Week 63

This week was great! I had the chance to work with two other missionaries that are in our zone and I really learned a lot from them! I just seemed to see a ton of little miracles that helped me know that the Lord is with us! 

One miracle we saw this week should have been a miracle we saw two weeks ago. One night we didn`t have much to do and as we looked for someone to teach we thought of a young guy we had met a couple of weeks back, but he plays soccer and is super hard to find at home. We decided to go look for him anyways even though we knew it was probably a long shot. Like we expected he wasn`t home, but he lives on the end of a long dark passage way and there was always another door about halfway along that we had never knocked. We decided to knock it and ended up finding a really cool lady and her three kids! She told us that she and her husband have been wanting to talk to us, and that a few weeks ago they saw us knocking the other door and as we left she tried to come out and invite us in to talk to them , but we had already left. A few weeks ago (I am pretty sure that very same night) both Elder Guañunua and I felt like we should knock that door, but we didn`t and we missed the opportunity to find this super cool family! I have no doubt that the Spirit was trying to lead us to them weeks ago, but we just didn`t listen and that this week we had finally given the attention that was needed so that we would find that family! To be honest it`s kind of embarrassing that we weren`t paying attention before, but I am glad that the Lord had patience with us and helped us run into this family now! 

This week we just kept working with the families from last weeks email and we are really excited for them to keep growing spiritually and making these great changes in their lives! 

Today we had a zone activity and we ate Thanksgiving dinner (for lunch)! It was great! Not exactly the same as the states, but we made it work! We had a couple of chickens, mashed potatoes with gravy, corn, lemon pie, french fries, and a cool Brazilian dessert! It was definitely a Thanksgiving that I won`t forget! Haha! 

Hope all is going well at home! Uruguay is a blast and I love being here! Love y'all!

Love,

Elder Cole

Parts from the family email:

This week was good. We had a couple of exchanges with other elders and they all went pretty well. I get kind of nervous being the example, but I always feel like the Lord helps me be good enough to help the other missionaries haha! Then we headed to Montevideo nice and early, because I did some paper work to become a Uruguayan citizen! In just a couple of weeks I will have my own Id haha! All is good here Ma! Love ya!

Love 

<Elder Cole

Week 62

This week was great! I had the chance to go to Montevideo 2 days back to back this week and it definitely took a little bit of a toll. We just had a lot to do when we were finally able to work in Maldonado and having conferences always drains me spiritually. But as always it was incredible to get extra guidance from President Eddy and I feel like there just aren`t enough hours in the day to do everything that I want to get done.  This week the Lord showed me, however, that even though we have to be home by 9pm and can`t leave the house until 10am He will make it possible for us to accomplish everything we need to, IF we put forth the diligence and work. We had 2 miracles this week! 

1) By the weekend we had worked hard, but we were a little nervous because we had gone all week without finding anyone new to teach.  As we worked all week it just seemed like we were almost working in vain, but the Lord helped us find the people that He is truly preparing! We decided to go visit a single mother that we met last week and see if we could talk to her and her 9 year old son. When we showed up to her house we didn`t just find her, but also several of her kids (we found out later that she has 10 kids!) and we had the chance to get to know them and share the Book of Mormon with their family! 

2)  Another day this week we worked hard and just didn`t seem to find any success, the only glimmer of light that we had was a Family Home Evening that night.  Just as the sun was going down we arrived at the Family Home Evening and found out that the family had to cancel and now we stuck with not much to do and a couple of hours in the day. We decided to go visit a family that we had talked to a couple of weeks ago, but had rejected us. I have no doubt that the Lord inspired us to go because we had to walk half an hour to get there and if it was up to me we probably wouldn`t have gone haha! But we went and we were able to sit down and get to know this great family of 4 that is really looking for some religious clarity. 

In both these experiences it is clear to me that the Lord has listened and responded to my prayers. Last week I fasted especially that we would be able to find a family that would be prepared for us to teach. Since that time, we have found and began teaching several families about the Gospel of Jesus Christ!  The Gospel truly is a blessing in our lives and I am so glad that I can be the means by which the Lord will help others feel these blessings! 

Love y'all! Hope all is well at home!

Love,

Elder Cole

Parts from the family email:

We only had the weekend to get all the work we needed to do done before Sunday. It was really stressful. We are teaching a family right now and the dad is a less active member, but he is super cool and wants his 4 kids to be baptized! We are also working with another young man that heard about the church from his cousin and now he is willing to do anything (quit smoking, read the Book of Mormon, come to church) so that he can be baptized! We are super glad we found him! We have also been looking for new people to teach and we ended up finding a family with a single mom and 10 kids! Some are older, but it is going to be a huge chance to strengthen this family!  

All is good here! Love y'all!

