Austin: 2/2/2015 - Wow. What a change...

Hola Familia!

Wow...this week was a SERIOUS change. Every aspect of my life changed, I think. Last week, I was in Retablo, with my "son", I knew every person, I was district leader, I was totally calm and knew exactly what to do in every moment. When plan B fell through, I had plan C, D, E, ...Z ready, because I had  been in my area for a long time. Well, this week, EVERYTHING changed. I`m now in Canto Grande, in the ward Las Lomas. I`m co-senior companion with Elder Sosa, who has a year in the mission. I`m no longer district leader, I no longer know what to do, I don`t even know who to put as plan A, not to mention plan Z. I was in control, and now I feel totally lost. My life has seriously changed this week. But, I do not say it is a bad thing. I`m super happy to be here. I am not where I thought I was going to be, I`m not with the companion that I thought I was going to be with, it`s all different. But I know it`s a good thing. I know there are a lot of things the Lord wants me to do. Things He needs me to learn. 

This week, I got here on Tuesday, and we had a baptism on Saturday! Valeria is a 14 or 15 year old girl that the other elders taught. She was ready, and she got baptized on Saturday. The baptism was also with another sister from the other companionship`s area. We have another baptism planned for this Saturday, her name is Cindy. She is a super preapred, super ready investigator. She listened to the missionaries in the East mission, and then found out she had to get baptized here, so she got in contact with the missionaries here, and now, on Saturday, she will be baptized! 

mom - you`re in the hosptial? What???

Dad - Did you go to byu men`s chorus or vocal point? Cuz they`re both good, but vocal point is better

John - does that guy go to byu-I? Is that allowed?

Jordan - hi

Tashita - good job. I don`t believe mother when she says you`re the best driver in the family. But...I`ll find out 

Shaylee - kyle is in vocal point? That`s cool...

Love you all!

Elder Schouten

I almost forgot to tell about my crazy story with the baptism. Saturday morning, we went to fill up the baptismal font for later that night. We got there, and the handle to turn on the water was broken. The bolt had fallen off, and the handle was stripped and didn`t work anymore. We didn`t know what to do. There was no water. So, I grabbed the handle, put it in the spot where is should`ve been, and yanked it down, and the water turned on! Haha! Success! I was super happy. But a minute later, I thought of a problem...if I could barely get it on, how was I going to turn off the water?? Oops. We were in trouble. So I tried to force the handle into its place again. No dice. I couldn`t do it. I had no idea what to do. So, I went into a room, kneeled down and prayed. There was nothing else I could do, so I turned to the Lord. I just prayed and asked Him to help me. When I came out of the room, I saw that the member we were with was calling his brother to bring some tools to shut it off. He brought the tools, and I went to see if I could shut the water off with the wrench. I couldn`t do it. But as I was trying to force it, I found the bolt that had fallen off the handle. So I put the handle in place, and with the wrench, I put the bolt back on. With that bolt, I could turn it off! We were all super happy. But then, a minute later, we realized that the water was still leaking out, bit by bit. But by then, the handle was completely stripped, I couldn`t force it again, even with the bolt. So I tried to use the wrench to turn it off. I couldn`t. It didn`t work, so I prayed again and asked for the Lord to help me again. And then, I tried one more time with the wrench, and it turned off! I did it! I know the Lord blessed me to be able to turn that water on and off. 

Then, about an hour before the baptism, we went to the church to get everything ready. As we were puting up the chairs, we looked at the water and realized that the font wasn`t full yet. There was enough water for our investigator, but the other lady is 9 months pregnant. We realized that we needed more water to fill it up. But I couln`t use the handle again. So what did I do? I grabbed a bucket and started to fill it up and dump it into the fountain. I was working like that, then later, I found a hose and I hooked up the hose to the water to fill up the font. But peruvian hoses aren`t the same as american. You have to hold a peruvian hose in it`s place so that it doesn`t come off. So as I did that, I got super wet. It looked like I had baptized, just from the water from the font. But in the end, we got it filled and the two people got baptized! I know the Lord help me do it. They may not have been my investigators, but I still did my part to help someone make the baptismal coventant with the Lord. 

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