On Thursday after her blessing and after finishing up studies we went out and did some finding, and we had a lesson with Araceli, a less active woman who just had a baby and has 2 other little girls. Her husband is a nonmember. So we went over there and taught her a lesson and we're going back there this week hopefully. Her kids are sooooo soo so cute. Then we taught another less active family, the Leon's. They actually ended up coming to church on Sunday, which was fabulous! Then we went over to the Otero's house (my home away from home on my mission) for dinner. I think Brother Otero could tell I was struggling a lot with my companion cause he made eye contact with my and his eyes just sorta said "I understand." Haha and then while my companion was talking to Tania, bbrother otero was like "sister Segle. How can we help you with your spanish." They are really pumped about me learning and I think they're disappointed that my progress has reached a stop because my companion hardly knows more than me. (Sigh) After dinner brother otero let us try his drunk glasses on which was hilarious and SUPER hard, why do people choose to feel like that???? The kids also tried them on which was super funny. After that, we taught Mariana. We read with her because she hadn't read her scriptures yet that day, but she's doing well and really progressing. She wants her family to be eternal and she really loves the gospel but she struggles a lot with the not drinking coffee thing. She also needs to get married to her boyfriend but it's tricky cause he needs to get divorced and sometimes she doesn't know if she wants to really be with him. Those are the only things really holding her back from being baptized. Then we had stake correlation which was awkward cause my companion has all these plans for eagle mountain and she's basically just tearing down the setup here.
Friday was basically the same, but we didn't have any lessons, just lots of people telling us they weren't interested. One family gave us all the pamphlets and Books of Mormon back which was awkward haha we also had an interesting meeting with one family who are less active because the husband got into some anti mormon stuff...so we actually got in and talked to the wife for awhile. I felt bad because she seemed so scatter brained and her house was an absolute mess but when we offered to help her she said no. She was super sweet but basically told us the gospel wasn't for her anymore. She said it was too clique-y and the members were super judgmental.
So something frustrating about being in a Utah mission is that the church is often a social thing. And a lot of the times the women here tend to make groups, and shun anyone who isn't under their classifications of perfect mormon household with perfect kids and a beautiful house and Pinterest wardrobe. Soooo so many of our less actives are less active because of this, or because someone offended them at church and I just feel like shaking the whole state of Utah and saying "HEY wake up!! This is NOT how this church is supposed to work!!" It's so frustrating. This mission is hard for that reason. We don't have people crawling into our baptismal fonts because the gospel is so new to them and is what they've been waiting for FOREVER. Nah, here it's like you have to remind them and convince them that this is the true gospel but it's hard to convince people to come back when they've been offended. I think that's what often makes this mission different from others. This woman also basically told us that our mission call sucked and that it probably would have been a lot more fulfilling to go to a third world country which kind of stung a little bit, to be honest. We weren't really sure what to say to that.
Saturday was pretty interesting, we went to an animal shelter in our area and volunteered there for a few hours. It's interesting, it's like a farm animal shelter so we brushed out the Pygmy goats for awhile and then hung out with the horses. It was super peaceful and we're gonna be volunteering there a few times a week which I'm excited about. Saturday night was interesting because we actually had people answer the doors to us! One family that my trainer and I had been looking for forever, the Villalobos actually answered their door! We introduced ourselves and invited them to church and he asked me in English where the chapel was and I thought he was speaking Spanish so I was like???whats he saying??? And when we got back in the car my companion was like, ummmm he was speaking English hahah so that was embarrassing. Then we tried another door, the Gaminos. They answered the door and invited us in and we taught them! They smoke a lot though so when we left I had a headache from the smell, but they invited us back later this week is great. Oh, I forgot to mention we had someone call us with a referral! Woohooo. That's super rare here so that was super cool. It's a family who lives out on the Mink farms so we're seeing them on Wednesday, and we have a Fellowshipper! Yay. Super cool.
Sunday we had branch counsel which I had to attempt to take over...it was rough. Church was alright except Mariana didn't come because she was sick and Vero left early cause she was starting to feel sick :/ bummer. That evening there was a stake missionary fireside where 3 return missionaries spoke about their mission experiences. It was super cool, and I learned a lot about how to be a better missionary. Oh also we had dinner with the Torres family , the YW president in our branch. Their family is incredible and I love them soooooooo much. They're from Colombia and they fed us steak and funeral potatoes hahaha (it was super good though!)
Overall this week was alright but at the same time really, really hard. I'm starting to know what it feels like to be lonely even though you're with someone 24/7. It's been really hard to keep a smile on my face and continue to be happy when my companion is so harsh. It's going to be a really long transfer. It's hard to keep my confidence in my spanish when my companion is correcting my pronunciation and everything. I wouldn't mind, except her pronunciation is horrid and she barely knows more than me anyways. The work goes on, though and this will just be one of those transfers that really sucks I guess. I'm trying my hardest and that's all you can really do I guess.
My message to you this week would probably be charity. I've been studying that a lot this week, and I've learned a lot about the pure love of Christ. In 1 Nefi 19: 9, it says
"Y el mundo, a causa de su iniquidad lo juzgará como cosa de ningún valor; por tanto, lo azotan y él lo soporte; lo hieren y él lo soporta. Sí, escupen sobre él, y él lo soporta, por motivo de su amoroso bondad y su longanimidad para con los hijos de los hombres."
It's incredible to me that Christ faced people who spat on Him, who humiliated Him, and eventually killed Him, and He suffered it all simply because of the love He has for us. So I challenge you to try to increase your charity towards others, no matter how hard it is. I know that's what I'll be working on this transfer....
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