Monday, September 25, 2017

September 25, 2017


Jose


Marilin


Adriana

Three amazing children of God are now members of this perfect church!

Adriana, who is 15 years old, was a reference from a member. She's kind of an intimidating girl at first, but once you start to get to know her, she's the sweetest. She's being such a good example to her family. It's been so fun to see her testimony grow so much and see a little bit more light and happiness enter into her life through this gospel.
Marilin was a contact on the street, and wow, this lady is incredible. She had been searching her whole life for the truth, and the first time she went to church, she knew she had found it. In all my 8 months in the mission, Marilin is probably the most prepared person I have met. 

And Jose Alberto. He was a reference from the sons of our bishop. He's only 11 but I truly think the influence of this church and his friends in this church are going to help him so much. His dad is always drinking, his home life is just kind of jacked up, but he's found so much happiness through the gospel and through the ward family.

Preparing a baptism for three is pretty stressful already but even more so when you're filling the baptismal font, and the dirtiest water comes out. Like with long worm-type things just swimming around. It was so gross. We got most of the bugs out before anyone saw them, but I'm sure there were still a few haha. So yeah, they didn't get the luxury of a nice, clean font like most people these days. But they got an experience more like the one of Jesus Christ being baptized in river water. so i guess that's cool.

But really, it was an incredible night and all three of them were just so happy afterwards. The spirit was so strong and once again it just testified to me that without a doubt this is the church that Jesus Christ established and that this is the baptism that our heavenly father intended us to have. There just isn't another way. The power and authority of God is in this church. 

Monday, September 18, 2017

September 18, 2017


The cuties that will be baptizedJose Alberto Adriana Marilin


Also one of the best lil old ladies!! She's the cutest thing and I love her sooo much!




Also, Anthony Davis is Mormon and in my ward. 

Random fact....Dominicans use their ovens as an extra cuppoard. They ask you if you want a drink of water, and then they pull out the cups from in the oven. Or they ask if you want some crackers, or avocados or something random, and they pull it out from the oven. Its really funny. Everything but stuff you bake goes in their ovens. 

Another fact. I hit 8 months in the mission today. Time is just flying by! ahhhhhhhh

Fact 3... I have lice. Washing your hair and then seeing gross little bugs coming out is not a fun experience. So this week was just a lot of lice hunting. All the actual bugs are out, but they laid billions of tiny eggs, so my comp has been real great and has been trying to find them and take them out strand by strand. But a pro to all this was that we got to go sleep in a nice air-conditioned apartment because we didn't have running water one night so the missionary couple that had been helping picked us up late one night and took us to their house where they put special shampoo in my hair and got some lice out. Then I slept in a nice, air-conditioned room snuggled up with a nice big comforter. 

We have been working with a few really great people and this week they had their baptismal interviews and next Saturday will be their big day!

My testimony has been really strengthened of just how true this church is lately. We have been working with this guy who is super into the bible and he needs all the evidence of everything in the bible. And then our most recent lesson he pulled out some Catholic bible with 8 other books that I had never heard of. I just asked him, but who are these people? Are they prophets? And he obviously couldn't say yes. He didn't really know where they came from. But working with him has just been an eye opener because everything in this church is of God, it´s what Jesus Christ intended for his church to be. I love this gospel sooo much! I know without a doubt its the only true church. If you don't know it, just pray to our Heavenly Father who knows everything!!!!

Monday, September 11, 2017

September 11, 2017


We were all so happy after their baptismal interview.

Yo yo yo. 

So this "huge hurricane" turned out to be a letdown. It was just your average rain storm. Not even lots of wind or anything where we were. But besides being stuck in our house all day Thursday because at any moment "the big part of the hurricane is going to come," it was an amazing week. I am just so beyond grateful for the hand of God in this work and for his spirit that touches the hearts of people who are ready. 

Ever since I've  arrived in this area we have been working with Jenny. she has about six months with the missionaries, and in that time has had several baptismal dates fall through because she just doesn't feel ready. The lessons we've had with her we have focused on repentance cause she doesn't feel the need to repent. So there's a lil back story. Now to the most recent lesson with her. We talked about the great sacrifice of Jesus Christ and how he suffered and died for us so we could return and live with our Heavenly Father again. We talked about how we need to be ready at any moment to return to the presence of God, and this is why repenting everyday is so important. I learned a lot in the MTC and one thing my MTC president said to me is that you can make a spiritual moment for your investigator, you can make any situation, any moment, the moment they come to know the truth. So there in that hot little garage, with wet clothes hanging around us, we all got on our knees and she offered the sweetest prayer asking God to help her repent and be ready for baptism. The spirit was so strong, and she looked the happiest I have ever seen her in the time I've known her. Jenny now has a baptismal date coming up. Woohooo.
 
