Mission Week 45, Arequipa Mission Office

 

This week was a rather tough one. Thought a lot about the advice that you and Dad would give me if I could talk to you. Many times the SUCK IT UP Story came to mind. Interviews with president happened and I told him that all that was left was to suck it up get back up and keep walking forward. Sometimes we fall, sometimes we fall hard but we can always get back up and keep walking.

We are going to go paintballing. I will not participate. Tonight we have three lessons planned and the Assistants have a baptism in our ward so we will invite all of the investigators that we can!

One investigator has been struggling with her parents to get permission to become baptized for almost a year now. She was almost eighteen and she told her parents that she knew it was true and that after she turned 18 she would still want to go through with the baptism however she did not want to do it without getting their permission and the other day she ran into the church with the biggest smile on her face and I knew that she would be baptized in a relatively short amount of time. It was a good day in the ward and everyone in the ward council had watched her progress for so long and to see her become baptized is a great victory for the lord. The lessons are with a few less actives and two young men who are not extremely interested in the church but their family members are members and they would like to learn more. EXTREMELY SMART KIDS! The older one Kevin is so interested and opened minded. It is absolutely amazing. Good news, Ezra, a member who lives here and is constantly hanging out with us is going to give me all the photos that he has. It will be awesome. Bad news, Elder Muñoz got an emergency change back into the field and the new materials secretary has not figured out how to pick up the package yet. It is here in Arequipa.

 

Love Elder Tanner

Mission Week 44, Arequipa Mission Home

I have been doing extremely well. I have been having a great time in the office. I have been learning tons of new ways to work more efficiently and I have become very good at counting money! I can see the importance of a budget and organization skills and I have been applying more effort to both of those skills in my life. We currently are teaching a couple and they are struggling with the family. We were in a lesson and their marriage was hanging by a thread.  The situation was extremely delicate and we were able to help them see that this is not what God wanted. That they were going to have to let go of the past and Fight for the family that they wanted. Another couple of recent converts have been having marital issues due to the dependency that one has to her parents. I know one thing though. When we do all we can the lord provides the rest. 

This week I have been learning lots of new ways to teach and ways to help people understand Doctrinal Principles. My teaching skills have tanked a little since coming into the office. We do not get to do much teaching but when we do I always feel the spirit. Right now we are teaching about 4 Investigators, 8 less actives and about 15 Recent converts. We have been focusing a lot on helping the less actives come back to church because that is something that the ward has definitely struggled with. We have four less actives who are all coming to church and learning tons and reaching out to friends and family and inviting us to teach them. I have been studying a lot harder. It has been a ton of fun to see how the lord guides you in your studies for your lessons. I am also looking for a way to learn Spanish while in the office. I have been looking up tons of synonyms and I have been trying to improve my vocabulary base. 

 

My week has gone really great.  I hope all goes well with the weather! 

Love

Shaw

Mission Week 43, Arequipa Mission Home

I got the package! It was an amazing day! I almost cried and then when I finally got home I DID CRY!!! I saw the package that you guys had sent me and I opened it and saw every careful wrapped and tied present. I put them all on my bed and was enveloped with a spirit of Christmas(and smell! Thanks for the scentsy bag!). I opened all of the gifts and they were all amazing. I have almost half of them here in the office! I set up the Christmas tree and I have the lights plugged in and everything. I love it so much. I will definitely use it next year wherever I find myself. I could not believe all of the food and clothes and Missionary stuff that I could use. I used the socks and the tie the very next day. I love the tie. I opened up the package of legos and built the ship that very night! I also have that sitting on my desk along with the most amazing calendar I have ever seen and the GO and DO sign. I have gotten so many compliments from so many members who pass by the office about the marble Christ statue. It was an amazing experience for me I will also put the pins and rings to good use. It was so amazing I still cant believe it happened. I opened the jerky first thing and started eating one. I shared them with everyone in the office. The M&Ms were gone within the first day.

 

Yesterday I had another very spiritual experience. The other day we were preparing for our lessons I was calling everyone because we had planned so many lessons that we had to do divisions I was looking forward to that and all of a sudden people started canceling. One bad phone call after the other left me desperately looking for people to teach. Eventually we gave up the idea of doing divisions and let the other office missionaries take the other member because one of them was so busy he could not leave the office. After going around looking for people we had the impression to go look for Hermano Marcos. Marcos is a recent along with his wife. They have a son, I think he is about a year old. We went to look for him and on the way we passed a man on the street and said LETS GO CONTACT HIM! We talked to him and shared a quick story about the restoration of the gospel. He said that he believed in god but that none of the churches were from god. We asked him when you have a question for god who should you ask. He said a preacher and I told him that if he wanted to know something from god he needed to ask god, and that a young man of fourteen years had the same question as he did and he asked god which church is true. Then we explained the restoration and he said when do you guys go to church. We told him what time and where and then we planned a lesson with him for this Sunday after church. Then we started to walk down the street to go to the house of Marcos and all of a sudden the phone started ringing. It was Marcos. He had gone to look for us in the office and so we jumped in a taxi and went screaming back to the office and we were able to talk to him about the gospel and how it blesses families. It was an extremely spiritual experience that I will never be able to forget. There is a quote from Jeffery R. Holland about when the blessings come and it is "Gods opportunity is Mans extremity" Its when we feel like there is nothing else to give but we decide to give it anyway that god steps in and helps to overfill our cup that may feel empty. I know that this is true. Its in the bleakest times, the hardest times, the saddest times, the darkest times, when we are tired and tested and want to give up so badly but don´t that the lord steps in and can fully shine his light in our lives.

 

 I love you guys so much and I know that you are in good hands. Thank you for the presents and thank you for the prayers I feel them daily! I love you so very much. 

 

-Elder Tanner (Shaw)

Mission Week 42 Arequipa Mission home 2016

This week has been an insane week. first I am going to talk about lesson stuff,

We have been teaching a couple and they are awesome. Their names are René and Alicia. They have a daughter and they have had a few huge challenges pass in their lives but they have remained together. Their daughter has been their major motivation. We have only visited them three times and they already came to church. The other day we went to the house with two members it was insanely disapointing. The members asked us what we were going to teach. We told them that we felt like we were going to talk about marriage. The members started to murmur... They asked us how many lessons we had and how well we knowed them, They all said no its way to soon to talk about marriage. That would be a mistake you should definately not talk about marriage. You guys may have the spirit but you need to teach with intellegince too. OH MY GOODNESS!  We went to the lessons and within thirty seconds we were talking about marriage. She had just talked with her husband about their plans for marriage. So goes to show LISTEN TO THE SPIRIT.

I went to presidents house to move around some old documents with Elder Hildebrandt and we ended fixing his surround sound and his direct TV and his blue ray. Afterwards he invited the whole office to lunch but everyone else had already eaten and so Elder Hildebrandt and I went to go eat at this really nice Italian Restaurant. I had Four Cheese Gnocchi and we got to know President and Hermana Zobrist really well.