A week filled with love and sunshine

Buenos días!

What a week it has been! Seriously, this week has been so great, so filled with love and sunshine. A little cheesy, but true.

 

I wanted to start out by explaining, as I may already have before, that I am almost a giant in this country. Being 5´9 isn´t that impressive in America, but here, 5´9 is equivalent to 8 feet in the States. I realized this as I was standing in one of the buses that we take everywhere, called "combis" which are basically just like mini vans with a roof that is up just a little bit higher than normal. I was standing next to this sweet little Peruvian lady, she was just standing there normally, her head not even touching the ceiling, and I was literally hunched over in the most uncomfortable position, with my neck bent in some unnatural, inhuman way. It was a funny moment until I got out of the combi and smacked the top of my head super hard just like I do EVERY SINGLE TIME. It´s just one of those things you never really get used to.

 

I don't have much time left, just like usual, but I just wanted to share something I learned this week. I absolutely loved talking to you guys on Christmas. I thought it was going to make me sad and homesick, but it literally just made me so happy that it was impossible to be sad. And I´m still feeling that happiness! That was easily the best Christmas gift I´ve ever gotten. I was honestly kind of bummed because none of my packages arrived in time to open on Christmas, but on Christmas Eve my companions and I swapped some small gifts, shared stories about our lives, and just hung out in the dark in our room, HAPPY, listening to the traditional Peruvian Christmas fireworks as we went to sleep. I realized that night that I didn´t need the material gifts, and that was even clearer to me as we started talking on Christmas day. That was just so fun for me!

 

Sorry to throw in a scripture, but I´m a missionary so I can´t help it. In Luke chapter 2 in the Bible, we can read about the birth of Jesus. I didn´t read this until the day after Christmas actually, but it talks about when the angel appears to the shepherds. It says that the shepherds were attending their flocks, taking care of them, doing their jobs just like normal. But the angel comes, tells them about Jesus, and IMMEDIATELY they leave to go see Jesus. Not only that - the thing that I find most interesting is that the angel never really even tells the shepherds that they need to go see Jesus. It wasn´t even really a question - the angel just told them what was happening. But the shepherds recognized what they needed to do, so they left immediately to go and do it. They come to the place where Jesus, Joseph and Mary are, they see the baby, and the scriptures say that from that moment they left and told all people about what they saw. It´s something really interesting, and I can see very clearly how this scripture would apply to a missionary, but it applies to all of us. Christmas has already passed, so the trees come down, and we move on and go back to work and all of the other things that we normally do. Just like the shepherds, we have all of daily duties that need to be taken care of. But we can always find room for the things that are most important if we can first be willing to act, and second be ready - Ready to accept guidance, change, invitations. Whatever it may be. The thing that matters is that we have a Savior. We don't just have a Savior on Christmas, but every day. Always.

 

Sorry I am out of time again. I just want to say that I hope you had a very Merry Christmas and enjoy the beginning of this new year! You know what´s crazy, I complete 5 months in the mission tomorrow...aah, time flies.

 

I LOVE YOU! Until next week!

Hermana Scott

I wish you all a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Hello family and friends! I can´t believe that it´s already Christmas! I hope that each and every one of you have a very Merry Christmas and that it is a day filled with love and SNOW, 'cause I certainly won´t have any of that! :)

Speaking of days filled with love, I had the best birthday! Thank you for all of the birthday wishes. First of all, I got to talk to you guys briefly on the phone, and that was probably the greatest gift I could have ever gotten. It was so awesome, because as a mission we celebrated Christmas that day also. So half of the mission came together (the other half did it the next day...there´s lots of missionaries, we have to take turns) and celebrated Christmas! We just did a lot of goofy things, like every zone did a skit in front of everyone, and we watched some videos, sang some songs, and they gave us some sweet gifts. We all got a personalized journal and a santa hat. AND about 100 missionaries sang Happy Birthday to me in English AND Spanish. There is a girl in the mission named Hermana Mack, and it was her birthday, and she completed 20 years too! It was cool. I can´t believe I am 20 years old. The first thing I said when I woke up was "Ew I´m 20." Haha but it was a great day! Later we went out to this fancy Peruvian restaurant, then went to this huge park called "El Parque de las Aguas" or something like that. It sounds funny, because it is. It was a park of a bunch of huge fountains, water tunnels, and random things like that. All of the missionaries just had a blast becuase we don´t ever do weird things like that. It was awesome and hilarious and we just played and ran around, and it was a very happy day :)

Other than that, we have really worked hard this week. While we were celebrating Christmas, we ran into this teenage boy at the park, and starting talking to him, and found out that he lives in our area. So we went and visited him this week, and his sister in law and brother were also there. They told us that they had already been to church a number of times, but that they had gone in a different city and when they moved they didn´t know where the church was. So they listened to us, and basically just told us straight up that they all want to get baptized, and that they wanted us to meet the rest of their family because her mom had always wanted to get baptized. We were just sitting there with the dumbest look on our faces like, "Yeah...sure." That NEVER happens. Let me repeat that..NEVER. That is a LITERAL miracle, and I don´t know how to explain the joy that we felt. We left, and since they live on the third floor of this building, they can see us until we turn the corner of the street, so as we were walking we were like "okay just keep it cool, act natural..." Then we turned the corner and just started jumping up and down, there may have been some tears, but really we were just so happy. It amazes me every day how as missionaries we literally don´t do anything. We just show up, or talk to someone on the street, and realize in these moments that God has already prepared these people to receive our message. I am realizing more and more that I need to be SO dang humble to do this work, because there are still so many times that I just want to do things my way, and realize that I really don´t know anything. I like to think that sometimes when I say stuff, God just kind of chuckles to himself and says "Someday you´ll learn." We have taught this family twice, and they are learning little by little, they have about 100 million questions, but we love to answer them. Bryan is 18, Cesar is 17, and Winnie is 21. Vanessa, the sister in law, is 25 I think. And they introduced us to Winnie´s boyfriend Carlos and Cesar´s friend Piero last night. They´re not even members, but they´re already so excited about the church and just want to learn more about it. It´s really amazing, and they´re all so sweet.

