Happy Valentine's Day

Family and Friends!! Happy Valentines Day, Dia del Amor! Love for Christ!! Hope it well for all of you! As for us, its been an interesting week. We did a Sister´s activity the day before Valentines day so I could meet all the girls that we are in charge of and to have a good time together to celebrate Valentines Day! We focused on the worth that we have as daughters of God and talked about the love of Christ. We made cookies and did activities as companions so they could have a better relationship with their companions. It turned out to be a fun activity. At the end we gave them a little gift that was a small mirror and a note that told them to look in the mirror and see the beautiful daughter of God that they were and to let the light of Christ shine through their acceptance. It turned out being a good activity! I love all the girls and I look forward to spending more time with them and being the best help that I can be. But when the activity was over there was a companionship that was having lots of troubles so we talked with them after in the mission home for about an hour or so trying to help them solve their problems. Then when they felt a little better President Zobrist came back. He talked to me and Hermana Waldron to see how things were going. The highlight of my week was when he told me that he has seen a new light in me since putting me as Sister Leader. He said that I am showing more love and taking things more seriously, in a good way. He said that he sees me as a good sister. I was really happy to hear that since I was really worried and nervous to be in charge of a group of girls. Its nice to feel that President has confidence in me. Another crazy thing that happened this week was that we received another sister in the zone from an emergency transfer. She is new to the mission and has been having lots of problems and has desires to go home. She's now moved into a trio with two other girls in our zone. We have been really nervous about her and giving her lots of love and checking up on her since she is very unstable right now. We have been praying and fasting for her so we hope that she will love her new companions and her new area and want to stay here with us in this great work. This week I have really felt the role of being a Sister Leader. Its been stressful since we have a whole group of sisters that we have to worry about on top of our area. But its been a blessing because I know that I am trying to be a better missionary because of it. This week we will be seeing the baptism of Max! We also have a great activity planned with the missionaries in the Stake. We are doing an International Buffet and all cooking something from our country. For the United States we are planning on making pancakes! We hope to have many investigators there and less actives as well. The best would be new investigators that want to learn more. This week has been super interesting since I feel like the focus had been on our other assignment as Sister Leader, but it is a calling that I know that Lord has given me and I am happy to have it! As a mission we have really been pushing the importance of the Book of Mormon. As a mission we've been teaching and preaching more about the Book of Mormon that the whole mission ran out of Book of Mormons! haha so hopefully we get more books so we can pass them out to our investigators this week. I hope you all have a great week and remember to read the Book of Mormon. Remember that God loves you! Love always, Hermana Flora

ITS POURING

February 9, 2015 MIRACLES!! Family and Friends!! This week has been the biggest miracle ever. I look back at this week and cant even believe that it even happened. Our first week here in Zamacola we had been working hard together and sort of started over in the area since Hermana Waldrons other companion was super sick and had bad knees so she couldn't walk too much, so when I got here we went out to work and worked hard! This week we were able to see some of the blessings of our hard work. We have been putting our faith in the Lord and pushing ourselves to work to the hardest of our abilities. I am thankful that the Lord has been trusting us with His children here in Zamacola. We have been able to meet and have lessons with people that are really ready to hear about the gospel. At the beginning of this we didn't have anyone that was preparing for baptism. By the end of this week we were able to help 4 people put dates down to get baptized! We now have 3 people that are getting prepared to get baptized the 21st of Feb and another the 28th of Feb. It really is a miracle! Im super happy to help these people come unto baptism. The first 2 people that accepted baptism were 2 sisters. Nancy (17) and Ariana (11). There mom (Erika) is a member but less active for about 15 years and wants to come back and see her daughters get baptized. We had a Noche de Hogar (FHE) with them on Tuesday and talked about the convenio of baptism and how important it is and the younger sister Ariana seemed more excited than Nancy but by the end of the lesson after explaining to Nancy that we all make mistakes after baptism, she was more excited to get baptized. She thought that we had to be PERFECT after baptism. But I asked her if she thought that we were perfect? And of course were not, so then she felt more excited to get baptized! They're preparing to get baptized the same day (just as her mom did with her sister) for the 21st of Feb! The next person is Max (16). His brother just got baptized 2 months ago and he has been interested in the church and wanted to take a different path in his life. Our second lesson with him we invited him to baptism for the 21st of Feb and he accepted. His brother was SUPER excited and I know that he will receive lots of support from his family since his brother is a member and his brothers wife and all her family are members. We eventually hope to get him on a mission! The last person this week we invited to baptism was Luis. He just showed up at church 3 weeks ago with his girlfriend, Daniela, who is a member from another city. They came again this Sunday and we set up a time to visit with them after church. We asked them what there goals were with our visits and Daniela told us that she wants him to get baptized! Then Luis said that he wants to learn more. He said he doesn't want to get baptized by force but wants to know more about baptism so we taught him the Gospel of Christ which includes baptism. After better explaining what baptism is, we invited him to prepare for baptism for the 28th of Feb and then he asked, ¨How can I prepare for baptism?¨ What a good question! We confirmed to him and let him know that we will be here to help him and also gave him some reading in the Book of Mormon and invited him to pray about it so he can receive an answer too! I really cant believe the miracles we've seen but its true! Thanks for all your prayers and your love. We are doing great here and working hard. We have a lot of good things going here in Zamacola! I love you all! Hermana Flora

