Elder Jake Moss: The Hard Work is Beginning to Payoff

Hola family.....Happy 24th! The work is going great here in Mantaro. This last week was really great. On P-Day we all packed lunches and went hiking in this hidden forest. It was a lot of fun. That night we went and visited Kory. She is a lady we found through our area book...the previous Elders had given up on her for various reasons and so I felt like we should go back and re-contact her. And now...she has baptismal date set for this Saturday! We were thinking that she was not real committed to us teaching her. She hadn't been able to meet with us for 2 weeks. But Gustavo, a member, came with us to teach her. She was telling us how she was feeling about getting baptized and the BOM. You could see how happy she was and excited. She said that she really feels like she needs to get baptized. Gustavo was helping her realize that is the spirit confirming to her that the feelings she's having are from the spirit and they testify of Christ. It was sweet! The spirit was SO strong! Testifying that this is the spirit and is telling us this is her time was something really special to witness. Her demeanor has changed completely whereas before she was sad but now she feels happy, has a little bit of a testimony that is starting to grow and the support from Gustavo has been great. So after a long four months in Mantaro and a ton of work, prayer and fasting, I will finally see a baptism in our area (fingers crossed)! Hallelujah! But that was a great feeling to see the fruits of our efforts are coming suddenly out of nowhere.

So on Tuesday we had a lot of appointments and one of them was with this guy Martin...who wants to be an atheist. So we showed him Alma 32 and read that with him and emphasized that it says in there to "try God" with faith. It was interesting trying to get guy who says he's an atheist to just use a little bit of faith. It's funny because by doing that, Martin will actually have to use quite a bit of faith!

So Weds was just okay. We played sports at the ward with the members, so that was pretty cool except they showed up an hour late :-)

Thursday I had to go to District Council meeting with all of the other DLs and ZLs. I got to see my friends Elder Campbell and my former companion from Huancavelica, Elder Jimenez! It was great to see them. We ate Popeye's chicken so that was a nice break from Peruvian food. Then we had the council meeting and it was like a panel interview where we could ask questions to the APs, President and Sister Silva. It was a good meeting. President spoke and as expected, he's made some changes to the mission rules. The big change was that going out of our Area...so not the Zone (big) but the Area (small). This change will be hard to get used to. He also has issues with us calling each other by just our last name (leaving out Elder)...this one is familiar to me because I remember my Dad's mission president in Hawaii would get after the missionaries for calling them "guys" or "dudes" or whatever they said back then. Slang and loose talk is the issue here. Also, President Silva said we are no longer restricted from eating with members. Before, we were only allowed to eat with our pension. President said that this added time with members might result in good work being accomplished. So all of this is going to take some getting used to but you have to just accept it and move forward! I know that President Silva is the Lord's servant called to lead us at this time and in this place.

On Friday we found another family to teach. They are dirt biking fanatics and their kid is like a world champ at it or something. So they accepted us into their home because they say they've been looking for a church to go to as a family! So that was great!

Saturday the parties began here in Peru. It is like 4th of July here this coming week but its not just one day, but the whole week.

Reflection of the Week: Talking to lots of people this week has brought us success. Something I refused to accept when I got here was that the area was "dead" or not known for being productive. Every area I've been in has had a similar challenge and so I've said from Day 1 as a goal that I wanted to improve the area in some way or another. A total of 11 new investigators this week! Contacting works! The Villanera family still comes and they were a family we contacted. They want to get baptized. They were a knocked door. I love it out here! Time is flying! Love you all! #doitforjesus