July 29, 2013

Well, here I am, partway through my second week in Bolivia! We do most of our contacting on the street. People are always willing to stop and talk because everyone here is religious, and a decent number of people are willing to have us take down their addresses and say we can come by. However, oftentimes they aren’t home (or they pretend they aren’t home, and it’s easy enough to do when there’s one main door to the group of mini houses, because they can just tell one of their neighbors to say they aren’t there when we know they are). The biggest challenge is that a lot of people don’t have phones, they move a lot because they cant afford rent, and they often aren’t available when we come by, but we cant very easily confirm appointments or reschedule when we cant call them. So if anyone has any ideas, please let me know! We have a bunch of investigators and contacts, but not many that are progressing for this very reason.

I’ve got to learn how to teach, how to contact, how to get around Santa Cruz, how to plan, and everything else, all while only understanding between 40 and 50% of what people say to me. My brain feels like its going to explode always ha-ha. But there is definitely progress. Hna Castaneta is a great teacher as far as how to explain the lessons simply and clearly, and I can definitely understand people more than I could when I first got here.

However, we are having success with some people who sincerely want to know more about the gospel. There is one couple; I think I might have written a little bit about last week, Omar and Noelia. They are both really great, and have two sons. However, they aren’t married and aren’t sure that they want to get married because they have some problems in their relationship. We haven’t been able to teach them very much because we want to teach them together but Monday through Friday Omar works until 10 or so at night, but with the little we have had a chance to teach, they really seem to be building in their faith. Noelia commented that originally she didn’t have very much faith in God, but she feels like she has more now. They went to church on Sunday as well (a big deal because that’s our other big challenge with investigators, is getting them to church, even when they know that its true) and Omar especially was really attentive in all the lessons. Then at night we had a Family Night with Omar and Noelia and a family in the ward who are really strong and aren’t too much older than them. It went really well, and they were still there, talking gospel topics when Hna Castañeta and I had to leave to go to our apartment for curfew. Unfortunately, we can’t teach them again until Saturday, and they have no phones to contact them and see how they’re doing. Ugh. But I really have confidence that they are progressing.

We also met a few other people who seem to be genuinely interested as well this week. One is Elizabeth, who was a contact from like four months ago that was never home when the other missionaries went by, but she was home a few days ago! She has had a lot of trials n her life and hasn’t found much peace, so I felt like I should share Alma 7:11-12 with her, which is a great scripture. When we pulled out the Book of Mormon, she said, "Oh, it’s the blue book of the Mormons!" We asked what she knew about it and it turns out her dad wasn’t a member, but he loved the Book of Mormon and read it all the time and taught the family that it was the word of God. Her dad died when she was six, so she never read it, but she said she has always wondered and she was super excited when we gave it to her. We are going to go back and teach her more on Tuesday and I’m stoked. I just pray that she’s actually home!!

And then there's one other person. We went to a less active member’s home, Jhosselij or something like that, to visit her. Her boyfriend was over, so we started to focus our lesson a little more on him. He took the lessons a while go but felt like he didn’t really get an answer when he prayed, so he stopped. We talked a lot about how to receive answers to prayers, that oftentimes it doesn’t come right away, but it comes gradually as we experiment upon the words of Christ and continue to learn more. He said he wanted to believe that these things are true, and we promised him that if he continues to learn and experiment on the words, God will answer his prayer in the timing that is right for him. We then challenged him to baptism on August 24, and he accepted! However, he didn’t go to church the next day, despite our best efforts, so I don’t know if he is sincere. I really hope so though! We’re praying for him.

We’ll be having a noche blanca, which means a day when the entire zone baptizes, on August 24, so we’re praying that someone that were teaching will be prepared for baptism that day.

This church is true and I’m happy to be a part of it!

Love you all,

Hermana Chelsie Faulk