Unity really is as important as they say.

Clap, clap, clap.... door opens 'si, hola' person starts to walk toward us.

my companion in a whisper 'I don't know what to do' silence 'oh come on Elder' silence

'hola, ¿si?' a little bit of silence and sometimes a very quiet 'fine' then louder 'hola, como esta...'

that was about how the week went this week. It was Elder Butlers turn to take control of things and he did a very good job. the spirit was in the lessons. we taught with unity and he did a lot of good work.

I learned some good things: Unity really is as important as they say, unity is most effective when we give 100 percent each one, and that it is important to step out of our comfort zone so that zone can grow. We can often do more than we think we can.

We also had an investigator come to church. Her name is Alejandra. She is having a rough time in her life right now and we are sure the gospel of Jesus Christ can help her. we are working hard and we were very happy she came to church.

I also got to give a talk in church. I talked about the strengthening power of the atonement using examples from Moroni preparing his people for war in the end of Alma. 

The spirit brings the strength to us so we need to obtain it to be strong. We can all do some simple things:

-Fight for the cause of the christians. (fight for Christ's cause we must seek to what Christ wants and follow the example he set)

-Fortify the line that divides us from the bad. (set limits and boundaries don't let any bad at all in)

-Build spiritual towers to see attacks coming at put safe guards in them to be safe against the attacks when they get there. (read the scriptures, pray, go to church, keep the commandments...)

-And surround us with security don't let the bad even get close. (have good friends, avoid places of temptation...)

To finish the talk I tried something President Franco recommended. We wrote our testimonies in a book of mormon and I presented it during the talk and invited a member to come up after and take it (I left it on the pulpit) then explained that when we share the gospel with others that we love and that love us it can be so much more powerful. The spirit can testify through those that love us so much more closely and more powerfully. So I invited the member who took it to pray to know who to give it to and to then look for that opportunity.

The recent convert in the branch took the book at the end of the meeting. Hopefully good things come of it.

I know that Christ lives and loves us and wants to help us. he can give us strength to overcome obstacles and become a better person. 

Also some other interesting things that happened.

We went to Resistencia for a multi-zone conference. We left here at 3 in the morning got to resistencia at 7 were in the church all day until the office elders left at 9 then we tried to go to Corrientes Capital to get our bus here again. We went to the taxi stop to Corrientes across the river and they said there was an accident on the two lane bridge. So we ended up stopping a regular city taxi and paying 2 times as much to get over there.

I felt bad for the driver, He had his light off when I stopped him and was on his way home. I think he saw an opportunity for a quick 20 bucks and then it turned out to be 2 hours of mostly sitting and waiting but we finally made it.

I was in the first taxi over there. We got there about 12 at night. the bus left at 11. so we went looking. we found the next one that left at 12:10. We called the other Elders in the zone, convinced the driver to wait 5 minutes so that all of our zone could come with us and we got back home at about 4.

so in the end it was a day that lasted longer than 24 hours from when we got out of bed to when we got back in it. next time I'm going to get over there earilier and try to see if there is a bus that gets back here sooner.

We were stuck in the apartment for the voting that was going on Sunday so we made cinnamon rolls. our oven only has one temperature so they came out burnt on the bottom just right on top, but it was still really fun.

Elder Dallin Skouson

The Gospel can fix and enhance our lives

This week went really fast. we are working hard 2 interesting things happened this week.

We explained to an investigator, Oscar, that if he wanted to go to the Celestial kingdom and stay with his family after death he would have to keep the commandments of God. and one of those was getting rid of the saints that he prays to. We asked him the questions would you rather follow your saints or God? he said I can't choose between the two. We then asked So would you rather choose your saints or your family? We passed by later in the week and he had decided that he didn't want to pray about it to know if the commandment came from God and he didn't want to live it. Hopefully he will change later in his life. And I learned that we all must trade in our sins and be made clean through Christ and that is the way that we choose our families as well.

We also are trying to help out Alejandra, she has been investigating the church for a while and her cousin is a member in the branch here. She lost her job the other day and was very sad we are going to try to help her see how the gospel can help her out in her life.

