This week was amazing. It gets better and better each day. We finally have a bishop in our ward to guide and direct our members. I am excited!
I am in shock and in awe to know that we are more than halfway through the transfer and that God is teaching me more each day. This week was full of learning experiences for sure.
I am actually in Sucre right now and tomorrow I will be in Cochabamba for another leadership training conference. As we were in the 3 hour car ride, I really thought back of the things I learned this week and of the people that I have grown to love. The Lord has helped us and blessed our area. He has given us the revelation to help it grow and progress these past weeks.
I think I am really learning more now during my last months in the mission than I have ever learned before. Its quite an adventure at the same time. My companion is amazing and she is teaching me a whole lot and at the same time we are learning a whole lot together.
Potosi is really changing me overall. I can see it test me in all possible aspects. Spiritually, physically, emotionally...everything. It made me realize how imperfect I am and how much I do need to rely on the Savior to help me to become a better person.
I admit that I can sometimes be a cranky person and reacts before thinking. I had to have a good talk about this with my companion so she could try to understand me and forgive me if I reacted feo, but I promised her and the Lord that I recognized it and that I would change. I prayed a whole lot this week so that God would help me to be able to control my emotions...and He has helped me and continues to help me. I feel absolutely free to know that I can rely on the Savior to be kinder and more loving towards my neighbors.
We had to do an emergency companion exchange this week. It was a learning experience for me...to realize how blessed my companion and I to be able help other sisters with their companionships and to know how to handle our own. The mission is really helping me to learn how to not be afraid to confront people or to be ashamed to be honest to others...to correct them and to correct them to help them grow. I love my companion because she has taught me something big that I can´t forget. We first learned together this week that we need to be a team, but then she taught me after that we need to treat each other as a team. I will always carry that with me throughout my life.
We have been talking with LOTS of people. We made new goals and they are really helping us to have lots of success. We see the blessings....and the Lord is helping us to even find families that we can rescue and baptize.
There is a family that I have met since I got here that I have been trying to find a way to help.....they have kids and they aren´t married and the wife isn´t a member and the husband has a complicated past. But the Lord helped us....I was so afraid of offending him, asking him why he isn´t married to the mother of his kids...but when I asked him, I prayed soooo hard. Asking God to help me speak the language well (when I get nervous, I speak bad Spanish), but I followed the spirit and it helped me to speak and express our love for this family. He didn´t get offended and in fact he was grateful for our concern and will be talking to his partner to know when they should be getting married. We are helping a family that will be getting sealed in the temple one day.
We met one of our recent converts´grandparents this week. Eugenio. Hermano Eugenio is 86 years old! The adorable man talked to us for a good hour of his childhood and how he knew the gospel. He is one of the very first members in Bolivia...in Potosi. He and his wife. It was an interesting conversation because the whole time, because I told him that I was from the States, he said I needed to learn Quechua and that my companion needed to translate for me. Then his grandaughter told him, Grandpa, she understands you!. He has a hard time hearing so the whole conversation was full of yelling haha. When we asked for a picture, he said that he needed to comb his hair. The cute man, he shuffled himself slowly to his closet to find a comb.
My companion and I have been anxiously waiting for a bishop and now we have one.
We went to the Casa de Moneda as a zone last week. Interesting lugar. I will miss being a missionary really. I am really happy....really happy. I know there is probably more that I wanted to tell you this week, but after being in a car for 3 hours, my brain in fried...but know that I love you. I will be working even harder this week...til the very end.
Have a great week,
Hermana Santeco
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