Monday, March 21, 2016

Week 32 March 21, 2016

At Stake Conference and I found my cute trainer! The first thing she said to me "Hermana Ingram you have gotten so fat!" Thanks Hna Apeña I love you too! (gotta love the brutally honest latin culture right?)
Week 2 of this transfer!

Yesterday we had 3 investigators come to church!! Woot woot!
The father of the family is Carlos he is actually a member that hasn't been to church in almost 30 years but we are bringing him back! His wife Miriam is pretty funny... She is super evangelica. We recently had a lesson with the two of them and taught about the restoration and baptism. During the lesson she crossed her arms and defiantly said, "Yo no voy a bautizarme." "I'm not getting baptized." Then she stated, "You believe in Joseph Smith but I believe in God." We very patiently and clearly explained to her why that isn't actually the case and then her husband lost all patience. He still has a testimony of the church so he defended it the whole time. But it was pretty awkward when they sat there arguing and my companion and I looked at each other like "what do we do now?"
Moral of the story they came to stake conference! It was awesome, Elder Nelson Ardila from the Seventy came. Carlos and Miriam have two sons who are progressing so fast! They have been to church twice now and participate in young mens and seminary! So we will see where it goes with them.

I am always so surprised at how unbelievably open everyone is here. Almost every single time we sit down in a lesson everyone tells us exactly what is going on in their lives and the personal problems that they have. Every time I always feel like I don't even know how to respond. But a lot of the time the people tend to blame God a little and it's very sad. This week we met with a less active Hermana named Marisol. We taught her about temples and eternal marriage and she seemed to love the lesson. Then we invited her to set a date for herself to go to the temple. Thats when she started to cry and opened up to us about her husband and the problems they have. It was super sad hearing about everything she has gone through and how unfaithful her husband is. It's always hard when people have marital problems because as missionaries we aren't exactly qualified to give any type of marriage counsel. We helped her the best we could and as we were talking her cell phone rang. It was her husband. He told her he was almost home so she immediately put the phone down and ran to the bathroom to wash her face. She sat there applying makeup to make it look as if she hadn't been crying for the past hour. Something she said really made me sad. She said, "Why is Heavenly Father letting this happen to me?" I think I would respond first with. Heavenly Father can't control our agency! Sometimes others use their agency negatively and it may effect us personally. Secondly, about trials in general, I read this in a talk that I really liked:

"The world would have us believe that trials are unfair and that we are entitled to only blue skies and sunshine... We may forget in the heat of our trials that God is aware of us and that He has a plan for us. He knows us individually and perfectly and customizes our mortal experiences to help us grow into our very best selves-- If we will let Him. He is the ultimate personal trainer!" I like that is says IF WE WILL LET HIM. We definitely cannot be changed to become like Christ by chance. Its a choice. Our will is the only thing Heavenly Father does not have, so it's our choice to try and align our will with his! "Every challenge you face, every hard thing you confront, every bad thing that happens to you, every unfairness, every conflict, every sadness, tragedy, every disappointment and heartache, every temptation and every opposition happens for one purpose only; to give you opportunity to respond by applying in your life the teachings of Jesus. As you do so you are change to become more like Him." So essentially it's our choice! I try to apply the Christlike attribute of patience every time the ward sings the hymns 5 octaves lower and with a melody similar to a rap song (:

Hasta la proxima semana!
Hermana Ingram

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