12.13.2010

I think that this has been one of the most jam-packed weeks in my whole mission. We had a ton of things that got in the way of doing the actual missionary work, but we still managed to do everything that we needed, and the Lord blessed us for our efforts with a really important success.

On Monday we went to Iguaçu Falls, the big waterfall in Indiana Jones, which was really stressful because President del Castillo wasn’t really excited about the idea. He wanted to be sure that everyone went out to work on time after p-day. It turned out to be really inspired though, because we contacted a huge family that a member had given us as a reference and five of them ended up coming to church on Sunday. It was a real miracle because we'd been really worried about how we were going to get a good number of investigators to show up. In the end, it turned out really well.

This week we were blessed to baptize Claudia, a single mom with two kids. Her children are going to get baptized next week. Claudia is really special because she’s had a lot of things happen in her life that helped to prepare her for the Gospel, but she doesn’t wear her problems out on her sleeve. She’s very focused in what she wants and has had to make some life-changes to get to this point. I'm really happy for her. She's also done very well at making friends with the ward members, which is going to help her to stay active in the church.

Elder Taylor and I are really excited for the rest of this month. I’ve been waiting a long time to be able to have the kind of success that we’re having in our area right now. I feel like this is by far the best time that I’ve ever had in my life. It’s so wonderful.

I’ve been putting a lot of thought into something that a Senior Missionary taught us in a Zone Conference a little while ago. He said that lots of people don’t accomplish what they want in life because they don’t have plans. That’s pretty much commonly known in the church. What he went on to say, however, was very interesting. He explained that if we are going to have success, we need to know why we’re here. He suggested making a life’s mission statement. Our Heavenly Father has one: “For this is my work and my glory...” A big part of why he’s so successful is that He’s completely dedicated to one thing, and all of His resources go towards that. The Elder that gave the lecture said that we should base our life’s mission statement on our patriarchal blessing.

I really liked the idea and have been trying to put together my mission statement. It’s a little bit elusive, because there’s a lot of information to consider, and because there is a certain practical limit to how much one can say. Every time that I start writing I end up with a whole paragraph of information. I must say, that it is a really useful meditative exercise. Every time that I find myself thinking about my purpose, I notice certain behaviors that I should eliminate. I highly recommend it.

I have a Christmas-related assignment for you guys. You should take a copy of the Book of Mormon or two, each one of you, put your testimony in it, mark a favorite passage, and commit to give it for Christmas to one of the people that matter to you. If you do, you will be able to see the people that you love in the celestial kingdom.

I’m glad to hear that you guys are doing so well. I miss you all a lot.

Love, Elder Rasband

11.23.2010

Dear Everyone,

Well, here I am. Sorry that I didn’t write yesterday. The President of Argentina declared a holiday. No one knows what the holiday was, but that’s okay.

This last week was rather hectic. Elder Robles left for a city near Resistencia. My new companion is Elder Taylor. He's from a tiny town in Illinois where his family were the only members. He is 6’4”, making him about average for my companions. He is the fifth of nine children, and likes to play basketball and to pitch.

The first couple of days this week we had little success, and then had to push really hard to teach the lessons that we needed to in order to finish the week strong. It all worked out in one of the Lord’s infinite mercies and we had 10 investigators in church!! It was really exciting. This week we had the primary presentation. I honestly thought it was a disaster, but everyone else seemed to think that it was very spiritual. I think that is was a really good thing for the investigators to see.

A 20 year old kid named Orlando who is going to get baptized on Saturday came with his whole family for the first time. We also had Aurora, the mom of one of the teenagers that got baptized last transfer, and two of her other sons that came. Aurora wants to get baptized next week. I wasn’t really too sure about how much actual desire she had, but I looked over at her during the meeting and there were tears running down her cheeks. It made me feel really grateful to my Father in Heaven that we have so many people to teach.

I’m glad that the new stake president is focusing on the youth and on missionary work. Sometimes, people think way to much when they have to give a reference to the missionaries. Finding new investigators is your responsibility. It is not that of the missionaries. Members are entitled to receive revelation when they give references. Let me explain with a story.

