Date: August 21, 2017 at
10:36 AM
Subject: It’s a jungle out
there
Hello family!
Last week, all of a sudden, I got the Monk theme song stuck in my
head. And I realized it's true. It's a jungle out there. A concrete jungle
where dreams are made of. Disorder and confusion everywhere. No one seems to
care-- well I do!
Well, since I hardly wrote what happened last week, I'll try to fill
you in.
Moratalaz-- aka Lima Peru:
Last Monday on our way to the castle, we got a call from Maria. We
didn't remember who she was, but she said she was coming to the church. We
asked if she could come on Tuesday. No problem. So we met with them on Tuesday:
Maria and Vicky. We found them in the retiro park a few days before that and
had left them with our card. They came from Peru and have been here a month.
They are looking for work and a different piso. Well we shared with them about
how God is our Heavenly Father. We gave them both a BOM and they said they
would read it. We introduced them to Raul (our mission leader--Peru). We set up
another appointment to see them on Friday. Which they came to. Just 2 hours
late! So we explained a little bit about the BOM and then they stayed for the
baptism the Elders of a different barrio had. I was asked right before if I
would do a musical number. So I just played the John the Baptist song. Props of
playing the piano. We invited them to an appointment. We told them to meet us
at 5:30 so we could get there by 6:30 because they always came late. We only
got there 10 minutes late. We shared the restauracion, and they came to church
yesterday. We also helped them move from their piso to a hotel on Friday. (The
matrimony couple helped us with their car.) At the same baptism we invited a
girl named Jeisel (Peru) and her friend Pierro (Peru) to come. They got there
late, but we planned to eat with them on Monday. Well we did, and it was
delicious, but we didn't have time to share anything. We lost Lourdes for about
a week and a half. On Friday, I asked Heavenly Father to help us have some kind
of contact with her that day. It didn't happen. But the next day, we saw her in
the metro, and we went quickly to get on the same train. She came to church yesterday
and then came to eat with us at Raul and Lily' s house (Peru). Bishop (Peru),
1st counselor (Peru), we visited a member, Gloria (Peru), and shared the
restauracion. At Zone conference the hermanas told us that they were visiting
Cynthia and her Family (Peru) (do you remember them?) And Andrés (11) said he
wanted to be baptized!! I don't think he told his dad yet. Then on Saturday,
they came to Pavones to play basketball and I got to see him. He ran over to me
with the biggest grin on his face. Man was I happy to see him. Saturday, Diego
(Peru) was baptized, and we did a little musical number. Cuando me bautice con
mas cerca Dios de ti. La mayoria de Las cantantes siendo... peruanos. Yo
esperaba servir en Perú, pero no sabía que mi Perú sería Pavones. [… musical number. “When I Am Baptized” along with “Nearer, My
God, to Thee.” Most of the singers were
Peruvian. I hoped to serve in Peru, but
I did not know that my Peru would be Pavones.]
Tuesday we had zone conference and that was a lifesaver. President
talked about the restoration. We are supposed to be teaching it to all members
in 4 minutes. It's what President calls a message with a lot of meat. He's not
joking. Anyway, so we went out with renewed energy and on Wednesday, we shared
the restoration with a family. They said they really liked the message because
God has 2 attributes: amor y alegria [love
and joy]. They said Hna Eckel was amor and I was alegria. Go figure. Then
we started walking around and talking to people and we stopped a guy walking
his dog. Turns out his name is Toby (the dog), but I thought he said Dobby. He
has the coloring of Cubby, but he's just not as cute, darnit. The guy's name is
Adrian. I said, "You live around here don't you? Haven’t you ever had any
curiosity about this giant white building over there?" Adrian: Si, what is
your religion about? Yo: well to be able to understand what we believe, first
you need to understand who God is for us ... and we did the restoration in 4
minutes. It was nice to have just practiced it. He had some really good
questions about knowing if the Bible was true, or how can you know if you've
chosen the right path. I feel like we just had a really good heart to heart
chat. And then he asked, "Ok, so why are we here?" we said: “Ahh! We
would love to explain this, but maybe tomorrow. So we met with him the next day
with some rm members and we talked some more about the restoration, then met
with him yesterday. On Wednesday, we’ll talk about the plan of salvation. He is
so cool. I really think God made our paths cross, and at a time when we were
ready to share.
Yesterday we also met with a girl named Jesse. She has a friend in
the US that told her how happy she is, and told her it was because of the
church.
I think that's about it. We are sad about Barcelona. Maybe this will
make Spain a little more united.
If you paid attention you'd be worried too. You better pay attention
all this work we love so much, might just kill you...
Some days are hard, and some days I don't know how we'll make it. But
it is all worth it.
love you all!!
Hna Christensen
No comments:
Post a Comment