The Spirit Equals Tears

Feliz dia de Memorial! 

I can not believe I am here writing home again, the time is flying I hit 5 months this week...so crazy! I feel bad for everyone not serving a mission though because really you are missing out there is nothing better. Everyone who has the chance to go serve go out and do it you will be blessed forever in ways you have never imagined!!

This week we saw some miracles (like always) and lots of tears haha so first! We went over to visit Talitha (unannounced) and we had planned to visit her at 3 but we felt like going over at 2:30 so right when we walked up Dontay was coming out and said Talitha is in the hospital im on my way up right now do you want to follow me? And I said yes almost without taking a breath! We got to the hospital and she had been there over night for some Kidney failure, she is in a lot of pain but should be okay! When we walked in she started crying she was so happy to see us. We read from the Book of Mormon with her and she cryed again and said God sent us there to let her know he is still there and loves her. The Lord loves Talitha soo much! (just like each of us) it truly was a miracle because 1 we weren't planning on going to visit her 2 we were prompted to go and switch the time and 3 she recognized our visit as blessing from God therefor strengthening her testimony!!! We also were able to have an awesome lesson with Gaspar. It was the most beautiful day and we were outside in the shade and Gaspar was teaching US about faith. It was perfect, it was soooo cool to see his testimony about faith he shared his thoughts on Alma 32. He loved the analogy of the seed. I am so proud of him and what he gets from the scriptures! He told us that when he likes a passage from the Book of Mormon he reads it in the morning the afternoon and the night and then just keeps reading it over and over haha he is awesome. 

This week we had Zone Conference and it was amazing!! We learned all about families and what they should be like when we get home. I guess the brethren really want the missionaries to learn about that out on their missions and then go home and have wonderful strong families asap! It was kinda funny to be learning about that while out serving but it was so wonderful. The spirit was overwhelmingly strong! For the closing song we stood and sang the spirit of god. The spirit was literally like a fire burning in my heart. Me and sister Jones were crying (lots of tears this week) and singing in spanish while everyone was singing in english. Being surrounded by all those valiant youth it was just awesome. 

One last cool thing, we were knocking doors yesterday and we met these ladies from El Salvador and they were so impressed with our spanish! They couldn't stop raving over it. It was a little confidence booster thats for sure :) It's the best because the hispanics love you and are way more apt to listen because we are white girls and we understand their language and speak it. I know its only with the help of the Lord though. The gift of Tongues rocks. 

Adolfo is doing wonderful. He is progressing spiritually and he committed to live the word of wisdom!!! Yay it is so cool to see people make sacrifices like that to just give up something an addictive habit they have had for years. It is only through the Lord! He gives us strength to conquer all things!!!

I love you all very much, Christ is the Savior and Redeemer of the world. We are children of a loving Heavenly Father and la iglesia de jesucristo de los santos de los ultimos dias es el reino de dios aqui en la tierra. Have a great week!

xoxox

Love,

Hermana Pentelute

Pictures

1. Pics: there are 1000 yard sells on the weekends, EVERYONE has a yard/garage sale.

2-3. we went to a cheese factory this week mmm

MMM Title of Boldness

MMM Title of Boldness

1. Prayerfully study chapters 1 and 11 of PMG.
a. Ask Heavenly Father what you can do to help specific investigators
b. Ask Heavenly Father to help you be bold in promising specific come unto Christ through baptism.

Blessings tied to the covenant of baptism and receiving the Gift of the Holy Ghost. (For example, “I promise you that your baptism and  confirmation will heal the pain from your recent divorce. By showing:

Faith in Jesus Christ and His atonement, the Lord will heal you. As you are baptized by water and then by the Holy Spirit, you will feel your burdens lifted and your doubts and fears will be replaced with faith and peace.”

2. Eat, drink and sleep baptisms. Why?
a. 3 Nephi 27:19-20
b. 3 Nephi 11:38
c. 2 Nephi 31:21

3. Boldness with every investigator
a. Who – declare the Lord sent you.
b. What -- to tell you to repent and change your life.
c. Why – so you can be healed through faith in the Lord’s atonement and

4. We must rely upon the Lord and not ourselves. The Holy Spirit converts, not the missionary. 97 PMG

a. We must boldly teach by the Spirit.
b. Boldness is essential when inviting investigators to repent (make and
c. Boldness requires specific promised blessings.

5. For any investigator you have taught three or more times who does not have
a. Review the baptism questions. Discern their objections. Elder Godoy
b. Boldly commit them to repent – change and keep the commandments.
a. Boldly testify
b. Boldly promise specific blessings as they keep the commandment.

