Hola familia
Okay, where to start? I feel like I didn´t get to send much of a real message last week, but oh my goodness!!! I´m so excited to tell you guys about some of my experiences in this international MTC! Happy Birthday this week Em, Sweet 15! You´re all growed up ha.
Ooh, I´d have to say that I am most grateful this week for the opportunity to talk about the Restoration and the Book of Mormon with Mecaela (close to Mckayla in English).. Um.. which leads me into my first report.
We got to do REAL PROSELYTING and REAL MISSIONARY WORK in the park for our very first time last Saturday.. Can you hear me? Oh my gosh, it was insane. I was shaking in my boots, so nervous and so excited. They split us up from our regular companions and I was with Hermana Williams, we both just came from the Provo MTC, entonces, none of us are fluent, or the trainer, both completely green and vulnerable. I really didn´t know what was going to happen. But our first contact took place in the Metro, her name was Selena and luckily for us, she actually was quite interested and wanted to talk, but she had to exit so we just got her phone number and left her with a pass along card.. Okay, so then they release us into this huge park comparable to Central Park in New York, and although it´s a big park, we´ve got a saturation of about 40 or 45 missionaries who are as eager as ever. So Hermana williams and I decided to veer off in a different direction.. We talked to a couple people along the way, with not much understanding (woh they speak fast here!!) and then we decided this little park with kiddies and mothers watching on benches was where we needed to be. Welp, we pointed out one sister but as we approached her, it just didnt´feel right.. So we continued on, and on, until we saw Mecaela sitting by herself, she was the last person we passed and so I´m thinking, well we came for a reason... Ha, and so I tried to break that first awkward HOla como está? And before we knew it we were sitting next to her and I can´t even remember how it happened, but we ended up spending the rest of our full hour in the park answering her questions, and teaching her accordingly. Oh my gosh, I can´t tell you how amazing it was.She had three sweet little boys who were playing in the park, and so from time to time, usually during one of those ideal testifying moments.. she´d have to look over and make sure they were still alive.. But I´m here to tell you, this lady is thirsting for more in here life, she´s emigrated from Romania ten years ago, her husband currently lives and works in france because he can´t find any work here and we could sense that they´re struggling financially, not completely impoverished. But she was just pure and as we looked into her eyes and told her that Father in Heaven loves her and wants to be able to communicate with her right now, I just could see her drinking it up. I love her, I couldn´t stop thinking about her and praying for her for days, and I probably will never see her again, it was one of those referrals when we had to hand it over to our maestros at the end of the day, we were like, ¨please make sure the missionaries visit her and bring her the book of mormon in romanian, so she can understand it completely¨ she was hesitant to accept a BOM in espanol because it´s not her native tongue but as we showed her a few passages, it was clear she could get the gist out of the verses. Anyways, she´s so great, she tried to explain to us how she the Spirit speaks to her, ¨I get warm inside and little chills all up and down from my toes to my head¨ we´re like, that´s so great, and we taught about the restauration and Jose Smith and how she can read the book of mormon and know for herself if it´s true and he was a prophet, and I think she was a little bit confused, ¨how can I pray about jose smith if I don´t know him¨? My favorite part was when we were talking about how joseph smith had a question, he wanted to know what church was true.. and so he prayed, and she´s like, ¨¨ I´ve been wondering the same thing for myself¨¨ I just felt like everything we taught her, she already had thought about or was so receptive to. Anyways, the park went so well for all of us that they planned 3 extra visits during our stay here! So I´ve already been back another time, but I don´t have time to elaborate on those experiences.
Today, we´re heading into the city, we´re going to see the Madrid soccer stadium and the Plaza Mayor and other awesome sites in town. But I just want to take the last couple minutes and describe how amazing this internationa MTC experience is. I didn´t realize because I thought we would only have us american missionaries, Spain bound. But we´ve had Itallians, russians, ARgentinans, just got some French and Chilean missionaries.. It´s so great. We constantly have translators and several languages being spoken in every meeting, I have loved getting to know, especially the russians and chileans because it reminds me of Hermana Bosco and Elder Harris.. I know that they´re loving the people of Ukraine and Argentina, if they´re anything like the ones I have met. It´s just incredible, I love this Gospel, it can unite all of us through all of our differences. I´m so grateful for our Spanish teachers, they ooze with love and they are so excited that we can be a light unto their nation. I love my life,
Hermana Nelson
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