This has been a very unique week. Last Sunday, Feb. 26th, our investigator, Lucille, came to church. Her husband is an inactive member who is starting to come back to church. She is an Indonesian lady who was raised Catholic. The missionaries have been teaching her for 4 months, I’ve just been a part of the teaching for the last month. Each time we teach her, she says things like, “This makes so much more sense than my church; than what we Catholics believe.” She was interested in learning, but not in changing religions. Well, on Sunday, a man in our ward who is about 70 years old, is blind, deaf, and mute, was assigned to speak in sacrament meeting. He stood at the podium and signed his whole talk, and his wife who can see, hear, and knows sign language, translated the talk for the congregation. His talk was 30 minutes long, and made a huge impression on Lucille!
After church, we got a text saying that Lucille wanted to be baptized right away. When we talked to her, she said, “When he was giving his talk, I got a feeling like fire in my chest, and I knew I needed to be baptized. I don’t know how to explain it – it’s just like fire. I want him to baptize me.” So, yesterday, Sunday, March 5th, Lucille was baptized by this brother. He stood in the water and signed the prayer, someone else stood in the font and translated, and then he put his arm to the square and baptized her. It was great!
I had my departing interview with my mission president today. I am having mixed feeling . . . excited to come home and sad to leave. Wednesday, when the mission has transfers, I will go with all the other departing missionaries to do some activities. We will go to the Temple together, go to Ashton Gardens, and then we will have dinner and a testimony meeting and stay at the mission president’s house, leaving for the airport Thursday morning.
Thank you for your support and encouragement!
Love, Elder Cluff