So I wanted to share one more thing this week. After I found out about Karl, Claire, and all that happened, my heart just shattered. I can´t even explain the sadness that I felt...it´s just so hard to be so far away, and just worse to think about the sadness and pain that so many people are experiencing right now. I wanted to share a personal experience...so I literally didn´t know how I was going to work that day. Every other minute, I would just start crying, I think I cried that whole day. I wanted to get out there and work, but I was just an emotional wreck. One thing that the men in the church do is give blessings of health and comfort, and what we believe is that they have the legitimate power to speak for God. So when someone receives a blessing, it´s not just words coming from the mouth of some random dude, rather they are literally speaking the words that God is saying to this person receiving the blessing. The only thing I could think of to do was receive one of these blessings, because I had no idea what else to do. So I called our zone leaders (one american, one latino) and asked if I could get this blessing in English. I don´t really know how to explain exactly what I felt in the moments that I was receiving the blessing, but one of the things that he told me that God knows us perfectly and has a plan for each and every one of His children. I have been hanging on to these words this week, and doing all that I can to believe in them without any doubt. I don´t doubt it, but sometimes we just don´t understand why things happen. I don´t know why all of these had to happen at Arapahoe. I don´t know why any bad thing happens to anyone, but I do know beyond a shadow of a doubt that God has a plan. We may not ever understand it, but He does.

I wish you all a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! Just know that I pray for you and love you all more than I can explain! Thank you for all of the Merry Christmases and Happy Birthday´s, they mean more to me than you know!

I LOVE YOU!

Hermana Scott

Feel the love

Hey there family!

So I am feeling really weird as I write this email. I know you all told me not to worry about it, but what you have all told me about the shooting really really surprised me, and I still have tears pouring non stop down my face. I just can´t really fathom the fact that that really happened. What´s more is that I knew Karl...he was my friend. I was his Link Leader. He bought my AP US History text book for $30 right before I left on my mission. Never in my life would I have imagined that this would happen. My heart goes out to you guys, that community. I don´t think I knew Claire, but regardless, that´s the most heartbreaking thing that I have heard in so long. I feel bad, I just ran out of this internet cafe bawling like a maniac, and my district leader from Honduras had no idea how to help me. I know this situation isn´t a funny at all, but I kind of laughed when I saw his face, probably thinking... "crap, that girl is white and doesn´t speak spanish, and she´s a girl." My life is still awesomely awkward.

All I can really think about to tell you at this point is one thing that happened this week. We had divisions for two days with some hermanas in a different area, and my companion Hna Phillips and I went to an area called Cieneguilla. It is probably the most beautiful area that I have seen in my almost 5 months out here. First of all, their area is HUGE. You have to take a bus for like 35 minutes to get from one end to the other. And it´s all mountains, hills, and GREEN trees. There´s not a whole lot of green in Lima. Just a lot of buildings, dirt, and empty windows. But not in Cieneguilla. When we were there, I felt like I was on a grand adventure. I loved being able to see green, flowers, and mountains again. It was amazing. The greatest part though was when we met the bishop. So Hna Phillips had served in this area for 5 months, so she knew everyone really well and had the area memorized almost. And the bishop just thought she was the best missionary in the world. Which she is amazing, but it was just so cool for me to see how much he appreciated what she had done for his ward. He is kind of a funny, awkward guy, but the love that he has for people is something that you can just feel. We had gone to his house, and we met his whole family, and you can just tell that this family is being raised with so much love. The kids are just happy, little balls of energy, and they are so friendly and just love to play. The bishop and his wife live in a humble house, but they are so happy and they love serving the Lord, and they´re not ashamed to talk about how much they love the church. I literally don´t know how to explain it, but I had been thinking of my first area a lot, and missing the people there, and when we had this division I missed it more. I just fell in love with Surco, what can I say. But meeting this bishop in some random part that I had never been in, I realized that that is exactly what this gospel is all about. Love. The love of God for His children, the love of Jesus Christ. Of course the missionaries, who teach this thing all the time, should feel that love. That´s the hope at least. That we feel love for the people we serve. And as I talked to this bishop, and could so easily feel and see the love that he has for this gospel, I felt it too. And I thought of the people I´m serving now in Monterrico, the less actives, the investigators, the members...I love them, too. I don´t really know what Im trying to say, but the love that I feel and teach about every day is something undeniable.

I think I thought to share that because of what happened at Arapahoe. There are so many people in the world who don´t feel that love, who don´t know the happiness that comes with believing in something greater than yourself. I am so thankful for the knowledge that I have of this love, and grateful that I not only feel it from my Heavenly Father, but from all of you as well. I love you, and I miss you. Take care of yourselves, and know that I am praying for you.

All of my love,

Hermana Scott

Mission picture 12-9-13

Transferre​d to Monterrico

AH I always run out of time. But HELLO! I will make this fast!

So I changed areas. And it was one of the hardest things I´ve ever done in my life. I love Surco, and I always will, but for some reason, God wants me in Monterrico. So here I am!

Monterrico is literally the richest part of Lima. It´s kind of a rough change because Surco certainly was not like that...everything is different here. It´s not bad, it´s just different. Everyone is always in a hurry, and contacting in the streets is almost impossible because people ignore you or say "estoy ocupado." We also live right next to the Embassy of the USA so that´s weird. I always feel weird when I walk by. A white girl in Peru WOULD be walking by the Embassy of the USA, wouldn´t she?

So there´s one part of this area that is literally magical. I don´t care if I sound cheesey or weird, but it´s true. Its´called  Villa Libertad, and it´s so pretty and it´s more like what you think of when you think of Peru. I promise to take pictures this week. Its´amazing. We do a lot more work there because the people actually talk to us.  But this week, we stopped by to visit one of our investigators in her store. We were just going to pass by because we were going to go look for someone else, but we thought it would be nice to just swing by really fast and say hi. Her name is Vicki, and she has two sons, Alex and Jesus. Jesus is severely disabled and we had never met him before, but Vicki always talked about her struggles taking care of him. Basically, we met Jesus. And for the first time, we understood. He is really severly disabled, and I can only imagine how hard that is because they have hardly any money at all. We sat down with her and were trying to teach Vicki, but people kept coming to the store so she had to keep talking to them. Hna Killian (one of my 2 companions) turned to Jesus and said " Remember how we were friends before this life? We told you we´d come and find your mom and teach her. We´re trying. We really are." She said that, and Jesus, who can´t speak at all, just smiled SO HUGE. I couldn´t help but cry. It was such a sweet moment.

