Week 100

Hey guys!
 It was great to talk to you all! Can´t wait to see everyone again in a few weeks! Yesterday after calling you guys on Skype we went out and worked and it was a lot of work going up and down the hill on crutches. I´ve noticed this week that as we´ve been going routes that we don´t normally take to avoid so many stairs, we are finding lots of people that are prepared by the Lord. We wouldn´t have found them if I hadn´t had my accident. So it´s a blessing in disguise. Also I got a lot of really good scripture study in on the days that I couldn´t leave the apartment. Juan Carlos has his birth certificate in his hands right now all ready for his marriage on May 21st. Juan Carlos, Karen, and Lenning are all still going strong to get baptized on the 21st! 

On Wednesday we had a ward activity and it was a huge success because many investigators came and a few of them came to church yesterday for the first time. Our investigators were the most eager to invite their friends and family members. I´m gald that they are already having experiences with sharing the gospel even before they are baptized. 

I hope you have a great week!

Elder Jones

Week 99

So we had a great week! We found out that there is going to be a communal marriage in the municipality of San Martin de Porres. (exactly the same place as last year with the Rosales Flores family in Rimac, almost exactly the same day.) On May 21st. Juan Carlos and Karen are excited about it, and they´re already getting their papers ready. We also invited Lidia and Victor to get married on may 21st and they also accepted! Lidia is Juan Carlos´ sister. She has been looking for work since before we arrived here, and precisely the same week that she and her husband decided to get married on a specific day, a job opened up at the work of one of the members in the ward, and she won´t have to work on sundays. Mosiah 2:24 "And secondly, he doth require that ye should do as he hath commanded you; for which if ye do, he doth immediately bless you;". 

This week we had left Juan Carlos and Karen Alma 32 to read and they had only read half of it. So we were reading the rest of it with them, and I can´t tell you how many times I´ve read Alma 32 on my mission, but this time I realized something I hadn´t seen before. We read verse 42 that reads, "And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst." I was thinking about the fruits of the gospel, blessings, and spiritual experiences that we recieve from God. They are intended to enjoyed personally, only for us. But whenever we partake of the fruit we are left with the seeds. We don´t eat the seeds, they are intended to be shared with others. The only way to obtain the seeds is by partaking of the fruit. No other part of the tree has seeds. In order for missionaries to constantly plant seeds (even though technically the spirit plants them) in the heart of others, they must constantly be partaking of the fruit, or they run out of seeds. I´m reminded of the conference talk by Bishop Waddell in april when he said that in Lehi´s dream the people that partook of the fruit only once were later ashamed and fell away, but the people that were continually partaking of the fruit did not pay attention. The gospel has to be continually working for us, and we need "many revelations (or spiritual experiences) daily". With every fruit that god gives us, he also gives us the seeds, or the responsibility to share it.

One thing that we recently noticed about our sector that is unique is that basically everyone that lives on the hill is related. They all know eachother. Now that we are teaching several families, we realize that they´re all related. When we ask for references from our investigators none of them say "I don´t know anyone here". They all tell us to go visit their friends or family members. This ward has so much potential because once things start moving, and a couple more families get baptized, the growth of the church here is going to be exponential.

Yesterday we had lunch with the Capuñay family. Brother capuñay served in Santiago Chile from 2005 to 2007, and his mission president was.. Brad Wilcox. hahah. Elder Holland was the Area president of Chile during his time there and he said that twice a month he had family home evening with Elder and Sister Holland and their investigators.  

We´re both really happy and we´re having lots of really great experiences, and I hope you all have a great week! 

Elder Jones

Week 98

Hey guys!
Congrats on moving in to the new house! It`s going to be a great missionary opportunity. Make a conscious effort to make friends with those that aren`t members of the church in the neighborhood. Especially Mom and Dad. Two questions that I have been pondering a lot this week, and that all of you can think about this week, are: Why is it important to have good member friends? and Why is it important to have good nonmember friends? How can you have a good balance?

