Elder Morley Haley Santa Fe Argentina Mission: This week was 8/10

¡¡Hola gente!! Mientras camino, estoy bien. Un poco cansado, ¡pero eso es normal como misionero! Sigue siendo tan caluroso y húmedo aquí.

I’m here again with what has been happening down here in Argentina, but this week I am going do this a little different. Honestly, not too much big stuff happened this week, but in every day we had a few cool experiences. So, instead of going through literally all that we did this week, I am going to go day by day and share just the cool experiences that we had or good lessons. Alright¿ Good. Let’s get into it.

Tuesday. So basically we worked all day, but didn’t get to have any lessons with investigadores. We visited Bishop in his house and talked with him and his wife for a bit and that was good because they are super cool. Part of that was that we asked him for a list of members in the Ward (congregation) so we could have more people to visit, including less actives, and also maybe find a few part member families. So that basically summed up the rest of the work we did for the week. We used the list of members and visited a bunch of them. Turns out that the list hasn’t been updated in a bit, so some of the people who were super inactive have moved or even died. But, we were able to find a few good people and their families. I’ll get more into that further in the week. So that was good. Other than that, the only thing to mention of Tuesday was our regular dinner and lesson appointment that we have with la familia Penno every Tuesday. It was great as always. This time we didn’t really teach anything, we did answer a bunch of their questions and doubts. Mostly, it was a time to help Noelia understand and learn a bit of somewhat basic doctrine that she had been mixed up on because she had been raised as a Jehovah’s Witness. So we had to use a bunch of scriptures and helped her understand a few things, mostly that Jesus is Jehovah and a few other things like that. It was super good because we are starting to get into a bit of the more deep doctrine, that as missionaries, we almost never talk about because we are always teaching basic gospel and doctrine principles. It was super nice and actually fun. Like I always say, I love them so much!!!

Wednesday. Alright, when we sat down to plan in the morning on Wednesday, it was a little sad to see that we didn’t have a single cita planned or anything whatsoever written in our planners. So, in the morning we decided to just go out and contact the entire morning. We set the goal of having at least 7 contacts in the morning. We ended up one contact short at the end of the morning, but we were still pretty happy and satisfied with the work we got done. We went to an area that I haven’t worked in too much and just tried to talk to all the people that we saw instead of just going door to door. Of course we knocked a few houses, but only the houses that we were impressed to contact. It was a pretty great morning actually. Contacting can sometimes be frustrating. But this morning it was fun. We just tried our hardest to talk to everyone and listen to the Spirit. One of the people that we contacted was a single mom that told us that she had already talked to just about all the missionaries from other churches that there are. So she was willing to listen to us, but she wanted to know why she should listen to us, or what made us different from all the rest. We told her basically that we were there with the sole purpose of sharing with her and that we would never try to push our beliefs on her or make her change what she believed to fit our beliefs. As missionaries, we are only here to share our beliefs, and then invite everyone that we teach to pray afterwards to know if what we shared was true and what God wanted them to know and believe. She seemed to really like that, so she accepted our invitation to go back and talk to her again and share a bit more of what we believe. In the afternoon, I was actually super tired and feeling super just without energy and really didn’t want to do anything. BUT! We went out anyways and I bought two alfahores to help me feel better. AND! It totally worked. After munchin’ on the yummy deliciousness of the chocolate goodness that is an alfahore, I was feeling much better. So, we went out and visited a bunch of the members on the list that we had received. We met one old lady that hasn’t been to church in a while because of how crazy old she is. We also met a guy that has been a member for a few decades now, but has recently gone inactive for one reason or another. But basically, that was the afternoon. A bunch of walking and talking to people, but not much for big, crazy, super spiritual missionary experiences. But it is always good to make contact with people, that is where it all starts.

