23 months down!

Wow, it’s crazy to think that I hit 23 months in the mission last week! After September 26th, I’ll officially be the oldest missionary in the ENTIRE MISSION! I’LL HAVE MORE TIME IN THE PERU LIMA NORTH MISSION THAN EVEN THE MISSION PRESIDENT! So that’s kind of crazy to think about…

… And that also means that exactly 1 day before I complete 25 months, I’m home!

Well, I’m not really sure what to write about this week because it’s been pretty routine; that’s why I didn’t write last week. I guess I’ll just write some of the quick little miracles that I’ve seen lately, but I’m going to do it in Spanish just because I can! (And because my autocorrect is set for Spanish and sometimes it’s just easier without all the little red lines under the English I write… Haha!)

Hace tres semanas atrás hablamos con una joven que se llama Melanie, la hija de un miembro que ya no va a la Iglesia. Ella ha estado yendo por un buen tiempo ya pero no ha tenido el deseo de bautizarse o hacer mucho más (de lo que nosotros sabíamos, por lo menos). Pero este domingo pasado hablamos con ella un ratito acerca del bautismo y cómo se sintió en la Iglesia. Le dejamos un folleto del plan de salvación para leer y un capítulo del Libro de Mormón y planificamos pasar el martes. Cuando fuimos, descubrimos que había leído el folleto y parte del capítulo (era muy largo) y nos dijo que quiere bautizarse, pero primero quiere estar segura que es lo que debe hacer. ¡Normalmente no pasa algo así de un momento al otro!

Tenemos a otra investigadora que se llama Liz que ha estado progresando poco a poco pero que siempre nos ha dicho que no quiere que le presionemos para que se bautice. Ella quiere que los deseos de bautizarse vengan de ella misma, entonces le hemos enseñado con su esposo que ya es miembro y su hijo, Aramís, que ha querido bautizarse por un tiempo. El viernes fuimos a su casa para enseñarles nuevamente esta vez Liz nos dijo que quiere bautizarse y, con lágrimas en los ojos, dijo, que sabía que esto era lo correcto para ella y para su familia. Ella tenía el temor que solamente se bautizaría por emoción y por sus hijos, pero no por ella misma; ahora ella realmente sabe. Nos dijo que sabe que el Libro de Mormón es verdadero y que quiere ser parte de la Iglesia.
Durante todo este tiempo que les hemos estado enseñando, nos enfocábamos más en contestar las preguntas de Liz y no habíamos hablado tanto con Aramís. Cuando Liz dijo que quería bautizarse, Aramís estaba feliz pero dijo que ahora él no está seguro que debe bautizarse. Entonces Liz decidió que esperaría para bautizarse con su hijo.

Empezamos a enfocarnos en Aramís, contestando sus preguntas y dudas para ayudarle. Yo sabía que él quería bautizarse y que sabía que la Iglesia y el Libro de Mormón eran verdaderos, pero por sus dudas él quería esperar. Fuimos el viernes para hablar solamente con él y, con la ayuda de los asistentes, hablamos con él y le ayudó a decidir que debe bautizarse. Él todavía siente conflicto entre sí porque siente nervioso, pero ¡ha decidido que se bautizará el 23 de noviembre con su madre! Él está poniendo su fe a prueba pero sé que él tiene la fe suficiente para hacerlo y que va a sentir muy agradecido que tomó esta decisión.

[Courtesy of Google Translate] ———-

Three weeks ago we talked to a young woman named Melanie, the daughter of a member who is no longer going to church. She has been going for a long time now but has not had the desire to be baptized or do much more (than we knew, at least). But last Sunday we talked to her about baptism and how she felt in the Church. We left a pamphlet of the plan of salvation to read, and a chapter of the Book of Mormon, and planned to see her again on Tuesday. When we went, we discovered that she had read the booklet and part of the chapter (it was very long) and told us that she wants to be baptized, but first she wants to be sure what to do. Normally something like that never happens!

We have another investigator named Liz who has been progressing little by little, but who has always told us that she does not want us to pressure her to be baptized. She wants the desires to be baptized to come from herself. We have taught her with her husband (who is already a member) and her son, Aramis, who has wanted to be baptized for a while. On Friday we went to her house to teach them again. This time Liz told us that she wants to be baptized and, with tears in her eyes, said that she knew this was the right thing for her and her family. She had the fear that she would only be baptized by emotion and by her children, but not by herself; now she really knows. She told us that she knows the Book of Mormon is true and that she wants to be a part of the Church.

