How are you all doing?? Can you believe it's already MARCH?! I hope that this past week has treated all of you well! As for Elder Albarán and me here in Avaroa, it's been a solidly normal week. Avaroa continues to be the best area in the mission ;) Well, with regards to investigators, I would love to focus on Liz, Martha Choque, and the Rojas Family. I am just constantly blown away by Liz. This past week, I had the opportunity to help her with her homework a couple times (#IMissPhysics!!), which was super fun, and every time we meet with her I am just more and more amazed. She always goes to Seminary in the morning, she is memorizing her doctrinal mastery, and she bore her testimony in chuch yesterday. She is amazing, and though I may not get to see her be baptized, I know that she is on the right path :) With Martha Choque, she was able to come to church again yesterday! She is amazing as well, and though she cannot read or write, she is such a pleasure to work with. She doesn't currently have a baptismal date, but we are hoping to extend the invitation this week because she is just such an amazing woman :) With the Rojas Family, which is a family of four that we've taught for some time, we had an amazing lesson with them this week about the Plan of Salvation and answered several questions. We were able to bear testimony to finish with a really powerful Spirit and it was unbelievable. We were able to extend a baptismal invitation and look forward to March 31st! :) We have a couple other investigators at the moment, but these are the ones that are really progressing and continuing strong at the moment :) Well, as I started with, this was a normal week, so I really don't have much to say more than it was great and I am still 100% in love with Bolivia :) I'm even learning to love Spanish! It is an amazing language and I would love to share a thought that I had about Spanish this week that I thought was cool :) In English, we use the verb "to be" to describe just about everything, temporary or permanent. However, in Spanish, there are two verbs, "Ser" and "Estar." Ser for permanent conditions, like personality (El es feliz=He a happy person), and Estar for changeable conditions, like emotions (El está feliz=He is happy). Well, the other day, I was doing some Spanish study when I realized something cool. When you use the word "Dead" in Spanish (Muerto), you do not use Ser, you use Estar. "El está muerto" As I thought about this a little bit more, I realized that even the Spanish language testifies of a very beautiful truth: Death is not permanent. No matter how devastating, no matter how sad death may seem, it is NEVER permanent. We know that death is NOT the end. We know that we will see our loved ones again. All of this we know because of Jesus Christ. In and through HIm, death has no sting and the grave has no victory (see 1 Corithians 15:54-55). We can take joy in this knowledge and we can remember it through any seemingly devastating losses that may come our way. I testify of the truth of this, and the Spanish language is my second witness ;) I hope that you all will remember this through anything that may come your way. As you do so, I promise that the peace that you seek will be easily found in the arms of our Savior, Jesus Christ. If you want another cool resource for this, I invite you to watch my favorite Mormon Message, entitled "Because of Him." Well, I just want to tell you all that I love you and I thank you for supporting me through this amazing adventure in Bolivia. I will have my transfers for you next week, so we'll see what happens! I hope you all have an amazing week, and as always, if you have any questions don't be afraid to ask! You are all amazing!
Elder Wynn
Me with Hermano Denis doing barbecue from last week!
Martha Choque and I :)
Real time selfie from the internet café in my alpaca wool sweater/jacket
Love you so much!
Love,
Elder Wynn
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