Monday, March 14, 2016

This week was good!  I am still with Elder Clark so I am going to be sending him home at the end of this change!!!!  We are super excited to still be here together.  There were some good changes in the zone.  One of them especially, my companion Elder Jones from the CCM, got put into our zone and is training so that is tough because they don't know much about the sector because they are both new there but he is awesome and they are doing so good. 

One great thing that happened this past week is that there is a girl who is 12 and has wanted to get baptized and goes to church all the time but her parents were against it.  We had a list of less actives and we were searching through it and we found her grandpa and went to visit.  He wasn't there but the girl's mom came out and was telling us that her daughter really wants to get baptized and that she was ok with it.  We talked more and she signed the baptismal record so that is super exciting!  We are shooting to have her baptized this weekend so hopefully all of that goes well.  

One bummer is that hermana ____ is still sick!  She is still in the hospital but we go by her house like every single day to see if she is there.  Hopefully this week she gets home from the hospital so we can teach her. 

We had a meeting with Elder Robbins from the presidency of the 70 Thursday and with Elder Montoya also.  It was soooo cool!  Afterwards we had a meeting with all the leaders in the mission and Elder Montoya was there with us and WOW.  It was great.  He talked very directly but with a lot of love. It was such a good meeting.  General authorities are so inspired.  Every opportunity we have to meet with them is such a special experience.  

Yesterday we had another meeting with the area 70.  Me, my comp, President Larson and the stake president.  It was another super cool meeting and we discussed some of the needs of the wards that are in the stake.  

We found a random family this week.  A guy was cleaning his windows and we told him to come down and he did and he let us in and we were able to teach them and so hopefully they are interested. We have another appointment to go back so it should be fun.  Also we are teaching a young couple and in just a couple of weeks they are making so much progress.  They went to church by themselves yesterday so that was great to see.  

So I had to write this really fast because I didnt have too much time today but I love you all!!  Have a great week!  MARCH MADNESS.

Monday, March 7, 2016

This week was highly stressful.  We had a lot of appointments fall through.  But the Lord is definitely testing our patience and diligence.  We had a couple of good lessons this week.  Besides all the appointments falling through the lessons we did have were good.  We had a lesson with this lady that is the daughter of recent converts.  She is having problems with her husband and is about to have a baby.  I think I talked about her last week.  But if not I will talk more about it.   In the lesson we read the Book of Mormon to help her understand more and she felt good and at the end of the lesson she told us that she wants to get baptized.  Her only problem is going to church because sometimes she doesn't feel too good so we are hoping that in these weeks we can get her to church.  

Other than that we had a SWEET contact last night.  We were in the street kind of disappointed because of all the lessons that had fallen through.  And we were about to have a lesson with a new family and it fell.  So we were bummed but then a guy came up to us and said that he is a member in another ward.  So then he told us that his daughter lives in our sector and that he wants us to go teach her.  We told him to take us to the house to be able to present us to his daughter and he did and we met her.  She is a mom and lives with her husband and 3 kids.  She told us that she used to go to church activities and participate in the church but then she moved and stopped going to church.  She even went to seminary when she was younger and loved it!  Her name is  _____.  We have a lesson with her tonight and so we will see how that goes.  Hopefully she will want to accept and be baptized.

Another good lesson we had was with a 22 year old that we met a while ago.  When we started the lesson we were prompted to teach him about God.  He had different ideas about who God is because in the past he had participated in another religion.  Elder Holland in the Liahona taught that the investigators will progress more if they understand who God is and his true nature.  So we started teaching and it was interesting because at the start of my mission I marked a couple of scriptures in my Bible with some tabs and I felt a while ago like taking them out because I had never used them but something told me to leave them in.  I did and in the lesson I ended up using those scriptures probably for about the first time in my mission.  It is so awesome how the spirit works!! I am glad that I did not take out those tabs!

_____ this week was sick and in the hospital all week long!  So that was a bummer because 1/ we couldn't teach her or give her a blessing and 2/ she couldn't go to church.  We are hoping and praying that this week she will get better so we can help her progress towards baptism.  

That is how our week went.  Tomorrow are transfers so we are praying that we stay together one more change.  We find out tonight!!   I love you all family!

 

Monday, February 29, 2016

Hello my family!  This week was stressful.  But it was good!  Everyone always said that January and February are the worst months of summer and last year it was true but wow, it is so hot.  I feel like I complain about the weather a lot.  But it is hot and it is not getting colder.  But oh well, what can ya do?  

