One Year

Hello to my Mother, Family and Friends,

So, this week it finally stopped raining and Thursday, and we saw the sun.  Everybody has a ton of clothes hanging on their fences and anything else they could hang their clothes on to dry the things out.

Wow, so officially, one year has come and gone and now the life of the mission is half way over. The things I have learned greatly here in Paraguay, is that every blessing is inseparable tied to a law in heaven and if we complete the law we will receive the blessings!!!

Way too often, we as humans say to God, “Perfect, if you want me to go to church, then give me a job where I only have to work Monday thru Friday and then I will be sure that I won’t miss a single Sunday.'' Or, “if you want me to stop smoking, take away my life problems, so that I can find peace and comfort without having to rely on cigarettes, and then I will stop smoking.'' But that is the opposite of how the things work; because the blessings and miracles come after the trail of our faith. Really, the need to humble ourselves before the counsels (consejos) of the Lord is essential. If we exercise our faith, then we will become strong to the point where we will not fear.

Mom, my hernia just continues as it is, sometime bothering me, but the vast majority of the time without any pain.

I have looked into sending a package to you guys, but I have been told that to send 1 kg to the States, it will cost 450,000 Guarani’s, which is almost 100 dollars, so that isn’t going to happen.

The Paredes’ family told us this past week that they don’t want to continue or change religions because we don’t believe in Saints and don’t recite things.  We explained it all to them and they understood but still don’t want to change.

The Rojas family is doing great.  I allowed them to barrow the cartoons of Living Scriptures of the Book of Mormon and they really enjoyed them. We had planned and prepared for the baptism of the uncle, Mario, last Saturday, but he ended up not coming and hid from us Sunday. We will see what occurred there and how we can be of help.

We were able to find a family, the Arce’s, of which one of the daughters is already a member but isn’t active.  They are great and we will see if we can help get them to the Church. They are super nice and many missionaries have passed and worked with them but the last ones that had visited them were two years back.  So we will see what can be done.

I love this Gospel and all that it entails, because, it holds all the truth in the world, even to the point where Joseph Smith summed it up by saying, “Well folks, the thing is that us Mormons believe anything and everything that is true and that is what Mormonism is.  Really search for truth and learn from the greatest books on earth.

I love you all and hope for the best.
Elder Call