Week 5 in the Office

Sundays

This last Sunday was super cool. Our church got moved to 2 o'clock because another stake attending our building was doing a stake conference earlier in the day.  So we had time to do our studies and plan before going, which was nice. While we were planning we called a bunch of contacts that we had made earlier in the week. We had a lot of people commit to coming. We picked up our investigator Marleni and went to church. We were there waiting and had a pf we had taught a few times before walk in with her aunt. (She accepted a fecha bautismal later in the week!) We were there waiting still and I sent out texts to a woman we had had a lesson with earlier in the week, as well as a man I had contacted who said he'd come. They both responded that they were on their way. Right after I sent that, this kinda crazy old catholic lady we had taught a lesson with earlier in the week came strolling in with her niece. She was one of the last people we expected to show up, but we were thankful that they did. Then the woman I texted earlier showed up too. The meeting started and we were feeling pretty good about how things were going. Then we started getting texts and calls from the man that I had said he was coming he said that he was outside of the building. So we went out to go walk him in and discovered a beautiful family of 4 Venezuelans that he was apart of that had all come. It was probably the most milagroso Sunday of people coming to church I've ever had. I know that if we keep the Sabbath day and help others to do it as well, we will receive many blessings. I know that the Lord loves us and will bless us abundantly as we obey his commandments. Have a good week!

Saturday
I know that God hears and answers our prayers.  In the scriptures it says, "ask (in faith), and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you," more than just a handful of times.  I believe that this is because God wants us to have 100% confidence to pray to him as a natural instinct and to have zero hesitation in doing so.  If you have a question, ask (James 1:5 and Moroni 10:4).  I know that God loves us and wants to bless us.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
The craziest thing happened last night--it rained!  We were walking home from dinner and water started falling out of the sky.  It was pretty good rain too; not just the typical two droplets.  Nothing heavy though and no wind it lasted from 10-12:30.  Our landlord lady cut off the water during the storm and when we went to ask her about it in the morning, she said she had to turn it off because there were "lluvias fuertes (heavy rains)".  Not quite sure what her thought process was there.  We had planned to get up kinda early and go play some sports, but the rain kinda ruined that.  Today was Jaxon's birthday.  This morning we went to the office to talk to our families like normal. We went to go visit Ciara again.  She's still not sure about a date, but it's kinda hard to work with her because she's really robotic.  The office had a "your mom" joke intervention where they all decided it was best to stop.  So now we just say "your mongoose" instead of "your mom".

 A top secret mission to create a fire on the roof:

Sunday
The Sabbath day is a critical commandment.  I know that if we go to church, the rest of our week will go better.  The church is a spiritual hospital and we're all spiritually ill.  If I remember right, the commandment is "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy."  I like the wording better in Spanish because it says "para santificarlo (to sanctify it)" instead, which to me is more of an action and a verb than "to keep it holy".  I feel like "to keep" something holy is mostly not doing certain things.  But the Sabbath is more than that!  We've got to "santificardo".  We need to make decisions and take action to truly set apart Sunday.  To be honest, I don't 100%  understand why it was changed from Saturday to Sunday, even after doing some research.  But what I do know is this: we are lead by modern day prophets.  If it were meant to be another way, they'd tell us.  Or you can just pray about it too.  It just occurred to me to try that and it helped a lot.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Another stake that attends our building had stake conference, so we had our church moved to 2:00.  The attendance today dropped from 140 to 105, but it was also probably the most miraculous Sunday I've ever seen.  In the morning we did weekly planning and called a bunch of people to get them to come.  I called a contact I didn't remember named Darwin.  He recognized that we were missionaries and was asking for directions, the church's name, how it started, etc. so I offered to go pick him up.  He said he'd use his maps app to get there, which usually means they won't go.  Elder Wilcox called the crazy old catholic lady and she said she'd get there by asking around.  So we went to eat lunch with la familia Cornejo and then went to go pick up Marlene.  She's cool beans.  We were there at church and Ciara walked in.  I sent Darwin and Marcia texts to see if they were on their way.  They both said yes.  Then the crazy catholic lady walked in with her niece.  We were shocked.  Then Marcia showed up too and we were feeling pretty good.  Then during the sacrament, I got a text from Darwin saying he was outside.  So when the sacrament ended, I went to go get them.  There Darwin was with his wife Mary, his 13 year old daughter Gabriela and his 10 year old son Sebastian; a beautiful Venezuelan family.  The other elders also had a couple come.  God was good to us today.  I mean, he's always good, but today we were really feeling it.  All of our 8 potential committed to returning next week too.  President promise that there's 10 people in every area ready to accept the gospel.  He wasn't lying.  I love being a missionary.  We ate dinner with some members from La Molina tonight.

Monday
I know that before coming here to Earth, we lived with our Heavenly Father in Heaven.  We liked it, but we wanted more than anything to become like him--a perfect, happy being with a body.  The only way for us to truly be happy was for us to have a body because for whatever reason, a spirit can't be as happy as a soul.  Satan and his followers rebelled against this plan for us to come to Earth, so they were cast out.  I know that I was an elect child of God and reserved to come forth in these latter days to do much good.  I know that He loves me.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Today was kinda crazy, so I'm glad I got to start the day out with a chiropractor treatment.  My back had been a bit uncomfortable.  The last week for me in the office had been quite relaxed.  But then today came around and sucker punched me right int he schnauzer.   Elder Ordoñez came into the office, again.  He's a new punk missionary that we have to burn all the time to keep him in his place.  Poor Elder Jensen is his companion.  So then we were chilling and all the sudden an elder and 2 sisters from the Huancayo Mission called and were like, "We just got back fro migrations and are gonna stay the night here."  The area forgot to tell Elder Wilcox, so we were all al little surprised and unprepared.  So we did what anyone would do in that position and went to McDonald's for lunch.  We got back and I had to scan 70 receipts one by one to document them for caja chica.  Then I got an email notifying me that President didn't sign off on the credit card reports, so his and our cards got suspended until Thursday so he came in to sign off.  While he was there, he told Elder Tenney that that Sunday was his last day.  He also told me that the area was going to come audit my work for a day or two here in a couple of weeks.  Basically they're going to tear me apart and tell me everything that I do wrong. 🙃  Kinda necessary, but still.  Then the water dude in the mission came and slapped a fat 4774 PEN bill on my desk for all the water he delivered this month (he's actually a real nice dude).  But yeah, crap went down today.  Elder Tenney and I went and took Marlene to a NDH with la familia Ortiz.  It was a disaster really.  It was a crazy night for the young family to say the least.  We were unprepared for the lesson, but I pulled a milagro out of thin air.  We asked Marlene if she liked it after and she got excited and said she did and told us all the stuff she learned.

Tuesday
I know that Jesus made the earth.  Someone once taught me that the 3 pillars of The Plan of Salvation were the creation, the fall, and the atonement.  So while right now I can't tell why the creation is a pillar, I'm striving to understand it better.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
I woke up this morning and was super dizzy.  Like, I couldn't walk straight.  I still got ready though.  But then my stomach started to hurt.  Elder Armstrong came into my office and said that we had to go run an errand and also mentioned that his stomach was hurting him.  I was like, "I wasn't going to say anything but mine is too."  So we took some pills and hopped in a taxi.  When we got back, he bolted from the taxi and threw up in the grass.  I followed suit about an hour later in my office.  Elder Cordova stopped by for a minute.  Consuelo, Bruce and Andres all got baptized on Saturday.

