Letter from March 16

This was a good week. This Sunday we will have changes. I'm not sure if I will be in Tena the next time I write but I am almost sure that I will have a new companion. Tena has been a great sector though! This week we finished painting most of the hospital with the gringos. We have to go back still and finish a bit. We also went around to a lot of the families in the branch who are struggling and brought them food and clothes from donations that all the doctors and members made that came from the states. It meant a lot to those families. It was a really great day! And it finally gave us something to do other than contact, so it helped us to. Saturday we did a service project for a family who lives out in the jungle. Basically we took down half of their house and rebuilt it. I don't have pictures. We saw tons of bugs though. There were tons of tarantulas. Most of them were small but there was one that was bigger than my hand!! Then, Saturday night we, printed out 1000 little cards and spent three hours contacting all of Tena and passing out the cards! It was pretty cool. Tena is small so the goal was to make it so all of Tena gets to know the church. We preached in the buses in the stores and all over the streets. IT was a cool idea.

Sunday we had six investigators in church which was cool and nine less actives. We had a good attendance this week overall. Two elders in our district finish their missions this week. Pretty exciting for them. Time seems to fly by fast, Two years is nothing. Pretty soon, it will be me. Our time to serve the Lord full time is not a lot. But it prepares us for a lifetime dedicated to his service. 

 

Read the story of the stripling warriors Alma 53 through 57

Mothers taught them! 

no sign of the package still. But everything is good. Love you, have a great week!

Elder Peterson

Worms...who knew they could taste good.

This week was pretty good. Tuesday we did a family home evening with a great family. They cooked a buck of worms up and we ate them, both alive and cooked. It was pretty cool. They actually taste pretty good. I will send some pictures. Also a giant group of doctors and their families from Utah that are members of the church are here in Tena right now, doing service in the hospitals and things. So Sunday we had about 60 Americans in the meetings. More than members who actually live here. I had to stand up front and translate all the talks. Then I had to translate all the classes. It was an interesting experience. They are all great people! A few have asked me for your phone number so they can call you when they get back to the states and send pictures. Not sure if your phone number is still the same. We went and painted a Catholic church with them and this morning they let us dedicate the hospital on live t.v. which was really cool. Tomorrow, we are going to go with them to all the families that are in need and bring them food and clothes.

I have been thinking a lot this week. I have come to a few realizations about the mission. We haven't had a ton of success here in Tena but I sure have learned a lot. I've realized the importance of serving a mission. It is a once in a lifetime experience to convert ones self to the gospel. I think we are on the mission more for our personal and eternal progression than we are for others. As we do everything to bring others unto Christ, we seem to bring ourselves closer every day. Serving a mission is a commandment, a once in a lifetime commandment. I was thinking about the story of Abraham. I heard in a talk once that many people ask why God commanded Abraham to sacrifice his son if God knew he was going to do it? Well, it wasn't because God needed to learn something about Abraham. It was because Abraham needed to learn something about Abraham. I think the mission is a similar commandment for us in these days. We aren't here so God can see if we really love Him and will serve Him, He already knows us perfectly. We are here so we can see if we really love Him, and if we will really serve Him. We are here to see if we are really converted to the gospel. Most of us don't start out converted. Maybe Abraham wasn't exactly sure what he would do when he got to his destination either. But he took the first step by leaving. It might of been during the journey that he decided he must do whatever God asks of him no matter how hard. Who knows. But for us it is something like that. If we do the mission right, serve with our whole heart, somewhere along the way we gain the determination to do whatever God asks of us no matter how hard. And like Abraham we might not always know why, but we learn to trust in our Father in Heaven.

 

I have realized that I need to change a whole lot of things in my life, or as a missionary. I think I still lack complete conversion, sad to say. I think we all lack a little bit of conversion. God continually teaches us and changes us, and we are continually made stronger and are converted even more. I realize that I have many weaknesses to overcome still. The first step is always to recognize our weakness. I trust in Moroni's promise (Ether 12:27).  "And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them." For any of you who are preparing for a mission, prepare good. They didn't lie when they said it may be the most important thing you do. It sure doesn't make sense to start preparing for a mission when we are on the mission. You´ll just loose precious time. 

