Welcome President and Hermana Parker!

This week was whack, I feel like we didn't get much done, but we actually did. We´ve been striving to get everything ready for the arrival of the Parker family, and boy are they awesome! Hermana Parker went out with some sisters and Presidente Parker went out with the APs for the night. When Hermana Parker came back, she waited a bit for her husband. She came and talked to me and told me how when they had received their call, they Googled “Peru Iquitos Mission” and sure enough my blog showed up. They said that they had been reading it weekly since January!! She said she felt like she already knew me inside and out, so that was funny! Good work mom! : )

I am stoked to be able to work with these guys. The mission sure will be different, but it will be great! I got a minute to talk to President Parker, and he admitted that Utah football is better than BYU football! Hahahahha I got a good laugh out of it. They both asked me what I thought about finishing the mission in the office…. I said I wasn’t quite sure. Now that they're here, I would like to get to know them some more and work with them. Like I said, I am quite excited to work with them. They are going to do a great job for the mission. Sometimes you can just kind of feel when someone has been called of God, and I felt that as soon as I met them. It was awesome. We basically were waiting in the office all day for them. One of the first things that President Parker told Elder Neves and I was that he wanted to visit everyone in the mission before transfers. (July 9^th) sooo Elder Neves worked his magic and got him flights and everything for the APs to show him around as well. Should be a fun time. Last night he was talking about going to lunch today and he wanted to invite a whole bunch of sisters and ahh man. Let the funds roll out I guess hahahahah. We'll be alright.

This week consisted of flying all over the place trying to get things ready for the arrival. Thursday we went to lunch with Pres Li and that night we had a family home evening with my old zone, Secada. They had been baptizing like crazy, so we all got a …wait for it….. a big ol chicken and rice dinner!!! It was great!! We sang a song for them, and they quite enjoyed it. I also got to talk to my dude Elder Porowski for a bit. He's from Canada, and I hadn’t seen him in over 11 months. We took a pic but I forgot to get it from him! Next week fo sho! 

Today a sister missionary (Hermana Hellewell) is going home for some health issues. She is from Orem Utah, and she offered to be a courier to send a letter home. I'm going to see if I write a letter to ship it to T-ville before she leaves! Hahah

I got my new planner for next transfer, and I realized just how dang short time is. I cannot believe it. It will go even quicker now hahahaha, time flies when you're havin' fun!

Later on today we'll take Presidente Li and Hermana Li to the airport, and then Presidente Parker will be all in!!! They're such a great couple!

I also got my other tie back from Pucallpa today! Red white and black looks pretty slick!!!!

Elder Neves and I took some pretty silly pics for a gift that we made for Presidente and Hermana Li this week! Haha!

Pretty short letter, today will almost be a normal work day taking so many dang people to the airport hahah.

Elder Roper

Me Faltan 100 Dias ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

Hello all! It was fun to see everyone on Sunday for Fathers Day! 

I have been reading lots of talks about pride and humility, and found a quote that pretty much floored me. I can’t remember who said it or where I found it… but it says “Pride is concerned with WHO is right, on the other hand, humility is concerned with WHAT is right”. 

We’ve had a pretty basic week. We got to proselyte a bit more than usual, which was fun. We didn’t have nearly as many experiences as we had last week, but nevertheless we saw some small and simple miracles.

About 2 weeks ago, the AP´s decided that we would do a morning devotional as soon as we arrive in the office. We sing a Hymn, have a prayer, spiritual thought, sing and pray again. Its small, but we quite enjoy it. Elder Castro this week shared Proverbs 22: 6 which says…  “Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it” It made me think pretty hard.

Last night President showed up to the offices and took the APs with him at about 3 pm. They didn’t get home until 10:20 jajajaj. He took them out to dinner and did transfers and a whole bunch of stuff. He should be in today and Thursday we will have one last family home evening with them before President Parker arrives on Friday. We are all obviously super excited for him, but at the same time, nervous. We don´t really know what to expect. Nevertheless, it will be excellent! Now that I think about it, there is a pretty soild chance that I finish my mission in the offices……. I am praying that it doesn’t happen, but we'll see.

In one of my studies this week, I decided to do a PMG study activity in Chapter 5. It says to compare the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7) with the sermon that Jesus gives to the Nephites in the temple (Nephi 12-14) It was awesome, there are lots of little details that I had never noticed before. I did that same study about 17 months ago in my first area, and didn’t catch anything. But when I did it this week, I learned a ton!