Last week, we got a reference from a member in our ward that he thought was really good. He said that the lady was literally looking for a new church. She lived really far away from where we usually work, so we had to wait a few days to be able to stop by. When we went to contact her, she flat-out turned us down and said that she belonged to ‘Dios es Amor,’ a local congregation.

My comp and I knew that if the Spirit had told that member to send us to that neighborhood, it had to be for a reason. We started knocking the doors on her block. Two houses down, we ran into Mili, a woman who six months ago had read the book of Mormon and been converted to the restored gospel. She’d attended church with her husband, but in the end had fallen away when her husband changed work and it became difficult to attend church on Sundays. We had a very pleasant lesson, and she committed to be baptized in December.

The person to whom our member friend had sent us was not prepared for our message, but the spirit had inspired him to send us to the closest person that he knew. Do not be afraid to give the names of your friends to the missionaries. When you begin to do so, the Spirit will take over and the ward will begin to have much more success.

Oh, Thanksgiving. I feel more grateful now than I ever have in my life, but it’s kind of hard to express why. I’m thankful that despite my own shortcomings, the Lord has seen fit to bless me with my calling, shape me into something so much more desirable than what I was, show me that I am nothing, and how with His help I can do anything. I’m gratefully for the incredible people that the Lord has given me to teach, and for the best family in the entire world. I’m also really grateful that someone blinded Melissa to of all of my weaknesses and tricked her into sticking with me. I feel like my entire life is perfect and I have everything that I ever wanted.

Thanks so much for everything.

Love,

Elder Rasband

News from Argentina

Hi everyone,

This week was really good. Some really important things happened for our area. It was REALLY hard to get lessons in though. No one was home when we went by their houses, even for the lessons that we had set ahead of time, and no one that we knocked into had time to receive us. It was hard because I really like to have good numbers, but the Lord blessed us for our efforts, and I’d rather have blessings than good numbers.

Funny Story. In our apartment there are two sets of elders, and my companion and I always play jokes on the other companionship. This week, we didn’t even have to plan anything because it was done for us. Sister Belaber, an amazingly nice woman in the ward who is in a wheelchair, had given a reference about two months ago to Elder Hyde (our favorite victim). He is an incredible missionary, so he tried for hours to find the house of Sister Belaber's friend, Claudia. Unfortunately, he was unsuccessful.

Last week, Claudia had to move suddenly, so Sister Belaber offered her to come and rent an apartment behind her house. Said apartment just happens to be in our area. We met Claudia this week, and have already had three lessons with her. She came to church on Sunday.

The words of Elder Hyde- I HATE YOU GUYS.

So funny.

Mari couldn’t make it to church this week because she had a family gathering on Sunday, but she accepted a baptismal date and committed to stop smoking. I felt really good about the lesson that we had with her about the Word of Wisdom because I know that she understands why she has to quit, and because I believe that she will be able to. When she gets baptized, she will be one of the most faithful members of the church in the whole world, because she is very good at recognizing spiritual blessings. I’m a little worried about her because she is afraid of pressure, and I don’t want her to think that we are pressuring her to get baptized.

Orlando is doing really well. He came to church again and is very ready to be baptized. He recognizes it too. I’m really excited.

Oh, and we also put a baptismal date with Paolo, the friend of a member girl who came to church at her invitation. He's 21 years old and is basically already Mormon. He has to work Sundays because everyone else at his job goes out to party Sunday mornings, and he's the only one who doesn’t drink. He is getting people to cover for him though so that he can go to church.

AND, the mom and brother of Noemi (one of the 15-year-old-girls that got baptized) both want to get baptized as well. They came to church for the first time yesterday.

All in all, we have a lot to be thankful for. I’ve never seen an area so blessed.

I love you guys so much, and know that the church is true.

Love, Elder Rasband

08.30.2010

Hi everyone!

 

This week I decided that I'm never getting married. Or at least, if I were to get married, my fiancé/future mother in law would be in charge of all of the wedding plans. This week was a disaster. I was more tired than ever, and we taught comparatively few lessons. Every day there seemed to be something that was going to prevent the wedding. It was really stressful, but we endured and the Montiel family got married on Friday baptized on Saturday, and confirmed yesterday. Whew.

