Week 10

Week 10

 This week has been another week filled with many blessings. We were able to have more lessons with our progressing investigators and helped prepare for two baptisms. I honestly am so grateful to be part of such amazing people’s lives, to help make this happen and to be able to have the power and authority of god to baptize investigators. We also had a rescue this week which was awesome, Hermano Leoncio has been inactive for more than a year, and being able to teach him and bring him back to the fullness of the gospel is amazing.

  I have also noticed our ward has been progressing a lot these past few weeks. At the beginning it was pretty hard because they were not as active, didn´t have much service or activities with the youth. Now our ward has been participating in Family Home Evening, going to English class at the church, coming to baptisms, and just being more helpful with us. I am so grateful to be part of this ward, though we are still working to be active together, I know that we are becoming one great big family.

I had my First day of leading the area on Friday and I will admit it’s really hard to learn your area. Luckily I had my companion and the Holy Ghost by my side to help. I am really learning to just trust in the lord and just work. It’s crazy how so many people recognize the missionaries. I had this feeling that my companion and I needed to go down another block so we could contact, or share a message. Once we went down the road we were stopped by a homeless man, who was just looking for missionaries for some reason, sadly I didn’t understand his reason. We ended up giving him a card of Jesus Christ shared a small message with him to come unto Christ and you will be at peace. I have never seen a man so emotional and happy to hear our message like this before. I am so grateful that we can make people feel joy when we share messages with them; I know it to be true because we have the Holy Ghost and only the Holy Ghost can reach other people and their hearts.   

Week 9

Week 9

This week was filled with many miracles, learning experiences, and some hard ships. Our hard ships were not finding more investigators or our investigators failing to follow through. I notice that I got really down when that happened this week; I did not let that bring me down, I just looked at the positives on who we did teach whether it was with members, Investigators, less actives or even contacting new people. My Spanish might not be the best but I do feel the comfort when I teach or when my companion helps me out with a word or phrase. It’s the little miracles that surprise me.

So this week when we were walking to our next appointment we ran into a drunken person on the side walk. The Crazy thing was that he called for our names, and he bore his testimony to us, he told us his story how his son is going on a mission and how he is a member of the church and knows this church is true. What made me question was why was he drinking, why does Satan have to do that to Gods children, and why do we go through hard ships. We couldn´t do much because he wasn´t in our area and that’s what made me sad but we did give him a card to contact the church. The reason I share this story because during conference those questions in my mind were answered. My favorite talk was all of them (jaja) but If I had to choose one it would be Russell M. Nelson. What can help us become spiritually stronger? He emphasized Joy in this talk so much. My favorite part of the talk was when he said ¨Saints can be happy and feel joy every day, even if it’s a bad one. Joy comes and is the definition of God, Learn to suffer with Joy¨. I learned so much this conference and realized how much I could get out of each conference as a missionary. I am so grateful for prophets today on this earth and love this gospel more and more each day.

Ok and now onto the positive, we will be have 2 baptisms this week, their names are Victor and Jerico, I am so excited for them because I know that they are taking One HUGE step towards Heavenly Fath

Week 8

This week has been a great week, Full of learning and growing experiences. I have noticed that I need to learn more patience and just forget myself and get to work. Now this week has definitely been a better week, I got to talk more while teaching lessons and do more contacts, although I am still a little shy I’ve  noticed I’m getting way better. This past week has been filled with a bunch of blessings. One of them is about two young boys that we taught this week. Their names are Alexander who is 8 and Jerico who is 9, I love these two kids. Their grandparents and siblings are strong in the church, the mom has been a little less active and the dad is not a member.  We were asked to give them lessons from the mom so they can become members of the church.  It’s amazing that we were given the opportunity to teach them. My companion has taught them a few times before, but these last two visits have been amazing teaching them about faith, prayer, and baptism. You can see the joy in these boys’ eyes and I just felt the spirit so strong. We asked them to baptism and had to have their Father sign a paper that it was ok for them to be baptized.  Alexander was baptized this past weekend and Jerico will be baptized next week after General Conference. I love this gospel so much and I love the people of Peru. Although my Spanish is not fluent I have seen a lot of progress these past few weeks.

As for where I live, it’s in a very poor area of Peru, high crime rates, very dirty, a lot of markets, and street food which we can’t have (but it’s smart, I could get sick). We have a pinchanist who cooks for us lunch and dinner, I don’t know how to spell it but hope you know what I mean. My living isn’t too bad, I at least have a bed and running water, most people that we teach here have one or the other or none at all, it’s very sad mom. My English classes I teach are great, I learn a lot of Spanish this way because my classmates help me (haha) but I Love them they are funny and great. Our last service we did was clean the whole church building, just me and my companion, but our building is super small.

