Week 40 : I Am Here To Deliver A Message To The People Of D.R. (Jan. 19, 2015)

This week was crazy.  We have this goal that our mission President set called ¨El Pulso¨ (the pulse)  to help us work harder.  It´s a high goal but it really helps us work hard.  Last week we didn´t do so good on numbers, so this week we decided to change that.  At the beginning of the week we had great lessons and almost every one of the citas we set were home.  That almost never happens.  Somewhere in the middle of the week, things went a little south and by the end of the week almost all of our citas were falling through everyday :P  Some of our best progressing investigators are slipping from us :( 

On saturday we realized that we were just a few numbers short of reaching our goal.  That got us really pumped so we set a goal not to come home without having reached our goal.  The day was crazy.  We walked sooo much, taught a lot of new people, got yelled at by a very angry lady, and what not.  We ran around like chickens with their heads cut off, but we met our goal!!! We were walking on clouds.  But the feeling didn´t last long.  By the time we were done with our daily planning, we were both feeling really off but we couldn´t place why.  After a moment we realized that what we had done wrong.  We had focused to much on the numbers.  We had taught people and had a lot of new investigators and lessons, but we taught them just to get a cita to return.  I can´t even tell you what one of their needs are, or even place their name to their face.  I felt like our numbers had slapped us in the face and left us on the floor in shame.  That´s not he kind of missionary the Lord needs.  He doesn´t care about numbers, or short lessons, or even if we shared a really great scripture with each person we met.  He cares about each individual need of His children.  I thought I was working the way the Lord wanted me to, but I was way wrong.  He´s got a whole different plan for this area, this work.  I definitely learned a big lesson this week.

I have a new love for  Ammon.  He is awesome.  (Alma 17:36-37; 18:17, 24-35).  Our District Scripture of the week--Ether 12:27.  I thought it was very fitting.

One last thing that I learned:  I wasn´t sent here to convince people or the change their minds about ¨Los Mormones¨.  I´m here to deliver a message and let the Spirit change their hearts.  It took awhile, but that finally hit me.

The church is true.  I love being a missionary.  love you all

Love, Hermana Perry

I think I might fly down to give Ashlyn a new camera, she is afraid hers is dying. (truth about the camera, but not about me flying down there)

 El Distrito,  Hna S, Hna P (my comp), me, Hna M, Elder O, Elder Ci

They call this their "TOY" washer

Week 39 : Hermana Perry is 9 months old!!! (Jan.12, 2015)

Hello everyone!

First off, I turned 9 months this week... :I  I don´t know how I feel about it.  I has caused me to do a lot of thinking about what I want these next 9 months hold.  Crazy crazy...

This week was kind of a down week.  We didn´t reach many of the goals we set which is bummer, but these weeks happen.  

We did, however, have Zone Meeting this week. I really love Zone Meetings.  I always come out of them with so much learned.  In this one I was in charge of giving the message about how to have effective member lessons.  What´s funny is that is what we struggled most with this week.  I think the Lord was trying to teach me something.  I learned a lot from that.  Something funny that happened: Only in the DR would you have a chicken join your Zone Meeting haha.  In the middle of my message a chicken walked in the door and started making its way to the front of the chapel.  It was quite a show to see the Elders chase it around trying to catch it ha!  They also really focused on working with members and the ward in the work.  They challenged us to think of creative ways to have members come out with us.  We (us 4 hermanas) thought of some fun ideas:  Give the members a ¨member missionary¨plack, and have ¨member missionary of the month¨ on the ward bulletin.  They also really emphasized the power of prayer and fasting.  Something that one of the Zone Leaders said was ¨There is a difference between prayer and prayer.¨ It doesn´t seem to make sense, but it´s true.  We can pray to just pray, or we can pray with real intent of heart with a firm desire to receive and answer and help our investigators.  Fervent prayer.

So now I want to ask you all the same question the Zone leaders asked us.  What is the difference between us and other missionaries (or members)?  They can use these same techniques and teach similar doctrine and convince people, but what makes us so special?  We have a gift.  A gift that none of the other religions have.  D&C 50:13-14

Love, Hermana Perry

9 month Birthday

 All Hermana's in Ashlyn's appartment

Frisbee on Pday with Hermana Paul

They call these the Q-tip flower

Week 37 : Christmas Dominican Style (Dec.29,2014)

Whey!! KLK?

