Monday, January 18, 2016

This past week was great.  On Wednesday we had a meeting with Elder Uceda, all the missionaries and leaders of ward council.  It was seriously such a great meeting.  The Bishops left the meeting very happy because Elder Uceda talked about how the bishop is responsible for the youth.   So if older people have family problems and things like that then it goes to the elders or the sumos and the stake so it was interesting and the Bishops were happy.  

Also, in the meeting, I was amazed the whole entire time.  He started telling us the story of the church here in Perú.  Perú is the country to make it to 100 stakes faster than any other country.  Faster than the US, faster than Mexico, Brasil, any country, the fastest.  And this past week Stake number 101 was opened.  So the church is growing fast here and Elder Uceda was talking because the people have the blood of Lehi.  So I feel very blessed to be able to be here in Perú teaching these people.

After that Elder Uceda called a family up.  Well a mom and a dad that were converts (and have 4 kids and 1 in the mission), then he called the ward council up from the ward of this couple.  He then talked to everyone and asked the ward council how they helped this family (that is now sealed) stay active in the church.  They talked about it all and Elder Uceda then called up 4 people to represent the kids and said that thanks to the ward council a family and many souls were saved.  Then he said the kids will also have kids and called up 3 kids for each child of the couple so 12 more people.  Then he said your grandkids will have kids and called up 3 people for each of the grandchildren and so it was 36 more people.  And he showed us that the work we do doesn't just save that one person.  It saves generations and generations of people.  He said that if a person makes a decision to leave the church they take with them hundreds and hundreds of other spirits because the next spirits will not be born in the church.  It was a very cool meeting.

The next day we had a meeting with him with our whole mission.  It was AWESOME.  It was from like 8 in the morning until 230.  He trained for almost 4 hours and it was incredible.  He has so much information in his head.  All these facts and everything and he didn't even use notes to teach us!  He just went based on the spirit.  It was truly incredible.  The general authorities and everyone in the church are called of God.  

We also got a triple in Russian yesterday!  Hermana Larsons son was asking RMs in Provo from Russia and he found one and sent it here and yesterday we went to the presidents house to pick it up then we went and gave it to _____. He is still very busy but he was happy to receive it and he told us that he could actually read and understand now.  So hopefully that helps him out in his progress.

I also got to go and baptize an investigator of some of the hermanas in my district this week!  The baptism was very nice and the spirit was very strong.  

Something I learned this week in the meeting with Elder Uceda is that repentance is a principle of perfection.  It is something sweet and should not be feared.