The Tale of "Happily Ever After": Monday Letters and Photos!!!

Isabella's Letter & Photos
Its been raining hard core here!

This week has been so rewarding. again we have been kicking butt finding new people to teach and after all thats what we have been called to do as missionaries. Before i used to get hung up on making them progress, and well you can't make anyone do anything. So now we find them and like crazy pray over them and see who the elect are. In doctrine and covenants it says that the elect hear his voice and harden not their hearts and that is the key. Another thing that I have been doing this week is praying like everything depends on the lord and working like a mule. I have lost so much weight this week I wore a dress that is a size 10 and before my mish I was a size 14 so I am happy about that. Chris one thing that has helped me is to learn from the scriptures how we gain a testimony and then explaining it to the investigators. Like when we first came to barrio pretrolero my comp contacted this young women she is 18 and is sorely shy and quiet but very bright. She is learning to be a agriculture engineer. her name is Alicia. We taught her and at the end of the lesson as I always ask I asked her what she learned or what gave her a new perspective because of the lesson. She said I now know that there is only one true church and that it’s the one that has apostles and prophets which before I didn’t know. I was like yeah she´s a chosen one. she got the message because she let the spirit testify of the truth to her and that’s why she understood. So then a week goes by and we go to pick her up for church and she hands us this note that says shes sorry but she's catholic and so is her family and she cant change and she's sorry for wasting out time. We, I , didn’t know what to do. My comp said lets go back I said no lets wait and respect her feelings, but lets pray that if God wills it she be but in our path again. So we did and guess what she was put on our path and we I gave her alma 32 about comparing the word unto a seed, we told her to read it. And that we would stop by to say hello. Which we did during out reunion I felt she was very afraid and I don’t remember what my comp was saying which is bad but I blurted out have you been reading? She said no, I said do you not want to know if what we have told you is the truth. She said I can't change. I said you haven’t read or prayed to know because you are afraid of changing the tradition of your parents. she started to cry a bit and said yes, then I kinda got mean and said do you believe in the catholic church ability to save your soul? She said yes and then I said how can that be if they baptize contrary to what jesus taught and baptism is the key to the kingdom of heaven, how can that be if they don’t have apostles or prophet I kept doing this praying to do it with love. She began to sob. I said I tell you this to remind you that we don’t chose a religion because it’s the one our fathers have chosen or because its what is most acceptable or gives us the most wordly freedom we chose the one Jesus established and we ask him which path leads to him. We told her, Alicia the answer to this is out there but you need to nourish the seed and water it daily to have it grow and testify of what we have told you. Will you cast out your fear and experiment our word with faith? She said yes the next time we saw her we took her to tour the church we asked her is she had been reading she said she had she said she got her answer with a smile I said yeah I know what it was but how did you get it she said everytime I got afraid I prayed and read and I asked him if what you taught was true if this church was the path to him like you said and I felt joy like I can't describe but it was soft but pure she said my comp and I were so happy. But then this Saturday she was afraid again because she had told her family she wanted to get baptized and then weren’t happy. We again dispelled her fears and told her she would be baptized feb 12 she said okay that sounds good, but this weekend when we went to pick her up she was in tears. Her family had told her that if she so much as stepped foot in our church they would disown her and she couldn’t return home ever. Her sister just kept yelling in quechua so I couldn’t understand it was horrible but she said I will figure something out and i´ll pray that everything will work out because this is true and God provides a way right? We were so proud and said right. Compare that to Dennis who just hardened his heart and kept questioning everything and finally I said when you decided to seek these things with humility and not with foolish pride God will show himself unto you. He got mad and said well i´m catholic anyway I said right and if you are unwilling to change God will not show you the way lest you condemn yourself by not heeding his response to you. This all happened this week and we had 7 at church this week and many less actives it was beautiful to see them again in church. God lives this is his work and glory and I get to be a small part of it!
Les amo! Hna florido

Eeeewww!!!!

Isabel and the Burros

Sheep For Jared

Singing In The Rain

Bolivia

Christopher's Letters and Photos

Hi! I have to go, but I don´t really have a lot to say. I´ve already used an hour writing president, uploading photos and reading your letters. Thank you so much for praying.

And thank you so much for you story Isabel. That was really beautiful. That´s my dream here, but with two people it always requires the both of us to feel the spirit, to work in unity.

Transfers are in two weeks exactly. Wow. Friday I complete 6 months in the mission. I feel a little cheated of my time, but I can speak Spanish. That was my first six month and the rest is to learn to follow and recognize all of the promtings of the spirit. I love you all. I miss you. I pray for you.

Sincerely,

Elder Hill