Abby Lynn: Aug 13, 2012

¡Hola!

This week was good!! A lot of really good things, and a lot of really hard things happened! We got to work at the temple this week! It was absolutely amazing. They had 5 companionships of Sisters come to the temple Friday afternoon, and we worked all day Friday, then slept there (at the MTC right next to the temple). Then we worked half the day Saturday too. I loved it! It was like a big sleep over with tons of the Hermana’s!! They had more then 8,000 people pass through Saturday. It was extremely busy and turned out better then they were expecting! (It was pouring rain that day too and they still had a ton of success, which is weird! Argentines have a weird phobia of rain...Sundays when it rains more then half the ward doesn’t come to church!)

But it was good; we will go this week sometime again, and on the 9th of September is the dedication! So that was all really good.

A few weeks ago we got a tour of the temple before anyone in the country with Elder Arnold (a 70 that is in charge of all the missions in south America) and when we were in the sealing room he gave us a promise. We are promised with the blessing that in our future we will know with out a doubt exactly who it is that we are supposed to marry. That we will know exactly who it is when it comes time to make the decision. How awesome is that!! One of the coolest experiences of my life. What a blessing.

My companion is just amazing. She is definitely one of my favorites. This area is amazing if anyone is planning of traveling to Argentina you have to come to Congreso. Well, Sunday morning came and we went to get all our investigators for church (not to mention our baptism Guliana) and turns out her parents put a lock on the door from the out side and left for the day. So she couldn’t leave the house. (¡Qué loco!) All of our other investigators didn´t come either. It was disappointing and the first time in my mission that we didn’t have even ONE investigator in church.

We were walking to an appointment and I felt extremely sad, literally almost to the point of tears. So I started brain storming everything we did, didn’t do but should have, could have done, everything... trying to find what we can improve and how. Well we were walking and I felt, probably one of the clearest ´´revelations´´ in my life ´´don’t lose your faith, and don’t be discouraged. Discouragement is a lack of faith´´. So we decided to say a prayer and start a fast about where to go and what to do. We both knew (because our President says it all the time) that we will find prepared people through recent converts. So we made a plan to teach all the retention lessons to the recent converts this transfer and get references from them. We went to a recent convert that doesn’t have even ONE of the retention lessons and asked him about 7 times in 7 different ways (he didn’t want to answer) who he knows that needs the gospel and FINALLY he gave us a reference of his cousin that lives in the same building.

We taught him a lesson and went to contact his cousin. Well turns out his cousin wasn´t there, but the daughter was. She’s about 17 years old. We explained who we are and how we have a message and she said ´´and what if I want to get baptized. How can I? ´´ My companion and I looked at each other in shock and told her that we will prepare her baptism service in 3 weeks and we´ll teach her everything. She said ´´Yeah my mom wants to too and my two brothers, we were just talking about this this week´´ hah! What a miracle.

Well, this week was definitely one that made me humble, and was definitely a test of faith. But it ended with a family that wants to get baptized! I know this week will be better and I know the Lord is preparing people to receive his message.

les amo,

Hermana Marchant