We started off this week on a low - it was super rainy and our lunch appointments had been canceling on us. Knowing we wouldn't have lunches with members we bought some ravioli's from Stock - a chuchi grocery store that opened near our area. The raviolis ended up upsetting our stomachs and making our Tuesday somewhat of a struggle. My comp also left her agenda in the capilla where we have our district meeting and that didn't help anything either. After planning on Tuesday night I decided to check on a pain I'd been having on one of my big toes. After making sure my nails were still well trimmed and examining my foot more closely I found another spot of pique and this time there were two piques under to the top of my big toe nail! That was gross. With the help of Hermana Getz I didn't freak out and we got the pique out - I have been watching my feet to make sure there aren't any more.
On Wednesday things started turning around - whenever you're at a low that just means a high is coming! We received a call from one of our recent converts who has not been coming to church and has not received us for over a month. We were able to visit her and she is now back on track reading her scriptures and saying her prayers - we're hoping to help her get back on track and to stay on track with the gospel!
On Friday while I was filling in my agenda during weekly planning my comp looked through the Area book and found a registro of an old investigator who lives close to the house of our Friday lunch appointment. We finished weekly planning early and went to contact the street listed on the registro in the hopes of finding her. We walked in the street a little ways and decided to clap at a random house to ask if the investigator on our registro lived close by. The random house ended up being hers! We had a lesson with her and found out she understands the importance of baptism and expresses desires to follow the commandments. Calidad! We are so excited to work with her! We probably never would have found her if my comp hadn't left her agenda in the district meeting - the Lord works in mysterious ways.
Later that day we went to visit the Abuelito of the Bosque, a menos activo who has been coming to church these last few weeks. Lessons with Abuelito are usually a little random, but this time Abuelito told us about his plans to further the missionary work by going out in groups to different countries and sharing the gospel. Due to our inability to speak Jopara, we weren't quite able to help him understand how missionary work works in the church, but we were able to help him give some advice on how to share the gospel in his neighborhood. At the end of our visit he asked us what we thought of his plans and all we could say was they were very nice. He then told us he was determined to present his plans in the second class of church. After our lesson we could not stop laughing - our Sunday School class did not know what was coming.
This week we also got a new ward mission leader. Hermano Oviedo is SO COOL. He was baptized a few years ago and is very humble in this new calling. Even though he is unfamiliar with his calling, he has the spirit so strongly with him and really understands that we need to work with the ward in order to help our investigators be truly converted.
On Saturday we did service for the familia Dure. We helped them take down part of their current house and carry it over to their new land where they are building a new house with the same materials. Afterwards we did some yard work in another member's house. We were sore and sunburned the day after, but it always feels good to do service.
On Sunday I gave my first talk in Spanish! It was on missionary work and I talked about how we can be missionaries as members of the church in our daily lives through knowing the word of God/studying the scriptures, being good examples and fellowshipping new members and less active members.
Sunday afternoon we decided to "explore" a part of our area and find new people. We had a few good contacts and will be following up on those and we also saw a bunch of goats. Later that night we saw a goat standing on a table or something, just chillin. We have no idea how it got up there. or how it would get down.
The days are long, the sopa Paraguaya is as big as my face, and this work is satisfying.
With love sent from Paraguay,
Hermana Carr
Ponderize scripture for this week: DyC 31:5-6
