Argentina ~week 51

This was another great week. We had lots of problems with no electricity and no water. The elders in charge of the pensions told us that they are looking for a new pension for all 4 of us that live here.

Monday night we had a family night with the Silva family.

On Tuesday we had zone conference in the morning. They talked alot about our purpose as missionaries, to preach repentance to baptize. After that we taught our investigator Felisa about Temples and Family History work. Then we went to the Silva family house to get haircuts. Wednesday morning we went back to the Silva family to help paint their house. But it was a little rainy so we helped mix cement to make their counter tops. They gave us lunch. Then we went to visit this crazy guy Hugo who always talks to us in the streets. He's a drunk so we invited a member to go with us. They both cancelled on us though. So we spent the rest of the day looking for people to teach.

Thursday morning we went to visit a few less active families. Then, after lunch we visited Felisa and talked about the baptismal interview and asked if she felt ready for baptism. She told us yes. Then plan was to have her interviewed on Sunday after church and baptized on the 27th. That night we had executive committee meeting.

Friday we did weekly planning in the morning. Then we had lunch with the Morel family. A less active family, but we got them to come to church on Sunday. Then we went looking for some old investigators, then we had missionary correlation meeting.

Saturday we had lunch with the Jerez family, read with Felisa the story of Lehi's Vision, and spent the rest of the time looking for people to teach.

Sunday morning we went to church. Unfortunately none of our investigators came. We were going to have Ward Council after church, but they cancelled it like always. We had lunch with the Piñol family then went to visit some of the people that we invited to church but didn't come. Felisa's family told us she didn't come because she was at her daughter's house. Hopefully we can help to get ready for baptism soon.

Anyways here's some pictures of what happened this week. I have more pictures and videos on my onedrive account that my parents have access to.

And that's about it that happened this week. It was a pretty good week. Hopefully we can help more people get to church next week!

-Elder Severtson

Argentina ~week 50

So this week has been kinda interesting, but great!. On Monday was transfers, so Elder Pruner stayed with his new companion Elder Gatto in our pension and I stayed with Elder Redzich in Quilmes.

Tuesday we just had a little bit of time to get ready for our new companions then we went to the mission offices. Now I'm training Elder Meza from Santiago Chile! He's 18, and likes to play soccer. Also like 2 other people in our district are training and a bunch in our zone. Also, when we left we were kind of lost because it was a holiday and there was a parade so the bus we usually take wasn't at the normal busstop and we had to ask directions alot because nobody knew where it was.

Wednesday morning we had Elder Meza's for lesson with Felisa. We taught her about the Day of Rest in a Liahona magazine. She really liked it and we're going to help her get subscribed to the Liahona. Then we went shopping so he could buy his food for the week, and then we had district meeting. That night we visited the Silva family. That night was the first night this week without electricity.

Thursday night we visited the Perez family. A family where the kids are less actives and the parents aren't members. We visit them every once in a while because they are a really nice family. They can't go to church because they always work on Sundays, but we are trying to help them. Then we had lunch with the Silva family. Then we went to set up appointments with investigators and less actives. And that night we had executive comittee meeting. We had electricity a few hours during the day and then it went out all night.

Friday I had to do tramites, which is like paperwork for the visa here. Apparently they lost the FBI clearance for a lot of people when the mission changed, so I have to do all the fingerprint stuff again. We went to capital in a taxi to do it. And I attached a picture here. After that we got back pretty late and had to go to ward mission correlation, or whatever its called. We also had no electricity that whole night. Some of the neighbors protested by burning tires in the streets, which blocked all traffic, and I attached a picture. It was really hot that night because we couldn't use fans, and we couldn't open the windows because of all the smoke. But, we talked to the Elders in charge of the pensions about all the problems we've been having. Before, they said they were going to move the two elders that live with us to a new pension, but now they are looking for a new one for all 4 of us.

Saturday we did weekly planning, had lunch with the Jerez family. We taught Felisa about Tithing and fast offerings. and that night we were invited to the youth mutual activity then we played soccer in the end.

Sunday we went to church. Felisa went and told us she loved it alot. Her baptism will probably be on the 27th. The whole ward loves how now there are 4 elders in the ward. We still have a problem with the lunches. We passed out a calendar for lunches for both companionships, and nobody signed up. Also, We had to find a new person to wash our clothes, and only one hermana said she could do it and that it would take a whole week each time. We are hoping to be able to fix all these problems. We had lunch with one of the few families that helps us with lunches, then we brought our laundry to the hermana. After that we just visited a few less active families.

