December 21, 2015

Dear Family and Friends,

This week has been a pretty great week! So Friday was a particularly awesome day because it snowed!! They call it furies out here and all that means is it snowed so lightly that as soon as it hit the ground it just became water, but it still snowed! Haha Elder Larson who is from Utah and used to massive blizzards was probably so sick of me because all I would talk about was the snow! Ha!

Anyways so something pretty cool happened to us last Wednesday night and Thursday morning. On Wednesday night we visited one of our investigators and read the Book of Mormon with them. They are pretty knowledgeable about the Bible and they are having a hard time accepting the Book of Mormon as God's word and Joseph Smith to be a prophet. As we read in 3 Nephi about the Savior's visit to the Americas, they brought up a concern that if the Savior appeared to the Americas then that would have to have been the Second Coming. Elder Larson and I were kinda stumped by that question so the next morning we spent a ton of time studying to try and figure out the answer. We prayed specifically for help in finding the answer and we most definitely did! We studied the New Testament when Christ appears to Mary and also to Thomas, one of his apostles and concluded that he appeared to Thomas as the same resurrected and glorified being as he appeared to the people in the Americas! So that means that if he already appeared to Thomas as the risen Christ, then that means that he could appear to not only the Americas, but also Joseph Smith! I don't know if all that made any sense, but just know that it was an awesome revelatory experience and my testimony is stronger because of it! I love how questions and curiosity lead to stronger testimonies and more powerful conviction! As long as we don't let questions shake our testimony, God will show us the answer! Joseph Smith is a prime example of this!

Well this was a pretty short week so I will have more next week for sure! I hope everyone has an awesome Christmas and remembers the true meaning of it! Have a great week!

Elder Barazoto

Christmas decorations!