SHES BACK FROM THE DEAD!

SHES BACK FROM THE DEAD! Sorry again for how awful my last few emails have been. Yes I'm alive, and yes I'm okay, thank you all for the concern (; so I guess I could update you on what's going on here in Villalba.

Every Monday we meet with our cute friend Dayana, she's the only member in her family but she is super strong. I have a ton of respect for her. All you out there who complain to go to church activities or to church because of travel, I don't want to hear it, she lives like a 20 min bus ride away from the church and the bus passes every hour. The motivation she has inspires me, I want to be more like her. She wants to serve a mission too so we've been helping her know how to start being a member missionary now and giving her tips for the future. 

Tuesdays are usually pretty slow. but in the mornings we usually meet with our cute friend Martina. She is from Peru but is visiting her daughter here in Villalba for as long as the government will let her. Here testimony is incredible, she's older but she doesn't let that stop her from looking to God and looking for the truth. Her first language is Quechua so its hard for her to read Spanish but she is doing really well and when she feels ready she will enter into the waters of baptism. That's her greatest desire.

Tuesday nights we used to meet with our friend Hernando but he is out traveling right now and wont get back for a few months. I pray that when he comes back he will take the lessons again with the missionaries here. We now have a new friend that we found from Honduras. She is a MIA member but we found her and we are going to bring her back! We taught her for the first time yesterday and we can see a to of potential in her.

Wednesdays we have District meetings in the morning, English Class at night and lessons in between. Last week we had the Missionary Broadcast, announcing all the changes happening in the mission field, so last week not a ton happened on Wednesday. 

On Thursdays we have weekly planning. Last week we met with our new friend Maria. It takes about 2 hours to get to her house when we leave with the bus so that is a little difficult. But she and her children came to church on Sunday! We have only met with her but we'd like to teach them as a family as a whole, we don't know the next time well be able to meet with them because of their schedules but the family is so cute and I'm excited to witness their progression. (:

Fridays are my favorite days (: In the mornings we've started meeting with our new friend Ramón and his wife Maria. The story of how we found them is actually pretty good. I don't know if I've already said it so I'll say it again!

So on a Tuesday I believe we were waiting at the bus stop to go visit Martina. Her son-in-law just happens to be standing nearby waiting for the same bus. We go over and start talking to him and he told us of how he had lost his phone on the way home from work. I decided to tell him about an experience about when my dad lost his phone. (This is how I remember it dad, I was pretty little so excuse me if its a little hazy) It was when flip phones were generally new and my dad "lost" it. I remember that around the same time, my aunt lost her wedding ring, so as a family we decided to have a special prayer that we could find these two very important things. I don't remember how long it took but I remember we looked and we looked for the lost phone. Until I remembered the small tables leaning against the computer closet. There was a small gap in there that I could reach my little arm in. I remembered seeing my dad's phone left at the computer desk and thought it would be funny to tease him by hiding it in the little gap between the tables and the closet. So when I reached my little arm in the slot to my excitement, I FOUND THE PHONE! And it was an answer to our prayer.

There was a cute elderly couple standing nearby the bus stop that heard my story and gave a little chuckle as well. We included them in the conversation and they agreed to let us meet with them. The first lesson we had with them was incredible. It's amazing to see how God has prepared them to receive his Gospel.

I'm so grateful for the opportunity I have to serve here in Villalba, I know it's where the Lord wants me to be for now. I'm so grateful for my Heavenly Father and our Savior Jesus Chris. I can do nothing without him, this is truly the Lords work. I'm so grateful for the Temple and for the blessing that it is to have so many all over the world.

I hope you all have a great week! 

Loves and awkward Besos!

Hermana Warner

Villalba

I love Christmas!!!

This week was overall pretty great. We've been so very blessed and I'm so grateful for all the miracles we've seen.

