Preaching in Puerto Rico: Puerto Rico sin luz

Well this week things were a little nuts here in Puerto Rico. We lost power on Wednesday at about 2pm and it seemed like the whole world was going to end! All the Puerto Ricans got in their cars and started driving around for no apparent reason, I assume just to have air conditioning haha. But then we started hearing rumors in the street and we come to find out that a power plant in Salinas blew up and that we were going to be without power for up to a week! So that night and the next night we ended up sleeping on the porch of the house with our mattresses out in the open air where it was somewhat, not a lot, cooler than inside. We loaded up with bug spray and slept outside and honestly I slept great.

But as far as missionary work this week... it was a little complicated because a phone company cut all services and so a lot of the phones weren't working as we tried to coordinate things. And people were always out buying ice and stuff and idk why everybody thinks that when the power goes out we have to get in our cars and drive around for no reason but that's how it seemed to me.

We have a family we're teaching and they're super cool, the mom and the daughter have a baptismal date for the 9th of October, but we have yet to be able to set the date with the dad. The mom is super excited and wants to be baptized really bad, her name is Maria Roman and she came to church and everything on Sunday. She brought her grandson and everybody loved him and I think that made her feel really accepted in church which was really cool to see.

We're working with a 12 year old boy named Ariel who is part of a part-member-family in the ward here. He's been coming to church for like 4 months now and wants to be baptized, but his dad is putting up walls and doesn't want to let him be baptized. And Ariel is scared to tell his dad what he wants to do!! So we're kinda at a standstill until we can convince the dad to let him get baptized. Because the kid is ready, just need the signature from the dad.

We finally got power back on Friday I think... but as we go around town there's still places in San Juan that have yet to fully receive power so it's still kinda shaking things up. As we walked through San Juan with the power out it was soooo loud because all the buildings have giant generators... and apparently when there's no power everybody goes to the bars. So the streets were really loud with tons of people in the bars. Satan has power wherever and whenever he needs it!

Sunday was really cool because the talks that were given in sacrament meeting were super good for our investigator, and I got to translate for some greengos! I got to go to primary and everything and translate for 4 boys super full of energy. It was pretty fun but man they were a handful, hahaha, I did more teaching than the teacher did.

I really felt this week that the Book of Mormon is true. It just hit me again and again that it's true. That the prophets are real and called of God. I know that this is His church. I know it and there's nothing anyone can do to disprove that. I'm so thankful for what I have!

Love you all!

Elder Zack Nelson