Monday, September 28, 2015

Blessings!

My stuffed animals kicked me out of my bed. ;)
My hair.

We had a super great week! We are learning a lot together and we are working well together. I am grateful for my companion because she is helping me become better. :)

We had lots of experiences to teach this week when we weren't expecting to. We were looking for a less active and we taught him and his friend. We ate lunch with a member and their friend was there too. We are also talking to lots of people in the street. It takes a lot of courage to stop someone in the street in a big city because everyone has lots of things to do, but I know that there are people here ready to listen...they just don't know it because they are super busy and really focused. ;)

We do have a less active family that is progressing really well! We found them last week. It is the Llancafil family. (You pronounce that Shankafill in Argentina.) They are a young couple and they have a 2 year old daughter. We taught them the importance of family prayer..and they started praying as a family. :) We invited them to church and Yesica, the wife, came to church! Now we just need to get Esteban to church. But they are great. Their testimonies are really strong, they just need the push to keep enduring to the end. :)

I loved the women's conference this week! I learned a lot about my self-worth as a daughter of a king. We are here to prepare to become Gods. One day, we will be in the position Heavenly Father is in. I know that the trials we face are difficult, but it is the only way to learn and become like Him. Like they said in the conference, "I repent every single day" and in the end, I will say, "Is that all I had to do?" Heavenly Father loves us so much.

This is also something I learned. I am a missionary. I am a representative of Jesus Christ. I am on His side. We chose in the pre-mortal world to fight with him to help save our brothers and sisters. It is our responsibilty to share the gospel with others who don't know that Jesus Christ died for them and that there is life after death. All we need to do is open our mouths and share our testimonies. I love you all!

Love,
Hermana Wood :)

Monday, September 21, 2015

Little Miracles

You will never guess what I found this week.
A STREET WITH MY LAST NAME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I never thought I would see that. How cool.
This is Nalany's grandma and her cousin, Josefina. :)

I am learning to look for little miracles. It is hard sometimes...but my companion and I are doing something really fun. Every night after we plan for the next day, we sit down and shout out the miracles of the day for 3 minutes. After every miracle, we both yell, "YAY!!!!!!!!!" It actually helps a ton to see the Lord's hand in our lives every day. Our miracles have increased as we have begun to look for them. I will tell you about a few of them. :)

We found a woman named Hortencia. She is less active for 30 years. She is married and has 3 kids, and none of them are baptized. She is really nice...but she didn't really have desires to come back to church. We were talking with her in her house and out of no where, my companion said, "Hermana, have you done your family history?" She said yes. What???? She said when she was 14 years old she loved family history. She found all the way to her great grandparents. And that is without technology. We were shocked. We told her that she could come to the church during the week and do family history for free and that there are people to help her. She was shocked. She got so excited and she said, "Well, would you look at that. Maybe I will come to church." Never in my life I thought she would say that or have interest in family history. My companion was very inspired to ask her. We hope she keeps progressing!

Another miracle is we went to eat lunch with a member named Violeta. She is 35 and got baptized about 3 years ago. She lives with her mom. Her mom is not a member. She has never sat down and listened to us share a scripture (which we always do after we finish eating). But this time she sat right down and listened to us very attently. She shared with us an experience of when she and her husband were driving down the road and they ran out of gas and they were literally in the middle of nowhere. They didn't know what to do. A few minutes later, there was a car. They flagged it down and told him their problem. He said he had a little car of gas in his car he could give them. Crazy! She said this is one of the reasons she believes in God. We were so happy that she talked to us. Maybe we will be able to teach her! :)

Other little miracles happened like we ate super yummy Peruvian food and we found our phone when we thought it was lost forever. It's the little things. :) We also found out that the mission office is trying to help us move!! We found an apartment and they said they are in contact trying to rent it. yay!

Something really important that a less active taught me this week is that salvation is PERSONAL, not INDIVIDUAL. Yes, everything depends on how you act while you are here on this earth, but you can't do it individually. You need to serve others. You need to help others grow. You need to fulfill your calling. You need to visit the sick and afflicted. And that is why it is personal and not individual. :)

Keep shining bright. I love you all!

Love,
Hermana Wood :)

Monday, September 14, 2015

Rosario. Vamos.

