Week #87

Hola Familia!

I had an awesome week this week. I´ve been in Viedma this week (it´s the zone furthest south in the mission) doing splits with Elder Fertig and Elder Figueredo. I´ve learned so many things from the two of them. We got to listen to Elder Bednar on Tuesday. He gave a conference for about 8000 missionaries in the Southern part of South America. I wanted to share with all of you guys today an experience from the week, and then something that inspired me in the Conference with Elder Bednar.

Before we got to Viedma, we were in Bahía and we taught a woman named Ana. She really wants to get baptized but she smokes. She wants to stop smoking but she doesn´t think that she has the strength to do it. We started talking to her about faith and she told us that before the missionaries had gotten to her home, she didn´t believe that Jesus Christ was the Son of God. She just believed that He was a great person who lived on this earth. She explained to us that she has gained a strong testimony that He is the Savior of the world. It impacted me so much because it was the same process that Alma explains in Alma 32. She planted a seed and it grew to the point where she knew that Jesus Christ is the Savior. That inspired me. We started teaching her about how that faith is the same faith necessary in order to stop smoking. Put your faith in Him, and He will give you the power. At the beginning, she didn´t believe that it was possible. But as the Spirit touched her heart, she started gaining self confidence. How weird to think that the Spirit gives us self confidence. By the end of the lesson, the Spirit had blessed her with so much faith in the Savior and faith in herself, that we made specific plans to get her off of cigarrettes. After the prayer, we asked for her cigarrettes and she gave us EVERYTHING- a tupper full of tobacco, the ash try, and the plastic straw looking thing to roll her own joints. From what I know, she hasn´t smoked since. The power of the Atonement gave her the strength minute by minute to resist all temptation. What a great blessing to be able to see as a representative of Jesus Christ.

The other experience helped me feel the Spirit when Sister Susan Bednar spoke to us. She spoke to us about her son that served on the mission many years ago and being able to visit the mission with him. She told us of the rewarding experience that it was when she got to see all of the people that truly were touched by her son´s work. She said later, "You want to be a fly on the wall as a parent and see you your son/daughter as they learn, live, and serve...Be the kind of missionary that your mother thinks you are." That last phrase impacted me a lot. We usually say that we want to be the missionary that the Savior wants us to be, and since our mothers are the most Christ-like figures in this world, am I the missionary that she thinks I am? I hope I can say yes the day that I see her again. The Spirit helped me realize for the sincere love that I have for my mom. I love you Mom. Thanks for preparing me to serve a mission. Just like the 2000 strippling warriors said, I have no doubt that she knows the truth.

Thanks for all the love and support. I feel your prayers daily.

Love Elder Bosco

The first one is Alexis and Belen´s home. They got married!

 

It´s blurry, but Elder Paleka and I visited Marcela!

 Drive to Mar del Plata

 The Circus in Mar del Plata. I didn´t go but it looked pretty cool from the outside. haha

 The Zone Conference in Olavarría. Where Elder White served a good chunk of his mission.

The Port Mar del Plata

Week #86

Hola Familia!

I´m sorry for not sending pictures again. I have a lot (don´t worry mom) but I forgot the little card reader in the house. I´ll try to send a lot next week. We had some incredible experiences this past week. We had some zone conferences this week so we´ve been on the road a lot. We were in Mar del Plata twice, Olavarría, and Tandil. I want to share an experience that impacted me a lot, and then something from the zone conference that I´ve learned this week.

First off, while Elder Paleka and I were in Mar del Plata, we couldn´t help but go visit some people from Pompeya. Pompeya was my first area and Elder Paleka served there after I did. I don´t know if any of you remember Cejas. He was the old man that was always in the pictures with me and Martín, sometimes he took us to restaurants. Anyways, I seriously love that man and so Elder Paleka and I went to his house first to visit him-- but he wasn´t home. We went to a member and we asked him about Cejas. He told us that Cejas had passed away on December 13, 2015 from a heart attack or a stroke. I was pretty surprised and a little sad that I wasn´t able to see him again. Through all the feelings and thoughts that ran through my mind, I couldn´t help to be extremely happy. That might not be the feeling that I was expecting, but I couldn´t help feeling peace and happiness. Cejas had a lot of physical problems that truly held him back from progressing and when I heard that he is now in the Spirit World, I began to think of all the ways he can spiritually progress now. I prayed that night talking to my Heavenly Father and I felt a lot of inner peace. I can´t wait to be able to do his temple work for him one day. This moment strengthened my testimony of the perfectness of God´s plan.