We also finally found marshmallows. I have been looking for a while now and we finally got a 300 gram bag for 60 pesos. so pretty expensive. They are not the same as they are there but they are very similar.

They also redid our bathroom. They had to break away a bunch of brick and tile and replace some stuff. we are happy to be back to using it as normal.

The Gospel can fix and enhance our lives we just have to let it do that so that we can feel the difference. I feel blessed to be working here in Argentina.

Love, 

Elder Dallin Skouson

The pictures are the marshmallows we found

Elder Butler and me right before we get on the bus to a district meeting

and out the bus window on the way back from the district meeting

picture in the elevator

I'm on the phone

and some cool lightning that Elder Butler's camera got good pictures of

The Lord's work

To start we have come up with some interesting lunch ideas.

We cooked rice with tomato sauce in it as it cooked and we threw in some peppers and onions and ate that with a side of pancakes. It was good and my companion tried the rice on the pancakes but I was not quite that brave. we also made hamburgers with pancakes for buns that was quite good as well. better than the rice on the pancakes I imagine.

Anyway we also had some good experiences working with people. I have had a bad tendency to get frustrated when people don't listen or seem to not want to take the obvious right choice. We taught a family that is Evangelico (i'm not sure what that actually means in English. It just like one of the many churches of whoever, so not catholic, not protestant, just a church...) and they were pretty right on up until we mentioned Joseph Smith. they hastily told us that his name wasn't in the bible and started to ask us firey questions. One of them removed himself from the situation and the other two were rather quiet. We stayed calm and invited them to pray about the message. What greater witness can you have than from God? They wouldn't answer us straight so we still calmly asked them why they didn't want to pray to ask God directly. That question was able to make room so the spirit taught them. although they didn't want to progress I know we did our part.

We also had some huge success with a less active lady and her son. we went to her house and asked her to come to church and read the Book of Mormon. they didn't make it to church so we went back again and read with them in the book. they then made it this Sunday for 2 of the 3 hours.

These two experiences taught me a lot. This is the Lords work and we are not in charge. He has put us where we are knowing our weaknesses and it is his spirit that is going to do all the work we just need to say and do what he wants us to. Then we can have success whatever happens.

Elder Dallin Skouson

seamos fieles! In English, Let us be faithful.

So, the beginning of this week was kinda rough, but then we had a very very awesome district meeting and we got to do divisions with the district leader I got back a lot of excitement after that. We also had interviews with president. in the end of the week we ended up with 7 fixed appointments Saturday afternoon and 6 Sunday. (not everyone was there but we were still super busy).

At the beginning of the week I was feeling quite negative with a lot of people. Many people don't want to listen to us. We did divisions and watching Elder Olivera just be friends with everyone in contacts helped me out to see that I can control if situations are positive or negative. It took work but It really helped to try to apply that. My attitude did change. We can decide if we are going to be negative or not. if we are really trying hard to be happy with everyone and be happy with ourselves we can be happy.

That really helped us out when we came around to Saturday where I learned another lesson. literally 0 of the 7 people we had set appointments with were there and willing to listen. But we tried to talk to all the people around those houses we could and we were able to fill the night with teaching instead of just wandering aimlessly. In the end we had a lot of success.

Sunday was better. We were able to find new people to teach, make it to our plans and get a lot of good lessons out of the day. We also try to have 21 lessons each week that look like they could lead to a baptism as a goal for the mission and we haven't been able to get that in this area before but this week we made it. we got 22.

I think these things really helped me to see how what I am reading now in the book of mormon applies. we are all trying to read the entire book as a mission by the end of this month. so I started from the beginning. When we are at an appointment that falls through seeking the guidance of the lord and being faithful to keep the commandments and spiritual promptings we get will help us get the job done and find the people we need to talk to. Like Nephi constantly reminds his brothers. Let us be faithful. the Lord knows who we are and where we are and how we can lift where we stand.

Elder Dallin Skouson