There was a man named Cornelius

Hola familia! This week was just awesome! I feel like it flew by cause it was just full of ¨stuff.¨ Interviews with President, exchanges with the hermanas and other meetings. On Tuesday I went to Pueblo Libre with an Hermana Antonio.. she is from Bolivia. It was a lot of fun! We met some cool people and had some great lessons. On Thursday Hna Rodriguez went to Jesus Maria while I stayed in our sector with Hna Loayza. She is from the north of Peru and is super cute! We also had lots of fun.

On Wednesday when I returned to our sector Hna Rodriguez told me that they had found a ¨Cornelius.¨ In Acts 10, a gentile named Cornelius has a vision from an angel that he needs to go Peter, so he sends his servants to talk to Peter. Peter ends up teaching and baptizing Cornelius and his whole household. We use this story in the mission to talk about ¨golden investigators,¨ people that the Lord has already been preparing to hear our message. So when Hna Rodriguez told me we had a Cornelius, I was super stoked! We had a lesson with him that day (his name is Nilo), and within minutes of meeting him I realized that he really had come to us prepared! He used to be a Jehova´s witness, but had left them because he didn´t agree with some of the things they taught. He told us that he was going through a hard time in his life, because his wife had left him and taken his two daughters with her. That day we taught Nilo in the park about the Restoration of the gospel. I taught him the first vision, and after, I asked him how he felt. He responded, ¨Well hermana, it´s hard to explain, but while you were talking, something just told me that it´s true.¨ We taught him that it was the Holy Ghost teaching him truth, that he was receiving an answer. This was only the second day we had known him! We taught him everyday this past week, and he accepted it all.. he still had questions, but we were able to explain and answer his doubts. The greatest miracle of all might be that he came to church wearing a full on suit!! We also had the blessing of a few other intestgators that came on their own. Elder Fankhauser who was with me in the MTC and who now is our district leader came after the meetings and gave him his baptismal interview. He passed!! Nilo now has a baptismal date for February 8. He may be the biggest miracle I´ve seen in my mission. I´ve never met someone who´s accepted the gospel with so much humility! We are super excited for him and can´t wait to see him grow and learn more.

On Saturday we went to the temple with a family that we are teaching. Do you remember Diego who was baptized in October? We went with him and his family.. his parents aren´t married, so we thought going to the temple would help them feel the spirit and see the blessings of an eternal marriage. They said they felt something different there outside the temple, like a peace that they had never felt before. That was also a great experience!

Saturday night I got a call from Sara saying she had a package for me, and Sunday she came to our church and gave me the package. She is so sweet! She filmed a little video of me saying hello.. sorry if it´s super awkward haha. But thanks for sending the package!!

Well that´s it for this week. Thanks for your emails and all your love and advice. It sounds like you´re all doing well. I love you all so much! Until next week!

Love, Hna Anderson

Just keep swimming

Hola familia! This week here in Las Brisas was a little slower as far as the work goes, but it was also a lot of fun and I learned a lot. Hna. Rodriguez and I are still getting along great! We realized if we have another transfer together we´ll have been companions for a third of our mission! 6 whole months. It´s pretty crazy, but pretty cool.

This last week on Tuesday was our turn as a zone to go to the temple. I love driving up to the temple and seeing the angel Moroni with all the buildings of Lima in the background. There is such a difference being inside the temple than being out on the streets. I have such a greater appreciation for the temple now. It´s so clean and beautiful inside! Even the gardens outside are just so different. What a blessing it is that just in the Salt Lake valley we have, what, like 7 or 8 temples? If you haven´t been to the temple lately, you should go! We can find so many personal answers to our questions there. I´m grateful that I´m realzing now just how important the temple is for us.

Like I said this week was a little slow as far as the work goes. We´ve been cleaning out the area book visiting old investigators and looking up the future ones. We´ve found a few less actives, which has been cool. Yesterday we were standing outside an apartment building looking up an old investigator when a man came up and asked which number we needed. He helped us out and we gave him a card with our number and the address for the church. He thanked us, and then told us that he was actually a member but that he hadn´t attended for a long time. He then started crying right then and there, a grown man about 50, crying in the street about how he still had his faith and he knew that God still loved him. It was a pretty powerful experience for me, how the Spirit can touch anyone at anytime. We are going to go next week to read the Book of Mormon with him so that he can gain his testimony back. I´m grateful for that experience I had with the spirit this week.

Last week we found an hermana named Maria who is progressing pretty well! She said she has been reading the Book of Mormon and knows it´s true. She didn´t come to church yesterday which was a bummer, but we´ll keep working with her. We also found an hermana named Melissa who has two little girls. We had a family home evening with her in a member´s house and it went great! We taught her the plan of salvation and how families can be together forever. She´s got some real potential as well.

I want to share something I read in the January Ensign this week. Here it´s called the Liahona, but I imagine the talks and stuff are pretty much the same. The talk is called ¨The best time to plant a tree,¨ by President Uchtdorf. He says in his message,

¨You don´t need an invitation to work towards your rightoues goals. You don´t have to wait for permission in order to become the person that you were made to be. You don´t need to wait to be invited to serve in the church.¨

If you´re thinking about going on a mission but are waiting for permission or an invitation from the Lord, the invitation has already been given! Here in the mission I really believe I´m learning so much more about the person I need to be. By serving I´m learning so much more about what I can accomplish.

I also really liked the talk in the same Ensign that talks about overcoming trials. The author is J. christopher Lansing. He says that we shouldn´t expect the Lord to take away our problems just because we promise Him that we´ll be better after if He does. We should endure our trials well, and after we´ll be blessed. Sometimes we just gotta keep swimming if things aren´t so great! The blessings will come after.

