Baptism!

 

I don't even know where to start. It's been a good week, but really busy getting everything ready for R's baptism. We had her baptismal interview on Tuesday. We were still a little hesitant on moving her baptism forward, but on Wednesday we had a really spiritual lesson with her and knew that it would be good for her baptism to happen on the 19th. So despite the extra work it took, we got everything ready and her baptism went great! (I'll send some pictures) It was very spiritual and there was a lot of support from the ward.

 

Another thing that added some hectic-ness to our week was a last minute zone conference on Wednesday night. It was kind of crazy setting it up the day before and trying to fit it around mutual, but it was a really good meeting. It was about the new Easter initiative, which I'm so excited about! I love these initiatives because they bring the Spirit so quickly and make doing missionary work so easy and Christ centered, just how it's supposed to be.

 

Recently, throughout the mission we've been focusing on the basic principles of missionary work and simply working on making our training meetings more focused on training and practicing those basic skills. Since starting that about 5 weeks ago, it's been amazing the change there's been. The mission went from about 2-3 convert baptisms a week on average to there being 15 convert baptisms these last two weeks! The basic principles of the gospel are so important and if we focus on those and simply strive to understand and apply those most basic aspects into our lives, the Lord can trust us and He will provide. If we choose to do things our way, we're left to "kick against the pricks", but doing things the Lord's way assures us His help and miracles.

 

I love you all and pray that you will remember Christ and the beautiful message of Easter, that "He is not here: for He is risen." Because of that miracle, we can find new life through Jesus Christ.

 

Love,

Elder Carlson