1. Hernando! We met with Hernando again on Tuesday. He's been reading a ton in the Book of Mormon and is doing really well, he just couldn't come to church because he was out of town.
2. Norma and Antonio. They are my FAVORITE! They are visiting their daughters right now from Argentina. We met with them for the second time this week and they are doing really well. When we met, Antonio told us of how his son-in-law had been reading the Book of Mormon and while he was reading he was like, "Mama mia! Mama mia! Nefi, que haces!?" Antonio got pretty excited to read 1 Nephi 4 and we will be meeting with the whole family later this up and coming week. 
3. Monica and Marisol. Hermana Phillips and I contacted them in the street a few weeks ago. Marisol works a ton but got hit by a car and broke her leg so when I called on a whim (the spirit) she answered and invited us to finally come teach them. When we started getting to know them more Monica (15 year old) started just talking to Hermana Koeber and Marisol turned to me and said, "You know, I was about her age when the missionaries found and baptized me, but you know, life just gets in the way." With like a little chuckle thing. What the heck!? So yeah, we found a MIA member and are now teaching her and her daughter. Miracle.
4. Fabian and Jerolin. The biggest miracle! About a month ago Hermana Koeber and I contacted a lady named Alba, she is also a MIA member form Columbia. We finally were able to get in contact with her and we had a lesson on Sunday. Her son and daughter-in-law were also there so we taught all of them. We had already planned and prepared to teach them about #ILLUMINATEtheWORLD and it ended up being exactly what they needed and thy are excited to learn more about how they can become more united as a family as they draw closer to Christ.

I'm so grateful to be a full time representative of Christ. I am studying the New Testament more and the more I learn the more I love our Savior. I'm so grateful for this holiday season that we have to remember what's really important, its like the Sabbath day of all the year. Idk I just love it. Everyone is so much more happy and open and willing to talk. I'm just so grateful! This week we are going to have and incredible Christmas party I will take pics an tell you all how it goes!

I hope you all have a great week!

Hermana Warner

I make snowflakes!

I make food.

Insert my dad saying, "It's Christmas" yep it's November. Yes it's Christmas.

Wow what a week! Well more like week and a half, it feels like forever since I've written. So this week was pretty good! We officially have two progressing investigators! Whoot whoot! My week in a nutshell: Thanksgiving feast with the Zone, Inercambios, miracles with Sadith, New investigator Hernando, we went to the temple today, El Escorial Monastery, all our lights burning out (we still have all our Christmas Lights though so don't worry), finally breaking through (literally they are shredded) those $10 boots I bought last min before I left and I can still breath... kinda... the inversion kills man.

But yeah the most important thing I wanted to write about is our miracle with Sadith! Sadith is incredible and I know I've introduced her before so I'll just get to it. Last weekend we felt prompted to teach her about keeping the commandments we studied and prayed and planned but when we got to the door step to her piso we knew we needed to change the game plan. We prayed again before entering and 100% relied on the spirit. As we started the lesson I felt prompted to follow up on her reading and daily prayers. She told us that she hadn't been reading and that she thought it might be a good idea to just read. So that's what we did. I prayed and prayed in those minuscule moments to try to remember a good chapter about keeping the commandments without the "and he shall be thrust down to hell" part. So yeah, I was at a blank. I asked her where she was at in her study, she said 1 Nephi 3....

My heart just exploded with happiness and I knew that that was exactly what Heavenly Father wanted us to do. The Spirit truly testified to her and to us that we need to be obedient to all of God's commandments and that the Lord truly will provide a way. I invited her to read every day and to attend church. She came!

The next lesson we had with her was even more of a miracle. We knew we wanted to teach her about baptism and covenants. Again we made the lesson plan prayed and studied. When we got there we still felt confident of what to teach. I followed up again about how her Scripture study had been for the week. She told us that she had found time to read the Book of Mormon just by taking it everywhere with her. She said she studied it between classes or on the bus ride home. She then proceeded in sharing two scriptures that impacted her deeply. She explained that they were the answers to her prayers. She told us of her desire to be baptized, we asked the baptismal questions and picked a date. It was incredible. 

I'm so grateful for the commandments of the Lord. No matter how small and simple they may seem they really do make a difference. I know that God answers prayers, that he wants to help us in our lives. I know that that BOM is the word of God and that as we apply it to our lives we will know what the Lord would have us do. I'm so grateful for the opportunity we have to attend church every Sunday to partake of the sacrament and to strengthen each other's testimonies. These things are small but I truly believe that, 

"...by small and simple things are great things brought to pass; and small means in many instances doth confound the wise.

   And the Lord God doth work by means to bring about his great and eternal purposes; and by very small means the Lord doth confound the wise and bringeth about the salvation of many souls." Alma 37:6-7

I'm so grateful to be one of the small and simple, I hope you all have a fantastic 25 days of serving this December.

 #ILLUMINATEtheWORLD  #LIGHTtheWORLD

Yeah do it soon!

That kid Elder Cample kills me with the chicken hahaha you can see me laughing hahaha.