¡Hola Todos!

This week we continue to improve. This transfer as been a slow process of improvement, but we are grateful that we are getting better every week! As of now we have two investigators that are progressing to be baptized in a couple weeks, Roman who is the son of a recent convert and Marina, an older lady. We are hopeful this week to find a lot more new investigators to teach!

Spiritual Experience of the Week: My spiritual experience I would like to share this week was from church. We have been very worried about one investigator Marina that is going through health problems and its difficult for her to come to church. She has a baptismal date for the 30th of January and needed to come si o si(no matter what) this week to be baptized. With a few difficulties, she made it! The joy you feel when an investigator comes to church is one of the best.

Scripture of the Week: The scripture I would like to share this week is Ether 12:4. I have been studying a little bit about hope this week. how when we have hope, we have confidence, we are more positive in every situation, and we have patience for difficulties and trials. I have learned that ope is just as important in our lives as other attributes of Christ such as faith. In reality, they are all connected and we should strife to develop them.

Funny of the Week: So one day this week, we were doing a few contacting of houses and we come across one. We didnt realize it was a house of a member when we contacted it because they had been gone for awhile out of town. We began to contact them like a normal contact. Apparently, she decided to play a joke on us and began to act like a pastor from another church and started saying all different kinds of crazy things about our church and trying to argue. We were so confused and began talking with her, but we were failing pretty bad. Eventually, she told us she was a member and all. Haha we felt pretty embarrassed with our bad fake contact.

Fact of the Week: A lot of meals they have here, they eat it with mayonnaise! They dont have a whole lot of sauces other than tomato sauce or ketchup that is common here. I wasnt a big fan of mayo before my mission, but the mayonnaise here is way better! Probably because its way more fatty and unhealthy haha, but i enjoy it anyways.

I hope all is well back home, love you all!

--

Elder Trent

There was a frog in our pench last night. Iii dont know why haha. I picked it up and it started vibrating it was so scared haha.

¡Hola Todos!

¡Hola Todos!

This week was a really great experience for me. We were able to have a lot of success, but not in the usually success. Last week, our President gave us an email that has really helped us improve. He talked about not looking back and being more grateful for what is happening good in our area, personally, the mission, etc. With the start of this new year, he counseled us to not looked back. Whether its back at home, past struggles in the missionaries, our weakness, whatever that doesnt help us to move forward and progress. This really helped us this week, to start this new year good and be able to continually improve, focusing on the going and not getting down on all the failure that impedes us to progress. We have been progressed a lot as a companionship this week, being more happy and excited than ever to continue this work.

This past week we had the baptism of Marciano and he is doing very well and happy. As of other investigators, we dont have any with baptismal dates, but we are working with Graciela, who is fighting to quit smoking so she can get baptized and also with Marina who is dealing with health problems, But both of them are possibilities for the end of this month. This week we saw a lot of progression in our area from last week as it was very slow. It is slowing picking up and we are seeing more success and having more lessons.

Spiritual Experience of the Week: This week we went to lunch of an active family whose daughter had returned from the mission about 6 months ago. They have a son who lives right next to them who is inactive and living with his family who are not members. His girlfriend was also their with us for the lunch. She hadnt never been interested before about the missionaries. The mother in law had always prayed for his son and his family that they could accept the Gospel. Laura, the daughter in law was earlier talking to the mother in law about how she wanted to listen to them because she wanted to raise her kids good, recognizing the examples we were. We could see in this moment of her life the Spirit working through her as we were able to teach her after lunch. It is an amazing experience, teaching someone who is humbled and prepared to hear and act on the message that we bring. We didnt have a lot of time as it was unplanned but we were grateful to be apart of the start of growing an eternal family even more.

Scripture of the Week: Omni 1:26. Our President gave us all a talk from a past MTC Devotional about being a consecrated missionary. There are good missionaries, great missionaries, but only a few consecrated missionaries. They are those who put every thing on the altar of sacrifice for the Lord and their mission. Putting everything they have into the work. Pushing out pride, fear, negativism, etc. so that they can do the Lords will. This scripture explains that, how we should put our whole soul into the Gospel.

