#30

This week was interesting indeed. I´m not going to have any structure or organization in this letter.

Anywhoo. A member introduced  us to her brother, who used to be a Evangelical pastor on the radio. I´m talking HALLELUJAH AMEN PRAISES evangelical pastor. She was worried that he would only want to fight with us but he actually listened really attentively and told us a week later that he got an answer that the message of the Restauracion is true. He told us he would like to get another confirmation but that God already told him that what we taught him was true. Now the problem is that he works on Sundays, but we´re working on that! But it´s pretty amazing to see how the Spirit can change someone´s heart. #thechurchistrue

We are also teaching a family, and we´re not sure why but they really love us. A lot. Their challenge too is that the parents and son work on Sundays, but we´re working on that too. I think the reason that the people love us so immediately is because we bring the Spirit into their homes, and they feel the happiness that comes. So that´s fun too. 

Ten o clock Saturday night the bishop called me and told me that he and his counselor felt inspired to call me to speak in church the next day for ten minutes about the obra of salvation and thatI should focus on hermanando..... fellowshipping? the new converts. I had no idea what to say, and the rule is lights out at 10:30 and I still had to call in the daily report, so I only had about an hour in the morning to prepare. I found quotes and what not in Preach my Gospel that spoke about the importance of members in the work, but I knew that the second I started reading quotes everyone would zone out. So I decided to talk about my first months in Ecuador. I told them that in my first lunch, I was baffled because they gave me a bowl of hot soup even though it was blazing hot outside, and that I had no idea how to eat meat with a spoon, nor how I would be able to eat the mountain of rice that they gave me. I explained that when we greet each other, we don`t kiss each other on the cheeks, that this is something reserved for boyfriends only, and the first day when the hermana greeted me by kissing me on the cheek I was utterly baffled. And of course I said that I didn`t understand a thing that anyone was saying. I was scared to death, confused, and I felt that I would never acostumbrar to Ecuador, but that the good thing was that the Lord didn`t call me here alone. He also called a compañion, someone to guide me, to explain to me, and to help me understand, and someone to be a friend. And then I said that it´s the same with the new members. In the church, we have our own language and customs, and the new members are confused, sometimes scared, and sometimes they feel that they will never fit in, but that the Lord has called cada uno of us to be their companions, to guide them, to explain things, and to be their friends. I like to think that the whole thing was a grand success. I called their attention with my funny experiences (everyone was laughing, and you know that making people laugh is my favorite) but then they were still attentive when I got to the more serious parts. Also, people told me congratulations afterwards.....so... Triumph!

And then we finally got the conference Liahona so me and my companion are pretty psyched. This morning I read the first thirty pages. I`m excited for it to arrive in English though, sometimes it´s so much more satisfying to read/listen to their own words and jokes in their native language.
My current favorite talk: Cristo el Redentor - Carlos H. Amado. 

 

So my counsel this week is to treasure up the words of the current apostles and prophets. While reading Neil A. Anderson´s talk, I thought about how it`s pretty cool of the Lord to keep giving us such current guidance, and that we need to show our appreciation and our faith by making sure we´re familiar with what the Lord´s servants are saying. 

I don`t know what else to say, I´m happy, I`m relatively healthy, and it looks like I`m staying in Valencia until the middle of June with my beloved Hermana Flores. We really are best friends.  

The church is true, José Smith was and is a prophet of God, and being a missionary is the best. 

I love you all!
Hermana Rust

#29

This is the bishop and his family. I was pretty sure I was going to have cambios yesterday, so I made sure we took a picture together. I sure love them, when I finally do have cambios I`m going to miss them the most.

