"the spanish is coming!!" July 9

well first off i gotta say...spanish is coming!! improving so much everyday. second....its been yet again one great week in this amazing work!

 

   green bay spanish elders at the beginning of this week had 13 refferals...tuesday we worked hard to try and contact as much as we could! we were only able to contact 4 but found an amzing family with one of them. with tons of potential. we talked on their porch for about an hour about what we do as missionarys and just really got to know them. aweome people with amazing questions...BUT they are leaving to mexico for a month this wednesday :( any ways we continued to contact ...it being 4th of july the next day almost everybody had family over and woulnt let us in.That night we had dinner with one of my favorite familys here! la familia gonzalez. they fed us some amazing dominican food and sounds like they are working hard for us and opening there mouths ! weve got some solid refferals in the works and have appointments with them this week!

 friday we decided to continue contacting our gazillion refferals and some that told us to come back later...the first door we knocked on was juan! we sat down on his couch and he just started telling us how hes made so many mistakes in his life and just wants to be free from them. he told us he wants joy in his life...elder gibbs and i looked at eachother did a high five in our mind and started teaching out of the book of mormon about repentance. we shared mosiah 4 9-12 and as juan read he started to cry. i love verse 12 we are promised so many blessings as we repent. and that was exactly what juan needed. those exact words in verse 12. haha after we read that verse he looked up at us and said "ya know...i think i wanna do this missionary thing"  after sharing mosiah we talked about baptism and shared 2nephi 31 9 -13 and invited him to be baptized on agust 3rd... he said he already had been baptized...we ran out of time right after that BUT set up an appointment for tuesday! definently will be teaching the restoration. we are stoked!

  our district meeting this week was focused on teaching people not lessons. meaning following the spirit and asking inspired questions...and teaching to their needs. last night we had an amazing lesson with the aranda family(one of the familys we have been teaching) they are absolutely amazing. they werent able to make it to church yesterday because alex there youngest son got pretty sick...but we set an appointment with them for that night. our plan was to teach el dia de reposo. hna aranda alex and almost all of the kids were able to read 2nephi2, the chapter we left with them last week, but do to a crazy couple days for cesar (hno aranda) he wasnt able to read. of course we were "devestated" like elder holland teaches us to be in pmg when our investigators dont read.... but we were able to read and teach,with the whole family together ,2nephi chapter 2. taught about the fall and agency how its one of the greatest gifts dios nos ha dado. the spirit was so strong as the whole family asked questions and were involved in the reading. the spirit was so strong in that little living room of their apartment as we read the word of god as another gift god has given us...familys. elder gibbs and i both felt the guidance of the spirit as we taught. its an undescribable feeling... we finished the cahpter...the spirit was there...and i was trying to listen. all i asked was "for you as a family..what does the book of mormon mean to you?"  the room went silent as they all sat there pondering. hermano aranda looked up and said one simple word...TRUTH.

  the aranda family have received an answer from there heavenly father through his holy spirit that the book of mormon is true. nights like last night, the spirit that was there, the feelings of joy as this amazing family testified to us that they know the book of mormon is true..that they feel so much peace as they read the words inside. they know it is the word of god. man....i wanted to get up and scream HALELUYA!!! nights/lessons like that make every hard day worth while.

  amazing things are happening! i love this work! i know that we have a loving heavenly father that wants the best for all of us... he loves us. and always will. he is a god of miracles as we pray to him with a sincere heart and act in faith he will help us with each step we take. keep those missionarys bussy over there in az.

 

con amor

  elder Harper-Smith

 

i love this work!!!!!