There was an MTC attack that day and they made the MTC elders baptize them. jajaja  Elder Cordova was telling me about how much Consuelo has changed.  For example, she goes to church on time on her own now.  When I was there, she said she'd never go alone--only if Anabel took her.  And I guess she's best friends with the Bishop's daughter now.  Crazy stuff.  (I just had to take a 15 minute because ese pedo salio con challa.  That was unpleasant.)  Anyways, I was so nauseous that I couldn't really work.  I got to the point where I felt as if I night vomit again when 2 Hermanas walked into my office.  It was dangerous, but I didn't throw up until 10 minutes after they left.  Elder Tenney got back from a meeting and I went upstairs to nap on the hidden couch.  I didn't have a whole lot of success since A) it was a tiny couch and B) Elder Pardo talks and laughs really loud.  Which reminds me--yesterday at McDonald's we told him that we'd buy him ice cream if he could go 5 minutes without talking.  I legit didn't think he could do it.  That 1 minute mark hit and he still hadn't spoken, so I sent out a few texts.  Long story short, he got his ice cream.  But he also got 8 or so calls from zone leaders over the next half hour asking how much a potato costs.  We all thought it was hilarious, but Elder Pardo wasn't feelin' it.  "I don't know, how much does your mom cost?!"  *Hangs up*  Any who, someone told the Amato's we were sick, so they showed up at the office at closing time.  They brought us homemade soup and other stuff too and drove us the whole 2 blocks back to our house, which was probably good since I threw up as soon as I got up the stairs.  It's awesome the love they have for us!

Wednesday
I know that Adam fell.  A lot of churches focus on only the negatives of the fall.  But I know that there are more positives than negatives.  Though the possibility of sin was introduced, the ability to learn and progress came.  Also, "Adam fell that men might be, and men are that they night have joy."  Because we could recognize the difference between right and wrong, we can also now distinguish between happiness and sadness.  I think about it this way: they were probably the happiest people in history, but couldn't recognize it because they'd never been sad before.  It's like every food in the world were chocolate cake.  Every time you ate it, you'd be eating something super nice, but you wouldn't know it since you'd never eaten something else.  And now we can be here too.  I know that the fall was necessary and that we can find God's blessings in it as well.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
I kind of had a restless night last night, due mostly to the fact that Elder Pardo and Elder Tenny were arguing with each other in their sleep at various points throughout the night.  They took sleep talking to a whole new level.  For example, the last one I heard (about 4 AM) I woke up because I heard Elder Pardo talking.  Then Elder Tenney said, "¡Callate Mongolo!" (Mongolo=sland for someone with Down's)  Then also said, "Oh, I missed you." *In a more sad voice*  "Did you miss me?"  Crazy night.  The other elders told me that the cita with Marcia didn't go all that well last night.  Turns out that she's a feminist and went on a rant and asked a million questions about how churches in general discredit women.  She needs Hermanas to teach her, not Elders.  Nothing too exciting happened in the office today.  La zona Vitarte came in for interviews.  When we went to dinner tonight, obispo (bishop) was making this big 'ole thingy outta bamboo and duct tape.  He said, "Elder White, I've got a question for ya."  I was just like, "Alright I guess."  He just walked up to me and rolled up my sleeve and slapped on a strip of duct tape.  He said something along the lines of, "How much hair is going to come off?"  So yeah.  Bishop goals.  Things are going well.  I've got the whole financial secretary thing basically down.  Sometimes I'll get a super sophisticated and formally complicated email.  I've learned that those are mainly informative, so I don't respond.  If it's something important though or if it's because someone wants money, they'll do some follow up.

Thursday
I know that we are here on Earth to be tried so that we can learn and grow.  I know that God loves us and if we follow his counsels while we're here, we'll be blessed while here on our mortal journey.  We'll mess up sometimes, but that's ok--Jesus just wants us to live his gospel.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen. 
I was trying to do some stuff to close caja chica today.  Francisco, my boss at the area office, had me call him and do a screen share so that he could help me better.  Not gonna lie, it was kinda just a 30 minute roast session while he was helping me through it.  Just when I thought I was getting good at my job. hehe  Today is Book of Mormon eve.  We kinda used up all of our hype juice last week for the series premier, so it was kinda hard to match that same hype level.  We went to go eat lasagna as a zone today, so that was pretty tasty.  On our way there, we were all walking in a group on the side of a quiet neighborhood street.  Then, out of no where, an old dude on a bike coming down the hill crashed into Elder Tenney, who had been looking at some dogs to the side of the road.  No one was hurt, well, the old man's pride was.  He was pretty mad, even though it was totally his fault.  "Obey the laws!  You're in Peru now!"  While we were out proselyting, Hermana Amato called me to make sure I was feeling better.  That was super thoughtful of her.  I sure do love the Amato's.  We had another cita with Ciara today.  We finally got her to accept a baptismal date for October 12th, but we're cautiously optimistic.  Then we were walking along and saw a woman (Mayte) out front of her house, whom the Hermana's from Mayorazgo had passed to us as a reference.  She was super cool.  She loves the church and has wanted to get baptized for years, but couldn't because her Testigo husband wouldn't let her.  Then we were like, "The policy changed.  You don't need your husband's permiso to get baptized."  She got really excited and invited us upstairs.  She's ready to get baptized, there's just one problem--she can't come to church because she's studying at the university.  She'll rearrange some things though.  The spirit was really strong the entire time that we were testifying to her.  She's 32 and has 3 kids with her husband.  She left him for 3 months and recently moved back in.  She was super nervous the whole time because she said her husband could walk in any moment.  Then he did, and she got super scared and tense.  We handled it well though.  And he did too.  He didn't get mad and seemed almost fine with it.  Super crazy and awesome milagro!

Friday
15 months.  Time is flying.  I know that Jesus Christ came to Earth to suffer and die for our sins.  This is the greatest showing of love ever, and nothing will ever top it.  The price has already been paid for each and everyone of our sins--all we have to do is repent.  He wants us to use this marvelous gift that he has bestowed upon us.  When he was in the Garden of Gethsemane, He suffered not just for our sins, but also for all of our pains and sicknesses and stuff too.  We can find peace in Christ when we are going through a hard time and pray to Him, because He knows that trial as perfectly well, better even, than we do.  I know that it is an infinite atonement.  I know that Jesus Christ is my Savior, Redeemer and older brother.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
I've had a solid case of enfermtitis (sickness) this week.  Tuesday was the ugly start.  Then there were some in between days where I was mostly ok, but still wasn't 100%.  Then today I felt like poop cheese again.  But I worked like normal and didn't throw up though at least.  The Book of Mormon video was super cool beans.  I was refreshing that page every 2 1/2 minutes trying to find it.  1 Nephi 3-5 is just so iconic.  There were probably about 50 missionaries wandering around the office today.  A zone was there for interviews with President and the other half had their companions all go to Miraflores for migrations.  Kinda crazy, but I didn't even have almost anything to do in the office.  We went to a member's house for lunch, but I was only able to eat half a burger unfortunately.  My time spent proselyting today was mainly just following Elder Tenney and Elder Wilcox, and trying not to die while still contacting a person here and there.  The Lindstroms invited us over to their home for a brief visit to eat ice cream and brownies.  You'd better believe I ate all that.  It was my motivation to keep walking throughout the night.  There's a lot of people in my area that know a decent amount of English.  For example, we were contacting when this Mexican looking dude with a bandana drove by in his old taxi and yelled, "S'up bros!"  Yesterday we asked Mayte how old one of her kids were and she said, "Sebastian, cuanto años tieres?  Sube las escaleras or so help me I swear.  (Sebastian, how old are you?  Go up the stairs or so help me I swear.)"  She was really funny about it.  I said guden nacht to some Germans tonight, but they didn't respond back.