Love you and thanks for your support! Until next week,

--

Elder Trent

Reunion de zona

Marciano's baptism

Marciano's baptism

A New Year and yet another new companion

¡Hola Todos!

Another week has passed and I already have a new companion! His name is Elder Smith and he is from Utah as well, Cedar City. This is his last transfer on his mission and already has 22 months. He is more reserved with a goofy sense of humor I would say. He liked to play the trumpet in high school and play video games. While we are a lot different, we are getting a long pretty well.

This week in our area was pretty tough honestly. When my past companion was transferred and I started to guide this area, I realized that I did not learn this area well. I was more of a follower to Elder Blosfeld so this week was hard, trying to get around, but I managed to do it. This week was filled with a few other trials as well, we had to drop a lot of our investigators and are having a hard time finding people to teach, causing me to be a little down this week. But we are still hopeful and determined to do everything we can this week to have more success. On the bright side, this week we will have the baptism of Marciano. I think I spelled his named wrong when I mentioned him earlier, but he is the one who came to church on his own three weeks ago. We have been teaching him a lot and he will be baptized this Saturday!

Spiritual Experience of the Week: This week for my spiritual experience, I would like to share my brief testimony with you all. This week has caused me to reflect a lot of my personal testimony and how I am improving as a missionary because of the trials we have been having this week. But I needed it, being able to grow my testimony a lot this week. I know the Lord gives us trials to help grow our faith in him and increase our patience. Honestly, a mission is really hard, but I know that this Gospel is true that Jesus Christ lives. That by turning to him, we recieve our strength. The Book of Mormon is true people! Read it! I know that when we actually put all of our effort into keeping the commandments, then we are blessed and happy.

Scripture of the Week: Alma 37:34. This short scripture talks about how we shouldnt tire from doing the things we need to, keeping the commandments. That the Gospel is what gives us the rest in our lives. 

Funny of the Week: For news years we had to come back to the apartment early at 8 for the parties and safety reasons. After planning, we bought some ice cream and went to bed. I sleep like a rock on the mission but when it hit midnight, it sounded like there were bombs going off there were so many fireworks and partying. My companion woke up to this sound at midnight as well and managed a weak hearted happy new year. I think I remember mumbling something back and then we fell right back asleep with the party continuing outside. Haha happy new year everyone.

I hope you all have a great new year! Love you all!
-- 

Elder Trent

This is my new companion! Elder.......Smith. Haha from Utah.

We bought ice cream for new years and thats about it

First Birthday and Christmas in the mission field

¡Hola Todos!

I hope you all had a great Christmas and holidays! Thank you to those that wrote to me wishing me a happy birthday or merry christmas. My week was really great, talking to the family and being able to spend christmas sharing the message of Christ to others.

Anyways, yesterday I got the news that my companion is leaving and I will be receiving a new companion here in Arco Iris tomorrow! I have realized that they change everything a lot in this mission haha. Im always a little bit nervous when there are changes, new companion and me leading the area, but Im looking forward to the new experience. 

Spiritual Experience of the Week. We had yet another crazy miracle happen this week. I believe last week I shared the story of Marciano that came to church on his own out of nowhere. By the way, he is doing very well and came back to church, yesterday. But also, this week, we had the exact same thing happen! A 17 year kid came in after church had already ended. He met the bishop, who called us to come over quick to meet him. We were pressed on time, but were able to get to know him briefly and talk to him about the Book of Mormon. We dont know much about him still, other than he lives alone and wants to change his life for the better, being closer to God. We are being hugely blessed here right now and are excited to visit him again.

Scripture of the Week: Jacob 2:18-19. This talks about how we need to look for God first in our lives and then we will have what we need in life, if what we need or want will help us to serve others. I love this scripture, because in life we worry a lot about work and things we want and need, but if we put God first in our lives those thing will come if we have the right intentions.

Funny of the Week: So last week on Tuesday was my birthday, and my companion likes to eat so he didnt fail telling everyone we were with that it was my birthday. So almost every appointment we went to, we ate. I think I had four cakes that day. Uuh I was soo full that day haha. 

Love you all, have a great week!

-- 

Elder Trent

My birthday

Another cake

My birthday that night. 

A chilean, A german, and a Brazilian attended my party haha

...Another Cake

Christmas Eve dinner with a great family

Watching the Christmas eve fireworks on the roof.

we slepted on mattresses.

