This week was filled with miracles. We found a lot of families and people who are studied in the bible and intelligent. This is what are bishop challenged us to find. Families and studied people. The reason is because a lot of times missionaries, with the pressure their is to baptize every month, jump into poor areas or slums and start to baptize people who of humble circumstances but little means to be leaders in the ward if they even remain active. But our bishop told us he wants us to seek out the areas that missionaries usually call 'hard' because the people might be a bit richer or well off and turn us down a whole lot more. So this week we did just that. We found 25 new investigators including 5 complete families (at least husband and wife and maybe kids) and they are from richer neighborhoods\houses. We are opening our mouths and talking to everyone, contacting buses, talking to families in the street and knocking on doors. When I say 'knocking on doors', what i really mean is the costa rican way of knocking on doors....yelling 'upe' whenever we find or pass a house with their door open ;)
This week we had a relief society activity and primary activity that we brought Hellen and her siblings to. They really enjoyed it. They are progressing but very slowly. We will try to extend the baptisimal invitation again soon (they´ve had so many baptismal dates that have fallen through because they won´t come to 9am church).
I know we are following the spirit because many of the new people and families that we found this week told us that they were suprised that we knocked on their door specifically when they saw that we didn´t try a single other house near them. We pick and choose pretty randomly according to what we feel. One lady, who actually accepted a baptisimal date with her husband in our first visit, told us that she doesn´t know how she was able to hear our 'upe' because no one else heard us (she was in a birthday party deep within her house) but she told us that she heard our voices as if voices of angels....wow. The Lord is helping us out so much. He is putting us where we need to be and we are opening our mouths and He is speaking through us. This same lady cried and cried when telling us her desire to find someway to have a better relationship with her son, who wants nothing to do with her, and how she knows that we were sent by God to help her and her family. Wow.
Ok, funny story now. So we visit lots of inactive and less active members, and one of those inactive members, Lidieth, has a brother. He is not member, and he is 19. He has a way of crushing on sister missionaries, especially the gringas (american girls). So anyway, in other visits he has made remarks that point out that he has a crush on me, to the point where he once left a chocolate in my bible that said 'me gustas', which in english is 'I like you'.... anyway....this week we watched the 30 minute video about our Heavenly Father´s plan with Lidieth, Walter (the brother with a crush), and Bayron (another brother who lost his leg a few months ago). Then when we finished the lesson, I asked Walter to offer the prayer. After the prayer he got down on his knees and pulled out a ring and asked me in poor English, Sister Flake, would you like to marry me? Um....so that was pretty awkward, haha. I told him that he already knew the answer because I am a missionary and missionaries cannot get married. He insisted that I marry him after my mission. I told him that I want to marry a return missionary who shares my standards, and that he should focus on looking for God instead of thinking of marrying missionaries. So yeah....He told me that I broke his heart and that he was going to cry when I left. Haha. My companion got a huge laugh out of all that.
Well family, I have had a wonderful week and I know that we are exactly obedient to the mission rules and as a result we are able to witness miracles. It´s hard. We are always pretty tired. But we have a slogan, my comp and I , Regocijar en vez de quejar... in english, that means Rejoice instead of Complain. It´s all about attitude. We are focusing hard on loving our investigators and the members and being positive.
Con mucho amor,
Hermana S. Flake
