"And he inviteth them all to come unto him..."

This email is from August 7, 2017

Que onda y'all? This week was definitely the most gratifying of my mission thus far. Pascual and his sons Oscar and Angel were baptized on Saturday and was a baptism that I will not soon forget. I had the honor of baptizing Pascual and Elder Garcia baptized his 2 sons. Pascual has come a long ways since when we first knocked on his door about a month ago but he was very prepared and progressed very rapidly. It was an especially happy day for his wife Yami who had been praying for him to change for awhile before we showed up. I already know that the Oropeza family will be a strong family in this church that will be leaders and will send their boys on missions. It was days like Saturday that made all of the sacrifice, frustration, and hard work of the mission worth it. I've been extremely blessed and fortunate to be in the position I'm currently in and to have had the

experiences I have had thus far on my mission. Just makes me want to continue to do my very best because you never know who may be on the other side of that door.

The Oropeza Family

Elder Barrus, Pascual, and Elder Garcia

The District 

Besides the baptism we've been working hard to refill the teaching pool so we can continue this wave of momentum. On Sunday we stopped by a guy we talked to about a month ago named Kevin who we gave a Book of Mormon to. He came out a little bit drunk and started going off on how everything related to Mormonism was wrong because there's a depiction of a white Jesus appearing to the ancient inhabitants of the Americas in the pictures section. He talked about racism and how we are racist and how he will grow up telling his son that Mormons are racist and not to associate with them. And then he said "Your belief in a white Jesus is ruining the future of this country!"  We honestly didn't say much to him, we both were just shocked by how bold he was. I wanted to point out a Book of Mormon verse that says:

"...And he inviteth them all to come unto him and partake of his

goodness; and he denieth none that come unto him, black and white,

bond and free, male and female; and he remembereth the heathen; and

all are alike unto God, both Jew and Gentile."

But ni modo, I wasn't upset, just amused at how passionate some people can be about simple things.

That's about all from here, look forward to hearing back from y'all next week!

Elder Barrus

THM