Thursday. In the morning really not too much happened. We spent most of the morning going through the list of members that we have to filter out the people that don’t live in our area. It’s necessary because we share the ward boundaries with the other Elders. About half of the members don’t live in our proselyting area. In the afternoon, we visited one member lady that has actually reactivated herself recently. We talked to her for a little bit about her and her life. She told us that she had been a missionary and with her sons had gone to the church for a really long time as a real, active, faithful members. One of her sons had even served a mini mission. But then, for a reason that she didn’t share with us, she and her kids went inactive. But she said that recently she had been visited by a few of the members and had decided to reactivate herself. But, she told us that her husband still hadn’t been baptized. So, she called him to talk to us with her and so we could get to know him a little more. It was super funny though. She had told us before that he had talked to a bunch of missionaries and had been to church a lot and even watched General Conference a few times, but basically, he just couldn’t get over a few doubts. So, she called him to meet us, but even before we could shake his hand and meet him, she invited him to take the lessons from us again and be an investigador. It was super funny cause she did it super straightforwardly, and he said that he didn’t have a problem with it. Then, THEN, we greeted him. She even gave us a little wink too. It was funny. Then, after that, we went to the FML Penno again for our regular Thursday night dinner and lesson, but this time we showed up a bit late. So we decided with them that this time it would just be a nice, chill dinner and that we just share a scripture. It was great. It was just like a normal dinner appointment with members, not a lesson with recent converts. They are so amazing. I can’t express it enough.

Friday. In the morning, we went to Santa Fe so I could pick my brand new, official, Argentine DNI. So now, I am a completely legal Foreign Immigrant to Argentina. It’s pretty sick actually. It was nice because all we had to do was get to Santa Fe, sign a few things, and leave back to Santo Tome. Super quick and easy. So we were able to get back to Santoto and visit a few other people. The best part of the day was our cita in the afternoon with Paula, the lady that I talked about in our morning of contacting that has already talked to a bunch of different missionaries from all types of religions. It was so great. The woman can talk your ear off, but she was super nice and was super receptive. We got to know her more and learned that she had two daughters that live with her in the house and that she is divorced since a few years. She talked a whole lot about her life and asked us a few questions to get to understand the mission and what we do and stuff like that. She asked us stuff like if we live here with our families (which we don’t), if we get paid for the work we do (which we don’t, we pay our own way), and if we enjoy the work we do (which we absolutely do). But after we got to know more about each other we started the lesson. We decided to teach the Restoration because it would be the kind of thing that would really get her interested, especially after listening to so many missionary lessons from all kinds of churches. Also, it was the perfect thing to show the differences between us and the other churches. And... She loved it!! It was a great lesson! We were good about explaining everything well and clear to her and she had a bunch to say and interesting comments. The best part was when we were talking about Joseph Smith as a boy before he had the First Vision and she was relating a lot to him and how confused he was. She also was saying stuff like "The real church would have to have something that made them stand out, to show the other people that they were right" and we were like "Yep, your absolutely right" and then we told her about the First Vision and she was so into it. You could totally see the Spirit working in her. Then, as we were talking about how Joseph restored the true church, and how he had a proof or a "fruit" of his labors as a prophet she was really interested. We explained the scripture in Matthew 7 verses 15-20 that talks about the fruits of the prophets and how we can know if they are true or not based on the fruits that they carry out. We gave examples like Moses when we split the sea, or Noah when we made the Arc and things like that. Then we showed her the Book of Mormon and said that the Book of Mormon is the fruit of Joseph Smith and the proof that he was a True Prophet. Of course she thought it was "our bible" but we explained to her what it really was, ANOTHER testament of Jesus Christ and a companion to the bible. And by the end of the lesson she was super ready to read the Book of Mormon and pray to know if it is true and if Joseph Smith was a prophet. It was amazing. I love how perfect the Gospel is! It makes teaching so fun! And after that, we had a lesson with the husband of the menos activo from the night before. His name is Roberto. He is super funny, but I could tell that he had been an investigador for a really long time because he is always asking for proof in the scriptures and is always picking at everything we say. It was a good time with him though. We got to know him a little more and learned that he had been pretty close to being baptized a few times, but that he was always doubtful of Joseph Smith. But we shared with him what we had just explained to Paula a few minutes before. Then we invited him to a challenge. We invited him to pray at least twice a day, when he wakes up and when he goes to bed, and to read the Book of Mormon every day. Then, we promised that if he would put in his full effort and try his hardest to find the answer, that we would receive his answer before the end of the 2 weeks. He said something like "Well, I guess I’ll try, but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do it every day..." So we explained diligence and a little bit of Grace and also the scripture in Mark 10 about the Rich Young Man and that as part of the invitation, he had to work his hardest and give up everything that he had to "Follow Christ and take up his cross". He was pretty satisfied by the end of the lesson and we were sure that he would do his best to read and pray every day, especially because it’s not a hard thing at all. AND THEN after that we went to see the FML Varino to ask them about a bit of metal that we needed for a service project. And it just so happened that as we were showing up, the FML Varino and the family of our Elders Quorum President were just about to have a dinner all together. So they invited us to say for a little bit and eat with them. So yeah. Miracles and blessings really do exist!