6. Teach that baptism completes repentance -- heals pains and sorrows and removes guilt and shame from our lives.
a. 3 Nephi 7:25-26
b. Moroni 8:25-26
c. 2 Nephi 31:17
d. Mosiah 18:8-10

7. Don’t use quit dates with the Word of Wisdom. Commit them immediately to live the Word of Wisdom while they’re feeling the Holy Spirit. Remove the “contraband” from the house.
Be baptized and receive the Gift of the Holy Ghost.
Keep commitments to live the commandments.

Letter from Mission President

May 18, 2014

Dear Sisters and Elders:

If I were to give this letter a title, I would call it “The Lord is in Charge”.

71 And the Lord of the vineyard said unto them: Go to, and labor in the vineyard, with your might. For behold, this is the last time that I shall nourish my vineyard; for the end is nigh at hand, and the season speedily cometh; and if ye labor with your might with me ye shall have joy in the fruit which I shall lay up unto myself against the time which will soon come.

72 And it came to pass that the servants did go and labor with their mights; and the Lord of the vineyard labored also with them; and they did obey the commandments of the Lord of the vineyard in all things.

The following experience shows the Lord is in charge. Sister Clements and I just returned from the Lakeville Stake Conference. After the meeting, one companionship approached me to relate a most amazing miracle. Missionary A is from Utah. His parents were converts in Minnesota a long time ago. Missionary A’s mother prayed that missionary A, her 11th and last child, would be sent to Minnesota to teach his relatives who still live in Minnesota. Most of those relatives don’t have positive impressions of the Church.

Missionary A is transferred two weeks ago to a new area. He and his companion are
knocking on doors in the middle of the day. No one answers. As they’re about to leave, a
man comes out from the garage. Missionaries introduce themselves. Man says he knows
who they are because his brother is a Mormon in Utah. Man introduces himself. His
name is the same as missionary A (not a common name). Missionary A says “That’s
funny, I have the same name and I’m from Utah.” Man gives missionary A a big hug and
says “You’re my nephew!”
When I prayerfully transferred Missionary A to his new area, I had forgotten all about his family connections in Minnesota. And I certainly didn’t know his uncle lived in the town he was about to be transferred to.

To summarize, Missionary A could be sent anywhere in the world to any one of the 405 missions. 

Here are the steps that took him to his uncle:

1. His mother quietly prays that he will be sent to Minnesota.
2. The Lord’s apostle feels impressed to assign Missionary A to Minnesota.
3. The mission president assigns him to the town in which his uncle lives.
4. Missionary A and his companion decide to tract in the middle of the day.
5. They happen to knock on the Uncle’s door.
6. Uncle is home in the middle of the day, contrary to his normal schedule.

Nothing on his application suggested he had relatives in Minnesota.

Missionary A and his companion are going to dinner at the uncle’s home this week. We are praying for him to astonish the uncle with his testimony when he teaches the restoration to the uncle and his family.

Since it’s the Lord’s work, we must expect miracles every minute of every day. And our expectation should be that those miracles lead to baptisms. We must “eat, drink and sleep baptisms.” That is our purpose. Surely in a mission of more than 6 million people, there are .1% of the people the Lord is preparing today for baptism. That would be 6000 people!

We simply must qualify ourselves for the Lord to trust is with these people. How do we qualify ourselves?

• Diligence
• Boldness

Diligence means we plan effective use of our time. We see every minute as precious.
We don’t find excuses to kill time. Rather every minute is the Lord’s. We make effective
backup plans so when an appointment falls through, we’re right on to the next plan.

My inspiration regarding boldness is included as a separate document with this email.

Please read and prayerfully study that document. At upcoming zone conferences, you will be asked to sign the “MMM Title of Boldness”. Please do each of the seven steps on the Title of Boldness. Your investigators will progress as you follow each step.

Item 5 of the Title talks about boldly committing people to live the commandments.

Don’t delay teaching the commandments. Some missionaries think that if they ignore or wait to teach the tougher commandments, the investigator will progress further. That is incorrect. The commandments are evidence of God’s love for his children. We teach early the commandments the investigator most needs to repent of. For example, if someone is a coffee drinker, teach that soon after teaching the Plan of Salvation. Or if someone is breaking the law of chastity, teach that promptly after the Plan of Salvation.

No one will ever be converted if you don’t teach the commandments. Conversion doesn’t happen until they start living the commandments. If you are fearful, they will be fearful.
Fear is the opposite of faith. You must have faith for your investigator to have faith. You must have confidence and faith that the commandments come from the Lord. You must know that he blesses those who live the commandments. If you don’t believe that deep in your heart, the spirit won’t back you up when you testify.

