What a long week. A part of that was that we had of time of not working on Monday and Tuesday for Zone Conference.
The zone conference was really good and this time I understood a lot more! Gift of tongues is real. But really we talked a lot about Hard work. It is necessary for many of us to pass through hard times, but hard is good. It is a sign to us that the Lord trusts us enough to do whatever it is and grow from it. This principle I have seen a lot of in the mission, but even though it is difficult in the moment, I already see how much I have grown and changed since I left back in July. If we replace our fear with faith, it helps us have patience and humbles us to rely more on Jesus Christ. The other part of the conference was working with members and recent converts. You are really critical to the work!
We had a baptismal service for Roberto this week which was really nice. I had the privilege of confirming him on Sunday during Sacrament meeting. We have been blessed to also have a baptism this upcoming week and the week following! It is incredible to me to see that as we throw our effort into the work that the Lord is guiding us to people who ready to accept this covenant and the fullness of the blessings that come from the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Faith, Repentance, Baptism, Gift of the Holy Ghost, and Enduring to the End are critical and it is amazing to see people change their lives in a matter of weeks.
We decided to start working in a different area of our sector in the mornings because it is less dangerous at that time. The people there live in humble circumstances but they have a great view of the city. We hope to meet a llot of people there.
The pictures this week are from the Baptism
Posing for the camera (also felt safer lying down than standing)
Walking in the area above my sector. Felt like it would have been iconic, but I need to work on the lighting ;)
Elder Porter
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints
From the family e-mail-
We are about to start baptizing weekly! We have had 2 baptisms in 3 weeks, so a gap of a week, but we have a baptism this week and 3 for next week! We are really blessed to be meeting with so many people.
The lady that is getting baptized this week, we met during the intercambio (exchange). She is 30 with a 5yr girl and she has never felt anything with other religions that her family attends. Also her husband had recently left her which is super fome (lame). Anyways we have taught her almost everything. When we taught the Restoration, the Spirit was really strong. (the other lesson was during another intercambio, then divisions) but we gave her parts of the Book of Mormon to read and she read all of the assignments including the Intro and a lot of 1 Nephi. Pretty amazing. Last night I taught the family that we are baptizing next week about the Palabra de Sabiduria (Word of Wisdom) and although they have a lot of challenges to overcome with this, they agreed to stop drinking coffee immediately cold turkey. That was really neat and it was a lesson for me in which I am starting to teach people and really know them and not lessons. That is something I am constantly trying to improve.
We decided to work in this one sector in the morning that is super poor and a little dangerous (that's why we go in the morning). It is on the hill y se llama Cerro Chuño. It overlooks Arica so that is pretty sweet. We think it will be a goldmine. So the pictures this week come from that. Not all that you see city-wise is our sector, but a large part of it is. We have a gigante sector.
Also forgot to mention we had a 6.6 Earthquake last Monday night. The people here are so used to it that the building didn't have any damage. It happened at like 3 in the morning and since we live on the 4th floor we felt a lot of swaying. My comp who is from Chile didn´t really think to much of it. Elder James jumped out of his bed and ran for the door and pulled me out of my bed. I was barely awake and so with that plus the movement, I was walking like a drunk. Elder Guayasamin just sat up in his bed and looked confused. We had some stuff fall but it was good. Not really any other issues. It is pretty loco here. If it is ever about an 8, there are tsunamis, so I will look out for that during the misson!
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