Saturday. Well, let’s just say that Saturday made me super tired and that by the end of the day I was really ready for a nap. When we planned in the morning, we had two citas in the morning, one with a less active and one with a contact. But, both of them fell through. So, in the morning, we did some contacting without much success at all and then passed by to see the FML Chomorro. They are doing okay, but none of them are readying the Book of Mormon everyday like we had committed them to do. So that was pretty disappointing. Then, the rest of the day, we had make plans to visit a bunch of people. Members, less actives, investigadores, contacts, literally everyone. But! Absolutely none of them were home or able to let us in. So that wasn’t fun. Literally the only person that we were able to talk to was a less active member at the very very very end of the day. Literally the last person that we visited for the night. He also lived really, really far away. So on the way to seeing him I was thinking like "Oh my goodness this is totally one of those typical mission stories. Last person, very end of the night, dark streets, super far from the pench. There is going to be someone waiting for us." I just knew it. So we got to the house and this guy of about 21 years old and he was sitting at the window of his house and when he saw us he came to the gate of his fence with a weird look on his face that looked kind of like "No way..." So we introduced ourselves and got to know him a little bit more. It turns out that he lives at home with his parents and that his mom is super sick with Kidney Stones. He didn’t say it, but I know he had been praying to have some kind of help. And it just so happened that we showed up. Weird... Almost like God was planning it or something... I know that other things fall through during the day so that a plan that Heavenly Father wants to happen will work out. If all of our citas that day had worked out, we wouldn’t have been able to find this young man. Heavenly Father always knows what is best, we need to trust in Him and Him timing.

Sunday. Sunday was pretty good. In the church, the lessons were great and I was happy to be able to be in the church building after missing a week because of the rain. The best part, by far, was the Sacrament. Not only because I hadn’t taken it for two weeks, but because Jose blessed the bread too! It was amazing. I felt so great and so happy. And even better, the Primary had their yearly Primary Program during sacrament meeting too! It was so amazing. I love the Primary kids. They make me so happy and make me laugh a lot. But that was basically it for the day. In the afternoon, we talked to a few people and worked, but nothing really happened for us. It was still a great day. I bore my testimony in the Gospel Principles class about families.

And then today for Pday in the morning we went to La Costa here in Santoto and had a morning of fishing with the FML Penno. It was great. They are the best in the world. In the whole time we were there, only one fish was caught, and Elder Gonzales was the one that caught it. It was even his first time fishing, so it was pretty funny and lucky for him. But the wind was super crazy and the current super strong, so I have a bit of an excuse for not catching anything. Then, after we were done fishing and we were heading back to the car, one of the tires of the car was flat. So we had to change the tire, but it turned out that the jack that Jose had wasn’t big enough to lift the car high enough to put the tire on. But, it was okay because a random guy was nice enough to help us and lent us his jack. It was a pretty fun morning.

So that’s the week. We are working our hardest to find the people that are ready to hear the message we have and help them the best we can. I know I have said it before-I LOVE being a missionary. I love Argentina so much and I know that this is where I am supposed to be right now in my life. Teaching, serving and learning. I am so thankful that I am here and that I still have a year left to continue to grow in the Gospel of Jesus Christ and to teach the people of Argentina about joy and how families can be together forever. It really is the “best two years.”

Thank you all for reading!

te quiero

Chau

Elder Haley