Thursday, January 28, 2016

Trabajemos Hoy en La Obra...

¡Hola Familia y Amigos!

This week has been a fairly normal week for us here in Juan de Salazar. To give you a day-by-day run down: we wake up, exercise, get ready, study, start proselyting/teaching, eat lunch, proselyte/teaching, come home, plan, do miscellaneous tasks or eat snacks, get ready for bed, sleep, and repeat. Although it seems the same every day, we learn a lot from our daily experiences and grow from diligently working all day every day.

This week we’ve been working on working more with the members and finding new people to teach. I’ve learned a lot from getting to know the members here. They are few, but the ones who come to church every week are rock solid. Here, a lot of iniquity is openly acceptable and even encouraged, sometimes, by the older generations. Although people know that a lot of what they do is wrong, they just follow the norm and put themselves subject to various types of vices. The majority of the members are converts and have family who do not follow the standards of the church, but, regardless of their family or personal history, they are strong and work to build their testimonies and teach their immediate families the truth of the gospel. It strengthens my testimony to see how difficult their situations are and yet how faithful they choose to be.

Part of finding new people to teach is finding people who are very deeply devoted to their churches. Here in Paraguay there are countless churches and varying degrees of devotion among the people who congregate in these churches. Usually people are very respectful and receive us regardless of their faith, however this week we’ve ran into a few very devoted religious people who tried to tell us where we are wrong and why their doctrine is right. Even though I may not have the bible memorized, I know this church is true and that the message we share is more than a theory or interpretation of the bible. Even after listening to variations of doctrines, I still have the firm belief that in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints we have the full truth and are lead by a living profet who receives revelation for us in these last days. The Holy Ghost has testified of this to me and can testify of this to any humble heart searching for the truth as well.

Today we had a good-bye lunch for Herman Farrish, my comp’s trainer, who is finishing her mission and heading home in a few days- crazy how fast time flies! We ate Domino’s and I forgot how much I love pizza. SO good. Earlier this week I also made mashed potatoes- It’s been a good week to remember the foods I love.

Hope all is well with everyone!

With love sent from Paraguay,

Hermana Carr