Happy Birthday Oran!

Today is the biggest fiesta en Oran- and luckily it´s p-daayy! It´s literally never been so hard to leave our house, because we live on the street that has the parade this morning.  And it´s still going- and it´s super loud.  And there are so many cool things to look at!  

And for 50 pesos ($5.38) you can take a photo with a pimped out llama, or pony. they have a  Craft Fair, Carnival games,Traditional dancing, music and FOOD.

We are still in winter, just starting spring.  And it´s 105 degrees outside.  Pray for me.

We had an area conference via satellite with Elder cook and Elder Hales. I´m pretty sure our investigators that were there are going to be baptized

A couple of unfortunate things happened this week with a few of our investigators. 

Norma y Chacho : We went to visit them, and THEIR HOUSE LITERALLY WASN'T THERE.  It burned completely to the ground.  There was only a little bit of ash where the house once stood.

Simon : He feel and broke his spine.  And he´s waiting in the hospital until he can find a blood donor so they can do surgery.

Satan is getting really creative in the ways that he is stopping our investigators from listening to us!  

And, Nehemías got baptized!!!! and it was literally a miracle.  We passed by his house half an hour before his baptism- and he wasn´t there!  His mom told us that his uncle picked him up recently and didn´t think they would be getting back anytime soon.  

We kinda freaked out, and decided that we would wait at the church.  The elders from the other branch had a baptism too, so we went to the back room and prayed our hearts out.  Then we sang a couple of hymns and went out to wait.  

One of our members asked us where Nehemías was- and when we told him we didn´t know he told us not to worry and asked where Nehemías lived.  He then left so fast on su moto with Franco who was supposed to baptize Nehemías, like an action movie!  

We then waited, and waited.  And then the elders told us that they were going to start the service.  We just chilled outside with the elders from our branch, and branch mission leader trying not to freak out.  And just when the other baptism was entering the font- Hermano Nelson and Franco arrive with Nehemias!  He literally only had time to change, we took a photo- and then he went straight in the water!

He was SOOO nervous, and wasn´t planning on coming to his baptism.  But the testimony of Hermano Nelson changed his mind! Franco told us that it was one of the most spiritual things he´s felt in his entire life.  I wish I could have been there.

I love you all!

Hermana Shumway

And I don´t have my camera with photos from the week because everyone keeps telling us that we are going to be robbed for fiesta today :( Next week.

miracles

I only have 5 months left in my mission.  And three weeks left in my current area with mi hijita.  It kinda freaks me out.  And we are working super hard.

We made empanadas to help a less active member who is 17 years old and lives alone and makes a living off of selling food.  We helped him do empanadas for 4 hours.

We have an investigator that I can already imagine serving a mission who is super excited to be baptized and learn more about the gospel.  We started teaching his parents, and he always read the pamphlets that we left for his parents! And now we are teaching him and he´s going to church.  His dog is named Monson. But he doesn´t like it when we call his dog Tommy.

We had a really spiritual lunch and are going to help my mom and dad in Argentina get married after being together for 25 years!

AND...........

This week we had a huge miracle with Nehemías!

Nehemías is basically the investigator that we know like crazy.  And the whole branch.  And our district. And our Zone. I never prayed, fasted,  studied more for anyone in my entire life!

I´ve never, never met anyone like him- and I don´t think that I will meet anyone like him again in my life.  He´s our investigator that bore his testimony his first time that he went to church.  That already goes to missionary prep and institute.  That almost got baptized in 3 weeks!  (He also made me the funniest cootie catcher in the entire world that I´ll have to show you when I get back)

He´s been going through a lot of really, really hard personal and family struggles.  We were starting to loose a little bit of hope for him, because these last few weeks he´s completely lost his encouragement to be baptized.  We went to visit him this weekend and when we got to his house he had fallen big time, and was questioning if God even existed.  We talked for a long time, but nothing was reaching him- and we never felt so sad. It´s like he´s been in this deep hole his whole life- and just when he was about out- Satan pushed him back in and he wasn´t sure if he could get out again no matter how much he wanted to. Then he asked if i could pass him my scriptures for a moment and he opened up to a random page and read Moroni 7:33 "And Christ hath said: if ye will have faith in me ye shall have power to do whatsoever thing is expedient in me"  then he looked up and it was like his face had changed completely and he told us that he was going to be baptized next week.  