A meme I made when I had some extra time on my hands.

Week 4 in the Office

Hade

Guys. It rained last night. Like, actually rained. And it did so for more than 2 hours. That kind of stuff doesn't happen here. We got caught in it while walking home, but we rather enjoyed it.

All the Peruvians freaked out though. They don't know how to handle it. For example, an hour into the rain, our building landlord lady cut off all the water for some reason. I'm not quite sure what her reasoning on that was jajaja. This was a pretty good week. We worked hard and were able to see the fruits of our labors. I was able to start the week off by going back so see one of my investigators get baptized in Manchay. It was actually the granddaughter of another lady that I was able to baptize named Lourdes. That was super nice for me to see, especially since I had to leave that area kinda quick. There's 3 more investigators there that I was teaching that'll get baptized tonight, but I don't know if I'll be able to go. In Covima we've been helping a lot of people get to know the gospel. In my companionship, we recently picked up a new investigator named Marlene. She's an antigua investigadora (former investigator) from back when the hermanas were here. She had always rejected our phone calls, but then we called again to see how she was doing. She was going through a tough time and decided to answer the phone for us. She was humbled and we were able to go to her house to teach her. We were talking about the gospel and then got to baptism. She kinda told us directly that she wasn't looking to get baptized and wasn't ready yet and stuff and had told the hermanas the same thing. But at that time the spirit inspired me with how to talk to her in a way of how she would come to see why baptism was necessary and how it would help her. So with the spirit leading the way, I was able to explain to her why baptism was necessary if she truly wanted Jesus' help. Not gonna lie, we were all surprised when she accepted a fecha for the 19th of October. I guess she was just the kind of person that needed some diligent missionaries to help her. She is a very cool person that we're excited to work with and help. I'm thankful for the chance that I have to be here as the Lord's representative on his errand. Have a good week!

-Elder White

Saturday
I know that the gospel blesses families.  Basically anyone you come across anywhere in the world will say that their family is the thing that matters most to them if you were to ask them.  This is all according to God's plan.  I believe that we're here in families because before coming here, we lived with God in his family.  Family is just one of the most basic eternal concepts.  When we apply the gospel in our families, learn together, and love each other, we will be blessed with a plenitude of the blessings that God has for us such as unity, happiness and tranquility.  I cite the hymns God Gave Us Families, Families Can Be Together Forever and Love at Home.  I know that I can live together forever with my family.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
We got up early this morning to go play soccer against the zone leaders from Mayorazgo.  It was 4 vs 3, but it was still fun.  Then they left and somehow Elder Armstrong and I beat the others by a lot in a crazy 2 vs 3 match.  Pday was pretty normal after that.  We had our weekly office Risk match.  My team managed to pull off the W this time.  We had an insane amount of luck rolling the dice.  Elder Tenney and I have to share a computer and be kinda took his time talking to his family.  It was fine though; I just passed time watching Spirit and some other movie I forgot.  Instead of getting 3 pizzas for S/40, the guys all wanted to go get all you can eat sushi for S/45 each instead.

 I wasn't too excited to be eating sushi in Peru, but I was pleasantly surprised.  It was really good.  They even had a tequeño roll.  The wings were super tasty and crispy.  But the crown jewel was the deep fried ice cream roll.  It's the only place in Peru I've seen with unlimited free refills.  I definitely ate my money's worth.  I'd love to go there with my dad in the future.  We were going to go have a cita with Milena tonight and then take her to a stake activity after, but she sorta disappeared on us.  I don't know why the missionaries had to be at this activity, but it was cool.  It was like a music talent show thing.  There was a 9 year old that started taking piano lessons in February, but is basically a prodigy.  Super complex songs memorized without messing up.  Oswaldo from Almeda for some reason randomly wandered in, so it was good to run into him.

Sunday
I know that the prophets are God's voice on Earth.  Since we can't communicate directly with God, so he gave us prophets to guide our families and us as individuals as well because He loves us and wants us to know how to return to him. While God doesn't change, the world and it's difficulties/temptations do.  Due to this, He has given us prophets in every dispensation.  Throughout the history of the world, there have been several mini apostasies with prophets to restore the Lord's church.  I feel so incredibly blessed to live in a time where we have modern prophets to lead and guide us.  I know that if we follow them, we will be blessed and everything will turn out ok.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Important Peruvian slang: Tiene la pepa--he is good looking.  El es un churro--like pepa, but it's basically the complete package.  This morning I went back to Manchay bright and early to see Hade's baptism.  It was really nice to go back since I got taken out the way I did.  I took Elder Pardo with me, which was cool for him since that's where he was serving a year ago.  Hade got really excited and ran up and gave me a hug when she saw me.  I was kinda sad that I couldn't hug her back.  It was good to see her family again too.  It was a very nice service and the spirit was definitely there.

I want a daughter like her.  Elena called me and told me she'd be there.  It turns out that Elena and Lourdes are cousins.  Elena was there in her husband's taxi.  They drove us down to Musa and we were able to talk a bit.  Elder Pardo and I made it back on time for 10:00 church with 1 minute to spare.  Milena wouldn't answer her phone so she wasn't there, but we did get an antiguio investigator named Marcia there, so that was an unexpected blessing.  For lunch we went to go eat at a pituco family's house, so that was cool.  While we were doing weekly planning, a group of adult gringos passed by and dropped off a package for a missionary.  Their countenances screamed "American".  Simply said, we can now see why the rest of the world might not like us a whole lot not that they did anything morally wrong.  Just different cultures.  Marcia went to the Face2Face even with Elder Soares, so that was cool.  We ran into Milena in the street.  We were all baffled that someone that was so escogido seems to have pulled a 180 degree turn on us.

Monday
One thing that every single prophet did was testify of Jesus Christ.  His ministry upon the Earth was the single most important thing to ever happen.  There's no denying that he existed.  To me, it's beyond all doubt.  I know that Christ is the Son of God.  I know that He loves us.  What I've come to really respect about Him is that he's very relatable to us.  Before the mission, I thought he was very much 100% God form here.  But he had the veil.  He suffered temptations.  He did a lot of the same things we do.  Just as other prophets had restored the church before, Christ also established his gospel and church with 4 main pillars:  Him as the prophet, he called 12 apostles to aid him, he had revelation on how to do it, and he had authority to end his earthly ministry.  I know that Christ died and paid the price for all of our sins.  I also know that he resurrected on the 3rd day, opening the grave for everyone.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.  Today was the day I designated for the mission to take out money.  I received phone calls from just about every zone leader with questions.   You wanna know how many of them were legitimate things to call me about?  Probably 2.  But that's whatever.  We had our weekly office meeting this week.  President announced that they're close La Caratera Central from Ceres until San Gregorio for 4 years for the subway.  No big deal, just closing up THE BUSIEST ROAD in the mission.  It's definitely gonna make some of these ward and stake divisions happen a little more pronto than planned.  After the meeting, President and I sat down together and signed paperwork for 45 minutes.  He said, "I haven't had to sign stuff like this in a while."  Yeah, well, it's probably because Elder Rushforth was the last financial secretary that had ya sign stuff.  It was basically all the paperwork from Elder Wall and Elder Tenney.  There were many high fives when it was finished.  They dropped another super cool behind the scenes for the Book of Mormon videos.  The office hype levels for it are through roof.  I'm more excited for this than I am for Star Wars 9.  We did a NDH with a new member family that just moved in.  Super pituco.  I did the Book of Mormon and airplane lesson.  Success.  They gave us Papa Johns after.  The dad, Victor, is a film maker.  There was an argument between the 4 other Elders about how to handle references.  I stayed out of it, but still lost the spirit.  It's interesting: sometimes you don't realize that you have the spirit with you until you lose it.

