Another Week in Paradise

We had a good week here in Chile! We are getting closer to Chilean independence day, so that’s cool. We are starting to see more cueca, more asado, more empanadas! and more calor! How do you say that in English? Its hotter here. This morning we got up and went to play volleyball and soccer with some missionaries nearby, and it was HOT. This week Hna Vilches and I had to make ourselves lunch a couple of times, and after a day of that, we figured out that we do not know how to cook! But we got better after a few days of trying! The most fancy thing we did was rice, but out of cauliflower, with black beans and chicken. Ha-ha, it was weird, but we were just trying to take advantage of not having to eat the same old rice every stinking day. This week we found a new investigator whose name is Daniel. He doesn’t believe in God, but he has had so many signs of God reaching out to him. In reality, I think Daniel has always been looking for God, but he’s just never found Him in the other churches so he decided not to believe. We invited him before our next appointment to just pray and ask God is he is there. If any of you are also feeling like maybe you’re not sure if there is a God who is there and who is aware of you, I invite to just pray and ask if God is there. I know He will respond to you!! We’ve been working with a lot of Haitians!! One whose name is Pelison. He’s pretty cool, and he lives in the same building as a member, so that helps a lot! Also Noemi, who kind of escaped us this week! We put like ten appointments with her last week but we could never find her! We have one with her tonight, so hopefully she’s home! Noemi went to the conference we had last week instead of church, so hopefully we can get her to come to the stake conference we have this weekend! 

This week I also started clase de canto (singing class)!! Only one person came, but hey it was good! They put it on FB on Sunday, and the class was Tuesday so there wasn’t much time for people to see it. Presidente has a lot of hope that people will come next week, and I do too. On Wednesday we had an English class that was really fun! We played a game where you have to ask questions in English to figure out what the person is thinking of. Ha-ha, it was fun! On Friday, we had divisions, with Hna Perez and Hna Machado, who are our capcitadoras! They are in Peñaflor, so that was fun! I was with Hna Perez, who was my comp for three weeks and who I love dearly. She’s the best. She is super trunky, but hey she goes home in October so whatta ya gonna do? What’s fun about that is that the hnas are also opening a new sector here in our zone, that beforehand was of elders, so it’s a little bit more flaite like they say here in Chile, like an elder’s sector would be, hahaha. It was so fun!1 So many people starting at me and yelling stupid things. Woohoo, it keeps they day interesting, hearing the different things people come up with. My favorite one so far is either "oh wow... too bad they’re Mormons..." or "conviertame linda!" Last week I bought new running shoes, and a jump rope. So I’ve just been jumping rope like a crazy person! It’s so fun!! Every morning I’m like "hey, let’s go see how long I can jump without messing up!!" 

Okay, so two weeks ago in the gospel principles class, an elder in my ward thought it would be funny to make a dumb comment about a scripture in the bible that says that the man is the head of the woman. I wanted to kill him a little bit, not just because that seems completely machista, but also because it’s a freaking class of INVESTIGATORS. You have to be careful what you joke about because they might take it seriously. This week Hna Vilches and I had to teach, and we decided to teach about the gospel of Jesus Christ. We did an object lesson on repentance and baptism, and for a “volunteer” we used this elder. We showed that he sinned, so he was dirty. We then put honey, dirt, and sharpie all over his hand. We talked about how sometimes we get dirty, when we make bad decisions. Then we invited this elder to clean himself up. so he tried and he couldn’t. We talked about he needs water to be able to be clean. It’s the same in our lives, we can’t clean ourselves from our sins, so Heavenly Father gave us water to help us, or baptism. We also talked about how that water doesn’t do much if we don’t have soap. So the soap was the proper authority. It was honestly very fun doing it, we enjoyed it. And then the best part of the week was that I played piano in Sacrament meeting, which I had not done in months! Then they asked me to play for the ward choir! It was hymn I’d never heard before, actually two, and I had to sight read them right then and there, but I did it, and not too bad!! I was proud of myself. The only news for the upcoming week would be that there is a little guitar store in my sector that we pass almost every day, and I’m getting more and more tempted!! ha-ha 

I’ve been finishing up Alma this week. I love towards the end of Alma, when Moroni is protecting his people. I love it because it is such a good example of how the Lord calls our leaders to help us be protected and safe, especially the prophet. He can see dangers that you can I can’t, and when we follow his guidance, we are so much better. In the Book of Mormon, Moroni tells his people to go to battle prepared with armadura (I can’t remember that in English???), and the Lamanites don’t have that guidance. When they meet each other, just seeing the preparation of the Nephites makes them afraid, and they don’t even want to fight. Similarly, when we follow the prophet’s guidance, we will be so prepared spiritually that the enemy won’t know where to attack. I also like that there’s a part when the Lamanites try to attack a city, but it is so well protected that they can’t even get to it. Then they think "hey there’s that city over there that we were able to destroy really easily the last time, because its their weak sport. Let’s go over there" so they go and find out that after they destroyed it last time, the Nephites built it up again, only stronger. Their weak point became their strong point. True repentance is like that in our lives. When we have spiritual weaknesses, and Satan attacks them it’s okay if we get destroyed, just as long as we really repent, because if we do that, like Ether 2:27 says, those weaknesses of ours will become our strengths. Satan will always go after our past sins or past difficulties, because He doesn’t understand the power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ!! Let’s all use that power in our lives to keep ourselves safe from the danger of sin! 

Hermana Stanley