A surprise baptism!

3/14  This week was absolutely one of the best weeks I have ever had on my mission! As you know, Pamela had a baptismal date for the 26th of March. Well, in our first visit last week we taught tithing. She loved the lesson and understood and agreed with the whole concept of tithing and committed to live it after her baptism. After the lesson, we were talking a little about her baptismal date and mentioned that if she wanted to she could get baptized sooner because she had already been to church twice. She looked at us and asked "can I get baptized this Saturday?" I had somewhat planned on moving it up just one week sooner, so I was astonished at her urgency. She told us that she felt that there was something trying to persuade her not to get baptized, so she wanted to get baptized as soon as possible to get rid of that feeling! We all agreed that if we could visit every day during the week, she would be prepared for the 12th, and so that's what we did. We had a visit every day and were able to teach all of the commandments and get her ready for the 12th.

On Friday we did the interview with the zone leaders. It was a really crazy morning and we had so many things to do, but somehow everything ended up working wonderfully. The interview went great, and as we were getting ready to leave, we heard Hermana Corina from the kitchen saying "now I understand! It all makes sense now!" When we asked her what she was talking about, she told us that in her patriarchal blessing it says that she will be like Joseph of Egypt. She said that it all made sense now that she had helped Pamela understand several of these dreams she was having, and now she is getting baptized.  That was a really cool connection there.

On Saturday, Pamela was baptized by Julio Pacheco. The baptismal service was perfect. Nothing went wrong, it all went very smoothly. At the end, Pamela shared her testimony, and the spirit filled the room! It was such a great experience to take part in! We have formed such a great relationship with Pamela and Los Pacheco, and it is a perfect handoff to the ward now. She already has an entire family to befriend her, and a ton of other friends in the chapel.

The thing I have learned from my experiences this week is that the Lord knows His sheep, and they hear His voice. The Lord knows each and every one of His sheep, and He knows which ones are prepared to receive the gospel. Pamela was clearly one of the sheep the Lord had prepared to hear His gospel. From day one I could tell that she really understood the gospel. Almost every time we taught her something new she would say "this seems really familiar to me". Before we even taught about tithing, we asked her what she understood about it. She answered us and gave us a word for word response from Preach My Gospel. It almost seemed like all of the lessons were a review to her. The Lord is preparing people in every part of His vineyard, and the best way to find them is working through the members.

Elder Male & Elder Cullimore with Pamela, her children, & Julio Pacheco