But that's not the only miracle of this week. We have been working with a wonderful Haitian family. The dad and the oldest son have been baptized a long time ago, and so we've been working on getting the mom and other son baptized, but they need to get married first. So along with the help of the ward, little by little they have been saving the money to get married. and finally we have enough so hopefully in the next week or two, depending on when they can get the appointment to sign the marital documents, we will be having the wedding and baptism of the Tibas. 

Yayay for missionary work!!                                  

So this transfer is almost coming to an end. Crazy how fast it went by. All of our hard work in the beginning is soon going to pay off. We are working with about 6 solid people to be baptized the last Saturday of this transfer, the 23. I'm hoping that all of them come through. Truly I feel so humbled that Heavenly Father is trusting me with these people. These precious souls. We are working with this 17 year-old boy who has soooo much knowledge of the bible and we were teaching him about the restoration and he had all these questions that were super deep and he wanted all the evidence in the bible, and truly I felt inadequate. I don't have all this bible knowledge, sometimes I don't have enough words in Spanish to explain the way I want to, Ya know, just those lil doubts that creep in. But it's Satan trying to get me down and I won't let him. I will just study even harder, learn more things, and keep teaching the best I can. Cause that's what I'm here to do. So back off Satan. 


I have a confession. I had a pet cat for a day and a half. So one day we were headed to an appointment and we saw this teeeeny tiny baby cat in a gutter all dirty and this man was trying to get her away from his shop so he was just pushing her with a broom, and it broke my heart. And then a day or two after that we saw her on the road all alone. And then one night as we were leaving an appointment we heard this little crying, meowing noise and we looked to the gutter and there was the same cat, all alone and sad. So I made the quick decision and I picked her up and took her home. She was so tiny, and although it's a mission rule not to have pets, my thinking behind it was "Why does Heavenly Father keep putting her in my path?" So yeah, I took her and I gave her a lil bath, tried to give her some milk and bread, and made a lil bed for her in a box. She was a cute gal, but she wouldn't stop meowing super loud. I think she just wanted her mama. So the next day I found a big mama cat on the street and gave her my baby cat. I hope she is doing well. 

Monday, September 4, 2017

September 4, 2017


a pic with all three of my comps. wooow cool.



Jacob is a dog but acts like a baby. 

This week was extremely fast, and super good. We had zone conference. Went on an intercambio to the southern part of the island where I saw horses and cows for the first time in like 7 months haha. Also saw some darling lil goats on the side of the road, but then a lil bit farther down the road, they were killing them and hanging them upside down, so I tried to forget that part. Goats are cute. 

I'm super sick of bugs. These huuuge cockroaches are always  getting into our house and they are like the length of my wrist. Also our bathroom always has tons of mosquitoes so while you're going to the bathroom you just gotta swat them away. Also our shower has all these little tiny bugs that I have no idea what they are and my shower body scrubber is always full of them, so I just gotta wash it out and then scrub my body and hope I'm not scrubbing these bugs into my skin. 

We had a great activity with our ward and investigators. It was about the plan of salvation. and everyone would move room to room to learn about each part of the plan and at the very end my comp and I stood in front to answer all the questions people had. But something you need to know is that there are lots of hoodrat kids off the street always doing stuff on the grass or basketball court of the chapel, so of course knowing that everyone needs this gospel we invited them in to learn this wonderful plan......and have a donut at the end.... the donut part got them. Okay so now back to the question and answer part of the activity. We had several investigators with good questions, but then all the hoodrat kids started asking all sorts of questions, like what is hell like, what does Satan look like, etc. Just really dumb questions like that just trying to stump us. Eventually the bishop stopped them haha I thought it was pretty funny though.

This week we saw tons of miracles. Finding houses here is impossible. Like the road names are never written, same with the house numbers, and so we had a couple people this week we contacted on the street and we tried to find their houses, and like i said it's impossible...to do on your own, but if you have the help of Heavenly Father it's possible. And by lil miracles here and there we found the houses and one of these people and her daughter came to church and I think they are gonna get baptized. 

And then the best way to finish the week was that we had sooo many investigators in church. (10 of them) They all  just kept coming throughout sacrament meeting and by the end our row was so squished with investigators I was practically sitting on my comp's lap. It was so great. I am having so much fun here, and we are seeing so much progress. Wooohooooo also this week someone in the street said i look like a fluffy dog cause of my hair. GRACIAS