Another great week!

Hello everybody!

This past week seemed to FLY by.  It seems that the weeks are getting progressively faster.  It's a weird feeling; how come this never happened to me while I was still in school?

Well, things are looking up here in Atascadero.  This past week we were able to get in contact with Michael's mom, and she gave us the green light for him to get baptized!  When Michael was 8 years old, the bishop at the time didn't think it was necessary for him to get baptized because his autism was so bad.  Now that he's 34, he's progressed a lot since then, and so he can now be baptized.  We read with him a few chapters from the children's Book of Mormon, and he soaked it all in.  We asked him what he got from the chapter we read with him, and he told us all about it with perfect detail!  Michael now has a baptismal date for November 23rd, and we are super ecstatic about what is going to take place in these next coming weeks.   I've attached a picture of me with Michael.  He's such a stud.

Another great thing also happened yesterday.  Jose came to church!  He brought his 2 year old daughter with him, and he seemed to have a good time.  Jose is really shy around people, but he'll warm up in time.  When we went to Sunday School, he dropped his daughter off at nursery, and when he came to pick her up, she actually didn't really want to leave with him.  It was awesome.  The High Priest Group Leader also invited us and Jose over to dinner last night, and we had a spiritual lesson about the Restoration.  The entire family bore their testimonies to him and told him that he was on the right path.  We also shared the Mormon Message with him by Neil L. Andersen in which he said, "You don't know everything, but you know enough."  When we asked Jose how he felt, he said that he felt scared, but in a good way.  He is gaining a more powerful testimony each and every time we go to visit him.  With he and Michael, we now have set times 3 times a week that we are going over to teach them, and we are doing our best to have members with us there as well.

We went to a baptismal service on Saturday in which a mom, son, and daughter got baptized into another ward.  The dad is going to get baptized in February, and the spirit was so strong.  When the bishop confirmed the 15 year old son, we heard that he told him that he would serve a mission and bring many others unto Christ.

Well, more news next week.  I'll keep you posted!

~Elder Harper