 

As if that weren't enough, the one-year-old daughter of a part member family that we're teaching drank bleach-water last Sunday and spent the entire week in and out of he hospital. Her mom was incredibly scared, and asked us to give her a blessing. We ended up passing by the house like every day during the week to help out. The little girl is really affectionate and it's so hard to see her like that.

 

To top it all off, in an extreme family home makeover moment, the Gonzalez family started getting he bricks that they needed to add on to their house. Two years or so ago, the house of the Gonzalez family burned down. They lost what little they had. Then, in a fight with their neighbors, someone called Social Services, who deemed that the parents could not provide for their five children. The kids went to government homes. Slowly but surely, the Gonzalez family is trying to add on to their one-room house so that it can be called adequate for the return of their children. Unfortunately, the homes where the children live have given them the deadline of December to do so or the children will be offered up for adoption.

 

We're trying to help them out so they can make the deadline, but of course we're limited in what we can do.

 

We're having a lot of success, but most of my days are spent thinking about how to teach better and a lot of other stuff that I'm not really sure I know how to share.

 

One thing I can say is this: lots of people, especially misionaries, want to be guided by the Spirit in what they say. To do this they try very hard to study out in their minds what they are going to say and then deliver the best sermon they can. When this is our focus, we are far from teaching by the Spirit. In order to teach someone by the Spirit, we have to be more focused on them than on our own lesson. As we listen carefully and sincerely to what they have to say, the Spirit allows us to discern their needs and then we can teach simply and without embelishment what the Spirit tells us they need to hear. Christ was so good at this that he could discern the thoughts of the people.

 

We've learned a lot about listening to our investigators lately, and had very spiritual experiences with them because of what we're putting in practice. Hopefully I'll be a much better listener when I get home.

 

Thanks for paying attention to my emails and for your prayers. I certainly felt the extra help this week with the Montiel family. I love you guys.

I remember that this time last year I was making fun of everyone because they acted like the 40-50 degree weather was really cold. This year it's not so funny. I am pretty much freezing.

This weekend was a girls'-camp-type of spiritual experience. We were wet, cold and muddy, and we could see our breath inside the house, but in the end everyone came through for us. We were able to have investigators in church, and our members even came, which was somewhat awesome. Our little branch had better attendence than the local ward (and they have six missionaries) and our members have to travel much further to get to the chapel.

On Saturday, there was a stakewide mini MTC activity. It was really cool. After a morning of training, the youth got to go out to teach with the missionaries. I ended up with the group of young men from the branch.  They're pretty much the most ADD, long-haired, Argentine group of 15-17 year old punks that there ever was. I had to control them. Dont laugh.

Anyway, I was really excited because one of the three youth was Silvio, the kid that was about to be baptized that evening. His testimony is so strong. It was a really cool experience to teach him and then see him teach other people. He's going to be a great missionary. I included pictures from both of the activities.

Hey guys!

Happy fourth of July!  And no, there were no fireworks.

We had a crazy and incredibly spiritual week. The members in our branch are really excited about missionary work. We've been having little training meetings and we've also been trying to do service in their houses.  We're starting to see a lot of unity and families are being reactivated. Everything that we've fasted and prayed for is coming to pass.

Two weeks ago we found a kid named Silvio while we were looking for a reference from a member.  This week Silvio got permission to be baptized. He's really excited.

At the end of Principles of the Gospel, my companion and I shared our testimonies. We were both kind of surprised when Silvio said: I'd also like to share my testimony. We were even more surprised by what he
said. He testified of the Book of Mormon and that the church was true. He thanked us for teaching him and bore his testimony of his upcoming baptism, quoting 2nd Nephi and saying that it was the "door
that leads to the path that leads to eternal life."

This kid is 17 years old and met the missionaries two weeks ago. He goes to seminary, mutual, bears his testimony and reads his scriptures every day. Then, when my companion and I ended the class without
challenging the students to pray about what we had taught, Silvio did it for us. The kid is incredible. I started to cry a little bit right there in the class because the Lord has blessed us so much.

This week we finally saw the end of the whole Argentine futbol craze.  I decided not to make fun of anyone. Mostly because there are a lot of them here, but also because I heard that some of the young men cried.
I felt very merciful.




