September 26, 2016

Hellllooo. After a year Im really running out of ways to start these letters, from now on Im gonna skip the greeting and just get into it.  

This week was... I cant tell you really because I dont remember. Hahah we do so much in a week that my mind just all blends together. I honestly think I´ve developed ADHD out here because my mind cant stay focused on one thing at a time with everything thats going on. 

We dropped Alicia as a progressing investigaor this week. We have been working with her for a good three months with zero progress so we decided that if she didnt come to church yesterday we would drop her, and she didnt so.. 

Jazmin, our 12 year old investigator we found last week has been progressing well. She´s been reading, came to a ward activity, and prayed about the Book of Mormon. She said she knows its true, and told her parents she wants to go to our church every week and they said thats fine.. but she didnt come yesterday. But we´re going to keep working with her and try to get in with her family and hopefully we´ll see some progress. 

We did divisions two days in a row this week. First with Lima and then with San Pedro. We saw a lot of success with our numbers. We found a lady who accepted a Book of Mormon and we have an appoitment with her tomorrow. She seems really open so hopefully she´ll progress!!

The other day we were waiting outside the church with the elders and one of the elders was talking with me about his investigator that came to church and he was all "hermana, remember vicente?" And when I said yes he made a finger to the throat motion, and I thought that he meant they dropped him, so I asked why, and he goes "What? No.. he died.." I literally just stared at him and he starts laughing and goes "yeah! he repented last night and died today at 1" It was unbeievable. 

In this very moment we´re in capital because President decided to take away our Pday and make us be sized for PANTS. KILL ME. For the mosquitos. I´ve never despised them more. They cant make me wear pants.. 

The sisters from San Pedro we taken out of the area because a bunch of drunk guys tried to get in their apartment the other day so they´re going to be with us, that means 4 of us in Zárate. Im just a little stressed. 

Our lesson yesterday was on developing talents and there was a quote I liked that says (its in spanish so dont judge me if its not perfectly translated) "That which we persist in doing becomes easier for us to do; not that the nature of the thing is changed, but that our power to do is increased" 

Love you all! Have a great week!

Hermana Prestwich

1. hermanas de la zona bautizárate

2. some of the ward, and jazmin, our investigator

3. literally this happens every time we pass one of these plants.  

Holaa!!

Holaa! 

This week was probably one of the longest weeks of my mission.. 

It started out with me getting a call on Monday from President. He had decided to make some changes due to a sister going home for knee problems. He decided to have my comp go take her place, and put me with another sister. Her name is Hermana Huaylla. She´s from Bolivia, and she finishes her mission in 2 weeks. So In 2 weeks I will be introducing you to my new comp again haha. She´s really great. Super funny, and we get along really well :)

Well I was sent to my bed for 3 days to rest my knee. They were probably the longest 3 days of my life. I wouldnt have minded if we were allowed to watch movies or something. I mean you can only watch the restoration so many times. After 3 days of doing nothing, we finally go to get out and work. 

We went to visit Alicia, who didnt go to church last week because she couldnt walk. I dont remember if I explained before, but she has just about every health problem imaginable. But we went to visit her and talked about the importance of going and the blessing she will receive and she said she was going si o si. Well Sunday came around and she didnt show up. We got a message from her saying that she got up to go, walked a few blocks, and then couldnt move her leg. We went to visit her after and she told us that she doesnt think its the right time. Sadly, I kind of agree. We´ve been working on her since I got to Zárate, and that was about 2.5 months ago. She´s kinda become an eternal investigator and isnt progressing. We´re gonna try again for a member to help her get to church but we´ll see what happens. 

We had given a Book of Mormon to a girl earlier this week and told her we were going to come by. She was 12, and honestly we didnt think much about it. We went by yesterday and she came out with her book, said she read what we left her, and really liked it. We had her read in 3 Nephi when Christ comes to America and she had said she really liked it. We´re gonna try to keep working with her and hopefully know her family and work with them. 

I dont have a lot to say this week, except that I love this gospel. I love being able to share this message with the people of Argentina. Every hard moment, every person that rejects us, every appointment that falls through, every single disappoimtnet in the mission is all worth it. Because in those moments, we´re able to experience of the Savior felt. As missionaries we have the opportunity to walk a small part of the path the Christ walked. I´ve never felt so low, so lonely, so sad, as I have on my mission. But I´ve also never felt  so high, so much joy, or so close to Christ. Every hard moment is worth it to be able to testify of Christ. To share this happiness that I have with others, happiniess that I know only comes from living the gospel of Christ. 

I love you all! Hope you have an amazing week!

Love,

Hermana Prestwich 

Flooding the Earth with the Book of Mormon

Hi everyone! This week was crazy busy as usual.  

It started off with leadership council on Tuesday. I absolutely love those meetings because 1, all my friends in the mission are there, and 2, it's like 5 straight hours of spiritual revelation. It took us about 3 hours to come to an agreement about the goal for the mission for the amount of Books of Mormon we would hand out per week.. but we finally came to an agreement. We agreed that every companionship will hand out 30 books/week. Seems más o menos easy, but the catch is that the people who accept the book have to also accept that we come back and visit them, and we have to agree on a day and time. That made it a whole lot harder. 

