Week #21

Hey everyone,

This week I sent home Hermana Butler.  Our time together went by so fast, but I learned so much from her.  Right now I am in a trio with Hermana Aycho from Peru who has about 4 weeks in the mission and is still being trained and with Hermana Dana who is from Argentina who will be going home at the end of January. It has been a little bit hard working in both sectors, but I have enjoyed working with them for the past two days and it is really only for 3 more weeks and then I should have a new companion.

Victor is doing pretty good. His baptism is in 2 weeks, on the 2nd of January, so we are really excited.  He still isn't smoking, which is amazing as he was smoking a lot before. He basically decided to stop the day he commited to a baptismal date and has been staying strong ever since.  The only thing that is really hard with him is his health is still really bad and he is undergoing dialysis and as part of that his memory has gone way down hill, so he has a hard time understanding some things and remembering what he is reading in the scriptures and what we are teaching.  The other thing is he is in the process of a divorce with his wife and is going to move soon after his baptism and so we are really working hard to help him have a firm testimony in the gospel before he leaves.  Please pray for him.

This week I finally found Jacquelin in her house and she let us enter for a little bit, but she told us that she isn't reading or praying and that all of this is a personal decision that she has to make, but it is very hard for her and she is happy with her life as it is right now.  It broke my heart to leave that house after working my whole time here with her, but I know that we did all that we could to help her and maybe she just isnt ready right now, but I pray that one day in the future she will be ready and will receive the missionaries.  We have had to stop teaching several of our investigators, but the others weren't as hard, but it is definitely one of the hardest things we have to do as missionaries.  Please pray for her as well even though we are not teaching her right now.

We taught Belen this week and shared the parable of the 10 virgins and talked about the importance of not putting off the things that are really important.  It was a great lesson and at the end she said that she was going to go to church this week no matter what and she was going to talk to Jonathon more about marriage, but then they weren't at the church on Sunday and so I am not sure what is going to happen with them.  Please pray for them.  They have testimonies and they want badly to be able to go to the temple with their family.  They are just struggling, with other things going on in their lives, to make time to do the things they need to do to reach these goals. 

Other than that we have been teaching a few other people that arent really progressing right now or that we have only been able to teach once, but I am excited to see what is going to happen with them.

This Sunday we had a Christmas devotional with just music, which was really cool we all sang and there were a lot of solos.  It is amazing the power that music has to bring people together and to bring the spirit.

Well I can't wait to see you all for Christmas.  I love you all so much and am So very grateful for all of your support!

Hermana Stringham