Elder Rasband

Hey guys,

Well, this week was very exciting, if not exactly for the same reasons as the last one, thank goodness.

This month, the World Cup is the only thing that matters in this country. There is nothing even comparable with the excitement that Argentina has for this tournament. It makes March Madness look like a 10-year-old's birthday party. On Saturday, Argentina beat Nigeria 1-0 in the world cup. We aren’t, of course, allowed to watch the matches, but every single television in the entire country was showing the game and we could pretty much hear what was going on from the street. Not only that, people bought fireworks to set off when Argentina scored, so we didn’t even have to ask anyone how the game was going. Then, on Sunday everyone made fun of me because the US tied with England 1-1. I hope we get to beat them just so the members stop making fun of the US.

Sunday was full of rather mixed emotions. Many of the investigators that we were expecting in Sacrament meeting didn’t show up, but Graciela, who is going to get baptized this week, did. I don’t know if I've said anything about her yet. Three weeks ago, Elder Simons was on a companionship exchange with another elder and they found Graciela's house. They said that the lesson was really spiritual and that when they asked Graciela if she would read the Book of Mormon to know that what they had taught was true she said that she had already received an answer. She did read though, and she started coming to church and is very excited for her baptism on Saturday. She’s already planning on going to a YSA activity in Posadas and to do baptisms for the dead next month. She also wants to serve a mission.

This week I’ve come to see a real need to improve the manner in which we commit our investigators to fulfil their commitments. The people here are really nice, and our investigators will stop what they’re doing to listen to our message. Unfortunately, they’re kind of lazy about actually coming to church or being at home when we have an appointment. It’s been bothering me a lot because when you teach someone about the gospel you can really get to love them, and then when they fail to act on what is taught it’s really sad. Today in my studies, I read part of preach my Gospel that suggests strategies that we can use to help people to keep their commitments. I’m really excited to be able to put it in practice starting tonight.

Apart from Graciela, a lot of our less-active families came, which made us very happy. I feel like I we work just a little bit harder, just a little more effectively, we are going to have a lot of success here in Ramita.

I love you guys!

05.31.2010

This week was incredibly busy. I was extremely tired the whole time, and about three days ago I lost my voice. Funny thing: as a missionary, I tend to use my voice a lot. I guess I just never really appreciated it as much as I should have. I've decided not to make that mistake again.

This week was also amazing. We had a bunch of investigators who came to church, which was a relief, because that's been really hard for us in the last few weeks.

Our branch is tiny. About thirty people come on a good week. The members are really good, but are mostly new to the church. Our leaders are learning their new roles. For now, the branch president is a member of the high council who lives in the nearby ward. We don't have enough people for a chapel so we take the bus to church.

There are two new families that are particularly helpful. They are the Rivas Family and the Dugos families. The husbands are the councilors in the branch presidency, and the wives are the relief society presidency. Those two, along with two other families and a few other people, comprise the core of our active members. We do have a lot of less active people who come if we're lucky though.

Life is good here!

03.17.2010

This week in sacrament meeting, I had a really special spiritual  experience. I guess I should explain a little. Every missionary in the  entire mission has my cell phone number. They aren`t allowed to call,  but they do it anyway so that they can get their questions answered when  we are not in the office. It's really annoying. Sometimes I take the  battery out because I get five calls in a row from people who shouldn´t  be calling at all.

So the other day, an Elder from Colombia called me and asked me for the  number of the office. That's slightly annoying because everyone else in  his zone has the number, and he is allowed to call them, but instead he  called me. I gave him the number and he hung up. Five seconds later he  called again. He had written it down wrong. I gave it to him. He hung up.  The phone of the elder standing next to me rang. It was the same guy. He  wants the office number. The elder with me gave him the exact number  that I did. It was really frustrating at that point. A few days later  the phone rang again. It was the same elder, asking for the same number. I  lost my patience a little bit and told him to write it down this time.  His response was very profound: "Please have patience with me."

When I was in sacrament meeting, I was thinking of all of the things  that I fail to accomplish. I found myself asking forgiveness as I took  the bread and water, and immediately that phrase came to my mind. "Please  have patience with me." How often do I have to ask forgiveness for the  exact same things? The whole experience was very humbling and opened my  eyes a lot.