Wednesday we then had our zone meeting. So it was our job to present the challenge to the zone. I've never seen so many looks of disbelief in my life. Haha after they calmed down and listened to us, the accepted the challenge. President Smith also decided to make a surprise appearance so that put a whole lot more pressure on us. After the zone meeting we did divisions with the sisters from San Pedro. I was with Hermana Riree and Hermana Zanotti. Hermana Riree is from Oregon, and Hermana Zanotti is waiting on her visa to go to Oregon so that was cool. 

Friday we had the new missionary meeting so we got to go to Capital again. I love those meetings. Friday was also my year mark so it was so weird to see all the new missionaries and think about how that was me a year ago. We got back to Zárate just in time for the ward movie night. 

Saturday we went to a school with our ward and the other ward from Zárate for a service project. It was super fun. 

Then Sunday I got a call from the nurse ordering me to my bed for 3 days as a trial period to see if it helps my knee, so after lunch we went home. I was only allowed to leave to write. Luckily we found some sisters in the ward to do divisions with us, so one will stay with me while the other leaves with my companion to work. 

We´ve found a lot of people who seem interested this week thanks to handing out Books of Mormon, but none that have progressed or who have let us come back. Once we showed up to a house and they were outside cleaning and we said hi and without saying a word all went inside and shut the door and windows. That was encouraging. But we do have Alicia. She was supposed to get baptized this coming week, but since she didn't come to church yesterday, we´re going to have to move her date back. She shared with us the most sincere testimony of the Book of Mormon the other day. It almost had me crying. 

I read a talk this week (don't remember what its called or who gave it) that talked about the difference between knowing and believing. We, as members of the church, know that this is the only true church on the earth, the same church that Christ established while He was here, but do we really believe it? We as members know that priesthood holders literally hold the power of God to act in His name, but do we really believe it? We know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and contains the fullness of the gospel, and has the power to change lives,  to change eternities, but do we really believe it?

I invite you all to reflect on that this week! And to share your testimony with someone.. and if you're up for the challenge, give a Book of Mormon so someone and give the reference to the missionaries :) They´ll love you. 

I love you all! Have a great week!

Love,

Hermana Prestwich

1. Meli y Tomy! Converts of about 4 months. 

2. 1 AÑO!! 

Flooding the Earth with the Book of Mormon

Some of the best people Ive ever met. I love the mission. (E´Machuca, E´França, y Hna muro) 

A Week of Milagros

Wow this week was amazing. I have SO MUCH to say so I´m just gonna get right to it.  

To be honest, the week started to get amazing on Thursday, when they called an emergency leadership meeting with the Zone leaders, district leaders and sister training leaders. So we got up bright and early at 4am to get to San Fernando where they pretty much changed everything. Last week in our mission conference with Elder Teixiera, he spoke a lot about the power of the Book of Mormon in conversion, and how we need to use it more. Well, President prayed a lot about that and decided that we need to use it as our first form of contacting. He explained that it took Joseph Smith 86 (that might be a wrong number) days to translate the Book of Mormon, or in other words, 8 pages a day (for the spanish version). President then challenged us as a leadership group to read the BoM in as many days as it took him to translate it, or in other words, 8 pages a day. And THEN he gave us another challenge. He told us that for every page we read daily, we need to give out BoM. O sea, 8 books a day. And it doesn't count unless that person accepts a follow up appointment. 

He then said we were going to try it out as leaders until our next meeting tomorrow, and then present the challenge to the mission. That put a ton of pressure on me to be honest. I mean I was already stressed, but dang. So we got to work. They gave each companionship a box of books and told us to get to work. Here in Argentina, on the trains, there are people going from cart to cart selling things or playing instruments or whatever they can for money. So my companion and I and our zone leaders decided to preach :) We and the elders went from cart to cart presenting the Book of Mormon. We only found 2 people that wanted it, but it was so awesome. 

This weekend has been full of miracles though. Giving out 8 books a day means a lot more contacting. Look, contacting is probably my least favorite thing to do, as I haven't seen any success from it yet in my mission, but we got to work and testified of the Book of Mormon within the first 15 seconds and WOW. I have never been rejected to many times and in so many ways ever in my life. But we were SO blessed! We found 7 people who were sincerely interested and who accepted an appointment. But the coolest thing is that we didnt always see the miracles directly from the people we contacted.. On Friday we got a text from the elders in our ward saying that they found a family with 10 PEOPLE who accepted and are super intertested. Honestly now I can't even imagine contacting without the book of mormon because using the book of mormon brings the spirit so strong and gives a purpose to what we´re saying.

This Friday I reach one year. I honestly can't believe how fast time has gone by. I feel like I´ve lived enough experiences in this one year to last a life time. But I also know there´s so much more I need to learn. I´m super excited for these last 6 months, but also super sad, because I know they´re going to go by even faster. I love the mission and I love being a missionary!

Love you all so much! I hope you have an amazing week! 

Love,

Hermana Prestwich