During all the time we have been teaching them, we focused more on answering Liz’s questions and we had not talked so much with Aramis. When Liz said she wanted to be baptized, Aramis was happy but said that now he is not sure that he should be baptized. Then Liz decided she would wait to be baptized with her son.

We started to focus on Aramis, answering his questions and doubts to help him. I knew that he wanted to be baptized and that he knew that the Church and the Book of Mormon were true, but because of his doubts he wanted to wait. We went on Friday to talk only with him and, with the help of the others, we talked with him and helped him to decide that he should be baptized. He still feels conflicted because he feels nervous, but he has decided that he will be baptized on November 23 with his mother! He is putting his faith to the test, and I know he has enough faith to do it and that he will feel very grateful that he made this decision.

———-

Now, for the stuff that’s a little less spiritual – but still very relevant: I accidentally wasted 100 soles on paperwork that I messed up on! It’s the first time I’ve ever made a mistake that’s actually costed a decent amount of money and it’s not a great thing, but I guess it’s a miracle that the only thing I messed up were these papers! I almost didn’t even notice until Elder Hewitson pointed it out to me! So that just made more stress for the 13th, which was both great and awful (for a time), because we had a conference with Elder Oaks, one of the twelve living apostles!

It’s cool to know that God continues to guide us today through living representatives like a prophet and twelve apostles; Elder Oaks and several other leaders in the Church taught us some very important things that we’ll use in our work to share the Gospel of Christ here in Peru. Some of the things they shared that I liked:

* The Gospel isn’t just about going from “unworthy” to “worthy”; the goal of our Heavenly Father is that we become “perfect” and gave His Son so that we can do it

* What we share isn’t just “a good idea” – it is quite literally the only way to return to live with our families forever

* Becoming saved is a personal matter, but becoming like Jesus Christ is a family matter

* Repenting for our sins and mistakes and becoming better isn’t God’s backup plan for us – repentance and change IS the plan!

* If we really want to receive answers from our Heavenly Father, we can’t just pray and ask – we have to pray and ask with a desire to act or change based on what we receive

So that part was a highlight of the week, but the three days preceding it and the several hours afterward were some of the most stressful moments here in the offices! I mean, if you don’t show up to hear a living apostle speak, you’re not just missing a Sunday school class, and since I’m secretario personal it was my job to coordinate everything that has to do with transportation! I made a plan, remade the plan, had to change the plan according to what Presidente Godfrey wanted (and also because the location and time changed), and contracted the buses. I made about 300 changes by the time I was finished, and on the actual day of the conference ONE OF THE BUSES BROKE DOWN! (And of course it has to be the only bus that we can’t possibly replace because it was the furthest away!)

Honestly, I probably would have laughed at how perfectly unfortunate that was, but I was too busy trying to find a solution! Luckily they got it working again and everything went well, but we had to make sure that everything went well… And then the 100 sol error that I made took about an hour of hunting people down after the conference to fix, so almost immediately after the conference I hit the ground running, so to speak, to find the people I was looking for… As a normal missionary you never have to worry about things like that after a spiritual conference, but there’s always more to do if you work in the offices! I love my job, except for the sporadic moments when problems arise! On the plus side, they keep life here interesting!

(In case you didn’t notice, the stress might be getting to me… Good thing it’s P-day!)

Anyway, to top this off, here’s some pictures from these last few weeks:

Papa John’s has a special that lets us get a second large pizza for just one sol more, so we took advantage of it:

… Unfortunately Elder Sánchez and Elder Castrejón are trying to lose weight and are on diets, so they fought their inner demons (And each other!) while they decided if they should eat the pizza or not:

“Look, we’ll just split it! It’s tiny!”
“No! We can’t eat that!… Well, maybe just a little, but you eat the first part!”
“No, you eat it! It’ll be so tasty but there’s so many calories…”
“Fine, then let’s not eat it!”
“No, how can we resist this?!… Here, eat it!”
“Yeah, OK, but I’ll eat it after you. You eat first!”

(I was over in the corner, dying!)

And here we are in the bus on the way to the conference:

(Man, I am not photogenic at all!)

– Elder Schroeder