One thing that is good that happened yesterday is that it was the last day of carnavales here.  Carnavales is every Sunday of February.  Here it apparently has gotten smaller and smaller over the years but it is basically where people just have water fights and paint fights.  Yesterday, the last Sunday of the month, is the biggest one so there was just a bunch of parties and everything but now it is over so that is good.  We don't have to worry about people getting us wet.  One day this week there was a guy in the street and he started chasing us with a giant bucket of water and water balloons.  We had to run so he didn't get us wet.  Even though it probably would have felt good haha.

This past week hermana _____ came to church again!  We were really nervous that she wasn't going to go because she said that she had to do a couple of things on Sunday so we were going to her house on Sunday morning to remind her about church and we found her in the street already wakling to church with her son!  So that was awesome and such a relief.  It was great.  She is doing good.  We also had the first lesson with her husband.  He is a little doubtful.  He isn't very religious but we really want to focus in on him so that they can be an eternal family.  The only problem is that he works and basically is only in his house on Saturday.  He is pretty much always in his job.  But if we can get him to come to church and progress we know that the whole family will be able to progress even better.  

We had a lesson that was SO COOL this week.  Some recent converts called us and told us that their daughter wanted to listen to us so we went over and talked to her.  We had met her in the past but she was doubtful because she has been in another religion and her husband and family are all part of the other religion.  But we were teaching her about the restoration and she basically said how can she know that everything is true if it is not written in the Bible?  And then we just got into the prayer and the Book of Mormon and the spirit was testifying so strong and she accepted baptism!  So this week we will see how that goes with her.  Hopefully she can complete all the commitments we gave to her so she can receive her answer.

One more cool thing that happened was that the Hermanas in our ward had two baptisms.  One of them was an investigator that we taught the first lesson to.  We taught him and he accepted baptism but he didn't live in our sector so we passed him to the hermanas and he got baptized this past saturday!  So that was exciting, he is sweet and he says that he wants to go on a mission.

That is all the news from this week.  I am doing well.  I hope that you all have a great week!!  Have fun, be safe, choose the right.

 

Monday, February 22, 2016

Hola familia!!  This week was super extremely highly stressful.  We were stressed out the whole time but it was also a great week!

First off, we had another baptism!  Her name is Marycielo.  She is a girl that has 9 years and her mom is being reactivated.  It was a miracle though because the church that we go to we normally assist at 10 in the morning.  We go to church outside of the mission and our capilla is the stake center of the other stake.  So yesterday they just happened to have their stake conference and so our meeting got pushed back to 2 o clock.  Ok, now with all of that in mind.  Marycielo had her date for the 20th but she went out of town and was going to get baptized on that day.  So we had planned for her to get back, teach, get her interview and baptize her.  So we went to her house and her mom was like I don't know if we are going to be able to go to church tomorrow because we just got back from viaje and there are some things that we need to do so probably next week.  BUT.  Surprise, we went to church at 2 so she was like ya, we are going to be able to go!  So Marycielo got baptized right before church yesterday and then got confirmed in the sacrament meeting.  It was such a miracle and she was really happy to get baptized.

Another cool thing was our convert from last week was in church yesterday, PASSING THE SACRAMENT.  It was awesome!  We were so excited for him and he was super happy.  He is doing good.  

ANOTHER MIRACLE.  So last week I told you about the lady that said she was not easy to convince and dura and didn't want to leave her world.  We had a couple of super good lessons with her this past week and we helped her with a couple of problems and she came to church yesterday!!!!!  Her and her two kids!  And she liked it and the members did such a good job of being friendly to them and helping them out.  It was seriously perfect!  They loved it and they have a baptismal date so hopefully they can keep progressing and be able to get baptized her in March.

Those are just a few of the miracles that happened this past week.  I love you all!

 

Monday, February 15, 2016

So this week was AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We seriously had such a big miracle.  God gives us miracles when we are exactly obedient.  So I don't remember if I told you about this last week but...  Our investigator, ____ had permission to get baptized but then he didn't (get baptized).  His parents didn't want him to get baptized so we decided to fast with him and he did it.  So we had a cita (date) with him on Tuesday and we asked him if he had permission and he said....................... YES!!!!!!!!!!  He got permission from his parents.  It was awesome!  Such a big big big miracle.  He was so happy.  So we got him ready, he passed his interview and he got baptized and confirmed this past weekend.  He was so happy and this week we are going to get him an interview with the bishop so he can get his temple recommend.

Another miracle!  So we were knocking on doors this past week and this lady came out and started telling us that she has a brother that is Mormon but she was too wordly and hard of heart to change.  And we got an appointment with her and honestly just talked to her very directly for like 20 minutes, after we saw that all of that was not working we decided to try something else.  We gave her a card with the steps to say a prayer on it and she started praying and she said the shortest prayer I have ever heard but started crying so hard.  Saying she wanted to change.  The spirit was so strong.  Honestly it was a HUGE change from when we first started talking to her.  It made me really realize that we are not the ones who teach but it is the spirit that teaches and can get to the hearts of the people.  It was another miracle.  

