Glad Tidings of Great Joy

This week started off well on Monday night. We found an antiguo we wanted to go by in the area book and we knocked and talked to the lady who came out. She's a member turns out, and her husband is not. He has had many previous interactions with missionaries but never acted much before. Well, a minute or two after talking to her outside, he pulls up- home early from work (a very nice "coincidence"). I asked if we could go inside to meet them better and they said yes. We talked and got to know them for a bit, and the shared lesson 1. It was an incredible lesson and we even invited him to be baptized if he received an answer. He said he would! The catch was that later we asked him if he would pray to receive an answer and he responded that he would if he felt like it. He was unwilling to act to receive the answer. We are going to continue to try to work with him because I know he can receive the answer, he simply doesn't want to. It's sad what he is missing out on wi...

My new area is full of houses. Lots of houses and then the usual stretch of campo where we really will not focus on too much. We work two wards here, that are both pretty small. But it means double the work as we coordinate with two bishops, mission leaders, etc. Definitely going to keep me busy in these last weeks. We have met both bishops and are working with them to gain their confidence and respect. My new companion is Elder Ward. He is from Pleasant Grove, Utah and graduated in 2019 from Lone Peak High School. He is here with lots of desires to work hard. He speaks very well, but lack of understanding has been a shock for him. Almost always is at the beginning, but I know that the Gift of Tongues is real and he will be okay very soon. He left the Peru MTC last week. In the sector we are teaching a women named Natalia who has her baptismal date soon. She is super excited for it! We have had two lessons with her since I got here. In one, we also taught her two daughters of 4...

I will be headed back to Valdivia where I started my mission, but on the other side in another zone. I will be training a missionary of gold and also acting as the only Zone Leader in a zone of 20 missionaries. Lots to keep me focused. I just hope I can have a good influence in my 6 short weeks there. A. is doing well. His life is not easy at all, but the teaching continues well. We had an incredible experience with him this week. We were teaching him the plan of salvation and he stopped us to tell that he was ready to stop smoking. He had felt he needed to do it in the morning and as we talked he said that he felt a pressure on his heart and that the box of cigarettes in his pocket was really bothering him (we were teaching him in the chapel). So he asked us to throw them away and we happily obliged. He is very very sensible to the Spirit. He said that when he got rid of them that he felt an incredible peace that he couldn't explain. That he felt like he was floating. It was s...