Baptisms lined up for August

This week wasn't as good as we were hoping but it seemed to go alright. We were hoping to teach more but it didn't happen. The good side of this week is that we have a lot of investigators progressing and the baptisms are really lining up for next month.

Sister Esposo is on tract to be baptized on August 3! She has finished the lessons so we are just focusing on her having spiritual experiences right now. Her children are members so it gives her a little bit of a push to be baptized. She is really going great. We also have Brother Lionel Bayon-on getting ready for baptism on August 3. He is very smart. He is 18 years old and really knows the gospel. He is asking questions about deeper doctrines and wants to know how things work in the church. Most of the time he is helping us teach the lesson. He is amazing. He says that I am his idol because I am American and he says that I am Mr. Bean! He is a great person. We also have 4 children preparing for baptism on August 10. Their sister is an RM. We teach them at the church because of family problems. They are really great kids. It is a little bit harder to teach them because of their understanding but we manage. We think Sister Jessa is doing good. She didn't come to church and when we went to teach her yesterday, she wasn't there but we talked with her dad and invited him to come and listen to us when we teach her. He said that he would. It is good because he his friends with our branch president so it gives a support system for him. Sister Zapanta is doing great. We taught her about baptism and she decided to wait to be baptized until she is married. We think it is a good decision so we are just going to support her until that happens. As far as the boarders at our branch president's house they are really gaining testimonies. All of them feel the spirit very strongly. We took them on a church tour and watched the Restoration with them. They all really felt the spirit. They all went home so they didn't attend church this week. We know that 2 of them probably won't continue because one of the members received texts from them that said they were baptized so they won't continue. It was sad because they really felt the spirit but the can choose.

Right now we are trying to get baptisms in the branch so that we can get more missionaries in the area. There are 4 cities, cities here are like counties, that are part of our area that we haven't touched. It is a very large area so we are getting baptisms so that we can ask President Lopez for more missionaries to start working in some of the areas that we aren't able to cover because of distance. We are hoping to ask in August.

I love you all,

Elder Nielsen