That is a hot dog. Yes, it comes with fries on top. Hermana Ribeiro!

Well, I will be the first to say it is VERY different working in a big city than in a little tiny town. Really different. But it is a good different. I am learning very different things here that I wouldn't learn anywhere else.

To be honest with you guys...we don't have hardly any investigators. We are working a lot with menos activos and helping them come back to church. The problem is that when people live in a big city, they are always busy. They are always working or buying something and get home super late at night. So...they are never home when we go to visit them. It's not that they don't want to listen, it's just that they literally don't have time to listen. It is kind of a problem.

We are teaching the Fuentes Family. They are less actives. The mom is in the process of getting a divorce and in the whole process stopped going to church. The members didn't help her out very much, so she slowly stopped going. We are teaching them the missionary lessons so that they can remember the testimonies they have and remember the importance of keeping the commandments and coming to church. They are super great and I hope we can keep helping them. We also taught Hermana Olga. She has started coming back church, but she has a problem with smoking. It is super great that she has come back and wants to make the change because that is the first step in the process. I know that she will be able to do it and we are here to help her. :) We are also looking for a new apartment. Our apartment is really small and has no ventilation.......so we are searching. We found a couple that we like, so we are going to hopefully move pretty soon.

On Sunday, I was able to gave a talk here in my new ward. I talked about that the Book of Mormon always talks about the missionaries. It tells about the stories and the conversions of the people and the miracles that they performed. But......if there were missionaries that whole time...obviously there were members. And what did the members do this whole time? I talked about Amulek, Abish, and Aminadab. Amulek left with Alma the missionary and helped share the gospel. Abish ran from door to door sharing her testimony. Aminadab (Helaman 5:35-42), a less active, was able to testify what the missionaries said and the investigators were able to pray and get rid of the darkness. These people were normal members that shared their testimonies. I am grateful for the Book of Mormon and missionary work. It isn't just for missionaries. It is for everyone.

My companion is teaching me so much. She is so humble and willing to work. She will do anything the Lord wants her to do. She is so patient and loving. She told me she wants to learn english, so I am teaching her. This will be her third language. She is awesome!!!! That's about it. I hope everyone has a great week! I love you all!!!!!!

Love,
Hermana Wood :)

Tuesday, September 8, 2015

NEW transfer. NEW area. NEW companion. Let's go

I got my package!
The girls from Acevedo. :)
This super funny kid named Jeremias from Acevedo that always talked to us in English. so funny.
TOBY!!!!
Hermana Christiansen. i love her.
A little bit of the fields on the way to Rosario.

Hello, everyone! I'm sure you are all dying to know what happened this week. So I guess I will tell you. I got transferred! My area is called Echesortu. It is right smack dab in the middle of Rosario. WHOO!! I am finally in Rosario!!! It's better that way because I am in the Rosario, Argentina mission. Echesortu was the first ward created in Rosario, so it is huge and all the members are super great! My companion is from Brazil. Her name is Hermana Rebeiro. No matter how you guys pronounce it, you will say it wrong. Because even I say it wrong. The correct pronunciation is in portuguese, and I can't even start to try and say it correctly. But she is so great. She the 6th of 6 children. She is 20 years old. Her closest sibling is 17 years older than her! Her and two of her sisters are the only members of her family. She is amazing and so humble and I am super grateful to be here with her! It is funny sometimes because neither of us are talking our first language, but spanish is the only way we can communicate. :) She does want to learn english, so I am going to teach her a little bit.

Echesortu is HUGE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Gigantic. Enormous. The biggest area I have had. I have only been here for a day, but I feel like I will never learn the streets. They all look the exact same because they all have big buildings and tons of cars and people. A completely new experience. I have already seen things that I will never forget. I am grateful for Heavenly Father's protection, especially as a missionary. I know that if we are obedient and follow the spirit's promptings, we will be fine. Don't worry about me, I am just telling you. :)

Funny thing. Hermana Cerna went to Acevedo to be with Hermana Christiansen! Haha, super funny.

Anyway, I honestly don't remember what I did last week in Acevedo, so....I don't have much more to write. Thank you for all your love and prayers! I love you all!!!!

Love,
Hermana Wood