Tuesday
I know that after Christ ascended into heaven, and the apostles had been martyred, the world was left in apostasy.  The church was taken from Earth.  I like to compare what happened with this example: A work place (or school) one day has the boss and all his assistants walkout.  What do the employees do?  Some might try and do their best to keep working.  Some might quit.  And them some might try to take charge or try and make their own business.  That's exactly what the people did.  I know that without those 4 pillars, there is no church.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
We had a district counsel this morning.  It was pretty good actually.  Hermana Gordon is the English specialist in the zone, so each week we'll be getting an Australian English lesson.  That's pretty hype.  Elder Pardo gave a real solid training of attitude is aptitude today.  For lunch we went to go eat pizza at Pizza Raul's.  It wasn't all that bad actually, but it did take them a while to make our food.  Office work was kinda frustrating.  I was trying to submit some stuff so that we'd be able to make online payments to some landlords, but each time I did, I'd get a notification that something with what I had sent was wrong.  Why couldn't they have just sent me an email explaining everything that was wrong instead of one by one?  Then some zone leaders came to the office right as we were gonna leave to proselyte and took an hour filling out paper work.  But that's whatever.  We decided to do a companionship fast today.  While we were out and about we ran into a young Venezuelan mom named Nataly.  Her and her husband got sealed in the temple in Venezuela, but have since stopped coming to church because she felt as if she had sinned too much.  We talked her through it and she said she'd go on Sunday.  We all felt real good walking out of that one.  Then we had a cita with Marcia.  She was super cool, but the other Elders weren't in a hurry to put a fecha on her.  We read from 3 Nephi 11 with her which she really enjoyed the spirit of.  It's interesting: a lot of the learning I do as a missionary is while I'm teaching.  For example, Marcia said she was a little skeptic of the Book of Mormon.  I told her God's ways aren't mans ways.  When something is true, we're gonna feel it more than think it.  And God won't give us feelings if something isn't true, so we can really trust our feelings in religious things.

Wednesday
I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet called of God.  I know that he restored His church upon the Earth.  I know that by the gift and Power of God he was able to translate the Book of Mormon.  Any missionary will tell you that the most powerful part of any lesson is almost always when we recount the first vision.  I know that the boy Joseph saw God the Father and His son Jesus Christ.  Knowing this brings me true peace and happiness.  Everything rests upon those truths.  I testify that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is His restored truth.  If you lack this knowledge, consult James 1:5-6.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Office work was pretty boring today.  There wasn't a whole lot for me to do.  What do I do when I'm bored?  I don't know yet, that's the rough part.  We'll get something figured out though for me.  The other Elders went to McDonald's and got a burger for me.  Pretty solid way to end a fast if you ask me.  Awkward moment of the day: Elder Tenney and I had to accompany Elder Armstrong to the clinic with a Hermana that I know so that she could pick up stuff to take samples of her poop.  It's ok though because Elder Tenney and I just stood in the back and talked about how funny Elder Myers was with his poop samples.  We hadn't been out contacting very long when I had an encounter with a "Christian" lady that had read into quite a bit of anti Mormon doctrine.  She presented somethings (some true, some false), so I told her not believe everything she reads on the internet.  Then she said how fallen angels would deceive men into preaching false gospels and how Moroni was the fallen angel and how everything in the Book of Mormon is a lie and false gospel from the Devil.  So I asked her, "Hermana, what's the gospel?"  She hesitated a little and then said, lacking 100% confidence, "The word of God."  "It's faith, repentance, baptism, the Holy Ghost and endure to the end."  "Well the Book of Mormon is of the Devil!"  So I replied, "I'm gonna read you a verse and afterwards I want you to look me in the eye and tell me it's from Satan," and broke out 2 Nephi 25:26 on her.  "Joseph Smith was a free Mason!"  "What does th--"  "They even put the triangle with an eye on it on his grave!"  "You're not listening.  I'm gonna leave."  Darn lady didn't even know the difference between Free Masons and Illuminati.  Elder Wilcox had a similar thing happen, so we recognized Satan trying to stop us; something great was gonna happen.  We took out 5 citas.

Thursday
It's the Book of Mormon video eve!  The hype is unreal!  If this episode were released one day earlier for every time that we've watched the trailer or mentioned it, the series would've come out before any of us even left to the mission field.  I know that the Book of Mormon is true.  I know that it contains the word of God.  It has His pure ever lasting gospel.  I know that if I can read it every day, my testimony will never falter.  Since the Book of Mormon is true, it's all true.  I've had too many personal experiences and testimonies given to me for me to ever deny it.  Complete with Moroni's promise; you can do it more than once.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
President was in the office doing interviews today.  He told us how Hermana Amato recently took up playing the piano.  Yesterday she was home practicing some hymns when there was a knock at the door.  She opened the door only to discover Elder Gong from the quorum of the 12 apostles.  He said, "Hello.  I was walking by and I  heard some hymns and got curious.  I'm Elder Gong," and shook her hand.  He said she was shaking all over.  Elder Gong made a quiet trip to Lima to meet with the Area and to meet with the JAS as well. None of us missionaries got to see him.  But as I mentioned earlier, La Molina came in for interviews.  I had always enjoyed talking to the office Elders.  But now that I work here, it's kind of hard when a zone comes in for interviews.  I have a hard time getting all my work done.  Today we had a cita with Ciara, the 12 year old niece of Gustavo and Andrea (Cr's).  She's been going to church and the activities for a while.  She accepted baptism, but she wasn't totally confident about accepting a fecha.  I think she'll feel better about it the next time that we go to visit though.  Today we also went to go visit President Delgoda and his family since they live in our ward.  We also had a brief correlations meeting.  To end the night off, we went to go visit a 78 year old woman that Elder Wilcox had contacted, saying she was super escogida.  She wasn't.  When I asked her who else lived with her she got defensive and wanted to know why I wanted to know.  That was a very unPeruvian thing to do.  Elder Muniz ended his mission today so Elder Wilcox took him to the airport.

