Thursday, September 18, 2014

September 8th


Sunday dinner!!

Teaching Pablo Picasso.
Hello beautiful family, friends and assorted loved ones. How is everybody doing?? Missing me terribly, right?? :)
 
This week was crazy. So.Much.Rejection. But at the same time, so many really cool miracles and so many great things that have happened as well!
First of all, we teach a 12 year old girl, C... She´s from Argentina and we met her in a really cool way. when I was with Hermana Lionetti still, we were looking up a former investigator and when he wasn´t home, we both felt really strongly that we needed to knock the doors on that floor, taht there was somebody there who needed us. So we knocked and nobody else was home until we got to the last door. We knocked and a woman, Noelia, opened. She is from Argentina and told us taht she has never really had any interest in religion but that something about us itnerests her. So she let us come back and it was a perfect first lesson- the woman even cried with us and told us that she wants to come to know Christ and that she wants to read the Book of Mormon. We came back the next time and her daughter, Candela, was there. We gifted her a copy of the Book of Mormon and the girl can´t get enough! she loves reading it and she loves praying. She told us there was something she ahd to tell us that she felt embarrassed saying in front of her mom, so we came over and chatted while her mom was at work and she told us that she prayed, received an answer and taht she knows that the Book of Mormon is true and that she wants to get baptized. She has a fecha for the 20th of September and she came to church on Sunday and LOVED it. There are 2 other girls her age and they all were laughing and acting like besties by the end. ITS SO COOL!! . I am so excited for C..!!

We met the biggest Paraguayan I´ve met my entire mission this week. This guy isn´t just big, he´s HUGE. And SO STINKING HUMBLE. We taught him on Tuesday and it was perfect. WE told him we wanted to give him something and when he saw the Book of Mormon, he got all excited and said, "I promise i am going to read this. I want to change my life. I want to learn more and do this." He even committed to baptism on teh 27th and gave us referrals!! He´s incredible. Then we got a text on Wednesday saying that he can´t continue, so we called and he told us that there are rthings in his life he can´t change but he knows they are wrong and so he can´t continue. We pleaded with him to rethink the decision and to just pray about it. He told us that he read the book and felt SO GOOD but that he´s made this decision. It was HEARTBREAKING. I just keep praying for Heavenly Father to soften his large heart and for him to call and say that he wants us to come back and that he´s ready to change his life.

We had interviews with President this week and mine was actually pretty long! We talked about everything and anything and he actually told me I need to start planning for after the mission. It was so weird, but he said he prefers for me to do it cause its better to come home to a plan and something set. Also he told me its very likely I will stay in Fuengirola for the rest of my mission. SO WEIRD. It was a great interview, but kinda trunky, talking about my post mission plans.
 
RANDOM THINGS
Things are definitely looking bright for S.. and A.. They asked for how long Hermana Hurtado and I will be together so they can figure out the date for the wedding with the ayuntamiento (uhmm townhall?) and so they know they have to do this thing before the end of October, so they are feeling some good healthy pressure:)
 
Our prime finding time is the same, 5-10pm, cause people are at home, or coming home from work and whatnto. I would say I do the majority of finding around 7 or 8. With our members we do many different things! Its depended on the area and to what degree the members are involved, cause I´ve had some areas where it was like pulling teeth getting member involvement so we have to get creative, but here they all freely share! One thing that I love to do with members is share a miracle I have seen with my companion that week so they can see that there REALLY IS work in their area. I think a lot of times, members get into their heads that there is no work in their ward, or that they don´t baptize, but its all about attitude, so I like to open their vision and let them see that you can baptize and help people everywhere!
The senior couple in the office fed us yesterday and she made beef roast and mashed potatoes and I was SO HAPPY- a true Sunday dinner for the first time in over a year!
My companion wants to learn English, but she is still learning. She understands a lot, but panicks when she has to speak and no matter how long I spend forcing her to practice lessons in English, when we get to it, she just stares at me and says, "NO PUEDO" but she totally can. She testified BEAUTIFULLY the other day in English using words I haven´t even taught her!  I wrote her a list of things she can testify of, and the last one on the list was "I know that what my companion says is true." Thats become her favorite:) I keep telling her that now she undesrtands how the rest of us feel when we come to Spain!
Christ is everything. Yesterday we were talking to a recent convert who is fighting with his parents and his mom found his Book of Mormon and made him throw it away. I began to cry when I heard that, which surprised me, but as I thought about it, I realized why it affected me so much. The Book of Mormon is our sword. WE are at WAR with satan and it pained me to hear that Se.. was going into teh battle without his sword, unarmed and unprotected. I felt such sorrow and I realized how important the Book of Mormon is. We aer reading it as a mission again and my goal is to finish it before the end of my mission. Spend time everyday in the Book of Mormon, you come closer to God by reading the Book of Mormon than any other book.

Have an excellent week! LOVE YOUALL!!
Hermana Folsom

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