Monday, June 9, 2014 9:42 AM

Well it has been a good week. To start things off we had the baptism of Noelia!!! It is pretty crazy how much she has changed! If you look at the picture of the big group of people I sent to you those are almost all of the people that live in the house we were teaching in..... lets just say it was not the easiest at times. When I first started teaching her about 4 and a half months ago I thought she would never get baptized, but the Lord sure helped us all out. Through the death of her baby son and many other things she gained a strong testimony. She is a girl that grew up in the street and has a pretty sad past, even though she only has 18 years! But the change was big and she was very happy. Her confirmation was also a very special experience and you can tell she has things to do. Well Facundo passed me the sacrament yesterday! How cool is that! He is a way better deacon than I ever was haha. On Sunday I was thinking and reflecting a lot on repentance and things that I had to change. Our gospel principles class was on repentance and it really made me think. Repentance doesn’t mean that you are a terrible sinner; it means that you are human and you want Christ to help you overcome your weaknesses and mistakes. There is always a lot that I can do better and I think I need more courage in this work. We also re found the sister of Facundo who was supposed to get baptized with him but then went rebel all the sudden and taught her and put another meta (goal) for  her baptism. We also put a goal for the baptism of Lily and her son, and she is changing a lot as well and finally starting to read more in the Book of Mormon!!! Transfers are next week so we will see if I get to keep working with these awesome people or will start working with a new group of awesome people!

Mucho Amor,

Elder Andrew

 

Monday, June 16, 2014 11:17 AM

Changes come and I go

First of all a very happy Father’s Day to my awesome Dadio. I love you dad and thank you for your awesome example in everything. This last week I had been thinking about really how awesome you were as parents to always make us have family home evening, family scripture study, and family prayer. I never realized what a blessing it really was and now I can see a huge difference between families that do it, and families that don’t. And I can proudly say that I come from a family that did. Also Dad I have always been impressed by your commitment to live the gospel. You had told me that when you were a kid you kind of had the choice to go to church or not and you are so cool for choosing to go. I also admire you for choosing to get all 4 years of seminary. I was talking to Elder Payne who is from California about his life before the mission and he was telling me how hard it was and that at age 17 he just decided not to date girls because the culture there was so against the culture of the church. So you are a super stud that is for sure Dad and I can’t wait to talk with you in Spanish after. You are the best dad I could have asked for and I try to mold a lot of what I do after your example. Well the time came for me..... I left Avellaneda.... and so did Elder Crowther.... they wanted the zone leaders to be in the same ward as the stake president so they took us both out and moved the zone leaders over. It was a pretty shocking call that we got on Friday from President telling us this. And it was right before a lesson so who knows how good that lesson went. Elder Crowther is going to some campo place super far away and will be a senior companion! Then I am now in Quilmes and Presidente just doesn’t let me rest so I have now been given the assignment of Zone Leader! Pretty weird and all before I even have a year in the mission. My comp is Elder Suarez who is from Paraguay! Finally not a Utah companion haha. I knew him when he was a district leader when I was back in Lanus. He is super cool and I think we will work really good together. The Ward is supposedly one of the oldest in Argentina. It was super tough saying goodbye to Avellaneda Elder Crowther and I had just been through so much together and grown to love everyone so much. There isn’t a family that we loved more than others we just loved the whole Ward collectively and they loved us back. There was some laments at the both of us leaving and some tears shed (I was one of the participants in the tear shedding) a lady that we helped reactivate after 20 years of being inactive made the gospel principals class give us a round of applause. I felt so blessed to have been able to serve there. Lily also said in the class that she knew baptism was necessary and understood much better, her poor little son Rainer was super sad and didn’t want us too leave even grabbing onto our legs to keep us there. Macarena Facundo´s sister came back to church and she is pretty much surely going to get baptized. We actually started the sacrament meeting on time and so no one was there (Argentina typical) and so they asked us to pass the sacrament with the only Aaronic Priesthood holder there. Facundo! So that was cool to get to pass the sacrament with him. If I ever do come back to Argentina which I really hope that I can I will definitely spend a few days in Avellaneda 2. But as we all know the Lord has his purposes for everything and I have something special to do here. I am grateful for the opportunity He has given me to serve a mission and that He prepares people to receive the gospel. In our last week there we found a new family that is married and shows a lot of potential, it just goes to show you need to work until the last moment, it is hard, but it is worth it! I love you all very much and hope you are all doing very well!

Love,

Elder Andrew