This week has been crazy!  It feels like its been an eternity long :P  But all is well.  Christmas was just awesome :)  It didn´t quite feel like Christmas, but it was a cool experience to be here amoung missionaries and members who are my Dominican Family.  I´m so grateful to be here right now and to feel the Christmas spirit Dominican style.  It was really different because they celebrate bigger on the 24th with a big dinner and family.  The 25th they just eat left overs and don´t really give gifts.  But they sure know how to party.. with beer and loud LOUD music.  What´s cool is that they still consider it Christmas until the 6th of Jan. when the 3 kings come.  That is when they give gifts.  Kind of cool :)

This week we worked on rethinking our pool of investigators.  We have a lot that aren´t progressing and it´s kind of just a waste of our time.  So we dropped a lot of people this week and are working on finding new investigators who will progress.  We have one that we found contacting.  Her name is Theanny.  She is awesome!! She came to church 3 days after we met her!  That doesn´t happen!!  Then we went to teach her about plan of Salvation because her husband died and she was so receptive.  What is unfortunate is that she lives right next to two giant colmado that always have loud music battles so we basically have to yell the whole lesson.  It kind of distracts from the spirit :P But the other day we invited her to be baptized and she told us that she has a smoking problem and has been smoking since she was 8 years old!!!  But she wants to quit.  We went back the other day and she told us how she was at her mom´s house for Christmas and resisted smoking for two whole days!!! And not just that, she didn´t drink coffee either,even before we told her it was bad!!! She is golden.  She came to church again and even brought her 10 year old grandson who is really rebellious. They both loved it and what to keep learning.  I´m beyond excited to keep teaching her.

Sadly we had to drop Angie, who was one of the best progressing investigators a few weeks back.  We think she is hiding from us.  In these 3 weeks that Hermana Paul has been here, we've gone probably 6 times and she has only let us in once and the rest of the time, her son has a different reason why we can´t come in.  So sad, but at least we planted the seed.

It´s going to be another crazy week with new years, but all is well.  We are going keep working hard!!

Love you all :)

Love, Hermana Perry

Excitement of visiting with families

None of the family have had their meds yet!!!

Beautiful Skies of San Cristobal on Christmas Day

Week 38: HAPPY 2015 Y´ALL!! (Jan. 5, 2015)

Hola :)

This past week was kind of crazy.  It was the last of crazy weeks of Christmas which is good.  I´m ready to be back to the normal mission schedule.  Monday was not a pday but Thursday was so it threw us all off again.

HAPPY 2015 Y´ALL!! The city was crazy here!! No one wanted to let us in to teach so we did a lot of contacting.  Everyone and their dog was out on the streets drinking and playing dominoes.  It really was the weirdest day because everyone was drunk and kind of funny.  We contacted this lady and she is not the average Domincan.  Sadly she couldn´t understand my comp and stopped her in the middle of the sentence to ask if she was hungry because she yawned.  She would then say something and then trun to Hermana Paul and ask if she understood and then procceed to explain it and then wink at me.  What´s really funny is that she really didn´t ever smile, haha.  It was probably the weirdest cita of my life.  It made the day a lot more interesting.

We started working we a lady and her kids a few weeks ago and they are just the cutest little famliy.  The kids get so excited to see us and we always feel the spirit so strong in lessons with them.  They have so much potencia and we´ve only taught them 3 times.  I´m so excited to teach them more! :)

So these past couple of weeks I´ve really been thinking about my mission thus far and what I want to do with the rest of my time here.  Really this time is ridiculouly short.  I bet you all think it´s forever long, but I seriously feel like I just got here.  I´m still a 2 week old missionary.  This is the time to crack down.  I´ve really learned what missionary work is all about and now is the time to apply it more than ever.  With this new year and I decided to be a new missionary.  Drop everything that is holding me back and move forward with faith.  I´m really excited for this new year and everything it brings.

Love you lots!!

Love, Hermana Perry

Week 36 : FELIZ NAVIDAD!!! ( Dec. 22,2014)

FELIZ NAVIDAD!!!!!!

Hola todos. So transfers were this week and I received a new companion.  Her name is Hermana Paul and she is from Pennsylvania.  She is awesome!!  I´m soooo excited for this transfer.  This week was just awesome.  She brought some great ideas for the area and I can just feel that things are going to take off.

We had an awesome lesson with a family that we´ve been teaching for about 2 transfers.  We taught them about Jose Smith and the Book of Mormon finally (they are kind of hard to find).  But they were so receptive to the spirit and the 3 family members that were present accepted a baptismal date.  I´m excited to see them progress.  Unfortunately, they have not come to church yet, but I have faith.  I know there is a reason the Lord doesn´t want us to drop them.  

My house is completely different than it used to be.  There are now two Americans woohoo!! An Hermana from Aruba (who was here last transfer too) and an Hermana from Spain who is super sweet and says her Z´s like TH¨s haha its kind of cool.

Sorry this is really short.  I didn´t plan on writing today (today isn´t pday. they changed it to Thursday and last minute told us we could still email today.)

Love you all!

Love, Hermana Perry

Scripture of the week: I´ve read it a billion times, but it really hit me hard this week: John 6:35, 48, 51

 35 And Jesus said unto them, I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst.

48 I am that bread of life

 51 I am the living bread which came down from heaven: if any man eat of this bread, he shall live for ever: and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world

Week 35 : Noche Blanco (Dec.15, 2014)

Sent from mission Presidents wife...sunday night Dec.14 2014.  This is a package from her Aunt Lisa and Uncle Dave Titensor, It is the Twelve Days of Christmas, for a missionary.

