Well, this week has been an interesting week spending most of our time wondering around lost haha! Many things have happened and so i hope to be able to share all things.
As you know, I am here training a new zone leader and opening a sector. Or in other words, my companion and I arrived in this sector at the same day. So, we both were quite lost all week. The weather here in the valley has changed dramatically! The sun usually never comes out, and it rains for almost 8 hours of the day! We had just finished the summer, and now comes in the winter for three months. I am in the armenia, about 5 minutes away from conocoto, my old sector. I can see the steeple of the chapel there. That has been a little tough on me seeing all of my old sector. We are on a hill, and we are always climbing. So i can always look down the hill to the flat fertile grounds of conocoto haha. Through this week of meeting members, I have realized why they sent out the last missionaries. The ward is really suffering now. about 70 out of 500 attend, so we have a lots of work to do! We share the stake center with another ward of almost 200, so when we are taking the sacrement it looks empty compared to the other ward here. But, although it seems like the ward is dying, there are excellent members here! They are very willing to help the mission work, and have been praying for new missionaries that can actually help the ward and not destroy it. So we are kind of understanding that the last missionaries here werent on good terms with the members. So we are going to do all we can to not only help the investigatores, but also the members. The bishop asked me to introduce myself at sacrement meeting for my companion and i, and i explained our goals and how we are going to help the ward. All seemed very happy, and willing to help. We havent had mamitas all this week (another sign the missionaries didnt get along with the members), and so now we are passing by members and gaining their confidence to see if we cant have them pick up a day to be our mamita.=)
This week has been interesting, the last elders that were here left us aboslutely nothing, so we are starting the whole program up again. We hope to be able to get some people coming to church. We spent so much time in the rain lost last week. That honesltly was quite hard. But I am applying a phrase that you would always share with me mom. "I can do hard things." It is so true. We can do hard things! We can accomplish hard tasks if we are diligent and persistent. I am also not alone in this task. As a missionary, I have all the rights to ask god for help. That is something that i am learning here. That i should be more humble and depend on the strength of the lord instead of my own strength. I have never prayed so hard or long or often like i have done this last week. I have seen many miracles this week, and i know they will continue to come. With time, work, and the lord, we will change this sector and this ward. I have faith that for that reason i was called here to this sector. To change this ward, and also myself. I really am counting my blessings now=)
My companion is kind of cool. He is from chile and likes to work, so that is good. To be honest, he is what a would call a grade A nerd haha. We have nothing in common, but, we are still doing everything we can to get along. I know being with him will also help me increase my patience and charity, so i am happy to have him here! I can tell that in this sector I am going to learn so much. I am really excited for the changes that i will make here. It is such a blessing to be in the work of the lord. I prepared a capacitation for the zone meeting we had this last friday, and i can see the difference i and my companion made in the lives of the missionaries. The past zone leaders just focused in on numbers. They spent all of their time focused on that, and when someone had bad numbers, they criticized badly that companionship. I thought of a new model. Instead of focusing ourselves in our numbers, we should focus ourselves in being converted to the lord. When we are more converted to the lord, we are going to want to be obedient, and we are going to want to be diligent. We talked about some ways we could convert ourselves more to the lord. It was a great capacitation and it really helped the missionaries be more animated for their work. We hope to see good outcomes from this way of working.
Well family, this is all i got this week! Hope you have a great time! Love you tons!
Elder Nielson
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