Exchanges in the South

Hola Familia!!

Sorry its late! This week was so cool! We went to the south to do exchanges with the Elderes and try and get things rolling. I was able to go to Esquel, Bariloche, and San Martin!! It was so cool!

Just one of the many experiences that i had, when i was in Esquel this week i went with Elder Heward, and we were trying to find new people for them to teach, and nothing was working out. So we decided to say a prayer and then we went to a members house. When we got there the sister of this member was there and told us that she has been interested in what the missionaries do but she was always emberassed to ask. We were able to teach her a little and she was really excited!! It was an awesome expeience to see how the Lord really listens to and answers our prayers!

That is all for this week! Love you all!!

Love,

Elder Stuart

Rely on the Spirit

[Ryan is hoping to send pictures later when they can get to the chapel. He says it is safer there, that maybe he won't get another virus!]

This week went really well! This week i learned a lot about relying on the spirit and how important it is for us. We had a lot of experiences with that this week, but the one that i liked the most happened last night. We were walking to the house of a family and we got a thought to go and visit another family instead. we didnt know why but we followed the spirit. We got there and the hermana answered the door and was so relieved to see us, she said that her husband and been really sick all day and was in a lot of pain and she didnt know what to do, so she said a prayer and we showed up. We were able to give him a blessing and he started to feel a lot better. It was such a good experience and taught me the importance of following the spirit :) Some times we need to remove the distractions in our lives to be able to hear the still small voice, i hope we all can try and apply that so that we can be in the right place at the right time when others are in need. Sorry this is short, i love you all! have a great week!

Love,

Elder Stuart

"Faith Leads to Power"

This week was amazing! We got to watch a broadcast with Elder Bednar who came and talked with all the missions in the South America South area! It was so cool to see and I learned so much! He taught us a lot about the Faith and how we can better apply it in our mission and in our lives and the lives of our investigators. He emphazied how faith leads to power. He taught us that in our prayers we could pray for hours and never recieve what we want becuase we are not acting. We need to act to recieve the power, we dont recieve the power to act. I loved it!! I have also seen this in the life of my investigators. Our investigator Matias taught me this same thing. The other day we were with him and he was talking to us and told us that whenever he wants to smoke he prays and then something comes to his mind that he has to do and it takes his mind off of it. That really is an example of what Elder Bednar taught us. Matias showed his faith by praying and then acting and has recieved a huge blessing and that is the ability to stop smoking. He is progressing so well and came to church again! We have his baptism set up for this week so i should be here because this is the last week before transfers and i think i will go! I am glad that he has made this decision to come closer to Christ and that I will be here and have been here to see the change that it has made in him. I love this work and i love this gospel. It is amazing what it does to the lives of anyone who will acept it. I know that the power of Prayer can help us accomplish anything we set our mind to. Just like in Moroni where we learn that anything we ask in prayer with faith believing that we will recieve (and act on that) we will recieve. I love prayer. It can help us so much and bring us closer to our father in heaven. I have seen how just a few simple prayers daily can change the life of someone, because it has changed me and brought me closer to my Father and Saviour as well. I love you all and hope you have a great week!!!

Love,

Elder Stuart

6 MONTHS!

Wow i cant believe that i have already passed the six month mark! Time is going by way fast! This week was so good!!!! We were walking down the street and an old investigator that i was teaching with Elder Rose, but we dropped, passed us and told us to come by his house sometime. His name is Matias and is 18, when we were teaching him he told us he really didnt believe in God but just liked talking with us to be friends, so we just bore testimony and told him to pray and ask and if he needed anything to just ask. Well he did this week! We went to his house and he said he prayed and got an answer, he said when he was praying he felt an overwhelming feeling of love and peace and he knows that God is there now!! The power of prayer is so strong!!!!! It was such a miracle! He now wants to change his life around and be baptized! He even came to church this sunday so that was a miracle! It was amazing to see how such a little things, as one little short prayer with our father in heaven changed his life forever. Such a miracle. It makes me think of Alma 37:37, we should pray in everything we do!

