They're Finally Married!!!!!

Hola Familia y Amigos!!

So this week I was smart and typed the email in Word first, and good thing because there was a computer malfunction of some kind.

Okay, so who freaked out when I didn´t write yesterday?? (Mom, don´t lie, fess up.) I´m sure you were all very sad to not have my email brighten your day, but we went to the temple this morning, so we had to have district meeting yesterday, which meant that our P day is today. So hopefully no one was too traumatized by not being able to read my fantastic emails until today.

So I was glad to see all your sad face emails about Familia Pino. But really the way I reacted to them was with . . . . . LAUGHTER!!! Because, my family and friends, I have buenas BUENAS noticias for all of you. Last week, on Thursday, February 25, Eduardo Pino and Karen Sanchez became, legally and lawfully, Señor and Señora Eduardo Pino. Yes. THEY GOT MARRIED!!!!! I don´t know how they did it or what went down, just that we got a call at about 11:30 in the morning on Thursday from the bishop´s wife, saying that they were getting married that day. We called them to confirm, then hopped in a taxi and went to a spur of the moment wedding, totally ditching our plans for the rest of the afternoon. Probably the best day ever. And yes, they are being baptized this Saturday. It will probably be my favorite baptism of my whole mission. And now, more than ever I have a firm and strong testimony that Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers. Because even though Fam. Pino had told us that they couldn´t get married for another year, I went home and prayed hard. Really hard. All that next week. And well . . . . look what happened!! There´s a parable in the Bible somewhere, don´t remember exactly where and am too lazy to pull out my scripures and look, but it´s about the unrighteous judge. Basically what happpens is that there´s this judge that doesn´t fear God or anyone else. This widow comes to him and wants him to avenge her of her enemy. For awhile he won´t, and then he says, even though I fear not God or man, I will avenge this widow, lest by her continual coming she weary me. The point is that if the unrighteous judge eventually caved to the widow, how much more likely is it that God, who is righteous, will give you the righteous desires of your heart if you just keep asking??? This parable gave me a lot of comfort when I was praying for Fam. Pino all this time. I´ll be sure to send some pictures soon!!

So yeah, this week was awesome. We found some new people to teach. We found another less active family and have been working with them. The hermana has read the Book of Mormon and knows it´s the Word of God . . . . . but is Catholic. I cannot even tell you how frustrating those words are. Seriously, when I hear the phrase yo soy catolico(a) I just want to roll my eyes. Most of them don´t even go to church, they´re just Catholic because it´s tradition.  Anyway, we´re going to work with them and hopefully little by little we´ll get the hermano back to church and the hermana and the kids baptized. Just need some faith that´s all.

We also have this guy that we´re teaching, Christian. He´s had some pretty traumatizing experiences with religion, for example, his dad was an Evangelical minister but then ran off with some chick from the church, so he´s pretty anti-religion. Which I can understand, but it´s frustrating because at the end of every lesson he asks us when we´re coming back again to teach him, but he refuses to do ANYTHING. Won´t read, won´t pray, won´t come to church . . . . . and we have to teach him outside of his hardware store, so there´s cars driving down the street and making a ton of noise and people coming and going to buy stuff from him and really we just can´t have the Spirit at all because the environment is totally non conducive. So we´re really frustrated with him and we´re thinking about leaving him, but then we feel bad because he obviously suffers and needs the gospel but refuses to do anything about it. So yeah, who knows what will happen with him.

So on Sunday I gave my first talk in church!! In Spanish!! It was pretty awesome, everyone said that I did really well. I´m pretty sure the Spirit helped me out a lot bc half the time I felt like I had no idea what I was even saying. But everyone said it was good, so I guess I must be doing something right!! Although in the middle of it I started laughing because Jimmito Balarezo ran up and started tugging at my skirt and saying HOLA!! HOLA!! I tried to ignore him but at the end I just couldn´t help it anymore. Oh well. It was funny.

Well I don´t really know what else to say. I laughed pretty hard at the story about Craig and his girlfriends. Hard to believe he´ll be 16 by the time I get back!! He´s already a heartbreaker, how hilarious. Well, be good and read your scriptures and remember that Heavenly Father loves you and listens to your prayers!! Chao!!