Heaven

Holy Cow, i am so happy right now!

In my last area of my mission, we were teaching a man named Tanan. He didnt act normal, but was very sincere in learning the gospel. Because others thought he was weird, many people, including other missionaries, thought that he would never be able to be baptized. As my companion and I taught him often, I realized that I had never had an investigator who had shown as much faith as Tanan had.

He had a Buddha image that he wore on his neck since he was little. It was very special to him his whole life and he always wore it, but when we taught the 10 commandments, he told us that if God wanted him to take it off, that he would. From that day he never put it on again. He smoked his whole life, and after a hard 2 months of trial after trial, he finally quit so that he could prepare to baptized. As he was approaching his date, many people still felt that he should not be baptized because he was "weird." We were then told that he would not be baptized because the District President had talked to our mission president and that our mission president said he could not. We hadnt heard anything from President Dodge, our mission president, so we talked him the next day. He said that he had only talked to the district president for 30 seconds and never said anything about Tanan not being able to be baptized. He told us that he would like to interview with Tanan, so we took Tanan to the mission office and President had a long interview with him. President said that he was very impressed with his knowledge of the gospel and the plan of salvation, but that he wanted Tanan to wait 6 months so that we could try and get more support from the members. So we set a goal for six months, which was the 1st Sunday of April. It was an amazing experience to serve Tanan for the last part of my mission and to see him gain his own testimony. Despite many others thoughts that he shouldnt be baptized, my companion and I always felt that he should be when we prayed about it, so we knew it would happen.

Well, I just talked to one of the members from my last area and he said that Tanan was baptized 2 weeks ago and received the Holy Ghost and the Aaronic Priesthood last week! I have not been happier. It's amazing! I will never forget Tanan's example of faith and patience. He never lost sight of the goal.