Speaking in Spanish Branch

Several weeks ago, we were invited by the sister missionaries who serve in the Cortez Branch, a Spanish-speaking branch located in Bradenton, to speak in Sacrament Meeting.  They said they asked us at the request of the branch president, but I suspect they may have volunteered us.  In any case, they wanted us to speak on missionary work.  When I was called as first counselor in the mission presidency, Pres. Cusick indicated that I might be asked to speak.  If so, we were to accept the assignment, but that we were to only speak on missionary work.  So the speaking request fit perfectly with our mandate.

Since we were going to attend the Sacrament Meeting anyway, we attended the other meetings as we do when we visit a ward.  All of their meetings are conducted in Spanish, so the sister missionaries or branch members translated for us so we would understand somewhat.

To assist those who were translating our talks, we had printed them.  One of the sister missionaries, Sister Paulsen, translated for Renee when she spoke.  She seemed quite self assured as she translated.  We sent her our talks on Friday, so she and her companion had translated them as part of their language training.  Her junior companion, Sister Johnson, wasn't comfortable translating for me, so the ward Relief Society President translated.  She is retired from the military, and she did a lot of translating while in the military.

I think that it went OK.  The advantage of having someone translate is that one only has to prepare a talk for half as long :-)