Finally, as a reminder, we always invite the investigator to kneel to pray at the end of every lesson. Do not ask him to call on someone to pray. That is fine for the opening prayer, but not the closing prayer. Always ask the investigator to kneel and pray. That prayer is an expression of faith. It will lead him to have a desire to repent. Kneeling brings a humble, worshipful attitude. You are bold missionaries. This is what bold, effective missionaries do.

I’m excited to see all of the dates that are set this week. For this week only, please report to the zone leaders two numbers: 1) reportable dates set and 2) all other dates set (report two numbers, not a combined number).

I’m excited to present Sister Clements her birthday gift on May 25. More importantly, I’m excited about all the wonderful people who will make the covenant of baptism with the Lord during the month of June.

We love you,
President and Sister Clements

It Is Never Too Late

Hola Familia!!

Yesterday, as we were driving to visit a less active I saw a man in our ward at the park. The strange thing was that he doesn't live in St. Peter he lives in Mankato. So my companion didn't believe me and wanted to see if he was really there. As we drove around the park we saw a part member family the Juantos driving who we haven't been able to have contact with in a few months. We waved and pulled into the park and they happened to turn around and be going to that same park. We got out of the car and talked with them and set up a time to see them woot woot! Also another miracle was that the member in our congregation is someone that the Juantos really admire and he speaks Spanish! So he was able to talk to them and hopefully get them excited to come to church. It is amazing what the Lord can do for us and for the countless miracles I am seeing cada dia!! I am constantly in awe of the mercy love and compassion he has on each of us and how he is SO aware of EVERY need each of his children has. Oh man and then we were knocking on doors and everyone kept saying no no no no no no no I don't have time you're wasting your time, blah blah blah hahah but we kept the faith that we could find someone who was prepared. So we prayed as to where we should go and we felt good about going down a few streets and we knocked into this girl named Jenifer. She was so open to our message and loved it and agreed with everything that we were saying she wouldn't commit to baptism but she is going to pray and read in the book of Mormon. Me and my comp both knew for sure she was the reason we knocked there. I know the Lord had her prepared even if she doesn't know it yet!!! Also this week we knocked into a girl who has been less active for a long time. She was baptized when she was 8 in California. She has since fallen away and doesn't want what we have to offer BUT she has siblings living in Utah who are Lds and she said almost all of her nieces and nephews are serving missions. She said she felt like we were them and so she had to open the door. Even though she pretty much told us to not come back I know God wanted her to have that reminder that he is there and that she is loved. No matter where you are in the gospel, lost, fallen away or have a faltering testimony. God loves you. He is aware of you. He knows what you need and he will be patient with you. He will not abandon you and it is NEVER too late to come back. Happiness resides within the arms of our savior. The only way to happiness is through the gospel of Jesus Christ. I know this with my whole heart and soul.

Adolfo is doing wonderful! I am so excited for him he is progressing wonderfully to be baptized on June 7th!

We had stake conference this weekend and it was awesome. Elder Spackman talked to us and I just loved it. He said that most people don't accept the gospel until they have been introduced to it 7 times, this is an average the church  did from recent converts. Me and hna Jones always now say oh well we were number 4 or we were number 6 and it helps! It is cool to think about and he told us that as long as we are doing our part and being an example and talking about it and doing our best that's enough! Even if we're not number 7. We will be able to be apart of number 7's some times but a lot of the time we are number 3's or 5's. Talk with everyone :) don't be ashamed of what you believe. We are on the wining team and Christ our loving savior will support you. I love you all!!!!!!! 

Have an awesome week.

Read and pray daily, you will see miracles.

xoxox

Hermana Pentelute

Just Another Week in Paradise :)

Hola Bonita Familia! 

Te amo mucho! Fue una Buena experiencia a hablar con ustedes ayer!! This past week has been crazy...the weather here I think might be crazier than in Utah! We have had ran for the past two weeks or more like heavy heavy rain. Me and my comp were soaked from head to toe just walking out of an apartment building to our car. It's just apart of the fun :) Then while we were finding we all of the sudden hear this loud "beeahapahahaha warning tornado in your area beeeppapapa" hahah so me and Hermana Jones just bust up laughing because we just had no idea what we were supposed to do. We have only ever been trained on what to do in case of an earthquake. Anyways we were getting texts from the ward and people telling us to take shelter it was an adventure and everything turned out fine! It was kind of fun/ funny to be apart of. Also! We almost got attacked by a dog this week. We needed to go to a guys house to teach and his dog was out in front barking at us. We tried to walk up slowly but the dog just dashed at us and was growling so we ran away haha and so we waited until the dog was in the house because he was not letting us get through.