Friday
Elder Tenney walks in without shirt after a shower.  I make comment.  "It's so I remember to put on deodorant."  I make comment about deodorant.  "Well you try not wearing it for a day and we'll see how you smell."  "Jokes on you because I haven't worn that stuff since I was 12."  *Elder Tenney stares at Elder White in surprise as Elder White turns and winks at the invisible camera.*  Change of topic.  I know that the priesthood is God's power given to men on Earth.  I know that I am a worthy holder of that priesthood and that God is pleased with me.  I know that John the Baptist and Peter, James and John restored the priesthood to Joseph Smith and that it was passed along to me.  I know that we are the only church in the world with God's authority.  I know that if we use the priesthood in the way the spirit makes known to us, we will work many miracles and be a force for good.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Today was Elder Armstrong's birthday, so I helped Elder Pardo make breakfast in bed for him.  We got to the office and you already know we were looking for that Book of Mormon video.  But it wasn't there despite my constant page refreshes.  "And it came to pass that in the end of the fourth week of Elder White in the financial seat, a cry was heard throughout the office; for behold, Elder White finally found the video.  And there was much rejoicing in the land round about."  However, due to complications with there being a zone there for interviews, we couldn't watch it immediately even though I had my popcorn ready.  Ya know, the video was ok.  Not overly exciting, but not too boring either.  For me it really helped me to understand their family situation, and the faith they put in Lehi, a lot better.  We went to Domino's to celebrate Elder Armstrong's birthday.  Tonight we had a cita with Marlene, an investigator that lost interest between the Hermana/Office Elders transition.  She said that she's been struggling recently (mainly because she broke up with her boyfriend).  That's why she finally answered our call.  She's 29.  The cita went really well.  Elder Wilcox was talking about baptism and she made it known she wasn't really looking to do that.  So I made a contrast analogy.  I asked if she wanted Jesus's blessings.  (Yes.)  I explained how baptism was like a contract because you can't get all those blessings until after you sign.  She surprised us all by accepting a date for October 19.  Powerful lesson.  Juana made pancakes and a cake for dinner.  Yum.

 A meme Elder Tenney made me that shows the challenges of being the Financial Secretary.

Week 3 in the Office

Saturday
I know that the gospel of Jesus Christ is the only thing in the world that bring true, lasting happiness unto the children of men.  The gospel changes us.  I didn't really understand that before the mission, but now I  know that that's why I'm here--to invite others to come unto Christ by teaching His restored gospel.  I've seen the changes wrought in the lives of others, and the reason why missionaries are such happy people is because we get to watch these changes.  I know that God loves us that that's why we have this gospel.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
So I was feeling bad about not being the one to teach Shirely.  Not because I don't trust the Hermanas or because I want glory for myself, but because I was bummed that I wouldn't be there along the way to take part in that joy.  But then Elder Wilcox said to me, "You'll see her again in heaven and her and her posterity/ancestors will thank you for introducing her to the church."  That was comforting to me.  This morning we all got up at 5 AM and drove up to Musa to play soccer against La Molina.  Everyone in the office has matching jerseys, everyone except me...hopefully we can get that fixed soon.  We had a good soccer match, but we lost unfortunately.  Leider.  Ich esse ein Apfel.  Guten morgen Schwien.  Bis spater. (Unfortunately.  I eat an apple.  Good morning pig.  See you later.)  Other than that stuff, Pday was pretty boring.  We just stayed in the office all day long.  We emailed our families, watched several movies like WiFi Ralph and Emperor's New Groove, ordered Domino's for lunch, and yeah.  My parents asked me to Skype them so I did.  Their connection was kinda bad though, so I really just talked with Jaxon for a while.  We played Risk, but I didn't last until my 2nd turn unfortunately because I was super spread out.  It was my turn to stay behind with Elder Sanches.  We basically just stayed in the office and watched President Nelson's birthday celebration.  We kinda freaked out when some people came and were pushing the doorbell at 8:45.  But it turned out that it was just some missionaries dropping off Elder Burley so that President could come pick him up.  I never really got the chance to know him, but he was a jokester and a good missionary.

Sunday
Transfer Sunday!  Judgement day came early and sneak attacked me so my judgement got postponed for a while.  The day wasn't overly exciting though.  Today I want to testify that it is by faith that miracles are worked.  Exercising faith wasn't something that I understood super well before the mission.  But then I got here and learned how to better use and apply my faith.  Now I know that if we act with faith, truly believing and putting our whole trust  in God, we will see blessings and miracles.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
We had a good day at church this morning.  Things were going swimmingly until the ex area 70/mission president (a different one from the one we visited) started openly taking shots at the missionaries in front of the members and investigators during Sunday school.  The teacher asked us (the missionaries) "What's an example of something good vs something excellent as a missionary?"  So I responded, "Well, it's good to read the Book of Mormon, but it's better to go out and proselyte to find people to teach."  Then the dude, seated in another part of the room spoke up.  "It's good to proselyte, but it's better to talk to everyone when you're in the street.  For example, a few months ago, I had the reference for the Elders in Santa Felicia (which were the assistants that that time, mind you) about a young couple.  I happened across them in the street and said hi to test them and see what they'd do.  They said hi back and kept walking.  Since they didn't stop to talk I determined they were bad missionaries and didn't give them the reference.  Because of them, the couple never joined the church and are now in other things.  A good missionary talks to everybody."  Needless to say, we were all pretty triggered after that.  It's ok though because we got to go to the family Suarez's for lunch and ate away our worries with some super rico pabellon with arepa.  Venezuelan food is the best.  They even have a Venezuelan Cafe Rio green sauce.  Tasty beans.  And there were beans that tasted good too hehe.  It was Elder Pardo's birthday, so the family bought him a cake to celebrate.  As for us in the office, in order to celebrate we introduced him to the spanking machine.  We had a decent day of contacting.  We went to the family history center with Juan Pablo y Carmen.  Then we went to the office to get some stuff ready to go for cambios.

Monday
I know that repentance brings blessings.  But it's not a true repentance unless you change your ways.  I love that, in Spanish, the verbs "to repents" and "to regret" are translated to the same verb--arrepentirese.  When we truly repent of past transgressions, we'll never want to go back to those old ways.  To repent is to change--change your mind, heart actions, etc.  I love what President Nelson taught in General Conference: he said that repentance isn't a punishment.  It's a gift given to us by the grace and mercy of God.  It's something so important that Jesus Christ himself was sent to Earth to atone for the sins of all mankind so that we would have this ability to change and progress to be perfect just as he and his father are perfect.  For that reason, each time we repent, we should do so with a heart full of gratitude.  Paul wrote that to sin is to die.  Sin is what separates us from God.  One way that I like to look at it is that we die emotionally in a way.  When we sin, it doesn't feel good.  We feel weighed down, guilty, depressed, unsatisfied, etc.  But when we repent, those feelings are replaced with feelings of freedom, happiness, love, peace, etc.  And most importantly, we'll be worthy to receive the blessings of heaven.  God loves us and want us to repent.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
I spent a good chuck of my time this morning dedicated to making the bus schedule for cambios tomorrow.  There were 4 missionaries that arrived throughout the day.  (1 will be from the Lima MTC.)  We took one of the new guys, Elder Horton (he's cool because his name is McKay too), to McDonald's for lunch.  Oh how I miss American fast food.  Good stuff.  Elder Napier walked into my office today just to chat and saw that I was listening to a talk about enduring through and learning from challenges, and also that I had the new church suicide prevention video pulled up on a tab too.  So he joked around with me all day about it.  That was kinda funny since it was a total coincidence that I had those 2 together.  I spent the night with Elder Pardo, which mainly meant going on a shopping trip.  We were in Tottus and this 70 year old woman started talking to me about basketball.  Long story short, she was low key trying to recruit me for her trampoline basketball team that she does social media for while also trying to set me up with her basketball playing <30 year old daughter (neither of us were interested).  She ended by trying to kiss me goodbye.

