Hello
Family, this has been another week in Terrada.
I am
doing good, just a solo act. My
companion does not speak Spanish or English or Portuguese. So, I
really am just am serving here on my own with a companion who follows behind
me. I am trying hard to serve and be
kind. Here is my week…
Monday
We had a good day we had a lot of elders in our house for the
zone meeting. It is so great to talk and have fun with other elders! For our district leader meetings, we had 6 elders stay at our
flat. Sadly, we only had two mattresses so some guys had to sleep on the floor!
We cooked empanadas and all went to the
park for some fun. They had a very little
museum that we found and went to check it out. It was about 3 rooms and about
10 feet by 10 feet. It was full of
homemade things for show and tell and it was great! It was super funny
cause it looked like a bunch of paper Mache stuff like flowers and Christmas lights
and it was super fun. They were so proud of it. They kept telling us that it
was such a great & creative museum! We enjoyed the time there.
Tuesday
We had zone meeting and it was super fun it was our last zone meeting
before transfers so we all hung out and wrote in our journals and it was a
great time! We were there most of the
day and when we went home we got invited by one of our investigators to play
soccer with him! So not only did we get to play soccer we got to teach a lesson
after!
Wednesday
We had a good day but, not a lot of success. It was
a holiday here and so you would think that we would be able to talk to a lot of
families. Well I would too, but it’s considered rude to
knock doors and talk to people during the work free day. So, we kept trying and hoping not everyone would have the same
attitude. Saddly, it was pretty
universal. We did get to know a lot more
of our area by walking around so much! So… that’s at least a plus for Wednesday.
Thursday
A day of service we passed for members that requested our service.
We have been having a week-long rain storm and it rains every day. It cools off
at night so it was not suited to our work schedule but we trudged through rain
and helped some people. At night, we tried to pass for members cause its
dedicated night for us to serve active members.
It was good we had some that let us talk to them and it was great! I
love talking to active members it’s like a break from work because they are trying
to do everything that they are supposed to already. It
makes you so proud of them!
Friday
It rained all day again!!! It literally flooded the streets. We
were soaked and cold that it was super miserable. The water came above our shoes on the sidewalks
and it was a long wet day! We tried to pass for investigators and menos activos
but did not have much luck, except getting wet.
Saturday
We taught a new investigator English or I did anyway. It was a
son of a recent convert and it was so exciting & great because we talked
about bible stories. We gradually talked about his questions & about the purpose
of life. We were also able to talk about where we go after
this life. So, I taught English and the first lesson all
wrapped up in one lesson, it was great! At
first he didn’t want anything to do with the Mormons, but he wants to work in America
one day. He found out I spoke English
and he started taking time off from work to talk to me. I am really excited because
he has a lot of faith in his church but is not to happy with his churches doctrine. It is
like the perfect opportunity really, the best thing ever for us. We have got it all in our church!
Sunday
We were in church sitting with one of our investigators and a
man entered in the church in normal cloths so we knew he must be a new comer. We
started talking to him and he is on vacation here in Argentina. He was walking home after shopping for some
stuff and he saw our chapel. He thought
wow, a church that beautiful must be doing something right so he strolled in. I wish everyone here would be brave enough
to do that.
So, I asked him if he had any questions about where he comes from
our why he is here and he said he has been looking for those answers his whole
life. He looked at me and said, “a young
kid couldn’t know more than me.” I said,” I may not know more but I may know a
little bit about a plan God has for you! The plan of happiness.” So, we started
talking about the plan of salvation and he got teary eyed and said I have been
searching for answers for so long! It was truly amazing because he asked for a Book
of Mormon. I happen to put a copy of the
book of Mormon in my book bag instead of my nice ones that I always bring with
me. I had just written my testimony on
the inside. It was truly amazing because
the day before I thought I might need a giveaway copy soon with my testimony. I
got a book and wrote in it. Then that
morning I thought I should bring it to church.
It is definite inspiration because that’s something I normally don’t
bring to church. It was a sweet experience to feel prompting and to help in a
great man’s searching for answers. Lesson
learned…Follow even the simplest promptings.
Look for
those little promptings this week and follow them. Let me know what you find!
Love you
all,
Elder
Vance