MIRACLES!! :) Family and Friends!! This week has been the biggest miracle ever. I look back at this week and can't even believe that it even happened. Our first week here in Zamacola we had been working hard together and sort of started over in the area since Hermana Waldron's other companion was super sick and had bad knees so she couldn't walk too much, so when I got here we went out to work and worked hard! This week we were able to see some of the blessings of our hard work. We have been putting our faith in the Lord and pushing ourselves to work to the hardest of our abilities. I am thankful that the Lord has been trusting us with His children here in Zamacola. We have been able to meet and have lessons with people that are really ready to hear about the gospel. At the beginning of this we didn't have anyone that was preparing for baptism. By the end of this week we were able to help 4 people put dates down to get baptized! We now have 3 people that are getting prepared to get baptized the 21st of Feb and another the 28th of Feb. It really is a miracle! I'm super happy to help these people come unto baptism. The first 2 people that accepted baptism were 2 sisters. Narcy (17) and Ariana (11). Their mom (Erika) is a member but less active for about 15 years and wants to come back and see her daughters get baptized. We had a Noche de Hogar (FHE) with them on Tuesday and talked about the convenio of baptism and how important it is and the younger sister Ariana seemed more excited than Narcy but by the end of the lesson after explaining to Narcy that we all make mistakes after baptism, she was more excited to get baptized. She thought that we had to be PERFECT after baptism. But I asked her if she thought that we were perfect? And of course we're not, so then she felt more excited to get baptized! They're preparing to get baptized the same day (just as her mom did with her sister) for the 21st of Feb! The next person is Max (16). His brother just got baptized 2 months ago and he has been interested in the church and wanted to take a different path in his life. Our second lesson with him we invited him to baptism for the 21st of Feb and he accepted. His brother was SUPER excited and I know that he will recieve lots of support from his family since his brother is a member and his brother's wife and all her family are members. We eventually hope to get him on a mission! The last person this week we invited to baptism was Luis. He just showed up at church 3 weeks ago with his girlfriend, Daniela, who is a member from another city. They came again this Sunday and we set up a time to visit with them after church. We asked them what their goals were with our visits and Daniela told us that she wants him to get baptized! Then Luis said that he wants to learn more. He said he doesn't want to get baptized by force but wants to know more about baptism so we taught him the Gospel of Christ which includes baptism. After better explaining what baptism is, we invited him to prepare for baptism for the 28th of Feb and then he asked, ¨How can I prepare for baptism?¨ What a good question! We confirmed to him and let him know that we will be here to help him and also gave him some scriptures to read in the Book of Mormon and invited him to pray about it so he can recieve an answer too! I really can't believe the miracles we've seen but it's true! Thanks for all your prayers and your love. We are doing great here and working hard. We have a lot of good things going on here in Zamacola! I love you all! Hermana Flora

Because of Him

Family and Friends!! With this week being fast Sunday we put our faith to the test and as always we were able to see many blessings. Fasting has always been a struggle for me since I love food and its super hard to go away from water while we are walking all day and night teaching people. But when we put our trust in the Lord He will never let us down. As a mission we put a goal to get 10 new investigators every week. The week had been coming to a close and we only had 3 new investigators and it was Saturday night...what do we do?...We had been working hard and diligent the whole week but we weren't seeing any results...I was a little bummed but we continued working with a smile on our faces :) Sunday came along and a member came up to us and invited us to show a video during the baptism of her daughter that afternoon. We got a video together which was called....Because of Him. (You should all watch it by the way, only 3 minutes and its the best). At the end of the baptism we showed the video and shared our testimonies after. After the member family came up to us and told us they wanted to introduce us to their friends that weren't members. There were SO MANY! They all seemed super interested and wanted to learn more and come to church. Hermana Waldron and I were both just so excited! Blessings come, Sunday night came along and we reached our goal of 10 new investigators! We were both so surprised!! Thanks to the members we were able to work together in a team and see miracles happen. I can testify that Fasting brings blessings. It is a huge trial of our faith but its a way that the Lord can bless us. I love you all! Have a good week and know that God loves you. Watch the video Because of Him!