Also, this is Carlos (nickname Bico). He`s 12, and he`s the cutest thing ever. We took him and his siblings to have a family night with Angel and his family, and I`m not even kidding you when I say that Bico and his 14 year old brother Kevin taught the entire lesson. Our goal was to help Jairo, Angel´s son, become more excited about being baptized, so we went with Bico, who is the same age so that he could share his experience about his baptism. We were teaching at first, and we invited them to share their testimonies, which they did, but then they kept going and taught everything and I`m not even kidding when I say that me and Hermana Flores cried. The Spirit was so strong and testified especially of the words of this 12 year old angel of a boy. Bico shared scripture stories and articles of faith, and explained everything without having his scriptures with them, he just already knew. It was even more awesome, because all the sons attend church alone, their mom has strong resentments and hasn`t attended in years, but Bico got baptized when he was ten and Kevin two weeks ago, and they are so presh. Everything they know, they know because the 4 brothers have studied the scriptures on their own and  with their aunt and uncle (Lina is their aunt) and have gone to church on their own without their mama.  Their family is my favorite, they show so much love for our investigators and always want to come teach with us (which we can`t do because two missionaries that always with teenage boys is not great). They prayed for Jairo to help him make the decision to be baptized, but he decided no. We don`t really know why he doesn`t want to, he won`t tell us and we have done every possible thing to help him, but the good thing is that he is going to keep attending chuch with his dad, and I know that one day whatever doubt he has with be resolved and he´ll be baptized. 

I`m going to just send photos, because I don`t really have much to say and because I don`t want another foto deleting disaster to suceder otra vez. 

I don`t know if I already sent this photo, but I absolutely love all these ladies. If I go to BYU when I get back, the blonde princess on the far right might be my roommate. We`re actually already friends on facebook, Hermana Scott. 

Me and my compy and my zone leaders. I`ve decided that I get along well with Colombians, all the ones I`ve met are pretty swell.  Elder Garzon on the far right goes home today, we already had our last hurrah as a zone. I bought the cake. Cake is super cheap here.

I don`t know what else to tell y´all. I really was certain I was going to have cambios, I even started organizing my suitcases... But I`m happy, because I adore my companion.
All is well!
Share the gospel please! Help the missionaries out, it`s really not fun knocking on doors haha. 

#28

This week was nuts. We had the best and worst days ever, but we came out alive and without transfers!

The worst thing: All my pictures got erased. All 700. I don`t have a single picture in my camera.  I feel like crying. I transferred most of my pictures from Milagro to my pen drive but I never got around to passing the others because the only reason I transferred the photos before hand was because there was the constant danger of being robbed, and here in Valencia, not so much. But an elder asked to use my camera to take pictures with his memory card during a zone meeting, because his camera doesn`t work, and his memory card jacked up my camera and when I put my card back in, my camera got confused and corrupted all the files.

I.... I who have nothing.... That song came to my mind. 

AWkrjewalñkfjsdñlkfjañsldkfjañldskjfñlksdjf sad.

The good thing is that the bishop and his wife were pretty good about taking pictures and posting them to facebook. I might steal my companions camera and send some pictures from our ´¨Christmas´´ We decided that since we wouldn`t be passing Christmas together, we`d better celebrate our own mini Christmas, so we did! It was swell. I sure love her.

This week, we were stoked because our beloved Familia Herrera was going to be baptized. Saturday evening arrived, we stopped by their house to make sure everything was alright, and they weren`t there. Our hearts dropped, and we had no clue what to do. So they didn`t get baptized that night, but we helped resolve some doubts Sunday morning, and Angel, the father, got baptized Sunday morning half an hour before church started. He´s happy, and we`re going to keep working with the rest of the family.

 

Thursday, we had a multi-zone conference in Quevedo, there were over 100 missionaries there and Presidente Amaya came to instruct us and what not and I was excited because I really love meetings and trainings and conferences and all those fun things. So Presidente Amaya spoke for the first half hour and then said "And now Elder Gomez, Hermana Rust, and Elder Rodriguez are going to give talks."

Without warning. He assigned us themes and then we had to speak for five minutes. But he had mercy and my theme was the Restoration, and I haven`t passed a day in the last 7 months without talking about the Restoration. But it was scary! I was in front of over 100 missionaries, 90% of which are fluent Spanish speakers. I can`t say that I said anything profound, but I had two goals: don`t cry, and don`t vomit, and I fulfilled those two goals so I`ve decided to call the whole thing a major success. 

I`m not sure what else to say, all is well, I`m happy, relatively healthy, (Lina´s husband told me that I`m getting fat. Here, you can say that without getting punched in the face.) We ate 3 meals in the space of four hours yesterday.... 

Hmm... I feel like I had a ton to tell y´all but I forgot it all.
Anywho love you all. We´ll be communicated through the member`s facebooks to put us in the same schedule to call on Sunday because no one`s answering me back!