One funny story that I forgot to tell you all last week is that whenever we walk past a big group of people here everyone always starts yelling HELLO HOW ARE YOU?   Because we are two white kids walking around in Perú and the other day we past a group of kids that were boxing in the street and They all stopped to say HELLO.  And one of the kids that was fighting stopped and said hello then BOOM.  The other kid came over and hit him in the face and knocked him over and oh my word.  It was funny.  So then after we helped him up we told him he was a champion and got his direction to go teach him but that was funny.

 

Monday, February 8, 2016

This week was much better than last week.  Last week we worked super hard but we didn't really see any success in getting people to church.  This week we were super worried the whole time that we were going to work super hard again and then otra vez not have anyone in church.  But those worries were taken away when we got to church and there were investigators there already and when we were sitting down more investigators came in.  It was so nice.  A load was taken off of our shoulders.

On Monday we met a really cool guy named ____.  He is 22.  He had just barely moved here from Chiclayo and has been here for a week.  And that same day we knocked on his door he said he had found out that one of his best friends had just passed away.  So that was a bummer but we kind of just said like HELLO.  What more do you need?  Like the same day that this happens two missionaries knock on your door, a random house that we didn't know and we found you.  So we have had a couple lessons with him this past week and they have all been super good.  Especially focusing in on repentance and baptism.  We read 3 nefi 11 with him and it was the best.  The spirit was so strong and we made him some pretty cool promises if he fulfills his commitments that we gave him.

We also met a really cool guy one day just contacting in the street.  He has been the administrator in his church for like 10 years but was super open to listening to us.  He even at the end of the lesson accepted a baptismal date in March.  We have a follow up lesson with him today so hopefully it all goes well.  Hopefully he read and prayed.  It is a little funny thinking about how simple it is for someone to get an answer.  We tell them just to read, pray and go to church and it is so easy.  God just asks the people to act and he gives the answer but sometimes people just get lazy or who knows what happens and don't do it.

Also I have been thinking a lot about all of the seeds that we plant on the mission.  Like sometimes we don't always see all of the success that we have.  We contacted a couple this past week and started talking to them and he starting telling us about how he like 6 years ago was going through something really hard and he met the missionaries at a friends house who was a member and said that the missionaries helped him out a lot and for that reason he really respects missionaries and loves them.  So when we went in his house he just like exploded with excitement.  So even if we don't always see everything we do, some day it will have an affect on someone's life.

Monday, February 1, 2016

Hola familia!!   This week was AWESOME!  I got changed to la zona condevilla ward -Jorge Chavez.  Elder Clark is my new companion and we are the zone leaders, he is from Alpine Utah and is awesome.  Except for the fact that he went to Lone Peak but it is ok I already expressed my feelings to him about Lone Peak.  But seriously he is awesome. He was going to go to Ukraine on his mission but while he was in the ccm he got changed to Perú because of the war over there.  He has 1 change more than I do.  It is a little different having a white companion.  We just understand each other and talk about cafe rio a lot haha.  So my sector is half Callao and half San Martin.  The people here are so much more receptive.  The whole week we were just running around like crazy just talking to everybody and being super energetic and making people laugh then teaching them repentance and inviting them to baptism.  I love this place.

This past week we had a bunch of people that we contacted that were really interested in listening to our message.  We found one guy in the street and sometimes to make people laugh we ask them really dumb questions but there was one guy drinking a peach juice called pulp.  And we asked him if he liked it then if he liked inca kola or pulp more and he said inca kola so then it was hilarious because the next question was sooo why did you buy pulp instead of inca kola?  it was seriously hilarious and we had him laughing and then we told him we were missionaries, got an appointment went to his house and he accepted baptism so this month we are hoping he gets baptized.   

We teach good together, me and my companion.  Like we have really just been asking people a lot of questions this week that make them think and then they basically teach themselves.  It is really cool.  It is like what Christ did to the people, he asked them questions that made them think and then after thinking and answering Christ taught more.  So that is what we have been trying to do this week.  

This week has been seriously awesome.  It was a little disappointing at the end because we didnt have very good attendance at church.  Not as many people went as we would have liked but it was still good and even though we were sad we were happy because we had done all we could have done in the week so we were happy because we worked hard. 

Now we just have more meetings with the President and the stake president to coordinate the missionary work and then after those meetings we teach the zone what the mission president wants us to teach the zone.  So it is fun.  My room also is awesome.  In my other room in Santa Cruz it was liike an oven in there.  But this room it is cooler so I can finally sleep now.  

Those are the stories and updates from this week.  The work is awesome and I love it.