Cambio 2

Hola todos! I´m a little short on time this week, but here´s the important stuff :)

I saw so many miracles this week with our investigators. We put several fechas this week for baptism, and they were all in contacts and first lessons! So many people ready to change and receive the gospel. It´s incredible. We also found some old investigators that disappeared off the face of the planet, and we´re going to keep teaching them, too :)

 

This week I feel like my Spanish has just SKYROCKETED. I don´t know what happened, but suddenly my understanding of everything is so much better, and I´m speaking faster and my vocabulary is growing, and it´s the best feeling. I actually do know where it came from. There´s no way I could learn this language so fast without the help of my Heavenly Father, who knows I´m trying my hardest to speak to these lovely people of Nicaragua and share my testimony of the gospel with them. The gift of tongues (and the interpretation thereof) is real, people. So real.

 

It´s been raining like crazy here. But I love the rain. I don´t get to swim here, so it´s the next best thing ;) Who needs umbrellas?

 

So, my spiritual thoughts. I did some studying this week in True to the Faith, which is AWESOME. Buy it and read it if you haven´t already. This week I studied specifically in Conversion, Covenants, and Conscience. I would share my specific thoughts, but I don´t have much time. Besides, it´s better to let you all learn for yourself the things you need the Spirit to tell you ;)

 

I also had some thoughts about faith. Everyone says that faith brings miracles. How? How does believing that something will happen make it happen. It doesn´t. And that´s the truth of it. But what does bring miracles? Trusting in our omnipotent God of miracles,and that through Him, all is possible. But not just that, either! We have to show HIM our faith through our corresponding actions and obedience to his commandments. When we work towards worthy goals, having our initial faith that it´s possible to achieve that goal, that is when we see our righteous desires come to pass, and occasionally a little miracle comes with it. Or maybe the righteous desire needed a miracle. But we can´t sit around and expect miracles to happen because we have faith, or a passive belief in something. Oh no no. Remember the scripture, faith without works is dead. It´s so true. A passive belief does nothing. But an initial belief, followed by action and obedience, is what truly brings us miracles. 

 

I also read something by Elder Bednar in the New Mission President´s Seminar at the Provo MTC this week (we got the talk in a pamphlet here in the mission) about teaching. It´s pretty eye-opening, especially as a missionary. He says, "Sometimes we think talking is teaching, and it is not. Teaching is observing and listening--eyes to see, ears to hear--that precedes discerning by the power of the Holy Ghost. Then, and only then, do we know what to say. If we talk without observing and listening, we talk to ourselves in front of other people." I´ll let you all make of that as you will :)

 

This week truly has been incredible. I´m learning so much every day, and I can just feel God´s love for me, this work, and all the people here and everyone around me. I love being a missionary, and I love being here. I´m so glad I still have 15 months left here :) Thank you for all your support and love. I´ve definitely felt any prayers that happened to have come my way. I hope you all have an awesome week. Never forget how much our Heavenly Father knows and loves you. He´s honestly right there, literally waiting for you personally to come unto him and humble yourself. It´s a beautiful thing to watch it happen, and even better to feel it yourself :) I love you all. Feliz semana!

- Hermana Oliphant

 

Photos:

We helped some girls take some fotos of some braids for something they're doing, (I´m not entirely sure what it is, honestly), and they gave us braids, too :) Enjoy these pictures of me and Hna Miza rocking our braids these sweet girls gave us :D

 

Week 6: Cambios!

Pic with "Hermana" Coke

Close up of Hermana

 Well, this was the last week of my first change. Crazy! We´re getting a new zone leader, and our district leader is training this change. I´m excited to meet the new greenie. This means I´m not the youngest here! Ahah!

Anyhow. I don´t have much time right now, but I went on divisions a couple times (which gringas, yes!) And it was good. I learn much more about the culture when I talk to people who actually find it strange x3

We had an activity for the Gospel Essentials class where all our recent converts and investigators attend. It was this past Saturday, and since on Sunday we learned about service, we decided to all clean the chapel. It was super fun, and we had a decent turnout. Afterwards we celebrated the birthday of the girl that we baptized a couple weeks ago, and we ate sweet bread and fresco de chicha. It´s an interesting juice...it kind of tastes like a hamburger in a juice. At least that´s how it tastes to me.