So the Church has announced where the new temple will be. Los Olivos! I can see Los Olivos from my apartment on the hill. 

We had a great week! Like always we did a lot of service. Harumi was finally confirmed almost a month after her baptism. We learned a lot this week about the importance of working with the head of the family. The uncle of Harumi, Juan Carlos, went to her baptism a few weeks ago and he really liked it. We haven`t been able to teach him and his family until this week because he works a lot. But now we have been able to find him at 8 o`clock in the morning before he goes to work, and he`s so excited about the gospel. He attended church with his family in Cusco when he was little until he was 7, when his family went inactive. He is now 27 and lives with his future wife, Karen, and they have an eight year old son named Lenning. The first lesson we were only able to find him, and he told us that he was willing to do everything it takes for him and his family to get baptized. Later in the week we explained to the entire family the blessings of the temple, and now Juan Carlos is willing to do everything it takes to be sealed to his family in the temple. They all came to church yesterday, and they really enjoyed it. They are working on getting married as soon as possible because they both feel that it is time to get married. It reminds me of Johan and his family when I was in Magdalena. When the father is the first one to get excited about church, everyone follows. We have also been teaching Teodoro who is 57 years old, goes to catholic church every week, and is actually married to his wife Jacky. He wasn`t religious in his life until december. When he was really sick in the hospital someone gave him a new testament, and he has been reading that ever since. It has always been hard to teach him because he always wants to teach us what he has learned from the bible and doesn`t really listen to us when we respond. Finally last week we gave him a Book of Mormon and invited him to read it. For the past two weeks he has been reading it and comparing it with his new testament which is exactly what we want him to do, and it is answering his questions about if it is necessary to be baptized again, or if he should pray to the virgin. The other day we saw his wife Jacky and she told us "That book is changing my husband. He wants to get baptized. I think I want to get baptized too." They are going to accompany us to church on Sunday. Last night there was an activity about family history and the temple for the recent converts, investigators, or less actives in the mission in one of the institute buildings. We brought the Damian family and there were hundreds of people there. At the end they gave out My Family booklets and temple coloring books for the kids. On the bus ride back I was sitting next to the driver, his name was José. His wife was the one that collected the money from the people, and their 8 year old son was in the bus with them. Guadalupe, who is 9 years old, gave her coloring book to the boy and his mom was looking through it with him. I started talking with José about the temple and they want to go to church. They live in... Los Olivos. hahah. I hope they end up going to church. 

We had a great week and I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Jones       

Week 97

Hey guys!
Sounds like everything is going great. That´s great to hear about the house, work, neighborhood friends, and Tyler´s mission prep class. We had lot´s of great experiences this week. On Tuesday we helped a man destroy his old wooden hut and then put together a new one, all in 2 hours. Nicole´s father changed his mind and said that she needs to wait until June to get baptized. We´re going to try to get him to agree to a date in Maty. Also Nely will have her birth certificate on Wednesday but now all of a sudden her husband wants to wait until June to get married. I´m not sure why everyone wants to wait until June to repent, but we´re going to try to help them do it sooner. Everyone thinks I´m going home in march, and I feel like it´s better if they don´t know that I wont be here in June. I don´t want their decisions to have anything to do with me or when I go home. I´ve seen it with my other companions that were finishing the mission. It´s kind of like how we shouldn´t know when the second coming is. Our desire should be to repent today, regardless of when the last day we have to repent is. Elder Alfaro is doing great. He´s coming out of his shell and he´s coming up with a lot of great ideas to help us work more efficiently instead of just following me. We´re working on helping the ward members get more excited about missionary work, and helping us out. Rodrigo is doing great! his grandma and extended family are going to come in May for his baptism! He´s still really excited about it. His parents are a losing a little bit of interest, and wanted us to bring Rodrigo to church so that they wouldn´t have to, and we made it very clear to them that we aren´t here for Rodrigo, but the entire family. We have lots of great spiritual experiences daily and we are happy. I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Jones