This week we taught Adolfo again. He is doing so awesome. He is going to be baptized on the 7th of June! I really am excited because he is so prepared at this time of his life. We even had him sit by one of our investigators at church this sunday, that's how awesome he is. Also, we taught this young girl named Angel last week and this week when we stopped by and her boyfriend talked to us for awhile and later that night they sent a text saying "can we get baptized?" hahah what an awesome text to get right!! Well they are going to have a lot of work to do but hopefully they can have that same animo (excitement) when they learn they need to get married!   

Pray for Adolfo and Talitha's family they could use your prayers! Also keep Gaspar in your prayers as well, he is trying to fight against all the things satan is throwing his way right now.

As we trust in the Lord, he will guide us for good. As we trust in the Lord we will become like our Savior, as we become like our Savior and align our will with the will of the father we will have happiness. I love you all. It was so cool to see the fam yesterday. I have amazing people in my life, I am so blessed and lucky. Thank you for all your continual support and prayers!

Have a great week, make a difference! :)

xoxox

Hermana Pentelute

Pics: 

1. cinco de mayo shirt gaspar gave me

2. a rover we studied by.

3-4. and the rain attack!

                                                                            

Yo Se Que Vive Mi Señor

Hola mi bonita familia les ama mucho!

This week was crazy and filled with miracles! I always wish you were out here with me because there really is nothing greater. I love the Lord so much and his children! Haha at times I feel like my investigators mother because I am always worried for them and just want to help them in any way possible! (especially with Gaspar) So first miracle of the week!

This week as we were striving to have more member present lessons and all of our set appointments were falling through...life of a missionary...and it was frustrating because we had members out with us. One of these days we were in Medelia, which is not a short drive, with a member and nothing seemed to be working out we had stopped by everyone and our appointments just didn't answer the door. We kept the faith though that we could teach someone even if we had to go knocking. We prayed and asked the Lord for guidance as what we should do and where we should go. The answer was clear that we needed to go to an apartment building down the road. As we pulled up a man walked out and started to smoke and I felt in my heart "he's the one". So we parked our car and just walked up to him and started to get to know him and talk with him. He accepted our invitation to go inside and talk some more. We taught him the restoration and invited him to baptism, he accepted the invitation and was at church this Sunday. So cool!!!! When we were done teaching him me and my comp were on cloud 9. It was amazing to see if we just let the spirit guide us we truly will see miracles and be the instrument in God's hands that he wants us to be!

Talitha and her family came to church all together yesterday for the first time. It was amazing to see them all walk in. She works all night and gets off at 8 in the morning so it has been hard for her not to go home and sleep (do you blame her) but this week she did it! Right now she is working on getting a desire to quit smoking. It is hard because she enjoys smoking. Who would of thought? Never the less she has cut down remarkably from a pack to day to a goal of just 5 or less a day and is reading in the Book of Mormon everyday. I know that the Lord is blessing her with a desire to stop even if it is small as she reads from the Book of Mormon. That is the power of the Book of Mormon. There is nothing truer and if we just talk 5 minutes a day to read the Lord will bless us in all aspects of life, THAT IS A PROMISE! It doesn't matter how tired you are or how much you have to do make reading the book of Mormon a priority and if you have never read it before I challenge you to. I promise it will change your life forever.

I forgot to tell you guys last week... I ate pig foot!! We were eating with Cecilia and zenita and they just brought out pig feet...toe nails and all! Oh it was awful hahah and I said no thank you I can NOT eat that. They wouldn't take no for an answer so I had to eat it. YUCK! haha its okay though now I can say I ate literal pig foot. So yesterday we were knocking on doors and ran into a man who had no shirt on and so he was standing behind his door, we asked him if now was a good time and if we could share our message and he said yeah of course! Well come to find out through the lesson as he got more relaxed he defiantly had no clothing on and it got uncomfortable real quick. Hahaha I have seen it all our here in Minn! One last thing remember Kristy? Well we gave her a picture of Jesus Christ and when we were in her trailer park yesterday she ran up to us with it and said it was hers and she loves it. It was so cute. She also started crying when we told her we only do this for 18 months, she loves us and hopefully can feel our love for her and more importantly the Lords love.

I love you guys all so much and am excited to talk with you next week! 
Make it a great week.

XOXOX

Hermana Pentelute