Another awesome week has passed by! This week was a lot of work, but was amazing as always!
On Monday we went to the market in the big city where they
have tons of shops and touristy stuff. It was a ton of fun! We found a place close to the beach with an AMAZING view! But of course
nobody had a camera because we don´t want to get robbed, so it will just be a nice
memory for me! Maybe one day we will all come back and see the beach here.
From what I´ve seen it´s so pretty! After p day ended we did tons of
contacts as always and then had a family home evening with some members and a
recently baptized member. It was nice because one of the members gave the
message, so it was just like I was having family home evening back at home!
On Tuesday morning we found this awesome new girl to teach! She was pretty shy at first, but by the end of our lesson
she had opened up to us completely! We had to ask a lot of questions to really
get to know her and know about her life. We asked her if she reads the bible
and she said "yes", and that she first read it last year when
her son was still born. After that we taught a lot about the Plan of
Salvation and how she can see her son again. One good thing about not having
tons of lessons to teach here is that I appreciate
the lessons we do have and feel the spirit so strongly when I'm teaching! So I
will count that as a blessing. :)
Wednesday was awesome! We had district meeting and it was so
good! We were talking about our areas and the struggles we have and how all we
can do is give our all and really have faith and the miracles will come. One
Elder talked about how he spent 7 and a half months in one area and he hardly
taught anyone, but looking back on his time there, he
realized that he was able to help one family in particular and that that made
it all worth it. It was a good reminder that it´s not always about the quantity
of people we´re helping, but the quality too! We ate lunch that day with a
Sister in the ward who is sooo fun. She and her husband were Mission President's
in Brasil and just got home four months ago. She was showing us the
hula hoops she has and she showed all of us up by hula hooping for fifteen
minutes straight!!!!!! This lady is 65 years old! haha! She is great! In the
evening we taught one of our investigator's. We talked with her about baptism and
she said she wasn´t sure because she still hasn´t come to church yet.
She feels like everything we´re teaching is true and she just wants to go to
church to make sure that it´s really what she wants to do. She also said that her mom
isn´t a fan of the idea of her being baptized, but that she would be baptized
for sure if she liked the church! We ended the night teaching Leonardo. He is
so good! He said that ever since his baptism, things at his house have been
going really well and there´s way more peace there. I´m glad he´s seeing the
blessings of his choice to be baptized!
Thursday was so good! We went back to teach an investigator. Her
husband was there and when he saw us he was like ´´I´m a member of your
church!´´ He was baptized when he was about 16 or 17 but stopped after one
year. He said he really misses the church and wants to go back with his
wife and son. It´s so cool to see how the Lord is working with them! They
didn´t get to come to church this Sunday, but if he´s not working next Sunday,
they will for sure come. I´m so excited about them! After that we visited a
lady I´d never met before. She is a member but isn´t attending church. She
always sends her 10 yr old son to church though. At the end of our visit we
asked her if we could help her with anything and she said she was really
needing our visit and that it helped her so much. That was so good to hear! In
the evening we taught a girl in the Ward. Her dad saw us in the street Tuesday
night and told us his daughter was a member and he wanted her to start going to
church again. We went to teach her and turns out the entire family are members!
As of right now she is the only one with a desire to come back to church.
We´ll keep working and with time they will all come back for sure!
On Friday we had an awesome lesson. We taught
about the word of wisdom and miracle of miracles, she doesn´t have a
problem with anything! Not even coffee! Here is a funny story: We were using
the pamphlet to teach her and showed her the picture of Joseph Smith. She was
like ´´Wow! He's so good looking!´´ We just laughed and she was like
´´seriously, you guys don´t think he´s attractive?!´´ I´ve never had anyone
think that Joseph Smith was attractive before on my mission. haha. She told us
that night that she´d for sure be at church Sunday, even if she was sick and in
a lot of pain!
Saturday there was an activity at the church for the
community. They had pediatritians, dentists, people to cut hair, and a lot of
other services for people. There was also a big event at this government
building across the street from our church, so we went there and did contacts
in the morning. We met Joseph Smith there! We stopped this guy and were talking
to him and he was like ´´Ask me what my name is.´´ So we asked and his name is
Joseph Smith. haha turns out he is a member. In the afternoon
ALL of our appointments were falling through. we were also trying to find a member to
go with us to a lesson and so we decidd to try Irma Claudete. She was cleaning
her house and at first said she couldn´t come. But I think she saw how
desperate we were. So she said to just give her fifteen minutes and she´d
finish everything and then go with us. I mopped while she did the laundry
and Sister Machado rested on the couch because she wasn´t feeling good. We went
out to our lesson and it was awesome! It was with this new lady we
met. She already goes to a church where she´s pretty active, but she said
she´d like to learn more and visit the church! After the lesson Claudete told
me that my portuguese is so good and that she understood everything perfectly!
It made me feel SO good! I still have tons to learn and improve on,
but I feel so blessed that Heavenly Father has helped me pick up the
language.
Sunday was really really good, but a little discouraging at
first! First of all, one of our investigators didn´t come to church. We went by her house in the
morning and her mom told us she was sick so she wouldn't come. We went back
later in the afternoon and had a really good lesson with her. We talked about
our purpose as misionaries and that now she just has to act on what she has learned, because that´s the
only way she´s going to know if she should be a member of this church or
not. If she doesn´t come to church this next week we will have to stop
teaching her.
This week I learned a lot about my true purpose as a
missionary and how to strengthen my area. It´s been a great transfer, but a
hard one too! At the end of each week and each day I´ve been wondering why we
haven´t been seeing very many results of all of our work and if there was
something that I was doing wrong or something that was missing. Yesterday
and today I read 2 really awesome articles that helped me out. The first
one was about this sister missionary who was basically in the same situation as
me and what she learned during this time where she wasn´t seeing much success
on her mission. She learned to look for the small miracles in every day and
really thank the Lord for all He is doing. She also learned to just give her
all and give the rest to the Lord. This transfer I´ve been feeling so stressed
out and like I have to be this perfect missionary because I have been out a long time, and so, of course I should be perfect by now, right?! But
there really is no such thing as a perfect missionary, or a perfect person
(besides Jesus Christ). All that I can do is honestly give my all and seek to
bless and serve others, and the rest is all up to the Lord. I realized
that I can´t be frustrated about the results of my work because it isn´t MY
work, it is Heavenly Father´s and the results are up to Him. I love this quote
that the article had from President Hinckley. ´´Do your best, your very, very
best. say your prayers and work hard and leave the harvest to the Lord.´´It´s
so simple but it´s hard to remember when you´re a stressed out sister
missionary :) So this week I´m going to focus more on really developing my
faith and trust in the Lord and His will!
As time goes by, I keep
thinking about all I have learned and am still learning on my
mission. I can´t believe how many things have changed and how
blessed I have been during my time as a missionary! Everyone thinks of a
mission as so much sacrifice and work, but when I look at all the blessings
I´ve received and will receive, I realize that I can never give
enough, or thank Heavenly Father enough, or work enough to really show how
grateful I am. Heavenly Father is so good! My family is so good! My life is so
good! I don´t know how I ever have a reason to complain!
I hope you guys have an amazing week! Love you all so
much!!
Sister Pehrson
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