Today in the morning we went shopping and then played soccer with other missionaries. Tonight we have a family night with the silva family.

Anyways, it was a great week. We got a lot of things done in the little time we had that wasn't taken up by meetings.

Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Severtson

Agentina ~week 49

Another great week this week. After PDay we had a lesson with an investigator Javier Flores. We invited a member Daniel, but he just never showed up. Javier is a very bible fanatic guy and he loves to talk and tell stories. He's been an investigator a long time, but never progresses. We decided to talk to him about something he would like - the 10 commandments, especially because he works on Sundays so he cant come to church. He liked the lesson, but I don't know if he wants to stop working Sundays. A weird thing that happened is he wife always hides into another room when we talk to him, and she came out the last 5 minutes and began singing a weird evangelical song at the top of her lungs. Me and Elder Pruner make lists of all the very strange things people do here. One time a lady wanted to invite her neighbor over and shouted his name outside for like 2 minutes before giving up... and he lives like 2 blocks away.

Tuesday we had district meeting. After eating lunch in the pension we walked to this guys house, and a group of guys wanted to take a selfie with us, so we did. Then we got to Hno. Romero's house, a less active who got offended because nobody in this ward helps other people, which is pretty true, I'll tell you more later. Then we met with Hilda again, and taught her the word of wisdom, which she thought was a cool idea. Then we met with the Ward Mission Leader and shared with him who we are visiting with.

Wednesday we visited Felisa and taught the Word of Wisdom and Law of Chastity. She already knew most of it and lived it. Then we went to visit Facundo a young man member, and his mom Mabel, and investigator, but they weren't there. We visited a guy who shared with us that he met the church at age 27, asked for an age exception to serve a mission and was allowed one year but in his home mission (He actually served my last area). Now he's married with children, and just wants to do visits with us sometimes. We're thinking of doing a tormenta blanca soon, which is when all the missionaries come to one area for a couple hours to work. They can all have young men/women go with them to help encourage them to serve missions. We'll probably do it in a few weeks now that our area split. Then we visited another less active family. Also they finally got a new pension for the other elders that were living with us because an area in our district split, so they moved out.

Thursday morning we had no plans, so we went around setting appointments. Then we had a lesson with an old investigator and needed someone to come with us, so we asked this 18 year old kid to come with us. His family, the Achar family, all have some sort of mental disability, but I'm not sure what it is. They mumble everything and talk to themselves and nobody can understand them. But we had nobody else to come with us to we asked him. But, the lady ended up not being there. Then we had a family night with that Achar family, which was also weird.

Friday morning we had weekly planning. In the afternoon we taught Felisa the Articles of Faith, it's a good way to talk about a lot of smaller topics in one lesson. She told us she'd go to church on Sunday, which is her birthday. Then we taught Hilda with Brother Piñol again. We read 3 Nephi 11 and talked about it alot and she liked it. Another random weird thing on the list of pointless stuff we see people to: She wanted to light a candle, so she lit a lighter to light the stove then used that to light the candle. We don't know why. haha

Saturday we had no plans so we went to look for a lot of less actives people have told us to visit. Apparently here there's been a lot of people going less active because our bishop does nothing, and almost no members do visits and stuff. We have a hard time getting lunches with families and getting them to wash our clothes. From what I've heard from other Elders is that many people are going less active because of that. The other day only 47 people went to church. It used to be like 90 until about a year ago. This week the bishop moved to Spain randomly, he never even told us. Hopefully we can get a new bishop quickly and start helping out the ward. There hasn't been ward council in the ward for months, because we always ask to have one and they always cancel. Hopefully with 2 more elders in the area we can really fix all these problems. Saturday night there was a broadcast of the area plan of the South america south area.

Sunday Hilda went to church. She wanted to leave right after Sacrament Meeting, before the classes ,and we are worried she didn't really like it, because she likes all that evangelic crazy yelling stuff. After church we had lunch with Brother and Sister Piñol, then went to visit less actives. It started raining pretty hard. We went to visit Felisa and brought her a Triple scriptures for her birthday, and she was very happy about it. She explained to us she didn't go to church, because she was all ready in the morning, the her family started showing up for her 54th birthday. We had a lesson with them, and shared Mosiah 5:1-5. Her sister and one of her daughters are less active members and some of her other kids were there too. Almost all of them listened to us, which was good. A few of them said they'd come to church next Sunday.

Today we had Transfers. Our area is splitting so we are both getting new companions. We are going to have 4 elders in our small pension again, the other ones just barely moved out. Elder Pruner is with Elder Gatto who has the same amount of time as him in the mission (just finished his training), and I'm training again. I get my new companion tomorrow.

