February 26, 2018

That was weird seeing a Utah license plate.

The new way I entertain myself is seeing how many lil things I can get in my comp's hair without her noticing. 

Yo yo yo. So there is this big river we have to cross to climb this mountain to an area that has some really great people progressing. So we go there about once a week even though it's quite the trek to get there.

And we have this lil dog that follows us everywhere. She's a Chihuahua. When I started here in this area, she started following us, but then would leave us for several days and then find us again. But now she's always with us. We don't even touch her or give her food, but she just sleeps in front of our house and walks with us to every lesson. Her name is Baby. So anyways it's always hilarious because she always crosses the river with us. She's quite the lil swimmer, her head just peaking up above the water until she makes it to the other side.  But this last week the river was huge cause of all the rain that's been comin down. So we get to the river and there are these like 20 year old men carrying people across the river for 50 pesos. They even told us they would do it for free, but of course me and my comp were like heck no, and we crossed the river on our own. Baby, as always, is following us. So she starts crossing the river. Usually the current takes her a little ways but she makes it out. But this time the river was just so strong she kept going under the water and the current was taking her pretty far. Everyone knows Baby by name, so everyone was yelling !Baby Baby!. Finally one of the guys carrying people across ran and threw Baby onto dry land and Baby ran ahead of us, probably humiliated haha. I was joking with the people watching that Baby got baptized and then the guy who threw her across asked if we baptize dogs. haha Woops. But yeah, probably one of the funnier things thats happened lately. 

 Also one of the miracles of training is that we get to go to the temple! ahhhhh I love the temple! It was so needed!

February 19, 2018

Love the afro

The young women in this branch are really comin along. Love them.

We went to the sand dunes today! That was a good time! Saw a gigantic iguana also so dat was cool. 

So Luis, our investigator who was smoking 10 cigarettes a day was down to one, and this week we set the goal with him to not smoke at all Friday and Saturday. Did he do it?? YESSSS!!! And then Sunday he came nice and early to catch the bus to go to stake conference and informed us, and he was just sooo happy and said that part of his life is in the past!! He's amazing!! Prayer and fasting really do work and God really does work miracles!

Also, we are teaching this wonderful young lady and this week she told us about how she feels something soooo different in our church. She has gone to the Catholic church and others, but she just told us that this is the true church and that if she got baptized in a different church she wouldn't be ready for Christ to come. But if she gets baptized in the Mormon church, she will be ready to see Christ. I just started crying, cause it's just soooo true and it's so amazing to see young people recognize the truth. This area is progressing sooooo much and God is blessing us and guiding us to soooo many prepared people. 

February 12, 2018

It was a nice week! BeBo who was baptized a few weeks ago passed the sacrament for the first time! Such a good moment to not only take the sacrament but to take it from a recent convert like BeBo.

This week we had zone conference. It was one of the better zone conferences. We talked about agency. When we think of agency we think of how we can do what we want cause we have our own power to choose right from wrong.  But after baptism...it's not that we are losing our agency, but that its kind of becoming smaller. In baptism we say we will follow the commandments of God and Jesus Christ.  So after baptism it's like our agency is the choice between good and good. We've already made a covenant saying that we will choose what's right. When we hear the words breaking a covenant we think of big things, but if we are knowingly doing something we shouldn't, we are breaking covenants with God cause we've made that covenant with him at baptism saying we will follow him in all things. So honestly we shouldn't be thinking about choosing between right and wrong. We need to be thinking of what is right and better to live up to these covenants with God. Even moreso to those who have entered into the temple to make those even higher covenants with God. 

I've learned that everything in the gospel really comes down to enduring to the end. When teaching someone that is about ready to be baptized I talk soooo much about enduring to the end cause after baptism we have that responsibility to God to do everything in our power to make it to the end of our lives using our agency the best way possible. I'm so thankful that in Gods plan we have his trust to make our own choices. but now we have quite the responsibility to use it well as baptized members of the true church. Missions are the best. Never in my life will I learn so much and have my testimony strengthened everyday like this. Love ya'll. Use your agency well.

February 5, 2018

What a wonderful week it was! President threw at me some new things! I'm training and now I'm sister leader. My trainee is Dominican. She's great. She's such a black woman! haha I love it. She speaks way good English too. We've traveled soooo much this week for all sorts of zone meetings, and leader meetings, and Ocoa is so far from everything, but I've learned a lot as sister leader and it should be real fun. Training is nothing but a blast. It makes me think back to my training and now I'm here with almost 13 months. We are working so hard these days, not only so I can start my daughter off with a good hardworking attitude for missionary work, but also because there is just so much to do and so many good progressing people to see.  We are sooo tired by the end of the day, but its just great! 

We had two baptisms this Saturday also.  Two sweet girls. Little by little the young women's is growing! We had our most successful Sunday here in Ocoa in all my time here. Less actives and investigators actually followed through with their commitment of coming to church. Luis is down to 1 cigarette a day! He's just about ready to be done forever with that part of his life! God is blessing us with so many miracles.