Meet my new companion! Hermana Monica Adriana Osorio Morales! She is super super cool or pila as they say in Guate. We are going to be the best of friends. She is from Guatemala City and has 10 months in the mission. She loves to laugh and work hard...so i think we are going to get along well! I was sad to say goodbye to my mom of the mission and partially terrified and partially excited to have a Latina companion...I still sometimes have a hard time finding the words I want to use, but Hermana Osorio is super helpful! She always does her best to help me do some translating :) I miss Hermana Crowley and wish I could go back and do our time together all over again...but I'm content and feliz to still be here in Turin. I think we are going to have some good success this cambio. We are going to watch a baptism this week. We are going to find a whooooollleee bunch of nuevos. And we already found a couple new families to teach. I just hope I can help my companion in these first few weeks here and do our planning well so we can have some success here. Its kind of scary leading an area. Our area is soooo huge so Hermana Osorio is pretty lost, but she will figure it out soon. We are working a ton with members..trying to have a member at every lesson with us and I think that is making her feel a little better. But we will just keep working hard and hopefully she can adjust to the heat and the people here in Turin.
ADVERTENCIA: this is going to be a super misionary'ish email...but I learned so much this week and my testimony has been strengthened so so much. So here we go...
NESTOR IS GETTING BAPTIZED IN 2 DAYS. I am soooo excited to finally watch this young man take this step. He has been so excited and has been waiting for what seems like forever and I know he is ready. We had a really really good lesson with him this Friday. We left him the folleto for tithes and fast offerings and told him that we wanted him to teach us the lesson the next day. He read the folleto and a little in the Book of Mormon during the night and Friday morning was all ready to go. He taught a great lesson! And when we invited him to do the ayuno with the barrio on the next fast sunday, he told us he had already done a fast the Sunday before. I can just hardly believe him sometimes. Its just like when we were teaching the palabra de sabiduria and when we invited him to keep the word of wisdom, he told us that his friend had told him that mormons don't drink cafe...so he had already stopped drinking cafe a couple weeks earlier. It is amazing to see how he has changed and that he really understands the principles of the gospel.And now that he has had the opportunity to repent in the right way, he says he feels relief and feels happier every day. I just hope his good example will affect the hearts of his mom and his sister so maybe they will start coming to church and Karen can get baptized. I talked to Karen this week and she opened up a little and told me she feels uncomfortable about getting baptized because she doesn't feel that she can be strong in keeping some of the commandments. I talked with her about the blessings of the gospel, how they are eternal and how as she strives to keep the commandments and stay fiel, she will receive the help that she needs. She agreed to meditate more in that and told me that she would pray to specifically know if she should be baptized on the 31st of March. We need all the prayers we can get for her. I know she can be ready for that day...she just needs to be able to recognize her answer.
We are still working alot with the familia Castillo and we have seen soooo many miracles with this family! About 6 weeks ago they were considering separating and i didn't think they would ever be able to fix there problems. They both said they didn't love each other at all, said they didn't have any desire to even be in the same room as each other. But now, they are doing so well! There is a HUGE difference in their home and you can just feel the love when you walk in. All it took was one thing...they started saying their family prayers and now that things are better between the two of them...he...for his own free will and choice...without us saying a thing...went in to talk to the obispo about recieving the priesthood! And we were able to see that happen this week! And now we have plans for the baptism of Jenifer on the 26th of this month. ahhh. I love these people here.
