Im so tired. All the time. SO tired. Ive come to know its a good thing. Means we´re working hard. Theres so many great and wonderful things that have happened this week. Miracles! Hard work sure paid off. All the fasting and diligenec and submitting to Heavenly Fathers will were all helpful with increasing our goal of investigators in Sacrament meeting in church! We doubled our goal! Theres nothing better then sitting in a row full of our investigators in the church for their first few times and then seeing more and more walk in the door all dressed nice and ready to join us in their best outfits that they have. Its so cute! And they all ask... "is this shirt okay?" and I just get so happy and say yes ofcourse, the important thing is that you and your family are here where the Lord wants you to
be! We have been praying so hard for Emiliano, Family Ponce, Family Dominguez, Sergio, Lautaro! and all of the less actives too!
THANK YOU GUYS FOR PRAYING SO MUCH FOR OUR INVESTIGATORS!!!!!! WE KNOW THAT THANKS TO YOUR PRAYERS THEY ALL CAME TO CHURCH!!!!!!!! You guys are so awesome for including them in your prayers!!!! you are all great missionaries! once a missionary always a missionary!
As far as me and my companion go... HORRIBLE.... JUST KIDDING! She is the most amazing girl. I really cant sum up how blessed I feel to have her in my life but we definately bring out the best in eachother and I love her so much. We are making the most of all this.
We had an awesome Sunday! We showed all of them around the church and introduced them to all the church leaders and that made a big difference. They were all warmly welcomed. Our meeting with the ward council was the best ive seen yet. I highly believe that it was better than ever because after our day of weekly planning we decided to visit the bishop and give him our report record on all of our plans and progress and what our investigators needs are then on Saturday we went to the bishops grocery store that he owns and we did service for his family by scrubing and mopping the floor. He was very appreciative and in return he was excited to help us with our work as missionaries!!! Saturday after our service we went to see each family and followed up with them that they would come to church for sure. We called all the members to help. The Bishop during our meeting was so excited to talk about his new plans with our investigators. He is getting the ward together to help Diego with his addiction recovery and home teachers, hes getting the ward to do a service project for a family that has a tiny home in a very bad condition. He wants them to redo some of it and repaint everything for them! The two sons are scheduled to be baptized next Saturday! I wanted to cry because of all that the Bishop had helped us with! My companion and I decided we are going to fast again and pray often to show Heavenly Father how thankful we truly are for these blessings. We wont be like the 9 leppors who didnt come back and thank Christ. We are going to remember our Heavenly Father and that this mission is His, not ours. I feel his love for us each day as we work hard.
I pondered to myself and came up with a list of reasons for why we had so much more success this week and these are the things we came up with...
1- exact obedience
2- charity and love of christ
3- specific prayers
4- giving the informe de progresso (progress report) to the bishop the same day that we plan!
5- Serving the bishop and church leaders
6- contacting each investigator daily and fasting for them with humility and desire for the welfare of their souls
7- Reading Presidents weekly letters and applying them
8- Thoughtful planning and setting up the right members of the ward to accompany us.
9- visiting the leaders, teachers and members of the ward at least once a day to express our love and gratitude for what they do to fulfill their callings and feed the Lords sheep (which also excited them to do more)
10- using the Book Of Mormon to resolve all doubts, problems, sorrows and to strengthen the faith of our investigators and ourselves.
These things have brought us so much more success and we know that they were revealed to us by our Heavenly Father who desires that we always seek to do His will in His way and not our own. He desires that we seek out the answere of the HOW and WHY and WHEN and WHERE we do things so that he might teach us a higher better way of doing the work hes given us to do.
We have found more happiness in this formula. We are learning so much in this time.
We are not just teaching individuals we are teaching families together and asking that each member participate in the discussions. We say that we are "un equipo" (one team) and we cant make it to the Celestial Kingdom without a single team-player. We focus the goal on getting there as "A FAMILY" and not seperated as the world would have us be.
Sergio is progressing incredibly!!!! Hes gone from heavy metal, several piercings, all black clothes, long black hair, tough skinned, smoking drinking and violent personality traits to a SAINT!!!! CAN YOU BELIEVE IT! This kid amazes me! I knew from the moment I met him that he was special. He is slowly but surely changing alot! Yesterday he promised to completely stop smoking, drinking, and strictly promised to obey the Prophets council on the word of wisdom. He asked if we could cut his hair next week to look more professional. He says he will be taking out his piercings one by one this week! we shared the scripture of 1 corrinthians from the bible chapter 12 vs. 30 where it says: "when I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things." I explained that a bunch of piercings in our face is taking Gods greatest art of all and tacking it with fish hooks and worlkliness that takes away from all the beautiful understanding of our value as sons and daughters of God. He agrees that its worldly he plans to take them all out for good! im so proud of him! I know Heavenly Father is even more!
He will be baptized on next saturday with his little brother Lautaro. Please pray for them! This week we would like to visit these two kids that are not yet baptized (incomplete family) and we want to invite them to be baptized this saturday. All the rest of our baptismal dates are scheduled for the 24th of March!!!!!! one big white march! im so happy to see these families progress so much! please keep praying for them all month! they need your prayers! We will also need your prayers. The weather all month has been full of rain storms and flooding streets. But we continue working and complaining isnt even an option because this is so worth it.
I love you all so much. I cant even express how grateful I am for each of you individually but its a lot. You all make a huge impact on me and my life. Thank you for your support and love and care for us!
So mom, you telling me that I get released at 8:30 makes me wanna cry. I cant imagine coming home and finally not being a missionary anymore because ive never experienced that transition before... yet... but it will be wierd. However, I will be so glad to hug and hold all of you guys again! I know how everyone goes to do the traditional CAFE RIO lunch after they get home but When I get to the airport, the first thing we gotta do is one last temple session before im released. Then the next day we can all do something. I still think its so sad to think of be released so I just dont think about it. I just work and pretend like its never going to happen so that when it does it will just be another thing that I say... okay lets get it over with before I cry too much. haha I love and miss you guys and im excited to see you. Pray for us! remember that the attitude of GRATITUDE makes all the difference!
Bye loves
Besos,
sister gillum
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