My husband and I are in San Cristobal right now. We brought this pkg to your daughter!  We have a super American companion for her.

Hola mi gente!!

This week went by so fast.  But it was good.  We found a lot of potencial investigators which is awesome.  I´m excited for the work to really take off was a pretty exciting day.  We went to the temple in the morning with our ward.  I sometimes forget how awesome the temple is. I think everytime I go I love it even more.  I´m so grateful we have a temple so close.  Such a blessing.  In the evening we had a Noche Blanca (white night).  Missionaries from all over San Cristobal prepared people to be baptized on the same day and it was a huge even.  I think 16 people in total were baptized which is awesome!!  Unfortuantely the 2 baptisms that we had planned fell through :P  Pero estamos en la lucha aun.  It was really special to see so many people take this first step in the gospel.  The spirit was very strong during the whole program.  I had the priviledge of singing with my mom (Hermana Francis) in the program.  Scary, but fun :)  One of our investigators (Aime) came and it was such a miracle.  At the start we didn´t think we would get anywhere with her.  She lost her pregancy pretty far along and was quite upset with God, but she has made a 180 turn.  She surprises us with how much she progresses with every visit.  I have no doubt she will take the decision soon to be baptized. 

Transfers this week... Hermana M is leaving for the Captial and I will receive Hermana P. I don´t know much about her other than that she is American (Woohooo), has 6 months on the mission, and is currently in the capital.  I´m really excited for this next transfer.  Many good things to come.

Sorry this is kind of short :P  But nonetheless I love you all :)

Love, Hermana Perry

Some of the Ward members at the Santo Domingo Temple

Week 34 : "Exact Obedience Brings Miracles" ( Dec. 9,2014)

Hola todos!!

This week was really good.  I learned sooo much.  For a while I´ve been thinking a lot about obedience and how obedient I have been up to this point on my mission.  Right now I live in a house that obedience to mission rules is not top priority and it makes it hard. It´s really been frustrating me because it has caused me to slack on my obedience as well.  But I decided that enough was enough.  I want to be obedient.  Right after I made that decision is when I started to see the Lord´s hand working in this aspect of my life.  I thought of how I could be more obedient and immediately thought of a quote I heard in the CCM:  When obedience ceases to be an irritant and begins to be a quest, that is when we start to see the miracles.  And also:  Obedience brings blessings.  Exact Obedience brings miracles.  Miracles are what we need as missionaries.  This work is impossible without miracles everyday from the Lord.  How can I be exactly obedient?  That answer came in a Leadership conference by President Nuckols: Omni 1:26 Give ourselves entirely to the work of the Lord.

Yesterday we had our Christmas Conference.  President Nuckols talked a lot about how the Savior is a Gift, to go along with the new movie the Church made for Christmas.  He is the Gift.  He talked about the Savior´s life and how the biggest gift we were given was the Atonement of Jesus Christ.  The he asked us a very profound question.  What is your gift to Him?  It almost left me breathless.  My first thought was ¨the Lord needs me to be Obedient.¨  He then went on to give us 3 suggestions of gifts we could give to the Lord. 1) 3 Nefi 9:20 A broke heart and a contrite spirit.  2) If ye love me, keep my commandments. 3) John 21:15-17 Feed my sheep.  With this last one he called up and Elder and asked the name of one investigator and one less active that he was teaching. (Let´s say they were Juan, and Marta...)  He then said to the Elder, ¨Elder, do you love the Savior?¨ ¨Yes.¨ ¨Will you feed Juan?¨ ¨Yes.¨ ¨Elder, do you love the Savior?¨ ¨Yes, Presidente.¨ ¨Will you feed Marta?¨ ¨Yes.¨ Ëlder, do you love the Savior?¨ ¨Yes.¨ ¨Will you feed your companion?¨... This last question hit me hard.  I have had a hard time lately with my companion and haven´t treated her with so much kindness through this trial.  But in that moment I was so overwhelmed with the spirit and love for her.  I got a nice big spiritual slap in the face, but it was exactly what I needed.  Part of my striving to be obedient is to love my companion, to pray for her, and to support her.  

In our Zone meeting at the beginning of the week, we talked about the Law of Consecration.   A question they wrote on the board was another answer to this desire to be obedient: What hurts more?  Working hard, or surrendering?  I knew what my answer was but it was confirmed in the Leadership Conference with a few scriptures: 1 Nefi 17:8-9 Where do I find the materials, not give me a boat.  1 Nefi 18:2-3 Work how the Lord wants you to, not how any man wants you to.  1 Nefi 17:51 (this one I have posted on my desk).  These moments have been some of the most spiritual moments of my mission thus far.  I´ve learned that growth isn´t easy, but it´s what we need.

I love my mission.  I wouldn´t change any part of what I´ve experienced for anything in the world.  I know this church is true with all that I am and have become.  Thanks for all your love and support.

Love, Hermana Perry