And now for the recap for this week. If you thought that last week's email was crazy, then this one is going to blow your minds!!! What a great way to end the mission--with this email.
So the plan for Saturday was to have Ernie and Rowena get married at 10 am and then get baptized at 11 am with Lynn-lynn. Well, that was the plan. So Friday night at the interview we find out that Rowena and Ernie have something to do in the morning and won't be able to make it all done-up and ready for a wedding at 10 am and 1 pm would be much better. So now we have to get a hold of President Piol who is going to be the one marrying them. I contact him and he tells me that he can't postpone anything. But he can do 11 am. So now the question is what do we do now??? So we decide to have it at 11 am and pray that it'll work.
Morning comes. The marriage contract isn't done. No witnesses. WHAT?!?!?! I totally thought that that was all done. I guess not. So then all morning we were running around trying to save this wedding. Because if it doesn't happen, then no baptism!! We go and get the marriage contract moving and edited up but its wasn't printing right at all!!! So the whole time I'm just praying that this stuff is going to work out before 11 am. FINALLY we get everything printed off and it looks great at 11:15. Elder Hardin and I run to the church and bust in the door to the church holding the papers. President Piol (who is not a very nice guy and didn't want to be there at all anyway) looks at the papers and I'm holding my breath. They're alright and the wedding happens. The wedding is over, they're man and wife, we have a nice lunch and then have the baptism. Happiest day of my entire life. No joke.
Then I reach in my pocket to check the time. No cell phone. I ask Elder Serrano if he has our cell phone. Nope. That means we left it at our Branch Presidents computer shop on his desk. No problem. We call the girl watching the shop but the phone isnt there. So we start calling the phone like crazy but nothing. So then I realize where it is. It fell out of my pocket while we were riding in the trisikad! Now, there are over 300 sikads in Toledo. They are all painted blue and they are the equivalent to New York cabs. I instantly gave up hope. Tough break! Looks like I'm gonna have to lose money outta my support for this one. But Elder Serrano, my companion and best friend, didn't give up hope. He told me later that he was praying all day that it would get found.
Later that night, Elder Hardin and I were taking care of some contract papers when we get a call on their cell phone. Its from some girl named Shirley. Her uncle is a sikad driver who found a cell phone in his kad. She was wondering if we knew anyone who had lost a cell phone. I was like "YEAH!!!!" So she told us to meet her uncle, Willie, over by the church at 8 am and he would bring the cell phone to us. Serrano's prayers were answered and I was quickly rebuked by the Spirit for my lack of faith and my neglecting to call upon the name of the Lord. Thank heavens for honest people tho, right? Right.....
So we go to the corner at 8 am the next morning and wait for the guy. Nothing. We waited until about 8:45 and then head home to get ready for church. Then we head back and wait. We talk to every sikad driver that we see asking them if they know Willie. Nobody knew him until we met this on guy who told us that Willie's number on his kad was 4 Largo. We wait for a long time and I'm just sitting there praying my brains out this this guy passes by. Then this lone sikad wheels by slowly. 4 Largo. Elder Serrano and I are in an instant full-on sprint for this guy. I catch him and ask his name. Its Willie. But he doesn't have the phone. He left it at home. He says he'll bring it to the church tomorrow at 10 am. Deal.
Next day. Church at 10. Nothing. We get on sikads for an hour just tracking back and forth looking for 4 Largo. Nothing. Praying like crazy again. Then that night we get a call from a member who happened to call us. The people were going to bring our phone but didn't have any money to make it to Toledo since they are from the next town over. But they say that tomorrow they will meet us at the church in Lutopan and give us the phone there.
Then yesterday morning Elder Serrano and I got up and headed out to Lutopan. At 10 am we got there and after a little waiting two girls get off a motorcycle and come across the street. I'm wondering which one is Shirley because I want to thank her. Turns out NEITHER of them is Shirley. Turns out Shirley turned around and sold our cell phone that night after she called us! But she was dumb enough to not delete the contacts and the girls who bought the cell phone were former investigators that were pretty close with the Elders. So they were going through the contacts (Shirley didn't delete them) and saw some Elders in there and then got a call from the member. They brought us the cell phone cuz they felt bad for us. We flipped them 500 pesos cuz they spent 700 on our phone.
Crazy stuff. The prayers we said definitely got answered. It was a lot of work and a lot of prayer but somehow everything still happened to work out. Crazy. Who gets their cell phone back AFTER it gets pawned off??? That's impossible. But not with Heavenly Father answering prayers. He brought that phone right back to us.
Just a lil story to keep you guys full spiritually. Love you all.
See you next week!!!
B-Rad.