Sorry I have 0 seconds left. Just know that I love you!! Thank you for your support.

MUCHO AMOR,

Hermana scott

Pictures!

Sharing a story of JC

HELLO!!! Hope all is well! Once again, thank you for the emails. I love getting them! Thanks for all of the love and support.

Like always, I´m a little short on time. But that´s just the story of the life of a missionary. Haha I sound like a drama queen. 

I wanted to tell a brief story though. So we are teaching a guy named Jorge Chavez, and his wife Liliana really doesn´t want to listen to us. Jorge Chavez is a rather odd individual, but he really loves the church and the gospel, and we are working with him a lot to get him to the point where he can get baptized. The only thing that really blocks his progress is the fact that he isn´t married, but his wife is Christian and she knows that it´s moral to get married and everything, so they´ll be doing that really soon, which is awesome! So basically, JC is for sure getting baptized, it´s just a matter of when. Anyway, so we visit him a lot and talk to him a lot (or, we visit him, and he talks to us....he´s a talker), but we are slowly, SLOWLY, gaining the confidence of Liliana. "poco a poco". So we are lucky if Liliana talks to us. Yesterday, JC called us and told us he wanted us to come to his house because he had something urgent to tell us, and our thought was Um...yeah we´ll try to squeeze you in into our schedule of 8 appointments in 6 hours. We were super busy that day because Sundays are crazy, and honestly kind of irritated that he wouldn´t just tell us on the phone, but we said we would make time to go see him. So miraculously (or just maybe because God is in charge of all this stuff) one of our appointments changed, so we had plenty of time to go visit them. We get to the house, and Liliana is there, JC had just left but was coming back. So we sat with L for a little while, and chated about life, but she didn´t seem to want to talk about the "urgent thing" so we didn´t really say anything. but when JC came back, he had all the details and was really concerned. Basically, he told us all about what had happened, and it was about Liliana. She goes to a Christian church, and always had talked about how much she loved it. But apparently yesterday morning, after church, her pastor and his wife met with her in his office, and they were talking about how L and JC aren´t married, and how it´s a sin. They also called her out on the fact that she comes to church alone, and that her husband goes to another church (that´s us...oopsies). Basically what they told her is that she is no longer "allowed" to come to church, and that she needs to find a new congregation. After JC stopped telling the story, L tried to say something, and just started bawling. It broke my heart. And it´s not like we were about to pounce and be like "Oh hey good news you can come to our church now! You´re church was wrong all along!!!" That was not at all what the purpose of this was. Hna Hamilton and I just looked at each other, and we didn´t really know what to say. Obivously we believe that our church is the true one, that´s why we´re here. But that´s not what she needed to hear in that moment. We shared a story about Jesus Christ, and talked about His life and what He did for us. I don´t know how to explain it, but the Spirit was so strong in that room. In the scriptures, Jesus Christ asks us to have a broken heart and a contrite spirit. I can tell you for sure that Liliana´s heart was broken in that moment, and I think that hearing about Jesus Christ is just what she needed. It was really cool for me, because I felt like I wasn´t even teaching. It was the scriptures that we read about Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world, and the feeling that we all had.

I want to say more, but there is not time. I just want to say that if I´m learning anything out here, it´s that I really don´t do much. I just wear a black tag, walk around and sweat a lot, and hope and pray that people can feel God´s love through our words in broken Spanish.

I love you all so much! Have a great week!

Hermana Scott

Living in the now

Hello!!! Buenos dias!!! I just want to say first things first, THANK YOU FOR THE EMAILS! More than you all know, I love getting emails and letters. It makes me feel like a normal person, and a little closer to home. Thank you!!

Funny moment of the week. Man, this one kills me. So we were teaching one of our recent converts, Pedro. He was my first convert in the mission, and I just love him to death. He´s a sweet, old 69 year old, and he´s just so funny. A few days ago, we went to teach him, and when he answered the door, he was wearing this funny, huge sweater, which was tucked into these huge, baggy sweatpants and his socks were pulled up super high and the bottoms of his pant legs were also tucked in. I´m sorry if I´m a jerk, but I really had to try hard not to laugh. So just keep in mind, I already had the giggles a little bit. Okay, so then we started teaching. He has a hard time reading - he can read just fine, but he just doesn´t do it. So we started with the first chapter in the Book of Mormon, and were just going to read that and the first 4 verses of the next chapter. In chapter 1, the prophet Lehi receives a commandment to leave with his family from Jerusalem because it was going to be destroyed. And in the first 4 verses of chapter 2, it just basically says that they left and took only the things they needed. verse 4 says "And it came to pass that he departed into the wilderness. And he left his house, and the land of his inheritance, and his gold, and his silver, and his precious things, and took nothing with him, save it were his family, and provisions, and tents, and departed into the wilderness." The point of reading that was so that he could see the importance of the family, because that´s really all he took! He left everything else. So I asked him something like, Hno Pedro, what did Lehi bring with him? What is the most important thing? Or something like that. And he says "La comida, no mas" THE FOOD. He said THE FOOD. I literally could not stop laughing. I was trying so hard to pull myself together, because obviously we shouldn´t be laughing at the people we teach, but that just killed me. Every time I think about it, it makes me laugh. I think, if that´s what people are getting from my message, I gotta change something. Hahaha he´s funny. He´s the best, but sometimes, those Peruvians...

