Elder Dallin Schipaanboord: Carl's Baptism

This week was so awesome!!! We had coordination meeting at the park (like always) and this guy rode up on his bike, waved at us, and then sat down on the other end of the park and kept looking at us, so I thought "man we need to go talk with him", so right after coordination, I said to Johnson "come on, we are going to get a new gator" and proceeded to go and talk with him. He was a really nice guy and we had a great conversation with him and then testified about the restoration of the gospel. he thought it was interesting and said that we could come by his house sometime, he gave us his number and his address, it was so sick!! its amazing what can happen when you actually follow those promptings that you get from the spirit, its hard and scary, but if you don't make that first step of faith, how is the lord supposed to help you see miracles?

we then headed down to panama city beach for our farewell zone conference with president and sister smith. it was really fun! there was a slide show of their whole mission, we did some skits and had some awesome food! presidents biggest pet peeve is when missionaries say "pres, this is hard", he said "good, i'm glad its hard, in fact i hope its hard, cause how are you supposed to grow if you don't have trials?" it was pretty cool to hear that, cause its so true! just like the refiners fire, how are you supposed to get better if you don't get put through the heat?

so for like half of the week, we couldn't get in contact with carl, like at all... he wasn't home and he wasn't answering his phone, so we were stressing out, cause he was scheduled to be baptized on saturday.... but on friday night we got a call from him telling us that his car broke down, and he went to stay at his niece's house, cause she was going to help him stay strong and not let him smoke!! when we heard that, we seriously started going crazy in the car, we were so happy (it must have been really funny to see)! so on saturday, we went over to the church, filled up the font and proceeded to have a baptismal service for carl, it was amazing!!! he loves the gospel so much! he keeps every commitment we leave with him, studies out of Preach My Gospel and the addiction recovery packet, and quite drinking and smoking, it truly is amazing! all of his crazy past is now wiped away, and he knows that! i am so glad that i was able to be a part of his 2 year long conversion!

i am so thankful for this gospel and how much it has blessed my life. it truly is the most amazing thing ever and brings me so much peace and happiness, i am thankful to be out serving the lord and having the opportunity to gain a stronger testimony of his restored gospel, i KNOW for a fact that it has been restored, and you can too if you truly search, ponder and pray.

i love you all, thank you for everything!!

love elder schipaanboord