Thursday, April 29, 2010

A Busy Week!!

Hey everyone how´s it going? Things are pretty good out here in Mar Del Plata. After my first week I´m starting to feel more and more comfortable in the area which is pretty nice. I still don´t always really know where we are but I at least know the people and am getting to know the members and investigators and different things like that. Elder Morrell is an awesome missionary. He´s not afraid to talk to anyone and he already speaks spanish really well. I really like the way we work together and we´re gonna have 2 baptisms this sunday of kids of less active families. These kids are awesome and super smart. It really blows me away sometimes but they´re way cool and I´ll try to send some pics of the baptisms next p day. The dad of one of the kids, Aliana, wants to get baptized. I think I already told you about him, his name is Carlos and he´s an awesome guy. He told us a little bit of his life beforehand and he has made a complete 180. Seriously it´s amazing to see the change the gospel can make in the lives of people. His wife was less active for a long time but she starting coming back to church and Carlos came this last week which was way cool. The only hiccup with that is that Carlos and Molena aren´t married. So that´s something we´re gonna have to take care of before he gets baptized but I don´t think it will be a problem. They want to do everything that´s right and keep the commandments. They even told us they were talking about marriage a while ago. So that´s Carlos, he´s awesome and we´re gonna put a baptismal date with him after they get married.
Another crazy thing happened to us this last week. I can´t remember if it was on Sunday or Monday but we were walking down the street and this little girl asked us if we were Jahova´s Wittnesses. I told her "no, we´re Mormons", and she said "oh my mom wants to talk to you. Follow me I´ll take you to my house". So we go and meet the mom and she´s an ex investigator from a long time ago. One or two of her kids got baptized when the missionaries taught them way back when, but she couldn´t cause she was already living with a guy and they weren´t married. Her marido wasn´t home at the time but we have an appointment later tonight so we´ll see how that situation turns out. Pray for us! Just crazy random things like that have been happening since I got here. Mar Del Plata is a pretty cool place. I´m really grateful for the chance I´ve been given to serve here cause it´s been an adventure so far. I gotta get going but I hope you are all doing well! I love you all, cuidense!!
Elder Gaughan

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Doing GREAT!!!

Familia!!!! Cómo están??? Everything is going pretty good here in Santa Rosa. Working with Elder Thackeray has been a really good experience for me. I´m not gonna lie, being in charge of things has been kinda random and unexpected at this point in the mission, but I like to think that we´re doing pretty well. I can´t remember exactly what I said in my last email but we are completely different. And when I say completely different I´m not exaggerating. He´s a really great kid though. One of his brothers is getting home from his mission in Albania this week and that made me think of how the situation is in our family. That it´s possible I won´t see Mike for 4 years and the same with him and John. That would be kinda crazy but it would most definitely be worth it. No question about that. We´re doing pretty well in the area too. We had an ezfuerzo last friday in the afternoon in our area and it worked out really well. An ezfuerzo is when we do divisions but all work in the same area. We were 4 companionships in Barrio 5 and it helped us out a ton. We found 4 new investigators and have some other people that were busy when we knocked the door but we´ll be going back later to see if we can start teaching them too. I worked with Elder Gomez who is a Mexican from Provo. He´s way awesome though. His parents moved to the states from mexico and he speaks both languages perfectly and without an accent which is pretty rare. He´s an awesome kid though, he´s been my district leader this transfer and has really helped me out. We taught this couple Juan and Noelia who are awesome people. Juan used to play soccer in the stake center a lot but now they live by our church. We taught them the all about the restoration and they had a bunch of questions after which was awesome. I love it when people ask us questions because it gives us a chance to see what they´re interested in and what we should teach them the next time. Also Matias is an awesome kid (I told you about him right?). Last thursday we taught him the first lesson and he really liked it. Then we were out working on sunday afternoon just knocking doors and I had a little prayer in my heart about who we could go pass by, and Matias came to my mind. So we ran over there and found him at the member´s house that lives accross the street from him. We get in the house start talking, asking him if he´d read and prayed and he said yes. And he feels that he recieved an answer about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon!!!!!! It was the coolest thing ever!!!! We went on to talk about why we go to church and baptism and he´s gonna pray about May 2 as a baptismal date!! All we have to do now is get him to come to church and he´ll be good to go. He´s such a cool kid. The only sad part is I might not be here when he gets baptized. Transfers are on Sunday and I have a really good chance of leaving cause I´ve been here for almost 6 months. Elder Dominguez has been here the same amount of time as I and President told him in his interview at zone conference that he was leaving, so that probably means that I´ll be going too. It´s ok though, as long as Matias gets baptized it´s all good.
I love you all!!
Elder Gaughan