Thursday, November 24, 2016

It's Still True

Hola,                                                                                                                 

Thanksgiving is upon us! There isn’t Thanksgiving here in the ARG but I´m sure we can find a turkey on the side of the road for dinner! Thanksgiving is such a wonderful time of the year: football, food, and of course remembering what we are thankful for. Since living in Argentina for a last little bit, I have realized how blessed I am and how grateful I am for everything I have in my life! Please eat turkey, mashed potatoes and watch as much football as you can!
It was a pretty interesting week here in Salto, one I will never forget! We started this week up in the beautiful city of Mendoza to finish up some of my legal work so I can be an actual citizen of Argentina. After what I heard last week about America and the results of the elections, maybe I should be glad that I’m about to be legal in another country. Just kidding of course, America is the best. 
Taking a little break from regular missionary work is always kind of nice but it slowed down the work we had in Salto. It has become really hard to find people at home when we want to because everyone is working the whole day in the fields. This week many appointments fell and most people just weren’t home, so we saw a lot of precious time slip out of our hands, which was frustrating.
Probably the worst part of the week was when we went to visit our good friend Segundo, who had just returned from Buenos Aires after being there for 3 weeks. We were really excited to start teaching him again because he had a baptism date that fell through. We knocked on his door on Friday night and luckily, he was there. He walked out and immediately said, “I don’t want to talk to you guys anymore. I’m not from your church.” Then, he just walked back inside. This was a huge bummer. We don’t even know what happened and he never gave us a legitimate explanation, so we were really confused. Just a few weeks ago he was showing us his wife’s Bible and he was crying to us about her.  We’re assuming his family said something to him while he was in Buenos AiresJ. I thought we really had something going with him, but I guess not L.
On Saturday, we had a really interesting experience with one of our members, Hermano Eyvar. We went to the Police Station to do some service. It was a good chance for us to get noticed in the community and show people that we aren’t “spies.”  While we were finishing up our work, the police truck pulled in and they had a man in the bed of the truck whose face looked like a nice piece of rare carne meat and he had blood all over his body. Apparently, he had stolen a car, while under the influence, and crashed into a ditch and flew through the windshield. This dude was messed up! The cops threw him in the back of the truck like he was a piece of game that they had just shot. Half of the cops were laughing at him while the others were just yelling at him. This poor guy had no idea what was going on as he was crying and trying to explain himself. The cops didn’t even get him medical attention, just a hose to wash off all of the blood. Looking back, it was a pretty hilarious experience, but still I felt so bad for the guy. 
Later that night we had a killer lesson with Francisco as we basically told him he had to start showing progress or we were going to have to drop him. We made some Argentine pancakes with him and they were “the bomb.” With our good friend Luis, we taught him a great lesson and the Spirit was so present. The kid is so ready for baptism and loves talking about it, but he needs to show that he really wants to do it. So, we told him that Luis was relying on him for a ride to church in the morning and… he came through!! Oh, man! When I saw him walk through the door before Sacrament meeting, it was the greatest feeling. He even participated in Sunday School! Now we just need to make this a habit for him and he´ll be ready for baptism. He was the first investigator to attend church in Salto for a whole year, so we are really pumped for him. 
On Sunday morning, we received a call from the bishopric that we are a part of and they informed us that we were in charge of the meetings in the day. It was a little stressful but everything went smoothly and the meetings were great. Being in a bishopric for the day was so awesome. 
Our man, Daniel, and his wife are doing so great. One of their kids had a bad asthma attack on Sunday morning so they couldn’t come to church, but they were really sad they couldn’t come. His wife, Carla, still needed to be taught about the Restoration so we reviewed that with all of them and then we pulled out the Book of Mormon and she told us that she has already read up to 2 Nephi!! I saw that and I was soooo excited for them. They are such a great family and there’s really something special about them!
Well, in my studies this week I finished El Libro De Mormon in Spanish and it´s still true!! How lucky we are to have this great book in our lives. It´s the most true book on the earth and I am so grateful for it in my life because it has given me guidance, motivation, and inspiration. 
Enjoy the entire week of Thanksgiving! I love you all so much and I am so humbled to be missionary! 

It's gonna be another good week!

Besos,

Elder Roderick


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