Tuesday
Baptism is the gateway to heaven.  Baptism is a covenant that we must make with God if we want a place in the celestial kingdom.  A covenant is a two sided promise that we make with God.  I know that as we do our part--to always remember Him, obey His commandments, and to take His name upon ourselves--we can remain pure and worthy, and also receive a remission of our sins each time we take the sacrament.  I know that the gospel, especially this critical stop of baptism, will be the solution to any problem anyone  has in the world.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Well, Elder Rushforth went home yesterday.  He was a good friend of mine.  His flight got canceled though so he had to spend the day in a hotel hehe.  Today was the first day training for the new missionaries.  I mean, Elder Horton isn't really a new missionary since he was serving here before (Elder Madruga's group) and went home and served for a few months in Tennessee.  The best part of being a secretary is being able to go to all of these meeting and getting free breakfast/lunch all of the time.  When I was in Manchay, I had just started losing some weight that I had picked up in the mission.  Not that I was fat or anything, but now I'm probably in danger of it.  It's nearly impossible to serve in the office without gaining some weight, considerable weight at that.  I just asked Elder Tenney how much weight he's gained and he said that he hadn't put on a whole lot really.  So I said, "Yeah, me neither."  He was just like, "Dude.  You've been here for 2 weeks."  At the same time, from the other room Elder Armstrong shouted, "You've been here for 2 weeks!  You're gonna look like me!"  That man has put on some good weight since getting to know him in Vitarte.  Funny beans.  But really they're ironic beans since he's the health secretary hehe.  I remember when Elder Rushforth was the financial secretary for my first training.  Elder Yañez was helping him out. Nothing overly exciting happened the rest of the day.  Elder Sanchez got transferred to Huertos 2.  I just went to the office and paid some bills and stuff.  Then we left in our trio (Elders Wilcox and Tenney) to go out and proselyte.  We went go go visit a CR named Gustavo and help him set up some stuff for family history.

Wednesday
I know that the gift of the Holy Ghost exists.  It is a gift from God that we all receive after our baptism.  Just as necessary as it is to be baptized by water, it is equally as important to be baptized by fire (the Holy Ghost) because otherwise it is incomplete.  I know that as we are worthy, the spirit will inspire, guide and warn us.  It is a gift that God has given me, for the which I am eternally grateful.  Constantly having the spirit with you is why missionary work is so enjoyable--because that is true happiness.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
We had a district counsel this morning.  Other than that we got to eat some tasty cake, there's nothing to report there.  It was a typical day of working in the office.  There were some crazy people while we were out contacting.  There were these 2  old ladies I tried to contact that didn't have interest.  I walked past only to hear them start talking about "the Mormons".  I turned around and said, "Actually we're from the Church of Jesus Christ."  "Some Catholics."  "Um ok.  Well we're from the church of Jesus Christ.  Have a good day."  We crossed the street and were another 10 yards in front when we heard them loudly start gossiping about "the Mormons" again.  It reminded me of how yesterday there was this dude the size of two Elder Whites, about a little over 50 years old, that had headphones on.  He was shouting about how he likes the bible and church and stuff and believes in Jesus, but, oh man does he enjoy fornicating.  He was telling me about all the women he sleeps with as dozens of people walked by on the busiest street in our area.  There was another dude tonight that tried to contend, but stunk at it.  After explaining the Book of Mormon he said that those prophets were "desconocides (unknown)".  So we asked if he had read the book, "No."  After talking a bit more, he said, "My favorite book in the Bible is Songs of Solomon.  It's well written with good insights."  After saying that, I knew he was crazy.  We had a cita tonight with a girl named Milena.  She's 19 and has got a 5 year old daughter that lives in Trujillo with her mom.  Milena lives here along with her sister.  She just ended her relationship with Valenina's (her daughter's) father.  It was a really toxic situation that left her emotionally damaged with little self love.  She's super escogida and accepted a fecha for October 12th.  I'm excited to see how the gospel and the church will help her.

Thursday
 Enduring to the end is just as important as the first 4 steps of the gospel.  If you spend years saving up money to buy a car and total it a few days later, all those years of work and saving would have amounted to nothing.  Similarly, if we choose to live the gospel and obey the commandments for only a given amount of time, our past selves can't really save us.  The Lord's gospel is a gospel of action.  It isn't something where we sit on the sidelines.  We need to read the Book of Mormon, pray, go to the church/temple, serve others, etc.  If we don't do these things regularly, than our faith is dead.  I know that if we endure to the end, we will have eternal life.  We will have happier, more successful, and more peaceful lives if we can do these things.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Last night we had a few missionaries stay the night with us so that their companions could go to migrations at "before I want to get up" AM.  Elder Pierce was one of them.  He's training Elder Jeffries and white washed Alameda.  He's pretty funny in the way that he uses a lot of slang when talking.  Also, he has a thing with his friends where they slap each other in the face all the time.  So just watch out.  He's a super good and obedient dude though.  Well, I got to the office this morning only to discover that all of my "office" apps like Outlook, Excel, Word, etc were broken and wouldn't open.  That kinda extremely limited my ability to work.  I was able to file a couple of receipts, but that was it.  From 11-4, almost all my efforts were focused on fixing it.  I tried repairing them, downloading stuff and looking up tutorials.  I even did this one thing where I started typing in codes to my computer like a hacker.  But none of it worked.  At 4, I made some phone calls and got directed to church tech support in Salt Lake City.  We got a professional hacker to help me out.  You know what they say: If you can't hack your computer yourself, call a dude in an office on the other side of the world to do it for you. He took complete control of it and fixed it.  Where ever you are Zach, thank you.  This week was semana de in farto (heart attacke week) in Dominos.  3 large pizzas for s/39.90.  We definitely aprovechared (took advantage) that deal to the max.  We had an amazing night of contacting with lots of animos, citas taken and contacts made.

Friday
God is our loving Heavenly Father.  I know that we are literally His children and that He loves us with a pure, perfect love.  If you have any doubt of this, all you need to do is pray on your knees vocally with a lot of faith.  This is how I came to know of His love for me.  I know that anyone who does the same will be able to feel at least a portion of this amazing love for each and every one of us.  I testify that there aren't exceptions for this love and that He wants more than anything to bless us and for us to return to live with Him again.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.
Today was Friday the 13th.  Nothing too overly sketch happened though.  I drew the short straw and had to go with Elder Pardo to set up stuff for trunky training.  It was pretty boring really.  The weirdest part though was that all the hermanas from my group and from the group after me were there.  What I did though was just hang out with all the missionaries that had to be there waiting for the companions.  There's a semi-new Hermana from Canada named Hermana Stephan, so I definitely had to aprovechar (take advantage of) that opportunity to ask about Canadian stereotypes since I had never met a Canadian before.  I don't know if you can even call her a Canadian though because she doesn't like maple syrup nor does she have a pet polar bear.  She does play hockey though.  Elder Pardo and I had to go to Tottus to pick up chicken for lunch.  You get a lot of weird looks if you have 12 whole chickens and 16 boxes of french fries in your cart, just FYI.  To everyone that asked, I just said, "What can I say?  We love chicken."  It was kind of a lie though because even though I ate my medio pollo (half chicken) with half a box of french fries, (which I was really proud of), I don't know if I ever want to eat chicken again.  Hermana Black was there and casually mentioned that their landlord is kicking them out, so now I've got that problem to deal with.  Contacting today wasn't quite like yesterday.  I kinda realized that I'm the 3rd wheel in this tri-companionship.  It's not that I'm mistreated so much as that I'm left out.  For example, if one of them is talking or telling a story and the other goes to make a contact, they'll wait till the contact is over to continue talking.  They don't wait for me when I contact though.  I know that I'm an introvert and I'm not amazing at carrying a conversation, but I don't feel like they try to talk to me a whole lot.

