Sister Jessie's Mission

Fam!

How are you all doing? It is so fun to hear about all that you are up to and accomplishing in your lives.  Everything seems to be going so great at home! Well this week has had its ups and downs but I always try to look for the miracles that have happened instead of the disappointments.  So let’s see . . .

This week we went to visit one of our less-actives. He is a man who was in the Bishopric in the past, has children married in the temple, was an extremely strong member of the church. However, for about 10 years now he has left the church, absolutely hating all the members and everything about the church. At our first visit he told us that he didn’t have faith and that we could never convince him to walk into the church again. But, through a lot of consistency, prayer, fasting and with the helping hand of the Lord we were able to bring him to church these last few weeks. And this last visit he told us that he doesn’t know how to write but he wants us to help him write his history of "coming back into the light," as he put it, and kind of his process of falling away and coming back. I told him our goal is to put this is the Ensign, so we are going to try to do that haha. What a miracle. Thanks to the guiding hand of the Lord and the power of the atonement he was able to change completely! Our next step with him is to get him and his wife to the temple!

Same with two other families that we are working with.  We are working as hard as we can to get them to the temple this October. This is one of my favorite things as a missionary, to work with these less active families and teach them about the eternal importance of the temple and sacred covenants we make there. There is no greater joy than to see these families changing slowly.  Through the power of this gospel, I am able to see the unity and love once again in these family's homes.  And as they have this goal of the temple in sight it is unreal to see the enabling power of the atonement of Christ work to get them to the house of the Lord to be sealed for time and all of eternity. 

We are making a lot of progress with Gaberiella, the 14 year old. She told us this last lesson that she feels like this is the path for her. She has believed all her life that God exhausts but now feels like she needs to DO something with this faith that she has. She is amazing. 

We met another lady who is a mom of 4 kids. We set an appointment with her and as we walked toward her house, she was sitting on her doorstep with her Bible and notebook in hand, ready to learn and ask questions. haha We were completely surprised, this rarely happens here in Peru! We began to talk to her and she started to tell us that she feels that the Catholic Church is completely wrong and every day she feels like she is missing something and needs to find the true path to invite Christ in her life. She is truly looking for the truth and I honestly think that she is one of the choice children of God that Heavenly Father put in our path.

One funny thing of the week; as I was walking in the street with my companion and I make the comment that "I just want to see a white person" haha I have no idea why. However, as we turned the corner I was shocked to see a lady with bright blue eyes and blonde hair. We began to talk to her and she is actually from Norway but has lived in Peru with her husband for 5 years. She speaks perfect Spanish but still has a really thick Norwegian accent. It was super weird to talk to someone with blue eyes. It kind of through me off. But we did set an appointment with her and are going to meet with her this next week. What a coincidence huh? haha

Well, that was my week! There are miracles each day; you just have to LOOK for them. I am so grateful to be a part of this work and I am unbelievable grateful each day that I have a family who I can live with for eternity.  And now, I can help the people here have this hope of an eternal family also! I love you and miss you all more than I could ever say! Keep smilin’.

Love, Jess

It was my comp's b-day on Tuesday

Tried to make it a surprise for her but the Peruvians here are not very discreet haha

lovely nap position