The next day he went to church, told which members that he wanted to give talks, and who he wanted to baptize him.  And during the sacrament meeting his earrings fell out and he couldn´t find them after! Miracle after miracle.  And he came with us to our meeting with the missionaries from our branch and branch missionary leader- and it wasn´t even awkward when we had to talk about our investigators- including him because he just makes a bunch of jokes and feels special.  He also offered to be in charge with 2 other Youth to throw the family home evening for the branch in the chapel next week! 

We really do live in a world of miracles.

Hermana Shumway

 Reading 2 nephi just got a little more bearable

we like juice

 We had a family home evening with a part member, recent converts, less active family!

 They drew in my planner and asked top wear my name tag

La obra

The most expensive and best smelling way to kill a cockroach: Perfume.

This week was SUPER great, and we were able to have 5 investigators come to church for the first time! And the Elders had a lot of people too.  As 4 missionaries in the branch, we brought more than 10% of the congregation!

We´ve been working super hard this week with part member families. And I´ve never been happier.

It´s super great that everyone is getting married back home!  I wish all of our investigators and some of the members would do the same.  Nobody wants to do all the paperwork and medical tests to be legally married :(  Satan knows that Latin America is super receptive that he has to make other obstacles!

We keep becoming better and better friends with all of the members, and it´s making us fatter and fatter.  

Missionary work defines the gospel.  And if we don´t share the gospel, we´re not participating fully in it- or we don´t understand it well enough.  Now it the time to take the gospel farther than it´s ever been before- and it can only be done if everyone with a testimony participates.  The church released a page titled "Share the Gospel naturally" that shoudn´t go unread by anyone. 

There is literally nothing more important  than having a testimony of the restored gospel.  

I know that Christ lives, and loves us.

I wish you all a buena semana.  Les amo.

It has been raining tons

My companion playing who am I.

An unwanted roommate.

 We be fancy

one of our favorite investigators in not progressing.

Tramites

This week my companion had to go to Salta to do her visa work and I had to do splits with the another Hermana for 3 DAYS!  It was basically forever.

But, mi hijita got to work in my old area in Salta for an afternoon- and my investigator that threw me a birthday party and could´t go to church mothers day because a bird flew into his house- has his baptismal interview!!!!! How neat is that?

This week I got free ice cream because we tried to do something for one of the elders in our branch- even though we couldn´t.  Bolivians are the best.

I´m really excited to work this week.  We´ve had trainings conferences and with the splits, and weekly planning session that´s super long, and meetings with the branch, and companionship study for my companion is 2x as long because she´s new- we didn´t have too much street time.  I think I only taught the resturacion like 3 times this week :(

Our Presidente do mission visited the branch.  And it was super spiritual.  And a little bit sad because our 3 investigators who were going to be there couldn´t.  Satan is the worst.

Les amo

Hermana Shumway

Our whole district! 

 a photo of me, my companion, and Elder Conejo (his finger) because he doesn´t know how to use a camera.

I cut my hair a little bit.

And most of our district our last day.  The Elders from our branch went for pizza :( 

 a super cute tree. It´s spring.

Looking for investigators to go to church! 

La Expiación

I hit my year mark in the mission.  AND EVERY ONE BROUGHT ME STUFF!!!

Our lider misional brought us lomito. Which is a steak sandwich with a fried egg.  Street carts sell them on every corner.

And one of my compañeras de living area shared Reeses spread.  It was the first time I´ve eaten peanut butter in a year. 

And her compañera gave me earnings.

And mi hijita bought me ice cream, and left candy and cute notes everywhere

Missionary birthdays > real birthdays.

 

This week was really hard, but I´ve never had the sacrament be more spiritual than it was this week.  And I prayed, repented, and thought of the lyrics of I Stand All Amazed- I began to cry.  And every testimony that we listened to for the rest of the meeting had the spirit so strong.  I love the testimonies of the church members down here.  Basically every one is a convert, and KNOW that these things are true, and the difference that the gospel has made in their lives.  They testify of the doctrine- the Book of Mormon, Thomas S. Monson, Christ, Jose Smith, and never finish with out saying that they know this is the only true church.  I felt so peaceful leaving that meeting that I can´t even describe it. 

I´m eternally grateful for the opportunidad to use the Atonement.  I know that Christ lives, and loves us.  We can change everyday, and continue on in our quest to be perfect like him.  And when we have our Gethsemane´s we have to follow his example and pray. 

Don´t take for granted the sacred experience of the sacrament.   

Even though things are a little rough- we are all working so hard.  And if we can sustain 5 men as Elders and maintain our assistance these next few months- our branch is going to be a ward!

I love you all.  Wish you the best on trek.

Hermana Shumway