Here's a picture of me with Elder Rios in district meeting. A picture of the bags me and Elder Pruner made, we bought scripture bags in the temple, then took straps off our old bags to make a super light bag. And Friday morning we heard a lot of glass break outside and looked and apparently a truck lost a few crates of beer bottles, and the whole pension smelled bad after.

Anyways, that's about it this week. It was a pretty good, but busy week. Lots of blessing during the week. We're hoping the area split will help out the ward alot, and we're hoping to help a few more investigators get to church. Also, I hope my new companion is North American, because I think it'll be fun helping him learn Spanish.

Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Severtson

Argentina ~week 48

This week was pretty good. We started off with going to the temple on tuesday and then had a week full of work.

Monday after PDay we went and had a family night with the Silva family, a big family who are some less actives, and some actives. We talked about the difference between our plans for life, and God's plans for our life.

Tuesday we got up early and went to the temple with our whole zone. We took a bus all the way there through capital. Unfortunately I forgot my camera, but I'm working on getting the pictures from someone else. It was really cool, my first time going in Spanish. Then we had a lesson with our investigator Hilda and invited a young couple who are both returned missionaries. It was an awesome lesson and now she really understands the restoration.

Wednesday morning we went to set up appointments with people, then we had district meeting and watched the missionary broadcast that we missed last week because there was no internet. Then we went to visit Felisa, our investigator whose granddaughter last week told us she didn't want us to come back. Felisa had no idea her granddaughter said that, and she told us none of it is true. We taught her lesson 3, the gospel of Jesus Christ, which she understood and remembered really well from the elders before us.

Thursday we had a lesson with a returned missionary who is the only member in his family. We want to be able to teach his family. After lunch and family cancelled a family night with us, then we went to the asado with Felisa and her family. Most of her family is nice to us, but one of her sons was just trying to argue with us and telling us that United States is ruining the world, and that the church is bad for always building temples and stuff instead of helping people. We wanted to explain to him, but he wouldn't listen. But the asado was good and we shared Mosiah 2:41 with 4 Nephi 1:15-18.

Friday morning we did weekly planning. then after lunch we started exchanged with our zone leader. I stayed in our area with Elder Stevenson. I had done exchanges with him in my first area too. We taught Hilda again with those members and watched the restoration movie. She really wanted to go to church on Sunday after that.

Saturday morning we visited a less active family Insaurralde, who another member told us to visit. Then we had lunch with the Jerez family, and old and poor couple. Then we switched back from exchanges and went to visit Felisa. We taught her the 10 commandments. Then we went to the church because a member invited us to help him clean it because nobody helps here.

On Sunday we went to church and none of our investigators made it. I was kind of upset at first because Felisa and Hilda both told us they would go. But there was a less active who lives behind the family Insaurralde who went. There was no Gospel Principles teacher so they asked us to teach the lesson on agency. It was pretty good for not being prepared. After church we had lunch with the Piñol family, the ones who came with us to visit Hilda the other two days. Then we went to visit our investigators and see why they didn't come to church. Hilda told us she really wanted to go with her son but her other kids got into a big fight and according to her there were threatenings and the police had to get involved and I think she said one of her kids had to move out. When we got to her house she was crying and looked like she was having a really hard time. We shared several comforting scriptures with her like Isaiah 41:10-13, Alma 7:10-13, and D&C122:7 about all bad things serving as experience in the end. She told us that really helped because she remembered after the problem her daughter who isn't religious at all grabbed the scriptures and started reading for comfort. She told us that she was alright now because 'if one person comes closer to God, that whole bad experience was worth it'. Felisa told us she didn't go because she was at her daughter's house, and had gotten all ready to go. Then someone came to the door for paperwork and she kept talking for like an hour and it got later. Which sounds likely because she talks ALOT. Lastly, we had a young man named Facundo who's 18 come to a lesson with us. Facundo is the only member in his family, and his mom listened to the missionaries before and liked it but didn't have time. Anyways, he came with us to visit a lady who stopped us on the road and asked what we do and why we do it, but she wasn't there. So we visited Facundo's mom, Mabel. She was glad we visited her. She had actually gone to church many times before, and decided to go that day because she had time. She told us she want's to get baptized, but first wants to listen a lot more and have more faith and knowledge first.

Anyways, it was a pretty good and successful week. Especially at the end. I was kind of sad a first that no investigators had come to church, and hardly any members were even there. But that afternoon we had lots of good lessons and I believe that they'll come next week. We finished the week and realized we had beaten some of our records this week like new investigators and weekly lessons taught.