Mom and Dad I hope you enjoy your Mexico trip! Mom what you said about the man looking through garbage and buying a joint… sadly I see that almost every night walking home. It makes me grateful for the family I have and the stability that the Gospel provides. Hopefully you can go to a Spanish ward on Sunday! hahahah 

Happy Anniversary this week Jackson y Jennay!! 

(TODAY I HAVE 100 DAYS LEFT)

Elder Roper

Elias Silbia Edila and Elias Hijo - we visited with them on Sunday after our call for Father's Day 

Elder Neves planner and mine

Happy Birthday Turk and Happy Father's Day!

Hey all! This week went by pretty slow to be honest, rare right? Mostly because small stupid things that happen during the day do not allow us to proselyte as much as we should/could. But even though that is happening, we are still having awesome lessons with our investigators. Les contaré de algunas experiencias que hemos tenido en esta semana……

Thursday night we taught our investigator Liz in the Church Building with some members. She told us that she had been reading her Book of Mormon and wanted to go to Church on Sunday and we were stoked. So we finished up the Plan of Salvation and made kind of a transition into lesson 3 (EVANGELIO DE JESUCRISTO) and she understood things very well. We invited her to be baptized and set the date of July 20^th…. Which she rejected saying that she just wasn´t sure yet. We then invited her to pray to know if that’s the day that God wants her to be baptized and she said she would, and if(when) she receives and answer, she will be baptized. So we don’t have a legit baptismal date, but we are getting there. 

Sunday we had a lesson with a family. (Daniel and Cynthia) The dad is a very less active member, his wife is not a member, and they are not married - (22 and 25 years old).  So we are working really hard with them, but things are going slow because the dad (Daniel) has a crazy work schedule, so it’s difficult to coordinate appointments with him. Anyways….. Sunday we stop by and were teaching with Daniel´s Dad (who is a member and has been for 25 years), Ernesto. And at the beginning, the lesson wasn´t going very well (la cita estuvo super bamba), and I kinda lost my patience with it. Their daughter was running around screaming and distracting all of us, the parents seemed like they didn’t really care etc etc etc. (we were teaching the Restoration btw) and it gets to the First Vision, and Daniel stops us and in essence says… “Elders, forgive me here, but I need to talk” and then proceeds to teach everyone about it, he even quoted James 1:5 while he was at it. It really changed the course of things and brought the Spirit right with it.  We then finish the lesson inviting Cynthia to be baptized and she wasn’t as sure as Liz, but she said she wanted to. Her biggest doubt was knowing how she would get an answer… we turn to Galatians 5 and explain the fruits of the Spirit all that, (THIS IS WHERE THINGS GET GOOD) and she says (like I said in essence, the translation is different), “soooo like the feelings I get when you guys are here teaching us and then you leave and I feel good for a bit, but after it goes away… you´re telling me that comes from the Holy Ghost?” Elder Neves and I looked at each other with that “can you believe this??” look. It was quite the experience… to see how the lesson started and how it finished…. I couldn’t believe it honestly.  Every day that we go out to teach it’s a miracle. The fact that two North Americans can enter the house of 3 Peruvians and they all understand each other (granted there are those moments when we have no clue what the people are saying), and that we can teach them the Gospel well enough in another language so that they can understand it, and they do….. that is incredible. That cannot be explained by the knowledge and wisdom of man. 

Sunday we also took a less active to church with us. His name is Renzon. He hadn't been to church in over 5 years. It was cool to see how he remembered everyone and it seemed to us that he was having a good time. Now we just need the rest of his family to come with him.

This weekend Presidente and Hermana Li, and the APs are in Tarapoto opening the new Stake. Elder Falabella and I think Held are there as well. It´s a pretty big deal. It will allow Presidente Li (now Parker) to rest a lot more… he being the Mission President over a district has to oversee the work much like a Stake President would. He will still travel to visit the missionaries, but not as much to oversee the work of the Stake.

Last night we had a fun ward activity, “Escrituras Vivientes” which translates to Living Scriptures. All the groups determined that what Scripture story they wanted to act out and how, and then presented to the ward members. It was fun and had quite the turn out. We acted out the Prodigal Son.

