Don't Judge a "book" by its cover! 12.12.16

This is from my last area Mariano Acosta, it is Morena and Juan. Juan is a member  and Morena is going to get baptized.  She is 12 Years old!

This is the Flores family alsofrom Mariano. Our last night there they floured us... A lot of missionaries have ended their missions there recently so they started a tradition in doing that and they did it to us as well... 

Happy Monday everyone! Hope you all had a great weekend and are getting as excited as I am for Christmas! Only 13 more days!! Keep "lighting the world" and remembering why we celebrate this time of year!

This week was a really good week with lots of special experiences! This Wednesday we had to travel to Ramos to the mission office for a meeting we had and we were there all day. On our way back we were waiting for the train and we were hot and tired and just ready to get home take our suits off and work in our new area! While we are waiting for the train an older man was staring at us and wouldn´t stop looking at us. I looked over to my companion and asked him what the guys deal was. Before we know it he came over and started talking to us. The first thing he did was thank us for our work and for dedicating time as young people to help other people believe in Jesus Christ. After this I felt really bad. We continued to talk to him but we was partially deaf so we had to write down all our questions and everything we wanted to ask him down in our agendas and then he would answer. He was a very special man and it was one of the most humbling experiences I have had in my mission. We ended up letting three trains pass by just to be able to talk to this man and help him learn a little bit more about Jesus Christ. The cool part was that he knew by memory about half of the bible! I learned a really big lesson from this experience! The gospel of Jesus Christ is for EVERYONE! Men ,women, old, young, black, white, rich or poor, Jesus Christ suffered for each and everyone of us. It is our responsibility to use this soecial gift He has given us! Many times we forget that the atonement doesn´t only clean usfrom our sins, but it also helps us to do hard things. We can do hard things! As we rely on the Lord and put our faith in Him, we are able to accomplish anything! I hope you can all remember that always and put it in practice in your lives! I am very grateful for this humbling experience that the Lord gave me because it was a special moment an dlesson that I really needed! 

I hope you all have a wonderful week and enjoy this special time of year!

Love,

Elder Petersen 

More Changes 12.5.16

Happy December to all! I hope everyone has put up the Christmas tree and all the other decorations and started listening to Christmas Music, we sure have! 

 This week was one of the best weeks of my mission! We worked super hard and our hardwork paid off! Something we are focusing on right now in the mission is working with the members and we had lots of success doing that this week! Elder Ortolano and I are super excited because we are going to be able to do that even better this new transfer. This week we had a meeting with President Robertson and our stake president and it went really well! President Fernandez wants to help and has always loved doing visits with the missionaries but for the past year and a half ever since the zone leaders were taken out of his ward he hasn´t worked with them as much as he would like. President Robertson was happy to hear about all the things the stake of Marcos Paz is doing to help the missionary work and granted President Fernandez wish; We will now be working in Arco Iris! I didn´t think I would be getting a new area so soon, but I am very excited for the new oportunities that will come in Arco Iris! The good thing about only being in an area for two weeks is that it isn´t as hard to say goodbye to the people. Although I will miss the many great members and people I got to know here in Mariano Acosta, I am very excited to be in Arco Iris. On Saturday when President let us know what would be happening I went to my new area to be able to get to know the people a little and I loved it! It is similar to where I am now but there was just something special that I am super excited to figure out what it is! 

 Yesterday the stake of Marcos Paz had their stake conference and it was super good! We made plans with 12 investigators to go and were super excited to have them all there! The plans didn´t turn out as we had hoped and only one was able to make it.. Although it was kind of discouraging, I know next week will be better and that the two new missionaries in this area will have all of them and more in church next week! I would like to share a story that was shared in the stake conference with you all. President and Hermana Robertson were driving down the streets of Brazil in the poring rain when they passed a bus stop where a young mother was waiting for the bus with her little child in her arms. They passed the women and then Hermana Robertson asked if President had seen the woman on the side of the road. He replied that he had seen her and that he felt very bad for her. She then told President how she had a strong desire to tell her that she is loved by her Father in Heaven and that He has a plan for her and her young family. They decided to turn around but when they had gotten back to where she was standing before, she was gone. For 25 years this experience haunted the both of them and how they missed the oportunity to share the gospel with this woman. Years later a similar experience happened in Peru. They passed a man on the side of the road crying. This time without hesitation they speedily returned to talk to this man. He had reently been robbed of all the items he was selling on the side of the road and the money he had. The Robertson´s were able to help him buy some new items to sell but more importantly testify of the Savior and His love for each and every one of us. We can learn a lot from this experience of the Robertson´s. I hope that we can all quicly recognize the promptings of the spirit, not hesitate and speedily act on these things. This week I invite you all to do this. I invite you to make goals on what you can do to better recognize the influence of the Holy Ghost in your lives. I know you will be blessed as you do this and will be able to receive even more of these promptings! 

 I love each and every one of you and am so grateful for your examples. I hope you all have a wonderful week! Talk to you soon! 

Elder Petersen