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.