The other thing I learned from these zone conferences is the importance of REPENTANCE in the process of the conversion of somebody. The subject of retencion has and will always be a difficult thing in the Church. What we can do as missionaries is improve the way that we teach and commit repentance to everyone. The process to conversion is a long and slow process. After all, we are all eternal beings, and true repentance is an eternal process. President Cifuentes does an excellent job at explaining to us this process. He read with us Alma 32 to us and he taught us this story in a way that made perfect live sense to us as missionaries in Bahía Blanca. This process of true repentance was taught by Alma even before the years of Jesus Christ on the earth. It´s incredible to truly understand what the prophets have taught us in the Book of Mormon. Every time I hear the discussion about Alma 32, the Spirit teaches me something different that improves my individual quest of true repentance.

Thanks for all the love and support. I´m extremely happy to be a missionary and I´m so honored to wear this badge every moment of my life.

Love, Elder Bosco II

Week #85

Hola Familia!

Before saying anything else, I have to wish a happy birthday to Miss Ella Mae Smith! I can´t believe that she´s already three years old. Time seriously flies by. This week was absolutely crazy. One of the weirdest on the entire mission. We´ve had a week full of activities. We helped the missionaries ending go home and we helped the new missionaries come in. Today and yesterday Elder Resek from the 70 came to our mission and we were able to hear from them. From all the things that happened this week, I think one thing stood out the most to me. We had a talk with President Cifuentes and he started talking about the Plan of Salvation. He took the time out of his busy day and sat down and spoke to us while we were waiting for some other elders. 

We spoke about the Pre-existence and about the importance of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. He helped me understand the plan on such a personal level. While he was talking about the Atonement of Jesus Christ, I remember looking at the picture of the Savior that was hung on his office wall. The picture almost spoke to me. I remember feeling the  Spirit in such strong way and just feeling the Holy Ghost testify again and again that it´s HIM. He truly is my Savior and there isn´t anyone else. It was Him who came to this earth and set a perfect example. It was Him who suffered for me. It was Him who was resurrected so that I can. It is He who lives and guides us today. I´m extremely lucky and grateful to be a representative of Him and His Church in the Last Days. I know that He suffered the Atonement for all of us. HE DID IT. It´s my testimony that if we just look to Him for everything, He will guide us back to our Father in Heaven. 

Thanks for all the love and support.

Love, Elder Bosco II

from Elder Sisson's mom- Elder Bosco at zone conference

Week #84

Hola Familia!

This week was another great one. Seeing the hand of the Lord everyday and the power of the Savior´s Atonement touch the lives of the people has helped me grow as a person. Last Saturday we got a call from an old investigador that we didn´t know. When we got to the area, he didn´t want more so we never got to know him. But he called us and told us that he needed some help. We ran (literally ran haha) over to his house and he was moving from his apartment to another in Cerri. We helped him move his furniture and put it in his new apartment. Afterwards we invited him to the activity that night in the Church and to Church the next day. He came to both. We´ve been teaching him these past few days and we had an awesome experience yesterday. As we were teaching him, he started opening up and telling us about weaknesses and needs that he had. It was incredible to me that he trusted two young boys from the U.S., that he hardly even knows, to share these personal problems with. We were able to listen and then share some of our own experiences with Book of Mormon scriptures on how the Atonement has changed our lives. When we are humble like Nestor (the investigador) and we have desires to change, this is when the Atonement has the strongest affect in our lives because it can change us. There isn´t any weakness in this life that is too big to be changes. I´m a walking testimony of that principle. It was incredible to feel the Atonement take a little place in the life of Nestor. I know as he keeps using the Atonement, he will be able to change completely.

Leaving that lesson full of the Spirit, we visited Rita (who came to Church this past week) and she began talking to us of the difficulties of having a husband in wheelchairs. Domingo, who has been in a wheelchair for quite a time now, told Rita that morning that he didn´t want to live any longer and didn´t have any more hope. A scripture popped into my head and the Spirit forced me to share it. We shared with Rita and Domingo Moroni 7:41. 

" And what is it that ye shall hope for? 

Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ 

and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, 

and this because of your faith in him according to the promise."

 

I had to scream the scripture because Domingo can´t hear very well, but when I finished, he was nodding his head and he said, "pray for me so that I wake up tomorrow." That response told me that he definitely felt the Spirit. What a great example of enduring to the end.

The atonement has the power to change us, clean us, and then strengthen us in the righteous path to our Heavenly Father. Thanks for your thoughts and prayers because they have truly strengthened me.

Love Elder Bosco II

 

 Making pizza!

 The Branch Activity for Alexis