Love,

Elder Cole

Week 61

This week was good! On Wednesday we had a huge conference with the other mission here in Uruguay because Bishop Davis from the Presiding Bishopric came to speak! It was super cool to be with over 400 missionaries and get to hear from both mission presidents and their wives! It was great as always to learn especially from President Eddy! We even got to met Bishop Davis real quick and it was great to hear him speak to us. He spoke of finding patterns in the scriptures. It was a good talk, but what I really learned was more from the example he showed rather than the words he spoke. Both he and President Eddy shared things that they had learned in their personal study of the scriptures, and what really interested me was that they didn`t just read the scriptures and make a mental note of the things they liked (like I do sometimes), but they truly searched the scriptures! Both of them found something as they read that they wanted to apply in their lives and then searched for how the people in the scriptures applied that lesson! It was incredible because as I studied the rest of the week, I tried to do the same and I learned so much more from the scriptures than I ever have! I wasn`t just reading to learn, but to learn how to apply  these lessons in my life! The conference really was something really great! It was also awesome to stand and sing "Called to Serve" all together as one big group! An experience I will never forget! 

Not much else happened this week.... I got bit by my first dog here in Uruguay haha! But we ended up finding a really cool guy at that house so it was worth it haha! I hope all is well at home! The mission is great and there isn`t anywhere I`d rather be than right here in Maldonado right now! Love y'all!

Love,

Elder Cole

Parts from the family email:

Hey Ma! It is going good here in Maldonado! We should be seeing a lot of good things happening soon! The guy that went to Treinta y Tres came back, we finished the lessons he needed and then he got kicked out of his house so he is moving back to Treinta y Tres. So he is completely ready, and we just have to call the other missionaries and let them baptize him. It really stinks because it was going to be the coolest baptism I have ever had! He is claustrophobic so he said he wouldn`t be baptized in the font, so we got special permission to baptize him in the ocean.... but now the other missionaries will get to baptize him in a river in Treinta y Tres.

We also had a baptism this week of a little 9 year old boy! His family was inactive and we reactivated them and baptized the youngest kid! Now they are helping fellowship the other investigators we are bringing to church!

Love,

Elder Cole

1. Got to see some old friends from all over the Americas at the conference (Utah, Washington, Colombia, Peru)

2. A guy in our ward got his mission call, he`s headed to Bolivia

Week 60

This week was great! We had a ton of work to do, but we also saw a ton of blessings everyday! This last week we had the chance to talk with President Eddy one-on-one in our interviews! It is always great to talk to him and get some extra guidance.  We are also in changes week! But luckily I am not getting changed and will be here in Maldonado with Elder Guañuna for another 6 weeks! We will see miracles here! 

This week we also made the decision to go to some parts of our area that we haven´t worked in very much and see if we could find people that were prepared to hear the Gospel. I was a little nervous because if we didn´t find anything we would be wasting time traveling and would loose a full day of work. We actually ended up finding a few really good people that have been prepared by the Lord to hear this message! We even found some great families and they seemed super excited to see us. At one point as a young man prayed with us he said, "Thank you for sending the missionaries that I have been waiting for."  I actually felt a little guilty that we hadn´t gone out there to find him sooner and he has had to wait so long haha! 

With all the miracles we saw this week we also saw a lot of opposition. I have realized throughout my mission, but particularly this week, the influence of Satan over the families. This week we taught a really amazing woman, who would be baptized so fast, but she has to get married and her "partner" doesn´t want to. She actually sent us a message the other day saying that she didn´t want to keep coming to church because it would be impossible to be baptized for that reason... and both my companion´s and my heart broke... She isn´t the only one either. There have been at least 4 families here in Maldonado that love the church and want to be baptized, but for different reasons cannot accept marriage and for that reason their spiritual progression has stopped. I honestly believe that the culture and way of thinking that Satan has managed to create regarding marriage in these last days has become one of the greatest stumbling blocks keeping people for being truly happy. People just don´t understand the blessings that come from a family bond by marriage, they just see it as a piece of paper. I am so glad for the blessings of having a family united in marriage and a family that I can spend the eternities with. It has been and will be one of the greatest blessings in my life and I am here right now to help others have those blessings too!

President Gordon B. Hinkley said,

“I see a wonderful future in a very uncertain world. If we will cling to our values, if we will build on our inheritance, if we will walk in obedience before the Lord, if we will simply live the gospel, we will be blessed in a magnificent and wonderful way. We will be looked upon as a peculiar people who have found the key to a peculiar happiness."

I love yall! Hope ya have a great week!

Love,

Elder Cole

Parts from the family email:

Hey Ma! We got the changes last night and I am STAYING! I am super glad to be staying here one more change with Elder Guañuna! We have so much good things set up right now that we will for sure see big things this next change! 

I saw Hallie´s picture and it is so funny that she is the Keeper of Romance! Brenton looks taller, but I am still holding out on a little bit of hope that I will grow a little in the mission! But he can have more armpit hair than me, I will let him win that one ;) 

Where are you guys at in the Book of Mormon right now? I am at the end of Alma in my personal study.

I was thinking about Cody the other day. I hope Kris is doing well!

That is crazy that you already have snow! I don´t remember it being like that when I was home. 

I will keep you in my prayers like always! Thanks for the Spiritual thought!

Love,

Elder Cole

This is a tortugon.. or part of it anyway...