Just a Couple New E-mails

02.12.2010

I learned a ton this week about myself and about how we need to be submissive to the will of God. Sometimes we face setbacks, but we have to do it with faith. We have to trust that no matter what happens, it is for our good.

This week, for instance, I was really frustrated because we didn't get to go out and teach our investigators much. This was especially frustrating because we need to teach Delia so much before her baptism the 19th. But then last night, when we finally got to talk to her, she was much more receptive than she had been before. She has had a really hard time accepting the need for prophets after the ministry of Christ. Last night we read to her from Ephesians 4 and a light came on in her eyes and she really understood.

My point is this: I have tried to teach the need for prophets to Delia at least 4 times personally, and I know that other missionaries have done the same. She accepted the teaching yesterday because the Lord had prepared her. I am convinced that if we had stopped by when we'd planned she would not have understood, but instead we were trapped in the office while she was being prepared to receive the lesson. I am so grateful that the Lord is in charge of what happens her, and not me.

Know that I'm praying for all of you and that I love you so much.

02/24/2010

Life here in the mission is going well. We are teaching a lot to a boy named Enso and he is progressing really well. I am really excited. It looks like he's going to get baptized soon, but more than that, I really love the kid.

Well, I want to let you guys know that I love you a ton. I also want you to know that the Gospel is true. Thanks to the covenants that we have made, the celestial kingdom is within our reach. We have to improve ourselves every day, and every day we have to repent, but in the end it will all be worth it.

12/30/09

Hey guys, it was great to talk to you all for Christmas. And it was even better to get to hear from you all again today. This week was pretty cool. We've been working really hard and having some success. We found a new family Monday night and we set another appointment with them for tonight. Literally within two blocks of their house, two members came up to us on a motorcycle asking if they could accompany us to a lesson this week. I guess you can call that a sign.

I don't know if I've actually mentioned the whole motorcycle-as-a-family-vehicle thing, have I? It is not uncommon to see a family consisting of two adults and two kids riding together on the same bike. Actually, it's not even limited to "motos." Sometimes the dad pedals a bicycle and the mom steers and supports a kid on her lap. Sometimes, they even combine the two, and the bicyclist holds onto the back of the motorcycle to keep up. I have to say that the funniest is when to guys my age share the same pedal bike. I don't care how Argentine I become, I will never do that.

The other day we went by Sister Nuñez' house to see if we could teach her grandson sometime this week. Sister Nuñez is Super-Mormon. She's about to turn 90 years old, but she still tries to give us references and help us to come in our teaching assignments. One time we went to visit one of her friends who is 85 years old, and the poor woman didn't want to talk to us and started making excuses. Sister Nuñez said "I'm five years older than you are and I'm still up and about
walking." It was pretty funny because there really isn't anything you can say to a woman like that.

Anyway, we went by her house to talk about her grandson, and she was about to go out and pick the ripe mangoes from this gigantic mango tree in her front yard. Needless to say, Elder Callaghan and I climbed the tree in no time and gathered up the fruit, which this poor sister promptly put in a bag and gave to us. So much for service.

Interesting fact--did you know that it's actually somewhat common to be allergic to mangoes? Apparently for some people, mango trees are like giant poison ivy plants. There are even people who can get sick from breathing the pollen or eating the fruit. Yeah, I found that out yesterday, when everyone kept asking me why my entire body was red with a rash. Finally someone said "You elders didn't go and climb a mango tree did you?" Yeah. I love my life.

The worst part was that we had a teaching appointment yesterday with the mission president's wife, who happens to be in charge of the health for all of the missionaries. She tried to make me go to the hospital to get the rash looked at. For some reason she wouldn't believe that I had painted my face red. Anyway, when we finally found out about the whole mango thing she let me off the hook and told me to wait until Saturday. What a disaster. Oh well.

We had Christmas Dinner with president and his family and the assistants. Sister del Castillo is an amazing cook. And they gave us all ties, which was nice of them. Actually it was Christmas Eve, which is when Argentines have their big family gatherings. On Christmas day I just talked on the phone and then we went out to go work in the evening. It was pretty low-key, which I
liked.