June 16, 2009

Well, things are going really well here in the Argentina. I´m feeling a little better lately; though, now I have a sore throat that just started today. But I have been okay. I’ve gone out to work every day except for when my comp was sick, but yeah, I’m all good. No worries. Thanks for your prayers.

Transfers are coming up at the end of next week. So the guessing game starts again. If you wanna take bets on which province i will end up in here are the choices. SALTA, JUJUY, TUCUMAN, SANTIAGO DEL ESTERO. I’m too lazy to write out all the zones and areas so you´ll just have to go with that ;) personally I don’t think that I will be transferred, but who knows.

So our investigators. The wedding is still on track, so Gonalo´s baptismal date is still standing for the 25th of July. It is a ways away, but we´ll see. Then, Jose, the old man, he really wants to get baptized but his daughter is making things very difficult. He is determined though and we had a super good chat with him yesterday and I thing he will take the plunge in the next week or two. Jimena, the daughter of the less active member, is a little bit confused according to her dad, but we talked with him an asked him for more support from his side and he said that he would start going with her to church. Hopefully that will help out the situation a little bit. We have been teaching a woman named Pilar Jerez and her daughter, they went to the
Stake conference on Sunday and we challenged them to baptism the other night. They were a little apprehensive but accepted for three weeks from now. Then finally we are still teaching Alejandro and Monica, it is just hard for them to go to church because he is looking for work and she goes to school almost every weekend all day long. But this next week will be their first chance to go to church together so that will be cool. We are also going to be working with the 10 year old son of a member who just never got baptized; so that should be cool.

Oh, and I almost forgot about Isabelle. She is 40 something years old and we knocked her door the other day. We taught her the first lesson and left her with a scripture to read. When we came back she asked us "this chapter talks a lot about baptism, doesn't it" we started to talk more about that and we challenged her to baptism, and she accepted. Then she asked more questions like "do I need to get married" and "what do you think about alcohol" and stuff like that and she is totally down [okay] with it all. So we will see how that plays out and whether she follows through. She is way ready though.

But anyway; things here are good. We went bowling today for p-day and I found a super cool máte (the mug used for drinking the tea down here). Don´t worry, it is a souvenir. Ha-ha, but things here are going well. President has been changing some stuff in the mission lately, adding rules, changing policies, schedules, all that. But it is going good. There is not much more to add.

So a cool story... We were talking Jose Gallardo the 88 year old man and he always mentions his concerns about his daughter and how she always tells him not to leave the Catholic Church because she doesn't want to lose him. We explained to him about temples and how our church only brings you closer to your family in the long run. I challenged him to talk with his daughter and express his desire to be baptized and I was impressed to make him a promise that if he would do so, everything would turn out alright. We ended the lesson and he was super excited and said that he was going to go talk to her. He just needs to come to church one more time and then he will be able to get baptized. It was way spiritual and I felt super good as I left from that lesson. Just the mission´s little miracles.

Thank you for all that you do and all the love that you show me in so many ways. I know that this experience would be a whole heck of a lot more difficult if I didn't have all of your prayers behind me pushing me forward every day. I think about you all a lot and know that I love you a ton!

ELDER ROSE

CHAUCITO HASTA LA PROXIMA SEMANA