November 17, 2014

What a week! Last week was super hard and discouraging and we had no idea what to do with ourselves, so we prayed and fasted and then went to work. Almost immediately it seemed like we were seeing blessings. We had an activity called Noche Misional and we were super stressed about it so we asked the bishop's family if they could help us out. With their help it ended up being such a success! We had 3 or 4 investigators there, along with 30 ward members (which is more than had gone to sacrament meeting) and we all played this scripture chase kind of game then ate empenadas. Everyone was able to participate and it was so much fun! The success of noche misional left us kind of on a spiritual high until sunday. Sunday morning our ward had to meet at 8 AM instead of 9 because a branch from Los Uros is supposed to be attending our casa capilla at 10. We were super worried that with it being so early that nobody would show up, and we also had to speak in sacrament meeting which stressed us out even more. Sunday morning we walked into the chapel though, and there were 42 people there! That's the most I've ever seen here, and almost double from the last week. Also 4 of them were investigators which made us so happy. It was the coolest meeting, everyone was so spiritual and it was amazing.

I can't remember if I've written about her already, but I need to tell you guys about my new favorite investigator. Her name is Adelia. Her husband Reuben is a member, but he's been inactive for 7 years and she had never gone to church or anything. Elder Thompson and Elder Vilches had a lesson with her right before I got here, but after I came it seemed like she had dropped off the face of the earth. We talked with Reuben a couple times and he always talked about how he wanted her to get baptised so they could be sealed, but he didn't think she would be interested. Finally after a couple weeks we found her and were able to talk to her again, and it was the coolest experience. She told us she had prayed about Joseph Smith after Elder Thompson and Elder Vilches taught her the restoration, and that everytime she prayed she could feel the spirit and she knew it was true. That day she told us she wants to be baptized and learn about the gospel. The only thing preventing her from baptism right now is that she and Reuben aren't actually married (nobody in Peru is), so they have to get married before we can baptize her. She has such a strong desire to learn the gospel though, and has been doing so much. We gave her a Book of Mormon last week, and Reuben told us she's been reading it every night and keeps asking him questions like "Is this Jacob the same Jacob from the bible? Who's Ammon? If the Lamanites were so bad, why didn't God just destroy them?" He said he's never seen her this excited about something before. She's also getting Reuben back to the gospel too, better than we ever could. This last thursday they came to the noche misional because she wanted to meet more members, then yesterday Adelia got him to come to church for the first time in 7 years. I'm so grateful I get to work with these two, they've been such a blessing.

This coming week is going to be really good too, we have a lot going on. On Wednesday a 70 is going to come speak to us, on thursday my whole zone is getting involved in a service project that's called "Operation Smile", then Saturday we're going to have a baptism for Cristian. I can't wait it's going to be the best week.

Hope you're all doing well. I can't wait to hear back from you all.

Elder Thacker