Happy New Year

Family and Friends!! Happy New Year! Cant believe another year has passed. I had never seen so many drunk people in my life than I did on New Years Day. Thankfully our mission President recieved revelation that we should all meet up as a zone and read the Book of Mormon. We got together as a zone of missionaries and read a chart that had 90 days of the Book of Mormon, and read it all in one day. We read from 8 in the morning until 8 at night! It was a lot of reading, but it was a great experience. President Zobrist wants us to focus more on the Book of Mormon this year, in our studies and in our lessons. So we basically read almost the whole book of mormon on the first day of the year. I loved it! After the reading as a zone many missionaries shared their testimonies about the Book of Mormon. Since I didnt have the chance to share mine, I would like to share mine with you! I know that the Book of Mormon is an inspried book written by prophets of old time specifically for us. Through the principles taught in the Book of Mormon we can become better people. I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God and I love reading it everyday. I encourage all those that havent read the book to read it. If you really want to know for yourself if the book is true, just read it and ask in prayer and I know that God will answer if you have faith. If you have a testimony of the Book of Mormon, share your testimony with at least one person. I know that this book can change lives. I am thankful to have the opportunity to be a full time missioanry and share this testimony I have with the people here in Peru. This year, read the book of mormon. Share your testimony about the book of mormon. We really are in the last days in preparation for the Second Coming of Christ. We need to prepare now. I encourage you all to start preparing little by little everyday. We can prepare by trying to be more like Christ everyday. Smile at someone you dont know. Write a nice note to a family member or friend. Act in service to others. Love unconditionally. I would like to share one of the last verses in the Book of Mormon which is in Moroni 10 verse 32 says...Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind, and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ. We are all invited to come into Christ and be perfected through Him. It is now up to us to see if we want to accpet His invitation or not. Love you all! Love always, Hermana Flora

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One Hour

Family and Friends!! I am coming on my last week here in Moquegua with Hermana Bourque. Nothing is set or sure but Im thinking that I will be leaving this tranfer so this is probably my last week in Moquegua. Its a little sad to think of leaving the people here so I try not to think about it for too long. The weeks have been mixing together and time just keeps flying by. Highlight, we are going to see Cristian and his younger brother get baptized THIS Saturday! Were super excited. We also set up an activity as missionaries to have a Sports Night that consisted of Ping Pong and Basketball. It was a good turn out with less actives and members and a few investigators. Another highlight of the week was Sunday talks. Its the 3rd week so naturally the missionaries speak. I wasnt wanting to speak at alllll because I feel like everytime I go up to speak no one listens because theyre either on their phones or sleeping or talking to others next to them. The worst is that the Bishop and his counsels wont set a good example since Ive seen them every Sunday on their phones looking at FaceBook or Instagram. I was talking about my frustration with a member and he remembered a talk that was in the Priesthood Session in April 2014 called the Chosen Generation. I asked him to print it off and it was Perfect! I planned to read much from the talk because I loved exactly what the man had said. I prayed a lot so that I could teach with the Spirit so that I would be able to help the members understand the importance of the sacrament meeting. When it was time to go up I begin teaching from what I had planned but one by one people starting going off into their other world found through their phones. I pushed the talk aside and began to teach from the heart. I taught, There is a time and place for everything. Sacrament Meeting is NOT the time for Instagram or FaceBook. Can you not give an hour or three hours to the Lord? Is it really that difficult to put your phone aside for just an hour? The rest I dont remember but the feeling I do remember. The room was silent and everyone was focused on what I was saying, as never before had happened. After the meeting the counselor came up and told me sorry and that he wouldnt go on Internet again, I was surpried. Then the bishop told me he was going to cut the Wifi in the building. Woah. I wasnt expecting that much of a reaction but I am just glad to see some actions happening so that the members can better focus on the importance of the Sacrament Meeting rather than be playing on their phones. Hope all of you can also remember the importance of the Sacrament Meeting. Can you leave your phone for 3 hours for the Lord? Love always, Hermana Flora