 

The church is true. Christ lives. Perhaps the greatest miracle of the atonement is the many miracles it can work in each one of us. I love this gospel! 

Love you all. Have a great week!

February

We are desperate to find people right now. It has been difficult since arriving here. One of the counselors of the mission came to Tena this week which was nice. The mission needs to know the situation here in Tena. Not sure what Tena´s future is.

This week we had a cool experience. One day we were contacting for a good two hours. We stopped and decided to say a prayer. It was a prayer with a lot of faith. Turns out God definitely answers prayers. About a half hour later we were walking and two girls called us over. They were both from the US. One of them has four friends on missions around the world and has always wanted to know more about the church. Pretty cool. Hopefully this week we will be able to teach her. Other than that it was a rough week.
 

Scriptures that have run through my mind this week : Jacob 2:18,19

Love you,

Elder Peterson

Faith of February...Miracle of March

This week was alright. There were changes last Monday, so there are two new missionaries here in Tena. One from Mexico and one from Argentina. One finishes his mission this change and the other the next change. In total there are three missionaries in our district of 6 that are finishing their missions in the next month or two. So, there is always a lot of talk about home and stuff going on here. 

This week in Tena there have been a lot of parades and things like that because everyone has vacations, so the work has been going kind of slow this week. Carnival is a holiday they have here. It started Friday and ends Tuesday. It's basically a week of throwing water balloons and spraying foam at each other. People have tried to get us wet, most have failed. Also they do celebrate Valentines Day does exist here, so it was a week full of holiday. Which means people didn't have a whole lot of time to listen to missionaries, but we were able to find a little of success. 

We have been teaching a single mom that came to church last week. She is really good and asks a ton of questions always so our lessons with her are always really long. She has a lot of potential. We have really been looking for families to teach though. I want to find a family in this sector that has a lot of potential to be able to help this tiny branch. The branch lacks priesthood and converted families. I don't want to leave this sector until we can find and convert a family like that. We have also been working a lot with less active families and a few are progressing. We are teaching a less active family right now. They aren't married and the sister has a lot of fear of getting married because of problems they have. It was an interesting lesson because usually as missionaries we push people to get married no matter what. I realized that we have an influence in things that are eternal. The things we do in the mission will have eternal blessings or eternal consequences, not just for us but for the people we teach and counsel. 

As a mission we fasted this week. We are doing a small program as a mission that is called faith of February - miracle of March. As a mission we are going to read the Book of Mormon, do a service every week, study an attribute of Christ every week, and do a personal sacrifice. My personal sacrifice is going to be to fast every week. Hopefully, we will see the fruits this coming month. 

 

Love you so much! I hope you have a great week! This week I have gained a testimony of hope! We must have hope so the we do not get discouraged during the trials of life! I love and miss you.

Elder Peterson

Cool story

Not a ton of exciting stuff happened this week. I don't have a lot of time but I wanted to share something cool that happened this week. I think it was Friday. We were contacting and we contacted all morning and on the way to lunch, someone stopped us and asked if we studied the bible.  We stopped and talked to him and made an appointment to visit him the next day. The next day we met him and went to a members house where we had a small lesson with him. He has made some mistakes in his life and is super, super humble and not sure where to go. After we finished the lesson he told us how he got kicked out of his house and then came here to live with his aunt. That day when we contacted him, he had been walking around all morning trying to talk to God and ask for guidance. When he saw us, he said that coincidences don't exist and that God must have sent us. Then he told us that it was like we read his mind. All the things we had taught were like we had spoke to his heart and knew exactly what he needed. He came to church with us the next day, but this week he leaves for Ambato, so he won't be staying here. It stinks for us, but we are happy that we had that experience. We also worked a lot this week with less active members and we had 11 come to church, which was awesome! 