So yeah. This week was full of walking, Spanish, crazy dogs, catcalls, near death experiences on buses, the works. I love this crazy little country and I´m so glad I get to spend the next 15 months getting to know it even better. Thank you everyone for your love and support, and sorry this email was so short.

This week, I reread the talk by Elder Holland from this past conference entitled, "Where Justice Love and Mercy Meet." Herman Miza has a recording of it in Spanish, so I listened to that and then found the Liahona issue in English and read it in my own language x3 It´s fantastic. If you want to understand the beauty and the complexity of the atonement more, I highly recommend looking that up. 

I also read a scripture somewhere in the Bible, I can´t remember where right now, about being chastized. Specifically that of God. When we´re shown the things in which we need to improve, we often feel taken aback and attacked, which is normal. It hurts to be told that we´re doing something wrong. But I love what the scripture said. When God chastens us, he´s doing it because he loves us. It hurts at first, but if we take what we learned to heart, and try our best to improve, we will be so blessed, and we will see the rewards of our efforts. 

Never forget that God has a plan for each of us! Life is so hard, and it´s so hard to do the right thing. But it´s always possible when we remember the reason we do all this things. 

Until next week! I love you all!

- Hermana Oliphant

After service at the church

all the sisters in the zone

Zone picture

Sunset last Saturday

Week 5

1st baptism. Hna. Miza, Adela, Sarah

The tiny cyber cubicle where she goes for mail.

Day 3 tan line

Week 5 tan line

Oh my goodness, cambios are almost here! Next Tuesday is our first set of transfers :) Only 11 more cambios left to go! And yes, mom, they`re each 6 weeks ;)

And how I use computers: There are lots of places called Cybers where you pay a certain amount an hour to use computers here. It`s about c$12 an hour, which is like $0.40. It`s not that bad ;) It`s just a little cubicle with sketchy mousepads and horrible keyboards. But it works :)

This week was pretty exciting. We had a multi-zone conference where we got taught *ahem* lectured *ahem* about food safety...because it`s so easy to get sick here or to get a parasite from the water. So we all need to be better at that. 

I also went on divisions with Hna Nicholls this week, in her area. I actually enjoyed that pretty much. Lots of cat-calling, a flock of freaky noisy birds, and 2 massive huge cockroaches in their bathroom. Such is the life.

So, Hna Miza and I made a contact this week, and they were super pilas and so we went back the next day to teach them, and they had friends over and were drinking vodka shots and pepsi...so it goes without saying that that lesson didn`t happen.

We have a group of 12 and 13-year olds that we`re teaching. There`s three of them, and they`re so cute and happy and they love hearing me speak English. I love that they love it, honestly x3

I had my first baptism this Saturday!! Al fin! Her name is Adela, and she just turned 16. She lives with her Aunt and Uncle and their kids, and they were less active. But they`ve started coming to church now and Adela has been baptized! I was so happy for her. I asked her how she felt as we were walking home, and she just told me, with a big smile on her face: "Libre." Or, free. Oh man that`s the best. Seeing the gospel work in people`s lives and change them for the better. It`s amazing.

 

So, neither Hermana Miza nor I enjoy contacting, which is pretty bad. So I came up with an idea to get us talking to people. We were going to try having a competition for the day to see who could contact the most people, and the loser had to buy the winner food today. I ended up winning, but not by much, and neither of us contacted that many people. It`s something I need to work on for sure, but hey. I won. Free brownie from TGI Fridays. (We got special permission to go eat lunch there, since it`s outside the mission boundries. But we were already in that area for choir practice, so it wasn`t that bad.)

Speaking of choir. We`re performing a musical number in a few weeks when a member of the Quorum of the Twelve comes to Nicaragua. All the missionaries from both the North and the South mission are coming, and there`s about 40 of us performing Divina Luz (Lead Kindly, Light). I`m pretty excited :)

So, there`s a milk company here called Eskimo. I know it`s just a central america thing, and it`s based in Nicaragua, but I need to find a way to get this stuff shipped to the states when I go home. The milk itself is kind of strange, but the ice cream is out of this world. I have literally never had a better ice cream bar or milk shake than I have here in Nicaragua. THey`re to die for. I had a vaca negra the other day, which is a root beer float in milkshake form, except with coke. One of the most amazing things I`ve had here. For sure.

