Remember Christ

Are y'all ready for the Cesario story that I promised?! I'm so excited to tell it! It's literally one of my favorites! 

A few months back, we got a text that gave us Cesario's address and told us that he'd requested a copy of the Book of Mormon, along with a note that said he would be baptized if he knew it was true. Sister Gagon and I got excited (as any missionary would) and stopped by a few times, but no one answered. We were in the area a while later and decided to try again, and his little sister answered! We asked for Cesario, but she told us that he wasn't there. We left the book with her, along with a #BecauseHeLives card with our phone number written on it. She told us that he enjoyed reading stuff like that and he'd probably give us a call. We waited, but the call didn't come. Which sort of made us sad... 

Cesario got baptized! :D

Skip forward a few weeks... And it came! We were sitting outside waiting to start a lesson, and he called us! Sister Montclair had only heard me mention his name a few times when we would pass the house on our way to another appointment, so when he said "Yeah, this is Cesario," she didn't get nearly as excited as I did. I grabbed the phone and scheduled an appointment with him for the next day and it was all I could do to sound normal and not totally crazy. I asked him how his reading had been going, and he told me that he had been making connections with the Bible and was already in chapter 4! And it's just gotten better from there! He's been reading every day since then, and even quotes it in lessons sometimes. We never had to ask him to liken the scriptures to himself... He just did it! And the other day, we committed him to serve a full-time mission! However, I think my favorite Cesario moment of all-time was his reaction to the First Vision: "That was moving." He's so super great (and mellow... very mellow.) We're working on getting his family to listen, but as of right now, they aren't interested. But he prays for them every time we hear him pray... It's just the greatest and I'm really excited about him. 

Sister Montclair wanted to 'hug' him... I just laughed!

His baptism was amazing! He said he was a little nervous, but he loved it. We had another investigator, Jerry, there, and he said that he "felt something"... !!! :) 

I'm also really excited about Dianna this week. When we first met her, she didn't want to come to church, and she certainly didn't want to even discuss baptism. But we left her a Book of Mormon, and she's been reading it... she's already mostly done with 1 Nephi! She asked us about coming to church, and then did it! We just love her so much! 

One of my goals this transfer is to read Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John and study how the Savior taught. As I've been doing that, I've noticed so many things that I hadn't really ever noticed before. One of my favorites can be found in Mark 8:14-21. The disciples are hungry, even though they have just witnessed Christ feeding four thousand people with 7 loaves of bread. Christ notices: 

"17 And when Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why reason ye, because ye have no bread? perceive ye not yet, neither understand? have ye your heart yet hardened?

18 Having eyes, see ye not? and having ears, hear ye not? and do ye not remember?

19 When I brake the five loaves among five thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? They say unto him, Twelve.

20 And when the seven among four thousand, how many baskets full of fragments took ye up? And they said, Seven.

21 And he said unto them, How is it that ye do not understand?"

I love that. I feel like sometimes miracles happen right before our eyes and we are amazed then, but in a short time we forget. How is it that we do not understand? Miracles happen around us every day! We just need to remember them! Especially when times seem hard. Christ is able to do all things. Remember that! 

I love you all and hope things are going great! 

Love, 

Sister Waite