So once again, this week has flown by. I can´t believe that it´s week 6 of this transfer. The sad thing about that is that I will probably be changing areas next week...it´s really hard for me to imagine being somewhere else. I have come to love these people so much. When I think about some of the goodbyes I´ll have to say, I get a little misty-eyed. It will be really hard, but something that my companion and I have been working on is "being where our feet are." If that makes sense. Living in the now, doing all that we can now, and focusing on what needs to be done now. That applies to missing home, thinking about stuff like transfers..all of it. Something that has happened recently is that we have set baptismal dates with people, but they´re all in December, when I probably won´t be here. At first I thought to myself, Well I don´t want to ask them to get baptized now because I won´t even be here to see it! But that´s not what we´re here for...I don´t ask these people to get baptized just to "get another baptism," so that I can enjoy it. These people get baptized because they believe that what we teach them is true. We ask them to get baptized because we know that what we teach them is true. Whether I´m here in Surco or somewhere else, the Lord is guiding His work. It will continue with or without me. That makes me think of something that I heard recently...One of the dear friends I´ve made here on the mission goes home next week. She bore her testimony in the Zone conference we had last week, and she said "He aprendido que no estamos ayudando en esta obra, sino El Señor nos está dando esta oportunidad." We´re not helping in this work, the Lord is giving us this opportunity to do the work. It´s really interesting. But it´s true. So I´m trying to keep that in mind as my time here in Surco comes to an end.

I´m out of time, but all is well here. I am super happy and we are getting lots done down here for the Lord. Or, he´s giving us lots of opportunities to learn and have some pretty amazing experiences.

I hope you are all well! I love you! Thank you so much for the support! HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!

Mucho amor,
Hermana Scott

Unspeakabl​e Joy!

Buenos días, familia y amigos!

This week literally flew by. I´m sitting here at the computer and I can´t believe that Monday has come again, and it´s already time to email.

So many things happened this week. This week, I have learned a ton, felt the Spirit a ton, cried a ton, and good news, laughed a ton also.

First, my companion told me on Tuesday morning that I had talked in my sleep on Monday night. Like...a lot, apparently. And the best part is that it was ALL IN SPANISH. Hahaha how weird is that? What she told me is that I was "making a contact" in my sleep...like saying what I would say to someone that we met in the street. Isn´t that so weird? And she said that I was talking 100% clearly, and that she could understand all of it as if I was wide awake talking to her. Haha when she told me that I just died laughing. How weird, but it´s kind of cool that my brain thinks in Spanish like that now. The mission does weird things to ya!

So I wanted to tell you about one of the most spiritual experiences that I´ve ever had in my whole life, if you don´t mind. This past week, I was struggling quite a bit. Mainly just Tuesday and Wednesday, I just was really beating myself up. I don´t really even know why, but I just felt like I wasn´t really good enough to be doing this stuff. I was exhausted, and we were both stressing out a little bit about all of the things we had to do. But mostly, it was an internal, personal battle that I was having with myself. Really, what I always say to myself and to God (in my prayers) is that "I just want to do this missionary stuff right." I had been struggling with other stuff too, but I just really want to be doing all of this right, in the way that the Lord wants it to be done. It´s His work, for heaven´s sake! I don´t really know how to explain it, but despite our successes I just felt crappy about myself (kind of like a pity party). But anyway, I really have decided that Alma 26 is my life´s motto. In this chapter in the Book of Mormon, a group of men have just returned from their "mission," and one of them, Ammon, is rejoicing. He is talking about how amazing the mission was, and how many great things they had accomplished, and one of the others, Aaron, tells him that he needs to knock it off because he´s boasting. But Ammon basically just turns to him and is like "What are you talking about? I´m not talking about myself...I´m talking about how amazing GOD is." This whole chapter is filled with his words, praising and thanking God for all of the miracles he had done, and for the help they had received from Him. I read this chapter all the time, almost every day, because I want to be like Ammon. I want to realize that all of the good we do out here, the "good results" we get are great, but it´s all thanks to God - we´re literally just instruments in His hands. Anyway, one of the things that Ammon says, is this-  "Therefore, let us ^aglory, yea, we will ^bglory in the Lord; yea, we will rejoice, for our joy is full; yea, we will praise our God forever. Behold, who can glory too much in the Lord? Yea, who can say too much of his great power, and of his ^cmercy, and of his long-suffering towards the children of men? Behold, I say unto you, I cannot say the smallest part which I feel." I have always loved that part..."I cannot say the smallest part of which I feel." I always think about that, and I want my joy to be like that. So in these days, I thought about that a ton. I kept wondering why I couldn´t feel that joy. So on Wednesday, I was reading my Patriarchal blessing (the blessing that members of the church receive...we get lots of blessings in the church, but this one is special, and intended for your whole life. It´s not like a prophesy of your life, but it tells you a lot about your life and blessings you will receive. I hope that makes sense) Anyway, I was reading that, and the last part of mine says the following - "You will be blessed with unspeakable joy in this life and in eternity as you serve the Lord..." UNSPEAKABLE JOY. That´s the blessing that I have. After reading my Patriarchal blessing who knows how many times, and reading Alma 26 every day for the past 3 and a half months, I FINALLY discovered that, just in the exact moment that I needed it. It´s funny because I wrote that scripture on the front of my agenda like 4 weeks ago, so that I could always see it. "I cannot say the smallest part of which I feel." And I have that blessing. To be able to experience that. And that unspeakable joy is exactly what I felt this week, after I had to fall a little bit.

Now that I´ve spent forever explaining that, I want to tell you about what happened this week. So I want to talk about our investigators a little bit.

Jorge Chavez - This crazy guy who loves to talk. Seriously, we really don´t talk much when we visit him, because he just talks and talks and talks. But he´s really great and he really wants to learn about the church. He wants to get baptized, but he can´t right now because he lives with his "Señora" and they aren´t married. They have two kids, and have lived together for years, but have never gotten married. That´s how it is here though,  the Law of Chastity is one of our biggest stumbling blocks. We´re helping them set up a date to get married, but we aren´t sure if they´re all in. His wife isn't really into the whole Mormonism thing, so she´s not really in a rush to get him baptized.

Ashley - The sweetest little girl! She is only 9, but her parents are members of the church, but were 100% inactive. She sought us out though - her parents hadn´t gone to church in years, but she decided that she wanted to figure out what it was all about, so she sought us out and we have been working with her and her family for about a month and a half. They are totally active now,  they come to church every week, and Ashley is getting baptized THIS Saturday!!!