Please tell everyone I said hello, and that I love them.

Week 7 September 19, 2016

Hola Madre!

My companion is sweet. I love him, his name is elder Hawks, he has lived in Spain for 13 years so he is very fluent in the language. I am so blessed to have him. On my first day we started contacting and tracking, I gave out my first book of Mormon to a man who has two kids and is married, his children are oh so cute. Anyway this week has been a really crazy week; it feels like the first week in the CCM. I am in training for 12 weeks which is really tough but I am enjoying it. I just want to say that my companion and I got a baptism this week! It was such an amazing experience mom! His name is Louis, he’s 13 years old, the only member in the family. Crazy I know. We will have another one this Saturday. We also brought an inactive back to church, she has been inactive for a long time. It has been such a humbling experience mom. Where I am from and the place I am serving in right now is called Central which is near the coast of Lima, I am near the End of the boundaries of my mission. Its super sad mom, I see hundreds and hundreds of homeless dogs, cats, drunk people you name it, It’s bad! The people are kind of rude or just have a bad attitude...



The language is hard, but I’m just going to stay positive and say that I am growing more and more. My ward is really nice, I teach Clase de Ingles every Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Saturdays. I also gave a talk on Sunday which was about 9 minutes, it was alright.. I mean they said they got what I was talking about but I just don’t know the language.. haha overall studying and learning more in the gospel has been a blessing, I have been studying in Preach my Gospel a lot in the First lesson about how God is our Loving Heavenly Father. It’s been a true blessing how much I have grown and know that God loves us and is with us every day. Its truly amazing how he answers prayers whether it’s at the moment or later when the time comes. I love you Mom and Dad.

Week 6 September 12, 2016

Buenos Tardes,

Well today is my last day at the MTC, I am so grateful for this opportunity to learn and grow just in these past 6 weeks. I have so much more to go and learn. The language is coming along but nowhere near being fluent. This past week we got to teach more members from Mexico City, and it was a huge blessing. They have so much love for us and I just don´t know why. They are so humble and just want what’s best for us. I am so grateful that I go teach each day to practice, I can see how the Holy Ghost works through me and it’s an amazing comforting feeling. God knows us and will guide us to tell us what to do and I know that to be true.

We heard a talk by Elder Ballard this past weekend and there are two things that really hit me in the heart and that was " Let your soul Be still and commit yourself, Heart, Might, Mind, and strength." another was " Nothing will stop us from serving the lord", I love this gospel so much and I know if we come unto Christ and be converted that we will see the blessing that God gives us, it starts with the act of faith.

Week 5 September 8, 2016

Week 5

Buenos Dias,

So this is my last week in the CCM! I leave next Monday to Peru and I can´t wait. This week was so awesome; we got to hear Elder Christofferson speak on Tuesday from Provo. It was on Teach repentance and baptize converts. It is such a blessing to have repentance and I am so grateful for it. One of my favorite things he says was "There is a Savior, He gives us the access of grace through faith in him". I love that and know to be true as well. Faith leads to obedience (articles of faith #4) which then leads us to repentance and being clean again. I know that our Heavenly Father loves all of us, we are his children. I have learned the importance of trust and by David O. Mckay (who was a prophet) said "It is greater to be trusted then loved", and to me I think it is more important to be trusted so then we are truly loved as well.

Week 4 September 1, 2016

So this week was really awesome, this past week our Branch president Elder Romero spoke to our District about obedience and sacrifice. In the Old Testament Samuel 15:1-22 (I challenge you all to read it) We learn in this chapter how Saul didn´t obey Gods commandment. To shorten it up Elder Romero says "Obeying and striving for obedience to the lord is better than sacrificing (for example: My life for two years). It’s just a small fraction of my life I can give to the lord. For i know and testify that he will pour his blessing onto me and everyone else as well.

Another cool experience that I had this week was in class yesterday. Our teacher Hermano Trujillo challenged us to pray and ask god one question and it can be any question, then go to your scripture and open to a random page. I´ll share my question, it was how can I strengthen myself spiritually and overcome bad days? And I happened to be in Alma 31:33 Wilt thou grant unto them that they may have strength, that they may bear their afflictions which shall come upon them because of the iniquities of this people. (Read it). It talks about how we are promised to have strength that they may Bear there afflictions. I know it’s just one small verse but i can testify that God does answer prayers and whether its little or big, he is always there and i challenge all of you to do this this week whenever you can, y en el nombre de jesucristo. Amen