 

We have had quite a few difficulties in this sector, all the missionaries of Tena have struggled. But we are working hard and little by little the branch is growing stronger. Also in our mission only the leaders have phones. But this week I became the first to have a phone that isn't a leader. Love you all. Have a great week!

 

Elder Peterson

Blessings

Well, I've completed nine months this week. The time has passed super fast. It was an interesting week and a successful week, so that was good. Starting from Monday...we got back to the house and changed and left to go pick up a family (we were going to do a family home evening with them). We were walking down the road and there was a car pulled over and they waived us down. By the way, people don't usually wave us down. We went over and they asked us to give a blessing to their son who was convulsing inside of the car. They aren't members of the church but they knew some missionaries about 20 years ago. So, we both leaned into one end of the car and I gave a small blessing. As soon as we finished, the boy calmed down and stopped convulsing. We talked to the family for a second. They live in Quito. Obviously, they have a lot of faith because the blessing worked. It was a cool experience. Then, we went with that family that we are teaching and did a family home evening. It was good. They came to church this week. It's a family of four. Tuesday morning I cut myself in the kitchen and it bled for a second, but it's healed now. Wednesday, we went to teach a family we have been working with but the appointment fell through. While we were walking out there, there was a tiny dirt road with one house and I felt that we should contact the house. We had walked by it plenty of times before, but this time I felt something. So, we went and knocked and a 19 year old kid answered the door. He's a less active member that just came from Guyaquil. The rest of his family members aren't members of the church. It was cool that we could find him. Hopefully we will be able to teach his family. Thursday and Friday were normal. Saturday we did a service. We painted the outside of a family's restaurant that we have been teaching. In the family, the little kids are all members of the church, but the parents aren't married, so they cant be baptized. The mom has been coming to church and wants to be baptized. The dad would never listen to the missionaries before, but he has listened to us a few times now and he came to church this week with his wife! 

We've been working really hard here with less actives and investigators. Since we got here the attendance has been 35-40. This week there were 71 people at church. We almost didn't have room for everyone. Hopefully it can keep it up so that Tena can have a chapel someday!! That was pretty much our week. Hopefully the families we are teaching can progress. The work is good! 

Love you all, hope you have a good week! Listen to the spirit always. 

 

D&C 75:26,27, Alma 37:36,37

Faith

This week was a good week. We have been working our butts off without a ton of results. There have been a lot of difficulties in the sector and were trying to figure out the best way to sectorize still. Since we started this change, we have found 4 or 5 new families. Of those we are still working with two. Hopefully they will progress. They still haven't gone to church. One of the problems we've seen with our investigators, less actives, and members in our sector is that the church is really far away and you have to take a bus or taxi. They don't have money to pay for that. It's either work, put food on the table or spend the money to go to church. So, it has been a difficult thing for them to exercise their faith and make that sacrifice. The branches attendance hasn't improved much since we got here, only slightly. Hopefully these next couple weeks will be better. These last 3 weeks have flown by super fast.

 

This week we did a service project. I got sunburned again. Saturday we went to visit a family. This family lives about an hour and a half away from Tena. It's an older couple that got to know the church when they were in Spain for three months. They live out in the Amazon, and have a little farm more or less. Not the kind of farm you think of when someone says farm in the United States. They've been members for probably 12 years and have at the most not made it to church only five times. They have to take the bus at 5 in the morning. Sometimes they wait for hours until someone opens the church up. Sometimes they haven't had money to pay for the bus, so they take some things from the farm, fruits etc. and sell it while they are waiting for the bus. Then they make enough for the trip. They are very faithful. They showed us around their farm and I sent some pictures of that. Overall, it was a good week. 

 

The church is true. I love this gospel. 100% obedience equals 100% blessings. I hope you all have a great week! love and miss you, you're always in my prayers.