Geraldine - We met her through a family in the church. She is the girlfriend of one of the brothers in this family, but the brother was also inactive for a really long time. Years! But about a month and a half ago also, we started teaching Geraldine. She really wanted to get baptized, but couldn´t because of the law of chastity thing too (DANG that commandment of God) (that´s a joke). But anyway, she lives with her boyfriend, Diego, and they have a child. But we have been working with them, and they are getting married on November 30th of this month!!!!! So that Geraldine can get baptized and they can start working towards getting married in the temple!! Diego is reactivated, and they´re really passionate about this. It´s amazing, and when I think about it I want to cry. I get to marry someone on my mission!!!!!!

Sebastian - He is the son of an Hermano in our ward, but his situation is difficult. He has like 5 people in his family telling him that he should join different churches, and he just doesn´t know what to do. His parents were also inactive, because they have to work on Sundays (well they don´t have to, but they do). The dad´s name is Jorge. So Jorge hasn´t come to church in so long, but he wanted his son to find about the church and get baptized, so that´s why we´re teaching Sebastian. Basically, we´re making progress with Sebastian, and Jorge is reactivating in the church!

Jenny - She is  a sweet, shy 26 year old that randomly came to church one day, just to check it out. Since then we´ve been teaching her, and she is making progress. It was not a coincidence that she came that day. She will probably be getting baptized next week!!

Okay, with all of that, I wanted to tell you what happened on Sunday. So there is an Hermana here, Hna Burga, who was inactive when I first came to this area two months ago. But now she is totally active, and I could tell you so much more about her, but just know that I just love her to death and thinking about her story and how she has changed, it makes me so happy. She is one of the dear friends that I have made. She talked in church on Sunday about a story that was in one of the church magazines. .. About a little girl that was meeting with the sister missionaries, and decided to get baptized. The missionaries were like best friends with this little girl, and they would always go by her house to bring her to church, and the little girl just loved them. Anyway, it turns out that the little girl had terminal cancer, and I don´t remember all of the story exactly, but she said that the missionaries were right there with this little girl when she died in the hospital. So Hna Burga is telling this story, and I´m just balling, and I realize that THAT is what the love of missionaries should be. they should love the people THAT much. And be willing to do anything for them. I was just crying, and thinking about how much I loved the people here, wondering if it was enough...and I looked around and saw that EVERY single one of our investigators were in Sacrament meeting. ALL of them. In that moment, I felt that "unspeakable joy"...I can´t even explain it. It was absolutely amazing. And I felt a love for them that I can´t even explain.

I am sorry I'm out of time, but just know that I love you so much! I wanted to tell you these things. I hope you know how much I love you! Thank you for the emails and support. I LOVE YOU!

Until next week!

con MUCHO amor,

Hermana Scott

Reactivate

HELLO! I hope all is well! Everything is great down here. The sun is coming out and I will soon be getting sunburns every day. How exciting, right?

I have to tell you something funny that happened this week. We had taught a lesson in the chapel one night this week, and when we left we were super happy and excited. I walked out on to the sidewalk, talking to my companion, just loving life and laughing and smiling, then I just completely ate it. I fell flat on my face, slid off the sidewalk, and just ended up sprawled out completely in the grass. I think my companion sat there laughing for literally 5 minutes. It was easily the funniest thing that has happened to me on the mission so far. The weird thing is this that I still don´t know how or why I fell. But all things happen for a reason... or at least that´s what I hear.

Anyway, I don´t have much time. But I say that every week. Basically, I have a million things to say. But I will share one. So we are assigned 5 families that are less active in the church to meet, work with, and "reactivate." It´s a really long process actually, but it´s really rewarding. So we hadn´t gotten to know one of our families yet, and one day one of our appointments fell through so we decided to go meet them. It wasn´t in the plan, but we thought that it would be a good idea. So we went and found the family, and when the hermana let us in she was kind of hesitant. Like she didn´t really want us there. That´s the awkward part of seeing less actives...they stopped coming for a reason, and usually the last person they want to see is a missionary. but we started talking to them (two of her children were there), and they started getting a little less tense. We shared one simple scripture with them, and bore testimony about Jesus Christ, and the mom just started crying. At first her face got really serious, and I thought she was going to say that we shouldn´t come back or something like that, but she just looked at us and tears just started coming down her face. She started talking about how things had been really hard for a lot of years, problems with money and family and health, and how she knew that the right thing for her to do was go to church and take her kids with her but she just couldn´t do it. She said that for her whole life, her parents had fed or housed the missionaries, and that the church and missionaries had always been a huge part of her life. But with these problems in the past few years, she slowly just kind of fell away. But she bore a beautiful, powerful testimony of Jesus Christ, and said that she knew the church was true. It was AMAZING. I just knew that it was not by coincidence that our other appointment fell through, and that God really led us to these people. I was so overwhelmed with the Spirit in that lesson, and I couldn´t stop thinking of the scripture in Alma 26.15 that says " We have been instruments in his hands of doing this great and marvelous work" INSTRUMENTS...that´s it.

I love missionary work! Life is good. And I am happy. And sometimes I forget how to speak English. Which is good...I think.

I love you all so much! Until next week!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Scott

Our Little Miracle Project

Buenos Dias!!!

I don´t have a ton of time left, but I have some important things to say.

First I ate the foot of a chicken. Yes, it´s true. Well, actually I couldn´t eat it. I tried. And I just couldn´t choke that sucker down. Apparently it´s good for wrinkles...I decided I would rather have wrinkles than eat one of those again.