Hermana Miza got really sick this weekend. We`re not sure what`s up, but it got pretty bad last night. She didn`t fall asleep for a long time, and so we both ended up awake at 3 in the morning. I didn`t know what else to do, so I gave her some pills that the enfermera told her to take, and then put on The Testaments in our little dvd player x3 we both ended up falling asleep around 4:30 or 5 in the morning. So that`s been my day.

So yeah. This week`s been crazy and exciting, but it`s been good :) I love you all, thanks for your emails, prayers, support, and everything else. I hope you all have an awesome week. My spiritual thought for the week is 1 Ne. 3:7 I feel like I use it a lot here. There is always a way to complete every single commandment we have been given. But also, since they`re commandments of God, we`ve also been promised blessings for following them. Not only are we automatically protected from the dangers of not following the commandments, we also get more blessings. How awesome is that? That`s something I`m trying to help our investigators and less actives understand, especially when it comes to going to church. It`s a commandment, but I don`t say that to condemn or judge you. I say that because our loving Heavenly Father has promised us so many blessings for keeping those commandments. So we should just do it :)

Have an awesome week!

- Hermana Oliphant

Bed and desk

Closet

Safety measures at apartment

Outside looking into the apartment

Week...4?

Hola todos! My goodness this week has been ca-razy. But, I won´t focus on that now x3 This week was definitely hard, to the point of tears a few times. But I have an awesome companion, and awesome zone leaders. AWESOME zone leaders. It´s so great to have someone there who can be like, "I went through this too. I know it´s hard, but keep going, keep working, and it will come." exactly when I need them. My main issue right now I suppose is the Spanish. One of the worst feelings is not being able to have conversations with people because you have no clue what they´re saying. And I´ve been struggling hardcore with that. But, honestly, after Tuesday, it´s all been uphill. I suddenly understand a little more, and I feel like I´m actually contributing as a missionary and not throwing out my jumbled mess of a whatever testimony randomly. This week has been such a growing and learning curve for me. And it passed by so fast :)

I had divisiones (exchanges) twice this week, once with the APs and another time just with some sisters in our zone. I´ve had to do them ALL THE TIME because my companion is Sister Training Leader...so you know. It happens. But it´s actually kind of fun. I always seemed to be with Latinas that didn´t know ANY English...that was fun. It always makes me more grateful that Hna Miza knows English enough that she understands me when I need to say something in English.

But when we went on divisiones with the AP, I was with a gringa, Hna Wilkins. She´s been here a year, and my gosh I understand why she´s one of the APs. She walks like a maniac, so much that I had to practically run to keep up with her. For 8 hours. She talks to EVERYONE and contacts everyone. She´s so happy and unafraid to ask Catholic contacts if they want to be baptized xD I didn´t have any warning and suddenly she turned to me and told me to invite this one girl to be baptized. At first I was like, um, are you crazy? But later she told me that we can never know who´s ready to be baptized. And we´re here to invite everyone to come unto Christ. That definitely made me think.

 

But by the end of the day, I was literally exhausted. I had worn holes in my socks and I couldn´t feel my feet, almost. But we taught so many lessons, talked to so many people, and I saw what missionary work truly is. Here´s what I wrote in my journal that night: "This is the obra misional. Holey socks and shoes, tired feet, sweaty bodies coated with dust, hands germy from shaking so many hands, a sore throat from talking to everyone (soon!), and a heart full of love for everyone you meet, without fear or shyness. Maybe one day I can be like that. But I´ve got to start somewhere." I´m struggling, but I´m learning. I know I have the capacity to be the missionary I want to be. But everyone has to start from the beginning. And I know if I want it and work for it, I can achieve it :)

A scripture I used a lot this week was Ether 12:4,6-7. Oh, and 3 Nephi 19:25-29 is excellent, too. I love that we need to test out the word of God before we can say if it´s true or not. I´ve seen that a lot this week with the people I teach.

Well, I´m out of time. Thank you for your prayers and your love and support. I´ve felt it this week, for sure :) We actually have baptisms this week! I hope. We´ll see.

Until next week! Love you all!

Hermana Oliphant