This week I also learned that sometimes we think we are guided to a house to teach someone, but in reality it is somebody else. Our friend Martin that we were teaching a while back has disappeared, but we found his uncle and we taught him the Restoration and he understood it so WELLLLL. When we got to the great apostasy, he said "well, if there weren't Prophets or Apostles, that would mean that the people teaching about God didn´t have authority, and they still don't have it today either... right?".  Once again Elder Neves and I looked at each other with that look. We set up a return appointment and we called him in the morning to remind him and he told us that he had been waiting all morning for us to call him and remind him. Our next appointment is Monday night, so we'll see what we can do with it! Like I said, Elder Neves and I are working so dang hard, and it´s really paying off. 

Calling home on Thursday for Keaton's birthday was awesome! I´m really glad that the Church changed that!

I have officially received my travel plan from the Church… I´m not sure how I feel about that hahahah.

I honestly feel that Elder Neves and I are striving to do everything in our power to bring about good to the people, and the Lord is content and blessing us for our efforts.

Interesting week! Sorry for the lack of pics! I´ll make up for it next week!

Elder Roper

My lunch of rice, beef, a fried egg and a fried banana.

8 de Junio!

Hey guys! We're still recovering from last week! This week was leaders council again and it happened to be President Li´s last one. Sooo we had been working really hard to make it a great experience for them, and I think it ended up pretty good. We sang their favorite Hymn “Grande eres tu” (How Great Thou Art) and “para siempre Dios esté con vos” (God Be With You Til We Meet Again) It was quite the experience!

This week I got one of my 2 ties from Pucallpa. I think it looks dang slick. Anything red, white and blue is slick for me haha. 

Consejo is always a good time because you get to see your friends that you don’t see every day- Having Elder Newell and Elder Ruiz back in the office for a bit was awesome. Elder Ruiz is a convert and I look up to him so much. The man just has such an understanding of the gospel. 

This consejo I really lost a lot of respect for a lot of people. Normally the leaders come Wednesday we have meetings that night, Thursday morning is the actual meeting and then they fly out Thursday afternoon. This time they left on Friday, and it was really sad to see that a lot of people just (instead of going out and working with other missionaries) just stayed here in the office and wanted to chat. 

Monday night President called the AP´s and told us that we were invited to a Family Home Evening and dinner in the mission home. It was pretty fun and spiritual. We are all kind of in disbelief that President is already finishing his mission. 

President Parkers bio finally showed up on lds.org!! Were stoked. He arrives the 28^th of this month and President Li leave the 29^th. 

Last Sunday I was too tired and I passed out on one of the couches in the office after church….. they decided to turn me into a meme. Hahahah

In two weeks of the transfer, I think we’ve taught maybe 4 lessons. Super frustrating. And it is probably only going to get worse as time goes on and when President Parker gets here. Last night we taught a kid named Martin. Hes 18 and studying/training to be a cop. He was just a random contact that we had. When we met him we gave him a Restoration pamphlet and then about 2 weeks later we were by his house with fallen appointments and decided to go visit him. Turns out the dude had read the whole pamphlet and basically memorized it. So we gave him a Book of Mormon. Which he went on to read the introduction and the testimonies of Joseph Smith and the 3 and 8 witnesses…. and last night and we invited him to be baptized and he said………………………. No. But I trust in the Book of Mormon and the role it has in the conversion of the investigators. 

Our other investigator Liz is awesome as well. She came to church a bit late on Sunday and told us that her aunt and uncle had threatened to kick her out of the house if she kept listening to “los mormones”. But we told her that it was her decision and she decided that she wanted to keep listening to us. She also told us that she has never been baptized ever, and that it’s something that she would like to do herself. 

We have lots of good things going for us in our area lately, it just dang hard coordinating our time well. They’ve been in the office painting and changing wifi and lights and it’s just rough right now. Oh wellll.

Sunday we also got invited into the Primary for a second. They (the leaders) asked us to share about our missions a little and explain what we do and all that. So we did and then they sang “I hope they call me on a mission”

And to explain the worms from last week.....

those are called "suri" and they look disgusting. Peruvians yes indeed EAT them (live and cooked) but Im not quite sure how or why. It is technically prohibited for missionaries to eat suri, but pretty much everyone does it anyway. I for one am not down to eat it. hahahah

Pretty eventful week to say the least!!

Hasta la próxima semana! 

Elder Roper