More important, we have the baptism of Carlos Lelkes this week! he is the best. He was the guy that was originally the contact in the park, but an hermana from the church brought us to teach him. This whole time he has been our little miracle project, because he just seriously wants to change his life and is ready and willing to do anything. But something really incredible happened with him this week. He told us one day that he was really happy, but he was really hungry because he hadn´t eaten anything in like 2 days. It broke my heart, but my companion and I just didn´t know what to do. That night, we had a meeting with the ward mission council (where we talk about the investigators and make plans for the members to help us) and we told our ward mission leader what Carlos had told us. Carlos came that night to the church to get a blessing of comfort and health from some hermanos, and Hno Barraza (the mission leader) talked for a long time with Carlos. Afterwards, we saw them walking and talking like they were best buds, and Carlos just looked so happy. He is always happy, despite all of the hard things in his life, but for some reason it was just different; he looked different. We talked to Hno Barraza, and he was like " Oh yeah, everything's fine. After the meeting we´re gonna go grab a bite to eat and just talk for a while." So here´s the thing. Hno Barraza took him out to dinner. But he also started him in a process to get a job, so that he won´t have to worry about money like he does right now. The people here, members included, really don´t have much. But they just want to share. They just want other people to feel the same happiness that they do. The members here are so strong, and such a huge help to us. After Hno Barraza told me he was taking him to dinner, and I saw the look of pure bliss on Carlos´face, I just started crying. It was so so sweet.

So I really don´t have much time, but I wanted to tell you that we are working hard. My companion said that she has never worked this hard in her whole mission. And it´s paying off...we´re getting a lot of good stuff done. But we´re exhausted! Hahaha literally I was a zombie yesterday. So it´s good, but we´re trying to learn a balance in all things. One thing that I personally am working on is realizing that all I do here, good work or bad work, is all FOR THE LORD. I don´t do this for myself. I don´t do this so that I can call my district leader every Sunday and give him good numbers. I´m working on learning that everything we do is for something greater than ourselves. It´s really interesting.

I am sorry I am out of time, I have more to say but there's never enough time! And pictures take forever to load so I only got those ones. Ill do better next week. I love you all so much!!!! Take care! And read Alma 26!!!

Mucho amor, Hermana Scott

Week 13...WHAT?

Hi :)

I hope you are all doing well. Sorry this email is a tad bit later than normal - we had to make a quick (3 hour) trip to La Molina. The good news about that is that when we got there, they told us that we didn´t need to be there and that we could go home. Haha, it´s funny now, but after riding a psycho lawn mower bus for an hour and having to do it all over again...it wasn´t the funniest moment of my life. But all is well. I´m always ready for a little adventure.

First things first, I am SOOO proud of Daniel´s soccer team!!! What a cool story. I hope that was a nice little birthday present for you, Daniel. You guys are the best, and good luck in the upcoming games! Keep me posted!

So something cool happened - we had our first change in the mission. Like, companion-wise. My dear Hermana Deoporto left me, but I have an awesome new companion, Hermana Hamilton, and she is from Oregon! Yeah - she´s gringa like me!!! It´s really fun to have an American companion. Obviously there´s nothing wrong with having a native companion, but I feel like I can express myself a lot better. My brain is constantly on overload because I switch from speaking English and Spanish probably 37 times daily. We speak some pretty sweet Spanglish too, which is fun. She is also a convert of two years, which was so cool when we found that out. She is a basketball star and is super cute and funny. We get along really well, which is a blessing from heaven and an answer to my prayers. I am learning so much from her, she is such a great missionary. She served the first four months of her mission in Alabama, and she´s been here in Peru for almost 4. But really, she´s just the best and I am having a great time with her!

I like telling funny stories so I´m just gonna pop one in here really quick. The first night, we were trying to change the bunk bed so that there was more room on the bottom. It´s hard to explain exactly what we did, but basically we did it completely wrong. I was climbing onto my bed, at 10:30, and we were both super tired. My companion was like "I hope this bed situation works out" and as I sit down with her laying in the bed underneath me in the dark, the bed starts falling. As I´m writing this I am just cracking up - it was so ridiculous. I just started screaming "GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT" because I was afraid that the combination of my weight and the black metal grate thing would probably hurt a little bit. So basically, the bed fell. And we had to take the whole thing apart and start over again. Eventually we figured it out, but man, it was funny. I climb into my bed a little hesitantly every night, but I haven´t fallen again yet.

I feel like I have a lot to say, but I just don´t know how to say it all. I want to talk about my ward here really quick. The people here are amazing. The members are so strong in the church, and they really just want to help us. Our  bishop has been working his booty off to make changes and make a lot of things better. He has been trying to get all of the organizations of the church totally involved in missionary work. And it´s working! We have members coming to teach with us all the time, members are visiting recent converts and less-active members, and it´s just amazing to see. The Relief Society (the women´s organization in the church) made little missionary name tags for all of the sisters in the whole relief society. So, EVERY hermana in the church has a little paper missionary nametag with their name on it. It was the cutest thing I´ve ever seen, and when I saw how excited they all were about them, I couldn´t help but cry a little bit. It´s helping me realize that "missionary work" really isn´t what we think it is. Yeah, the missionaries play a big role in this work, but a more appropriate name would be the "Work of Salvation" or the Work of the Lord, because really that is what I am learning. This is the work of the Lord, and I am just one little part of it. It´s amazing. And I feel so blessed to be able to work with this amazing ward!

So this past week, I have worked harder than I have in all of my mission. I just had a different mind set. I´m realizing that I just was not a very humble person before the mission, and little by little I am changing that. When I can forget about the fact that I am exhausted, or hungry, or just want to take a little break, and focus on the fact that we are about to go teach a young man who hasn´t attended church in a couple of months, or the fact that the Spirit is telling me to make just one more contact in the street even though it´s the LAST thing I want to do, I can feel that I am becoming more humble. I can feel that I am learning my purpose as a missionary. Now, that´s not to say that I never complain about being hungry, or that sometimes I don´t make those contacts even when I know I should, but I am learning. I can see those little changes. I think. Hermana Hamilton likes to work hard, and that´s what we´re doing.

