Bueno, just kidding. I´ll write this letter in english. I thought about writing it in spanish. Just for a second. But then I decided against it. I´m a good person, I promise. This week was great. A lot better then last week. I was a bit stressed last week. This week God decided that I had put forth my faith enough to give me a booster shot of spirit so I wouldn´t go crazy. I love it when God shows me He loves me. It allows me to make it through the next bout of crazyness.
A ver, what happened this week. Lunes - I took a nap. That was awesome. Then my life got rearranged like three times (last minute phone calls - you have to be here at such and such time). But we were invited to a special training conference in San Fernando (training - yeah! Getting up at 4 in the morning - Boo!). We talked about the Doctrine of Christ and read in Mosiah 3:19 about the natural man and how are goal is to overcome the natural man. We do it by the Atonement of Christ first - to become Saints - applying faith, repentance, baptism (weekly through the sacrament) and the gift of the holy Ghost. But we get faith first by learning and understanding the Gospel. Something that needs to be planted in our hearts (Alma 36:13? I think somewhere around there. I don´t have my notes) And if we plant faith in our hearts, we will feel the true fear of God - because we will want to repent because we know we are messing up every day. But if we feel this fear, then we will offer a true prayer (not a quick insincere prayer) and we will receive forgiveness. Which will lead us to become humble, meek, patient, longsuffering - like a child. It was a mixture of Mosiah 3:19 and Alma 36. And it was great. I loved it. And I walked away knowing that I needed to repent but knowing that God knew I could do it. (As opposed to the week before where I went to the training meeting and walked away feeling like the worst/least efficient missionary of all time) Sometimes I just need a good dose of the doctrine to keep me going. And as we become these things we will become even as Christ is - perfect. But it´s a progression. So keep repenting.
Then Hna Lobos and I talked about our Santification - we were given the assignment to teach it in our district meeting. And Santification is being freed from sin and staying pure. The goal of our lives is to be sanctified and live with God (Moises 1:39). The only way to do this is by applying the Atonement in our lives (Moises 6:59-60). We apply the atonement in our lives through the Sacrament. By partaking of the bread and water we reknew our convenants, are cleansed once again, and can begin a new week with renewed faith and motivation. Thus being sanctified. Cool huh?
So, that´s the doctrine I´ve learned/studied. I´ve also been thinking a lot about the change over from the law of Moises to the Law of Christ (3 Nefi 9:17-22). And I was thinking about the difficulties when it finally occurred. Because all of the believers had been looking forward to the coming of Christ, but were living a different law. So when the time came to change, they had to change all their habits all at once. And I´m sure quite a few people struggled with the changes even though they knew that it was what they wanted, and they wanted to follow Christ. But it took time, to change over. And some people probably changed super fast and it wasn´t even a struggle. It depends on our faith and willingness, and if we understand. It´s how we live our lives, no? We are living and doing good things, but there comes a time when Christ asks us to jump in our faith and live a higher law (we receive a calling, they up the standards, we are asked to do more in whatever position we are in). And it´s hard because we felt like we were completing our part and doing good, and it´s harder what we are being asked to do. But we have to show our faith and receive the confirmation that this is what God is asking us to do right now. And each time, God is giving us a bit more of His laws to live, so that we can become like Him.
Alright, investigators. We don´t have a ton that are progressing. Just one family. The family from Paraguay told us that they didn´t want to change churches (I don´t think they really read in the Book of Mormon) we´re going to try to pass by again and invite them to really read in the Book Of Mormon. We have another family that we were doing good with, but then our lives got super busy and weird so we´ve only been able to have contact by telephono. We´ll see what comes of that.
The most exciting is this new family we found this week. One of the projects of the ward is to clean up the member list. So we´ve been given a list of older members and asked to pass by to see if they´ve died or not (it´s not morbid, we just ask if they are there, and they tell us if they´ve died or not). IT´s a great way to get new investigators because we start talking to whoever answers the door. Anyways, so we go, find out this one specific Hna is not dead, but she doesn´t want anything to do with the church - we ask for a reference and she points us to one of her neighbors. It´s late so we have to go home. The next day we are walking and a member from Zarate I stops us and says "I have a reference for you" He didn´t even introduce himself, just looked at us, searched for our placks and when he saw that we were missionaries gave us this reference. But the reference gave us the needed opportunity to go back and contact the neighbor of this member. So we go, and the reference isn´t interested, but her granddaughter came walking up and we got a return cita with her. We went back to teach her and she accepted a baptismal date and everthing! She was so excited, she´s had a lot of bad experiences, she´s 16, she married some guy ("married" she lived with this guy) who beat her, she was pregnant with twins, lost the twins, and then went back to her family. who only half accepts her because her grandma taught her to rob. The point is she wants to change. So Sunday we go pass by for her house and she does not want to get out of bed - a bad consequence of being out late until 7 in the morning at a boliche. But her 2 sisters and her mom come to church with us. Miracle! And as we were walking home they accepted a baptismal date. And they were super excited because there are a couple of activities going on this saturday and they want to go. Hurray! Miracles. And we reset the fecha with the original so the whole family (poco a poco) will be getting baptized. Love it.
And that´s the highlight of my week. I´m going to go sleep now.
Love you lots!
Hermana Reed
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