We had a great view

on the roof

At the temple

Where's Waldo...I mean Elder Trent

   The Buenos Aires West Mission at the Buenos Aires Temple December 23 2015

Best Christmas Present Ever!

We got to Skype with Elder Trent!! You cant see Elder Trent very well in the picture but he is there.

Feliz Navidad!

¡Hola Todos!

Feliz Navidad to you all! I hope your christmas and new year will be as great as it will be here also. As a mission, we get to go to the temple on the 23rd so we are all excited for that. The temple is not in our mission so we dont ever get to go, but we get a special christmas gift this year! In this season of Christs birth, I hope you can all remember the importance of Christmas. I know every once says that, but really this year put an effort to help someone else or share the knowledge of the great gift of Christ to others. This year more than ever, I am grateful for this time of year to recognize the birth of the Savior and also share it with others. Christmas here isnt much. Usually its just a week of partying and barbacueing(asado), but we have been able to share the real meaning of Christmas to the souls ready to here it. The Lord is definitely blessing us and the work here this time of year. We are seeing miracles after miracles. We were able to have many investigators in church this past sunday with some of our investigators progressing well to be baptized soon in January. Unfortunately, Cintia, her son Kevin, and Graciela wont be baptized this saturday, but pushed back to January. We were down a little, but it just means that we will have a great start to the new year! 

Spiritual Experience of the Week: This past sunday, we had a christmas miracle when a random man came into church. His name is Marcial and he is Bolivian. He came here for medical reasons, but also has family that lives here. He is very religious and wanted to attend any church, so he saw ours and came in. Also, because is aunt in a member as well. We were able to stay with him during the meetings and he really enjoyed it. He didnt know his address so we could come by to talk to him again so we invited him to come back to the chapel later that day. He came back and we were able to teach him the first lesson. It was very spiritual and he accepted a date to be baptized him January!

Scripture of the Week: I wanted to share a scripture of Christmas and Christ this week but I decided to share this one instead. This is a very known scripture, but I was able to think a lot more deeply and study this scripture more, which really helped me. Ether 12.27. As humans, we are not perfect, but our weaknesses are not sins, we shouldnt get down on ourselves becuase of our weaknesses, but should have faith and trust in the Lord that he will help us turn them into strengths. I have experienced this first hand already on my mission. I have been able to do things and develop atributes that I have never before been good at. But through the Lord, I am developing more talents and atributes to better help others. If you look to better yourself to help others, you will succeed witht the Lord help. I know this to be true.

Funny of the Week: We are always having fun here and laughing as well. Its always good to stay happy and laugh often. I have learned this on my mission. However, its hard to come up with things to write haha. Anyways, we decided to make a little christmas tree and nativity in our apartment. After a little arts and craft. We made a pretty sad looking christmas tree and nativity out of paper and pictures from ensigns and liahonas. We had to take a picture of our masterpiece of course after, so I set a timer and we hurriedly got into place. But I accidently knocked everything over trying to get there fast. We hurriedly tried to put everything back into place put the picture took too soon. Haha the picture turned out pretty funny though. Doesnt sound as funny is writing and without the picture. Its one of those you had to be there stories, but oh well haha.

Fact of the Week: Here, people put there trash right in the middle of the dirt streets to burn it. So there is trash burning alot...and it doesnt smell that great but what are ya gonna do.

Love you all and Merry Christmas!

-- 

Elder Trent

Our Christmas tree and decorations haha! (There is a nativity and an Argentina flag)

Close up of decorations

Funny picture; We tried to put a timer but I accidently pushed over all of the decorations trying to be fast, and so we tried to put them all back up and this is the photo that it took. Haha

We went and played soccer with a few other elders in our zone last pday. It was fun! and my first time playing soccer in Argentina ha!

We had a very successful ward christmas party here and had an asado! We were only able to stay for a little bit until we had to return back home, but it turned out very well with a huge turnout.

Cooking the asado. (So many people here look american. just everyone has dark hair)

The one that is facing the camera is the bishop. He reminds me a lot of bishop graf, with the same personality, knows how to do a lot of things and has been raised in this area his whole life.

--