One of the people that we started teaching this week is a kid named Julio Lengua. His mom and sister are members, but they are totally inactive, and his dad and brothers aren´t members. He hasn´t been to church or seminary in forever, so he was our project. We met with him on Saturday night for the first time, and he was just so sweet and humble. At one point he wanted to serve a mission, but he just kind of fell away. He isn´t really inactive, but it´s just been a long time since he went to church. We talked to him, and he just received our lesson so well. When we invited him to church he kind of hesitated (since it starts at 8:30), but he said he would come. So we went to pick him up and he actually came with us! HE CAME WITH US!! That doesn´t always happen. But anyway, he came, walked straight up to the front of the church, and blessed the sacrament, and went to all of his classes and every thing. I barely know this kid, but seeing him up there in his suit and tie, for the first time in who knows how long, just made me so happy. We are not just here to baptize people or pass out invitations to church so we can get a good number of contacts at the end of the week. We´re just here to "invite all people to come unto Jesus Christ." That´s our purpose. That´s really all we do. And we just hope and pray and work for those people to do exactly that - come unto Jesus Christ. I can´t explain the joy that I feel when I see that someone has done that, for the first time ever or maybe just the first time in a long time. It´s the best. And that´s why I´m here.

There´s always more to say, but I just want you all to know that I am really, genuinely happy. Yes, I´m tired, and sometimes my feet are sore, and yeah I´m probably a little bit fatter now than I was (darn it, all that rice.......) but I am genuinely happy. I miss you all like crazy, but I can feel every day that I am doing the right thing. Know that I pray for you and I think about you. I hope that you are enjoying the beautiful Colorado autumn. Thanks for all of your support, I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!

Con todo amor en mi corazón,

Hermana Scott

A Work of Miracles

BUENOS DIAS!!!

 

I hope this email finds all of you happy and excited to hear a little bit about life south of the equator.

I want to tell you about a few things before I get to the important things.

Okay, first, this week I ate some more weird food. First was cow stomach. Yes, I ate the lining of the stomach of a cow. And it was so so weird and I was genuinely surprised when I liked it. I was trying not to think too much about what I was eating, slightly enjoying myself, then they put a plate of peppers in front of me so I thought, "Yeah I´ll try that! Peppers have always been my thing!" YEAH...that was a big joke. Never, NEVER in my life have I eaten anything that spicy. And of course I ate a giant chunk of it. I´m not exaggerating when I say that my whole face was on fire. I could not breathe...I could have sworn that my mouth was just bleeding, same with my nose. I don´t even know how to explain it. But nothing made it better, I tried to eat rice, but it just made it worse! Hahaha looking back it was hilarious, but as I was silently dying, crying, and drooling, I didn´t think it was that funny. Mother, you´d be fine to eat those. The people here eat them like candy, so I thought I´d be fine...Yeah well now I know. NEVER. AGAIN.

Also, apparently a few days ago there was a pretty strong earth quake. It was in the night time, and I somehow managed to sleep through it. Every night, I sleep perfectly fine. I have never once had a problem sleeping...and nothing except my sweet, soft alarm in the morning wakes me up. Anyway so everyone keeps talking about how crazy this earth quake was, including my companion. But I was just sleepin´ my first experience away. Everything is fine though, it wasn´t a super bad earthquake. But I guess that this time of year it´s a normal occurrence....I´ll keep you posted on that. As far as I know, it´s not anything to worry about. But if it happens again, the good news is that I probably won´t even notice!

So, in other important news....WE HAD OUR FIRST BAPTISM!!! I can´t even explain my joy. Recently, I´ve been thinking a lot about the purpose we have as missionaries. "Invite all people to come unto Christ..." Our purpose isn´t JUST to baptize. We do a lot more than that. So sometimes I struggle when we talk about goals to get baptisms every week, or whatever. Obviously baptisms are important, but we can´t just be focused in that...it´s something really interesting about the mission, and there are a lot of feelings involved in that topic, and it´s something that I just don´t really know how to explain. But, we had our first baptism. And all of my worries about that subject just kind of disappeared. Hermano Pedro was BAPTIZED! I was sitting there, listening to the talks, watching Pedro, and I couldn´t help but think of my own baptism. The way I felt then, and all of the things that have happened in my life since then. All of the blessings that I have, thanks to that decision I made. I mean, look where I am right now!!! It´s amazing. Honestly, the gospel changes lives. I have a testimony of that. And as I watched Hermano Pedro get baptized, I realized that YES, we do want people to get baptized. Baptism is just the first step we make. It´s the beginning of a life in the gospel, the first "acceptance" of the invitation to come unto Christ. Yes, we have to focus on other things too, but yes, baptism is a beautiful, important thing. It´s such an interesting thing to think about. 

Something cool about the baptism is that I got to play the piano! There was no one else that knew how, so I played the two songs that I know how to play. It was such a special experience for me, the baptism. I couldn´t stop smiling, and there were certainly tears. When I cry, my face turns red, and when my face turns red, all the Latinos make fun of me. It was worth it though. :)

One cool thing that happened this week is that one Hermana in our ward here took us to meet someone to teach. In the mission, that´s called a reference, and we LOVE references! We were super excited about it, and so was she. I had read a scripture earlier that day, Doctrine and Covenants 84:88 which says "And whoso ^areceiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go^bbefore your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my ^cSpirit shall be in your hearts, and mine ^dangels round about you, to bear you up.. I had told my companion, Hey, this scripture is telling us that if this person accepts us and wants to listen to us ("receives" us), that means that Jesus Christ is literally there with us." So we went to meet the reference, and as we were walking to the park, I saw the man that was waiting with the hermana, and I realized that we had met him a few weeks earlier - he was one of our street contacts!!! He had told us that he wanted to listen to us, so we took his address and everything, but for whatever reason, we had never contacted him again. But that morning, there he was, just waiting for us. I literally can´t explain the way I felt...that promise in that scripture is true. I just knew that the Lord had led us to this man. And as we were teaching him, I just felt the Spirit so strongly...I spoke perfect Spanish. That´s not even a joke. It just came out of my mouth and I wasn´t even thinking about it. It was one of the best lessons we´ve had. AND, he accepted baptism, right then and there!!!! HE IS GOING TO GET BAPTIZED!!! These are the moments when I realize that this is the work of the Lord. I don´t do anything, He just does His work through me. It´s a work of miracles. Think about it...we didn´t contact Carlos after that first time. He would maybe never have learned about the gospel. But he was one of the very few people that are "chosen" for us, so the Lord made sure that he was put in our path again. "Que milagro" Seriously...it was a miracle.

