Preguntas y Respuestas
1. How was your temple day? How long did it take you to get to Asuncion from where you live now?
The Temple was awesome!! I remember the first time I went down here.. I didn´t understand anything! But it was a great time with my trainer- a time I´ll never forget! The lomitos gave me chivivi!! It was great. Thanks Cale :D
This time I understood everything! It was sweet to do everything in Spanish. We did baptisms and confirmations and then we did a session so it was really cool! I bought a couple a´o po´ii temple ties.. They´re hand- woven ties from PARAGUAY! They´re super cool..
2. Did you catch your rat? Yuk! I think mice are bad!! Rats with those long tails! Gross!
Haha.. funny story about that! I went out on the balcony this morning and the rat was dead! We threw some rat poisoning out there a couple days ago. I forgot to take pictures of my apartment, shoot! Sorry.. Next week!
3. How are the four families that are ready for baptism?
We still gotta find them, Paraguayans are terrible with giving directions.. We´re gonna get them this week!
4. What are your plans for your area? Are you going to do more movies in the park? Ward Parties? What? Tell us!!!
We´re trying to fix the branch here.. It´s a train wreck. We´re going to find all the inactives and reactivate them. The Sunday meetings are a mess, honestly I´m embarrassed to bring investigators to church right now. So we´re going to have FHE with everyone every week.. We´re going to have it at one member´s house one week, and rotate through all the members every week after that. That will show everyone how it´s done, then they can break off and have FHE within their own families after that. Then we´re going to do English classes every Wednesday, we need to organize that better, but it will be great! Then every other Saturday we´re going to have activities in the church and stuff for the branch. It´s going to be booming here in a couple of weeks!
5. How is your companion doing? Have you swapped waterskiing stories? How long has he been out? How well does he know the language?
He´s a stud! I love this guy! We get along great.. I feel like I´ve known him forever. We story swap all the time. He´s just a stud! He´s been out for 7 months and he knows the language really well. We´re a good companionship, President Callan knew what he was doing when he put us together!
So yesterday we had District Conference (it´s like Stake Conference- Paraguay style!) and President Callan came out and spoke. The whole chapel was filled! I forgot what it was like to be in a full house! I was so excited! I wanted to get up and bear my testimony or speak or something! I would KILL to serve in a ward like that! I hope the Elders in my home ward are working like crazy with the members! That´s when you see miracles, that´s when people get baptized.. The members are GOLD, everyone I´ve baptized has been a close friend of a member. Plus the members know who are ready to receive to Gospel! DO IT!! Elder Wilding and I have about 4 members we can really work with right now; there are Elders with HUNDREDS of members and they don´t work with them! They´re crazy! We are all missionaries, plaquita negra or not, viejito or jovencito.. EVERYONE! It´s so cool! Alright tranquilo..
Like I said, it was a long week.. We had to prepare everything for our trip to Encarnación yesterday for the District Conference. My companion and I are the first and second councelors here and the Branch President gives us all his responsability. I´m learning a ton! It´s great! We´ve been talking with the members to see what we can do to strengthen the branch and to bring back the inactives. We´ve got a TON of work to do! We´re gonna be busy for a while.. We have a ton of references we need to go find and teach, they´re people that are ready to hear the Gospel and ready to be freed from their sins. It´s going to be great to find them and help them!
We have divisions with the Zone Leaders tomorrow and then again with the Asistants later this week.. I don´t know what day yet though.. So I think this week is going to go by really fast because our days are going to be jam-packed! It´s going to be good though because I´ll learn a lot, that will help me for now in the mission and also for the rest of my life. Sweet!
This week I was kind of having a test of my faith.. I was thinking about why I was here.. Why I´m giving up 2 years of my life while I could be working or going to school.. Then I started asking myself if I REALLY knew if God existed. How can I really be sure? I´ve never seen God, I´ve never heard His voice.. Then 3 days ago in my personal study, I didn´t know what to do. I was kind of shuffling throught stuff on my desk and looking at what book I could read.. I picked up my Triple and started thumbing the pages not really paying attention, then it was like my book just fell open. Both sides are unmarked, except for one verse. And the verse itself was unmarked, I had just put a star by the verse number, and I don´t even remember it. I´ll always remember this day.. The scripture is Alma 30:44 (this was in my Spanish set by the way..) ¨But Alma said unto him: Thou hast had signs enough; will ye tempt your God? Will ye say, Show unto me a sign, when ye have the testimony of all these thy bretheren, and also all the holy prophets? The sriptures are laid before thee, yea, and all things denote there is a God; yea, even all the earth, and all things that are upon the face of it, yea, and its motion, yea, and also all the planets which move in their regular form do witness that there is a Supreme Creator.¨ It was like, DUH Elder Heiner! Of course God exists.. I know He knows me personally and He knows every one of my needs. When I humble myself and turn to Him, He helps me. He takes my burdens and troubles away and replaces them with happiness and joy. I love my Heavenly Father! Now that I think back on that experience more, I wasn´t being humble- I was relying on my own strengths and talents. Yo sé que nada soy... Alma 26:12.
I hope you all have a great week! I love you so much!
Elder Colby Dane Heiner
Scenery picture, Asuncion Temple, Elder Heiner and Elder Wilding, Temperature