 Me next to the giant stack of paperwork I need President to sign.

 A fancy restaurant we went to. I wasn't too overly excited about eating a rich person salad...

...but the crepes were good at least.

Week 2 in the Office

Juan Pablo y Carmen

We had a pretty good week this week. Last Saturday we were able to have the baptisms of two of our investigators, Juan Pablo and Carmen. It was a nice service that we had for them. The spirit was strong. I always enjoy feeling the spirit that accompanies us every time we have a baptism. The work is going well in Covima. We're just looking for some people to teach right now. I've been adjusting to the office life here. I like it. I feel like there's a lot of blessings that come from fulfilling all of the responsibilities that the Lord has given us. I feel like as we are able to recognize this, we will be more willing to do what He has asked of us. Be obedient to God and keep the commandments and we'll see blessings. That's the biggest thing I've learned this week.  In the Book of Mormon it says a ton of times that if we keep the commandments the Lord will help us and will be on our side. But if we don't keep His commandments, we have no such promise. So it's better to be obedient! Have a good week!

-Elder White

Saturday
Baptism is the gateway to heaven.  It's also the gateway to our blessings here on earth.  If someone's living a life without baptism, then God isn't able to bless them like he wants and they're not living to their full potential of happiness.  I know that when you're baptized you sins are washed away and can begin to truly live the kind of life God wants you to live. Repentance without baptism is like washing a shirt without soap, only water; it doesn't benefit you much.  This morning Elder and Hermana Lindstrom, the self-reliance missionaries assigned to our mission, invited the 5 office elders over for a district breakfast.)  The assistants are assigned to La Molina, La Molina and we're assigned to Covima, Mayorazgo.)  They made scrambled eggs and French toast, so that was pretty tasty.  From there we went back tot he office and hung out there almost all of our p-day.  We watched a lot of movies.  We also played a 3 vs 3 game of Risk.  It was fun.  Elder Tenney got dealt a pretty good hand and was dominating the game.  Elder Leite was on my team (Elder Napier too).  He got to be pretty salty that we were losing.  Someone reminded him how he lost last week too despite having a huge advantage.  He said, "My teammates were playing and thinking like little girls!"  *Elder Tenney laughs.*  "Hey shut up, you were one of them."  That was pretty funny.  The sushi place was closed, so my wallet was saved.  Instead, Elder Pardo and I went to Big Chicken and got food there.  Throughout the day I got a lot of random phone calls from zone leaders with questions about taking out money.  They were mainly common sense questions I feel like.  It got to be kinda boring just sitting around the office all day.  I opened up excel and watched some tutorial videos and started to make a Fantasy Missionaries thing (Like Fantasy Football), but then decided that that probably wouldn't be such a great idea and deleted it.  We went to the park and played 2 hand touch football.  While that was fun, it probably wasn't the best thing to do while fasting.  Our ward had the 4 baptisms tonight with Juan Pablo and Carmen from our part.  It was a really nice service.  President Amaato went with his family.

So dude named Andre called me before hand and asked if I could talk while the others were changing.  Then at the start of the meeting, he said, "Our first message will be by Elder White and the 2nd by President Amato."  We both were kinda surprised, but, ya know, YOLO.  Elder Hales and ELder Rineon were there.  Hermana Amato shook Elder Hale's hand and was like, "Wow, you're freezing!  President, give him your coat."  So Presdient gave him his suit coat and made himtake it home with him.  He wasn't even cold hahaha.

The office Elders

Sunday

I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet called of God.  I know that God the Father and His Son, Jesus Christ, appeared to him when he was 14.  I know that the spirit testifies to us strongly when we recant the first vision because God wants us to know that it's true.  Because if that and the Book of Mormon are true, its all true.  Today we went to church.  We tried to go pick up a dude in our taxi, but we couldn't find him.  Covima is a pretty cool ward.  All of the other wards around it have grown out of it.  A year ago was the last split, and the ward was left with only 80 members.  But today the attendance was 142.  I'm not quite sure how since from January-June the Hermanas baptized 3 and the office Elders have baptized 7 since July now.  But that's cool.  The ward used to be called Santa Patricia when I first got here, but the name change has left some of the members a little salty.  One of the things that I noticed was that there was a respectable umber of old people there.  That's something that I've never seen in Peru before.  The only downside of that is that one of them had a broken hearing aid that would occasionally let out a high frequency beep that all the kids and only a few of us Elders could hear.  Everyone got confirmed ok and Juan Pablo even got ordained as a priest afterwards too.  We went to go eat lunch with Obispo Dipaz after.  His brother is the Dipaz in Manchay.  In church he seemed kinda cold and serious.  But in his home he was super sacrastic and funny.  He was teaching us all sorts of slang.  For example, calling someone a carrot is like calling them a fool.  The dog was barking so his wife said, "Shut up dog!" and he responded by saying, "Hey, you can't talk about Elder Tenney like that."  He calls us whities and him and his wife call each other cholo.  So that was a fun lunch.  His mother-in-law is our pensionista.  We had a full day of contacting. 

Monday

I testify that Jesus is the Christ.  I know that He loves us.  I know that through his atonement, everyone can repent and be saved.  I know that he is the son of God and that he directs the church, His church.  I know that because of His sacrifice, I and everyone else, can become as Him: a perfect being.  He is my savior and I love him.  My number 1 priority is to please Him.  It is him that I am serving as a missionary.  In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Well, Elder Tenney talks frequently in his sleep.  He doesn't just talk though; he straight up trolls me.  Last night I woke up to him talking and was gonna fall back asleep when he said, "Wait."  I looked over at him kind of confused, but he was asleep.  I was about to sleep again when he said, "Hold on a sec."  But he was still sleeping without moving at all.  I made a 30 sec effort to stay awake in case something supernatural happened, but nothing did.  Today was P-day for everyone else, but not for us, which was super weird.  There's a chiropractor that we hire to come to the office every Monday morning for an hour so that everyone in the mission that needs it can go.  All the guys in teh office got me to go get a 3 min session with him.  Elder Peterson was there because his companion has a bad back.  The two of us walked out right as President walked in the front door.  Elder Peterson told him that we had just been in there and that it felt good.  So President said something along the lines of, "Oh man, I want a turn!" and went in and plopped himself on the dude's table.  That was pretty funny.  Every Monday there's a meeting with all the office Elders, the assistants and President and Sister Amato.  One of the things that President brought up was that the area was doing something with the transfers and long story short, we're all going home a week earlier.  Then they started talking about departure plans, which was kinda weird.  Hermana Amato said, "Les avisamos (We will let you know)," because Elders Napier, Armstrong, Wilcox and I (as well as 12 more or so) have the same release date as them.  The office and assistants teamed up for lunch and the waiter ripped us off by selling us an extra churrasco.  Elder Sanchez had surgery and is on 30 days rest, so he's with us in the office.  Elder Tenney and I had a good night of contacting.  We put the goal of visiting 1 member/day, but it looked as though we wouldn't be able to day.  But then we were blessed to run into a member that we were then able to visit right at the end of the night.

