Glady Veloz

This wonderful woman died earlier this week.  She is just a couple years older than my mom but had a brain aneurism. She is one of the women that taught me the most on my mission.  I was about halfway through my mission, serving in Manta.  It was the first time I'd served in a bigger city and it was harder to talk to people.  She did not faun over the missionaries like some people that we met.  One of her daughters was in the ward that we served in and had referred her to us. We would teach her weekly and her 20 something daughter would sit in her room with the door open and pretend not to listen.  Gladys taught school at a Catholic school.  She was a joy to teach, but she wasn't progressing.  In a last-ditch effort to teach her (we had run out of lessons and extra lessons), we held a family night and watched a video about Priesthood Authority.  She fell asleep for part of it and I figured we'd have to say goodbye for the last time. We didn't say a word, but God knew her heart and her worries.  We finished the video and told us that she was ready to be baptized.  She shocked us for sure.  She said that she had worried about the idea of the Priesthood.  She couldn't understand how God could give power to imperfect men.  God knew that and bore testimony through the Holy Ghost.  I learned that it's not the teacher, but the Spirit that converts.  She was baptized and called to work in the Young Women's.  Her daughter, Elena, was later baptized. I came to visit a year after my mission.  She didn't even have time to sit and visit because she was so diligently taking care of those sweet YW. I had knocked on her door when she was leaving to go to a Young Women's activity.  I walked with her to the church, hugged her and left. Gladys is the perfect example of being guided by the Holy Ghost, loving her neighbor and having a testimony planted in her heart.  I'm so proud of her and hope that she is having a joyous reunion with those that have gone before.  I send my love from this side of the veil and hugs to her daughters and grandkids on this side.