 

Things are so great here, the people are amazing, and i have seen that when we push through our trials the Lord will bless us in ways we never thought. I never thought this would be the investigator that started to progress so fast, but God knows us all personally and has a plan for each and everyone of us. And if we never give up and trust in him, we can find that plan. Goes to show that getting your feet wet really works!! ;) haha I hope you all had a great week, and have an even better one this week full of the love and spirit of our Heavenly Father. 

 

Love,

Elder Stuart

Baptisms!

Hola familia y amigos!

This week was a really great week! We had a training with the assistants at the biggining of this week and we talked a lot about living baptism. Because if we go into lessons and the investigators don´t know that we are there to help bring them closer to Christ, but to just to chat, then they aren´t going to progress. But if they know why we are there, then they will start to progress more. We have really seen this in this week!! We have three people set up to be baptized this week and we have two others that can be prepared if they work really hard! It is so cool to see the gospel change their life and bring them so much joy. I love helping people come closer to Christ :) Brian and Guadalupe, the two miracle investigators we have, are such Capos!!! They are so cool and progressing so well, they tell us how much more joy and happiness they have in their life since they have been meeting with us. They are going to get baptized this saturday! I am so excited for them :) 

 

This week we had a fun experience! We were on the way back from a lesson and on to another investigator, Matias, and on the way to his house we found him on the side of the road and his car broke down. We ended up pushing his car for half a mile up a dirt road to his house! Hahahah it was so tiring but it was so much fun and a great way to do service!! I loved it! He is progressing pretty well, but he is 18 and doesn´t like some of the things about the gospel because he feels restricted... but we are working with him. But i think i got my exercise in for about the next month!! 

This week i really have been studying 3 Nephi 18:19-21 about prayer and how important it is to pray ALWAYS and with our families, and when we do this we will receive so many blessings. I really have such a strong testimony that prayer is the best thing we can do to come closer to our heavenly Father because we are communicating with Him. And when we pray in our families so many miracles come from that. We have seen some many non active member families start to come back just by sharing this with them. I love it.

This was a great week. Thanks for all your love and support! I love you all and I hope you all have a great week!!

Love,

Elder Stuart

MTC

Hola Familia!! It is the second day here in the MTC and they have given us ten minutes to hurry and write home to let you know how we are doing. Things here are GREAT!!! I love the spirit that I feel when I am here, and the biggest thing that I have learned in these two days is that prayer is key to having the spirit with you. I have never prayed so much in my entire life, and I have already noticed the difference that it has made in my life. I challenge all of you to increase your amount of daily prayers, and family prayers. If you pray once a day, up it to two times. If you pray five times a day, up it to six. I promise you that as you do this you will have the spirit stronger in your life, and that it will bless you in more ways that you know, so that is my challenge for this week. 

My companion is Elder Lloyd and I really like him! We get along great and I can tell that he has a great spirit about him. We also are rooming with Elder Fielding and Elder Buzan, and we get along great with them as well! The first day was crazy with so many emotions, but as soon as the tears and homesickness went away I was able to feel the spirit so strongly that it really helped comfort me. We got all my stuff, dropped it by my room, and then headed straight to class... where they did not speak one word of english!!! It was intense but i feel like i actually understood quite a bit! We then went to a devotional and we opened by singing called to serve. And the spirit that you can feel when we sing that song is incredible and unlike anything else. We then were able to role play with three different investigators as the "Orange Dots", or new kids, and that was a really cool learning experience! Then we went back and unpacked and got ready for bed. It was an incredible day and I love the spirit I am feeling here. 

I have seen so many familiar faces here that it has really helped to know that my friends are out serving the Lord just like I am! I was able to see Sister Alapa and catch up and get a few tips on the MTC before I had to rush to class so that was really cool! All the familiar faces have really helped.

I miss you guys so much but i know that this is were my Savior needs me at this time and i Can't wait to be able to get to Argentina and be able to serve the people there and bring this light unto them. I love you all so much and thank you for all of your examples that you set for me! Remember that Christ lives and that He loves us, and that through Him and His Atonement anything is possible. Keep praying, and know that all of you are in my prayers. I love you all.

Love,  (Finally)Elder Stuart :)