May 1, Friday

We have had such a good week with all of our appointments being kept. I was talking to Elder Whiting last night on the way to our last appointment at 7 p.m. I commented how blessed we had been because we hadn't had any appointments fall thru for the week. Wouldn't you know it! When we got to that appointment, they wouldn't answer the door. We knew they were in there, but they were hiding. It is so ridiculous, all they have to do is tell us, "no," and we will not come. But we had that one cancel and two today that also canceled. I spoke too soon.

We had a great experience with Mark today. We taught him the 3rd lesson on Faith, Repentance, Baptism, and the Holy Ghost. He is just amazing. When we finished we ask him some of the Baptism questions and he just answered them all correct. We then told him that next week we will be talking to him about a baptism date in the future. We just have a few more things to teach him and he will be ready. He just beamed!! He is very happy about it and anxious to be baptized.

On another note, Kaitlin and Luke who were baptized on Sunday and due to be confirmed this next Sunday, have a little drama going on. We don't know if their father is going to let them be confirmed or not. According to our Mission leader, he is upset that he didn't have the opportunity to baptize them. We let his wife pick out the whole program. She chose who was baptizing, the harp, the prayers, etc. We did the background stuff and just supported her. She filled it all out. The problem is the communication between the husband and wife. The other thing is that he has not been active at all. How could he baptize her? Anyway, we are waiting for the ward to work things out with them so they can be confirmed this Sunday.

Actually I think that this is a good thing because: 1. It will help the Stack family to look at their communication and level of activity; 2. It will help this ward to look at their responsibility and level of communication. Many people in the ward have been brought into this, and there are many opinions. They just need to be wise and listen to the spirit. I am so glad that we are not in the middle of this. Sister Stacks planned the program and handed it to the Ward Mission Leader, who handed it to the Bishop for approval.

The real problem is that Bro Stacks is an ER Dr. and is never home to communicate with his wife and family. We were told that he does not want to come to church because the ward is not intellectual enough. It is just a funny situation.

I told Mark today that I would make him some Peanut Butter Cookies tomorrow. He was excited. He is so skinny, he needs them. Sister Kelly, in his Ward, is excited to fatten him up as soon as he is baptized. She wants us to teach him in her home. So we will go there next week. She likes to fix dinner for all of us.

Tomorrow we are meeting with Jennie and Monica Via and teaching new member lessons along with Brother Haut, the Mission leader. Then we need to plan a Relief Society lesson for the First Ward for the next day. It will be fun to plan the lesson together.