We have also been working alot with the familia Pichinte over the past few weeks. Their son Eric is a menos activo and I just cant figure out why. Over the 3 months that I have been here in Turin, I have heard his testimony several times. He has a good strong testimony and is reading his scriptures every day and always has these really good spiritual experiences that make him want to change, but he just isn't coming to church. We sat down and had a good talk with the whole family this week and I just spent the whole time just bawling. It was so sad to watch his mother and his brother just cry as they shared their thoughts and feelings with him. They understand so well the bigger perspective of the gospel and they know how important living with the gospel is. Eric and his brother Alex were baptized together and when Alex left for his mission, Eric was super super strong in the church, but when he came back, Eric had gone inactive. It just broke my heart to hear him talk about it. Even more in this lesson with them, I came to understand the WHY of the gospel. A person can not prepare themselves to enter into the presence of our Heavenly Father without following the principles and ordinances of the gospel or without partaking of the Sacrament worthily cada semana. That's why this is all so important. We are here to prepare ourselves to enter into the presence of God and the only way that we can do that is through the authority that Jesus Christ established here on the earth. The authority that is found within our church is the most important thing we have in this world. It is literally the power, that through our faith and actions can carry us to the life eternal and into the arms of our loving Heavenly Father. If all people could understand the apostasy and the need of the restoration of this priesthood power through a prophet of God, the whole world would be LDS. I understood more coming out of this lesson the need that we have to esforsarnos (sorry i don't have Hermana Crowley any more to tell me what the words mean in English..look it up haha) every day here to become more like Christ and to follow the commandments just as closely as we possibly can and if we have the need...which we all do...we need to repent. We HAVE to repent. EVERY DAY, if we want to return to our Father in Heaven. And if we don't, the scriptures tell us very clearly whats gonna happen. We either choose eternal life, or eternal death by fire and eternal torment. We get one chance. We´ve got to do the absolute best we can to prepare ourselves and no matter what the sacrifices are to do it...its all going to be worth it one day. Also, I learned that we have to be super patient with people like Eric...although we kinda machetied him in the lesson, every one makes mistakes and every one can be forgiven for their mistakes though the 7 steps of repentance. We have to be just as loving as you can imagine our Heavenly Father is. We make mistakes every single day and sometimes make the same mistakes over and over and over again but he is still standing with open arms waiting for us to just humble ourselves and let him know whats going on.
I also read something about a month ago that has completely changed my whole way of teaching here, and I have felt the full power of it these last couple weeks. Harold B Lee said, "The most important thing you can learn to do is talk with God. Talk to Him as you would talk to your father, for He is your father, and He wants you to talk to Him. He wants you to cultivate ears to listen, when He gives you the impressions of the Spirit to tell you what to do. If you learn to give heed to the sudden ideas that come to your minds, you will find these things coming through in the very hour of need. If you will cultivate an ear to hear the promptings, you will have learned to walk by the spirit of revelation." I have been trying to do all that I can to follow every tiny prompting that I receive in every lesson and throughout the day as we are walking and I have seen this promise coming true. I feel like it was hard for me at the beginning of my mission to know what to say and now I understand that it was not only for my poor Spanish, but because I wasn't giving heed to the small promptings that I was receiving. I have been trying to do my best over the last month to follow every thought that I receive even if sometimes they don't really make sense and I have really seen a difference over these past two weeks...I feel guided by the Spirit in every moment. I receive several promptings throughout the lessons and have learned to recognize and act on the Spirit. I almost always know what I need to say or what we need to do...and I am teaching alot better with my companion. It is amazing what you can do as you follow the promptings of the Spirit.
Its sad to see our second home empty...but the truth is that wherever grandma and grandpa are..is just as home to me as grays lake is. I just hope they really love the new house and that you can all get some good rest after the big move! I want to see pictures of the new house all finished and also of course pictures of the prom! Shelb will have fun with Bridger! Its so exciting to hear of all the work that's being done at home for the Project Zion...thanks mom for submitting those names! Hope your all doing well and that your not all too worn out..sounds like there's lots going on at home! We are doing super good...I am really loving my new companion and am super happy to be here in Turín still! We have potential to have 3 baptisms this month and 6 ...not including the new people we will meet...over the next couple months. But mostly the moral of my story is....The church is still true. The Book is BLUE! and God has a work to be done here in Turín. His hand is here! And his angels are here preparing the hearts of the people here for us...and for you at home too! There is so much work to be done...even in our little valley of Grays Lake. Take initiative...and get it done!
Hermana Stoor
Hard day of goodbyes for Hermana Crowley....especially with our sweet KAREN
Elder Glygare and Hermana Crowley got transferred...but we took one last picture as the 4 gringos of Turin!
Nestor...Eric and Luis....We´re seeing miracles with these boys!
Mynor was a hard goodbye for Hermana Crowley....Hes gonna get baptized.. APRIL 31.
We showed up this week to Hermano Horacio and got to meet his son...his companera de vida (was his wife..now his friend) and his only grandchild! Shes sooooo soooo beautiful! And I've almost never seen a happier smile on his face...except for when he stepped in the font to be baptized ;)
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