Tuesday

I know that the Book of Mormon is the word of God.  I know that it contains the fullness of the gospel.  By reading and studying it daily, we will gain a true conversion unto Christ and we will not falter.  I know that Joseph Smith translated it by the Gift and Power of God.  I know that it's true.  I have received revelations from the Book of Mormon many times.  I know that it's the keystone of our religion.  And because it is, everything else is true as well.  That's how God talks to us.  In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Well, this morning I showed the other Elders the video of me running and jumping into a locker.  That was pretty funny.  I had a productive day working this morning.  For lunch we went to the 12 week training, which happened to be held in the Amato's home.  It was my first time there.  They have a tiny little dog.  I didn't know that they had a dog.  For lunch she made spaghetti with beef, which high key destroyed all of our white shirts.  Hermana Amato is kind of a big health fanatic.  She had a big 'ole bowl of big 'ole pieces of broccoli so I took 2 just to avoid being called out on it.  It's ok though because they had Root Beer and a tasty Brazilian dessert.  They did it there because there were only 3 people in the group.  Things are kind of crazy in the way that we only have 140 missionaries right now (we had 200 in May) and there's not a whole lot more scheduled to come in; just 5 or so at a time and they're almost all hermanas.  But yeah.  I went back to the office and did some work there.  I had some extra time at the end of the day before I could leave to proselyte, so I opened up a Duilingo account and started to learn some German.  Brot und wasser (bread and water)!  That's the only thing I really remember.  Elder Tenney made the claim that pollo a la brasa is the tastiest and most eaten dish in Peru, but I knew otherwise.  So we would ask people in contacts what they thought the best dishes in Peru were and not a single one said pollo a la brasa.  I rest my case.  It is tasty though, don't get me wrong.  We did another short member visit tonight.  What we do is go in, take a minute to introduce ourselves, explain Jesus isn't there right then but that we're his personal reps, ask "What would you ask of Jesus if he were here with us?" talk about that for a few minutes, say a good prayer for what they told us and then leave.  It works well.

Wednesday

Ich bin ein Mann (I am a man).  Ich trinke Wasser (I drink water).  Das Brot (The bread)!  Du bist ein Junge (You are a boy).  Nothing like a little German to start your day hehe.  Imma tell you a summarized story and the nits spiritual application.  When I was 14 or 15, I went scuba diving for the first time.  One of the things they teach you is that when your tank has 500 psi left, you have to tell your guide so that  you can start making preparation to go back up, and the guide would ask occasionally how you were doing on air.  I was new, so I used more air than the rest of the group.  We were swimming along and got to a big, cool, underwater arch.  He showed that we were going to go through it, bu then asked us how we were doing on air.  I looked at my gauge and saw that I had just under 500 psi left.  But every one else was ok so I didn't say anything.  I didn't want to be the reason every one else didn't go through.  So we did it.  Shortly after, I noticed that my air was getting thinner.  I began to panic.  I signaled to may partner, and then to the guide, that I was out of air and was going to surface.  They guided handed me his extra air hose.  I rejected it at first, partly because I was embarrassed and also because I wasn't totally out of air yet.  But he insisted.  When we got out of the water the guide told me, "Never reject air."  Takeaways?  Obedience.  Don't succumb to peer pressure.  Don't hide your serious problems--get help from the bishop and other leaders and don't push them away.  Don't push the limits.  For lunch we went on over to the leadership counsel.  They had donuts there, so that was pretty dope.  Right after that we went to the Area Office to drop off the monthly expense report, which is a whole lot more tedious than it initially seemed.  I now know why every past financial secretary that I've known has complained about it.  All the area office had to tell me about it was that I need to be more specific on my descriptions next time.  First time there and they're already burning me.  DEP.  We had a solid work night though.  We even visited an ex-mission president in our ward.  We found some cool people whose numbers we wrote down and I was able to schedule a cita (she might live outside our area though).  I almost have to relearn to contact because contacting in rich areas is a lot different than contacting in pour areas.

Thursday

There are blessings in going to church.  God WILL bless us if we go.  It's literally a commandment.  In the Book of Mormon, we read a bazillion times that if we keep the commandments, we'll prosper in the land.  But if we don't keep them we have no such promise.  It's that simple.  If we make that sacrifice of time, God will bless us with more success in work, more unity in our families and will make us happier, etc.  We bless and fortify each other and learn as well.  We also renew our baptismal covenants through the sacrament so that we can be cleansed weekly of our sins, which easily makes it the most important part of the week.  Asistir (attend) is a critical part of the OLA (Orar (pray), Leer (read), Asistir (attend)).  As a personal representative of Jesus Christ, I promise you that if you go to church this week and every week after, the Lord will immediately bless you in a way you never thought possible despite how much of a sacrifice it might have been.  Don't just keep the Sabbath holy; sanctify it.  Jesus loves you.  The quicker you obey this and other commandments is the quicker you'll receive the subsequent blessings.  In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

Today wasn't that exciting of an office day.  I'm caught up on all of my work, so it was another great day to learn some German.  I was doing really well up until the point where I realized that there's more than 30 words in the German language.  We went to Subway for lunch.  I was really proud of myself for putting some healthy looking stuff on my sandwich.  We had a solid work day today.  We had a correlations meeting with Andre, the new ward mission leader.  Yesterday I contacted a 19 year old named Shirely.  She seemed super cool and stuff so we took out a cita.  Afterwards someone told me that that was an address in Mayorazgo, the adjacent area.  We decided that it'd be best to have a mini cita and then pass the reference.  She showed up with her 18 year old friend Tania (not quite as excogida since she typically works Sundays).  We went to a park to talk.  They both met on a bus on their way here from 4 hours outside of Lima.  Shirely is the oldest child in her family, the which is falling apart back home.  She's here alone with Tania trying to study and work to help her family back home.  We promised that going to church would bless her and her family and she teared up a bit.  We prayed for them and then left.  Not gonna lie, I'm kinda really disappointed that I'm not the one that's gonna teach her.  But at least she's going to accept the gospel.

Friday

Elder Napier was telling me about how he was in the car with the Amato's today.  A taxi stopped in front of them and President flashed his lights.  Hermana Amato told him to honk the horn and he said, "I can't."  Then he smiled looked at everyone and said, "It's one of my charity goals."  Hermana Amato said, "It's not one of mine!" and reached over and honked the horn for him.  That's pretty funny.  I know that revelation hasn't ceased; we have a prophet to guide us in these latter days.  I know that Russell M Nelson is a man called of God.  Through the inspiration of Jesus Christ, he leads His church.  As we follow his counsel, we will find more happiness and peace in our lives.  This morning we had a district counsel.  Good stuff taught and learned.  The zone leaders made a jeopardy game thing that was pretty fun. Team office won hehe.  The church released a trailer for the new Book of Mormon series that's coming out.  We all freaked out about that and watched it.  It straight up looks like a Netflix series.  Not gonna lie though, it seems super cool.  Super cool.  We've been waiting for this forever.  It's officially more anticipated than the new hymn book that's coming out.  For lunch we met up as a zone and went to go eat some pancha manka a la holla at somebody's pension.  That was pretty good.  We didn't have all that much office time today, but that's ok.  We had a solid night of contacting that I really enjoyed.  It's likely that once I leave the office I'll only have 2 or so transfers left.  If I could choose my last area, I'd go back to Huaycan 2.  I didn't have too much success there.  I'd like to go back, work my heart out and enjoy the fruits of my labors.