Monday, March 7, 2016

Sunday Bloody Sunday


Last week we had a companionship exchange with Elder Clark from Utah.  We went to an investigator's house, the Morelo Family. 
Joni Polo and his family with Luis Barraza and Juan Jose
They came to church this week.  When we taught them in their home, they had a bunch of questions about the restoration of the church.   We talked to them about all of their doubts and concerns.  We challenged them to pray about them.  We did it right then, in the moment.  We knelt down and prayed and acted right then.  After we were sitting there, they all felt the spirit.  They got their own answer from the spirit. They all knew that what we were teaching is true.  They all accepted a baptismal date.  It was so awesome! One of them wants to be a missionary.  

Also, church was pretty awesome.  We had 8 investigators come from our area.  And the other Elders had a lot of less actives come from their area. Our class for Gospel Principles was full--38 people came!  Also the ward numbers are going up. We are getting past 200 in attendance on Sundays.  We confirmed Hermana Silvia this week.  The Bishop and the Member that baptized her weren't sure how to confirm her, so I did it.  : )
Last pday we went to a castillo, a really old building close to the beach.  We took a lot of great pictures.  I'm still working with my companion.  He likes to work.  He's super excited, and he likes to talk.  

This week we had a meeting with the Bishop on Wednesday night, we talked to him about the recent converts.  We have a lot of recent converts, but they all have problems.  Mostly because they are not self sufficient. So we are trying to get the members of the ward that are rich, to minister to the poor, to help them become self sufficient.  If that works out, we're going to solve a lot of problems, and have a lot of success helping both sides.  We're super excited about that!

Sunday, we were coming back from lunch, and we were walking down the street, and we approached a very busy intersection.  There were tons of people there, and once we got closer we realized why...somebody had died.  And he was lying there in the street. Apparently, two guys got in a big fight, one of them pulled out a big pistol, and boom, one of them was dead.  

There were a ton of cops all around.  Everyone was just sitting there in the street next to him.  In Colombia ambulances do not come very fast.  So we start coming down the street and we find cops in green that are normal, then there was the swat team looking cops, not normal--it was like a whole ton of ninja-looking cops holding shields. 

We get down there and we find out there are a whole bunch of the poor people standing on their side of the street, in the dirt road.   It was one of their people that died.  The swat cops were on the other side of the street facing them.  And as we're walking, we hear a couple of shots go off.  All of sudden, everyone leaves. Within 10 seconds, the streets were totally empty.  

We didn't understand what was happening.  One minute 200 people are filling the streets, the next minute-no one.  Then we smelled why...they shot off a couple of gas bombs.  The breeze carried the gas our direction, and hit us in the face.  We got gassed out!  I was like, Whoa--it's covering my eyes and my mouth. It was so strong. The first thing I thought was, "I'm going to have the coolest story to tell my Mom this Monday!"  It was pretty awesome.  So we quickly ran away.  

As we were running away, we saw people sitting on the side of the road crying.  It was obvious that the Police wanted everyone to leave.  There were kids that were having problems from inhaling the gas, so their parents took the milk bags and squirted them in the face.  Apparently that helps.  Now we know. Lesson learned, watch out for gas bombs!  Those are not my favorite. 

I hope you guys are great.  I hope you're loving life.

See ya later, have a great week.
Elder Burk  

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