Welp that´s just some thoughts I had this week. I love you guys SOO much!! Thanks for always writing. Hope you´re still reading the book of mormon together. Have a great week!! Keep smiling. Keep swimming. Until next week!

Love, Hermana Anderson

pics Bday party in the house of our pensionista

A meal here called Pachamanca. It´s sooo good. It´s called grean beans, sweet potato, normal potato, and lots of meat.

First week of intercambios

Hola family! How are you all? This was a good first week here in the new transfer with Hermana Rodriguez. I am kinda sad that I´m not with Hna Aguero anymore, but we see each other everyday at lunch at meetings and stuff. Hna Rodriguez and I are living in our same room just us two. President doesn´t want more than two hermanas in the same room, cause lots of problems could happen with hermanas in the future. It´s fun to be with Hermana Rodriguez again! We´ve been talking about all of our old jokes and already have new ones. I can see how she´s grown since we were companions the first time, and she also says that I´ve changed too. Pretty cool!

So this week we started with exchanges. Normally we just have one exchange per week, but we have more hermanas that we have to visit this transfer, so it´ll be pretty busy. On Tuesday an Hermana Richardson came with me here while Hna Rodriguez went to the ward Magdalena. Hna Richardson is from Weber and actually lives like five minutes away from Pineview. She is pretty cool and we had fun together! I love being able to learn from the Hermanas and also share what I´ve learned. On Thursday it was my turn to go to a different area. I went with an Hermana Hymas from Philadelphia. She´s also pretty cool and we had some funny experiences there in her area. She´s also in the Magdalena ward and they have a lot of houses right on the beach. We were walking in a steep, skinny street on the beach when a man that looked like Santa Claus came running up to us. He was big and tall with long white hair and a long white beard. He started talking to us and asking if we were Mormons. I asked the classic question, ¨Do you believe in Christ?¨ And he said, ¨More or less. I´m Jewish.¨ That started a pretty interesting conversation about how there are Jews that believe in Christ... which I didn´t know. We couldn´t enter his house cause we were alone, but we stood in his doorway and he showed us all the pictures he has of Jerusalem and Jewish Rabbies (spelling?) on his walls. Then he asked us to sing a hymn. Hna Hymas still doesn´t know the songs in Spanish, so we sang I am a child of God in English. After that, he said, ¨My turn.¨ He started to sing a song in Hebrew for us right there in the door! It sounded cool, but it was really kind of weird ha. We (well the hermanas in the area) have a date to go back to teach him, so maybe they´ll get to teach him more!

This week in our area with Hna Rodriguez was a little slow, but still fun. We actually had a lot of success finding a bunch of new people, but it was a little discouraging when no one came to church yesterday. The past month a lot of our investigators were baptized, which is awesome, but now we need all new people. It´s been a little slow but fun with the exchanges and all.

Well I love you guys so much!! Thanks for writing. Hope you´re having fun there in the freezing cold of Utah. It´s super duper hot here actually, a little bit of snow would be nice! Love you guys!! Until next week!

Love, Hermana Anderson

After a whole lot of changes... everything´s the same

     Okay, I don´t even know where to start with everything that´s happened this week! I guess I should start with hey family, how are you guys?? So Monday night we heard the transfers and our district leader told us that Hermana Aguero had a change!! We were super confused because we were in the middle of her training and she still needs a transfer more to finish. So, we packed up all her bags but then the zone leaders told us that SHE was going to be the one to open up the new sector, las brisas 2. So we were both going to be getting new companions! At transfer meeting 10 new hermanas came, so basically all the hermanas had a change and a ton are training now, even my friend Hermana Hollberg that has about 5 or 6 months. Up on the projector we found out that Hermana Brudnicki, the hermana that was in La Legua with me, was going to come and finish the training of Hna Aguero. She also has about 5 months. Then, my picture came up on the board, and my companion is.... HERMANA RODRIGUEZ!!!! Yeah! Again!! Haha we couldn´t believe that we´re together again! AND we are now hermanas capacitadores, or in English, sister training leaders. I was SO shocked. I don´t know if I´ve ever heard of a missionary returning to be with their trainer! We were so pumped!

     So, obviously there´s been lots of changes here, but like it says in the title, I decided that everything´s still the same. I´m with Hna Rodriguez again, Hna Brudnicki is in my ward again, I´m in a ward with four hermanas, I started in New Mexico with companion sister training leaders.... Oh, and Elder Fankhauser from my MTC district is my district leader! This week has been crazy ha. My zone is awesome and I love it already. Now that we´re STL´s we´ll be doing exchanges with the hermanas in our zone and two other companionships in another zone, so in all we have 14 hermanas that we now have to train. We´re going to be doing our first exchange tomorrow. I´ll probably be going with an Hna Richardson that is from Utah and went to Weber. I´m excited to get to know other sectors and meet some new people. I´m excited but nervous, grateful, but shocked. If the Lord says that I can do something, I know I can do it! Like I said before, it´s like that Uncle Ben quote, but opposite.... with great responsibility, comes great power.

     On Saturday Gustavo was baptized and Sunday confirmed!!! He bore a really powerful testimony about how he feels like a new person, like he was reborn. I´ve grown to really care for the people I teach, and I know Gustavo will be a strong priesthood holder in the church.

     This week I ate cow stomach and cow liver. The stomach is a dish called cau cau, and the liver is called higalo. They were both feo.

 

 Love, Hermana Anderson 

Hermana Anderson and Rodriguez

Pucusana (south of Lima)

Gustavo's baptism