I'd like to go back to the experience of knowing Bill. For a long time and for many areas I have been really trying to work hard because of how hard it has been to find people. I've essentially been trying to buy a miracle by working so hard. But I've learned that that's not how it works. God asks that I, and all other missionaries, have faith, and do my best, but I will never be a perfectly hard working missionary, and I will never deserve a miracle or deserve someone to teach. That is given by God's grace. I've also developed a greater understanding that this is not about me. If I had kept the ward that I had, I probably wouldn't have met Bill or be able to attend lessons. And yet, even though I did go to lessons, I still was never really his missionaries. But meeting Bill has been such a blessing and it has been cool to be a part of, from a more outside perspective. There were many moments where I just was so full of joy because of what Bill is doing. It is about Bill, and it is about others around me and it is about God.
Also, if you are interested in some upliftment, Bill shared this video with us that he made some years ago https://www.youtube.com/
Love you all!
- Elder Wride
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