 

And sorry, I forgot my camera cord, so I can´t send pictures, but I will next week! I owe you lots of pictures...I really am sorry about that. Next time!!!

Also, I have officially completed 12 weeks here. It´s unreal, and the time really does fly. Our first transfer is over, so we might have exchanges...we find out tonight. I will tell you all about it next week.

Well, I love you all so much. Thank you for everything. I got a letter from Nana, Tommy Madden, and the Krells this week in the mail...THANK YOU SO MUCH! I loved that!!! 

I pray for you guys all the time. I love you so much!!!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Michelle Scott

First Baptism

BUENOS DIAS, FAMILIA!!!

Today is a happy day because THE SUN IS OUT! It´s crazy that you are all entering the cold time of the year, and it´s finally starting to be warm here. I´m the only white person here for miles which is interesting enough as it is in this sea of Peruvians, but it will be even more interesting when I am the only sunburned white person for miles. It´s bound to happen. But don´t worry mother, I have sunscreen!

One interesting thing I have to share is that we ate cow heart and cow liver this week. I don´t really know what to say about it....I just sort of ate it. And you know, it wasn´t that bad. All I know is that I eat what they give me. Sometimes I just close my eyes while I do it. No but really, it was actually pretty good! 

Another thing, yesterday was Sunday. We had like 4 of our investigators there, a family of less actives, and some other less actives. It was a miracle!! I´m learning the importance that the gospel has in the lives of every person, and it´s so incredible to see its influence in the lives of different people. Obviously investigators are so important, but people who are already baptized that don´t come to church are equally important. As missionaries, we invite ALL people to come unto Christ. Including those who came unto Christ once before, and decided to take a little break. I love working with less actives and seeing them come back to church, or teaching them lessons, because they start to remember the way they felt before. It´s really a beautiful thing, and I was super excited yesterday.

Also, after sacrament, the Relief Society president came up to me and asked if I could speak for 10 minutes THAT DAY in Relief Society. It was crazy, because I have really been wanting to speak to them, but I was planning on preparing something specific, you know? If someone asked me to do that at home, where everyone speaks the same language that I am fluent in, I think I would have been totally fine. But I was pretty darn nervous to just wing it in front of these people, speaking a language in which I am certainly not fluent. It´s crazy how much I do know, though. It´s moments like that when I realize how much I´ve learned. The little talk was pretty good, and a lot of people commented on it. They also commented on how "linda" my red face is. What can I say, when I get nervous, my face turns red. And trust me, I was nervous. Red face syndrome is just one part of being a gringa.¨

Good news - WE HAVE OUR FIRST BAPTISM THIS WEEK!!!!! On Saturday!! Your birthday, daddy! It´s a pretty cool birthday present, if I do say so myself. Pedro, our golden investigator. He is so great. He is 69 years old, and we just met him one day while we were walking in the street. He was so excited to learn about the gospel, and he has just taken it all in. There are some people that are just ready to receive the gospel, and he was certainly one of them. We have been teaching him for a few weeks, and he is ready, and he´s getting baptized this weekend and I am so happy for him and I am so excited and I can´t even tell you how happy I am!!!! I will send pictures next week.

This past week was really great, but also really difficult. Sometimes I am really selfish, really stubborn, and really impatient. It´s so important in missionary work to just be humble in every way. I am slowly learning how to be humble. But the thing is that as missionaries, we invite everyone - EVERYONE - to come unto Christ. That includes ourselves. I may have already said this, but it´s so important and I´m learning more about it everyday. I, Hermana Scott, also need to come unto Christ. I need to come unto Him, and do all I can to become more like Him. He was humble. He was patient. He was loving. And that is exactly what I want to be. I´m trying, and everyday I learn more about how I can do that.

The mission is the best, I am so so happy, and I can´t believe how fast time is flying. Every week I just can´t believe it´s time to write to you all again. Thank you for your love and support, it never goes unnoticed. I love you all so much, and I pray for you about 80 times a day. We pray a lot out here.

I LOVE YOU!!!!!!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Scott

Getting lost in this work

Hi everyone! This is a two-part email from Michelle...enjoy!

 

 

PART 1

 

FAMILY!!!! Hello!! I hope all is well and that you are having a great morning so far.

Before I write anything else, I have to tell you something, and this is directed mostly to Daddy...but this morning, I had the world´s most amazingly incredibly delicious tamale ever. I don´t even know how to explain it besides, "Holy crap." I didn´t want to eat it because I didn´t want it to be gone. But then I ate it in like 12 seconds, so..so much for that. But yeah, seriously the food here is amazing. And I haven´t had a repeat of a meal yet! Which is crazy if you think about it, because...

I´ve officially completed one month in the field! It´s so crazy how time flies. I think about all that has happened, and time out here just doesn´t make sense. My first week felt like a year, but the weeks after that have really flown by. It´s like a mind game. I don´t know how to explain it. But "el tiempo buela."

Thank you also to everyone who has been sending me emails! I love it more than you know. They are the perfect boost in the beginnings of the weeks here. Thank you thank you thank you!!!

Okay so this week was great. It was really hard, but I learned a ton this week. On Thursday, everyone in my zone had interviews with the mission President. It was my first interview in the field, and I was a little bit nervous about it, but our mission president is the bomb so I got over those nerves pretty quickly. I was mainly nervous because I usually cry when people ask me questions like "How are you REALLY doing, Hermana Scott?" You know what I mean? But it was great. Our Zone leader, earlier in the week, invited us to think of a question that we could ask him. And my question was along the lines of... "I want to be lost in the work and "forget myself" completely. How can I do that? I´m trying but I feel like I´m not totally there." Before the mission, so many people told me to just love the people, focus on them, and forget myself. But in total honesty, that´s hard to do. I don´t think that I have a problem with loving these amazing people, but I think about myself too much. Anyway, President Ardila told me that I should be thinking about the investigators always. When I am studying, I need to look for things that will help my investigators. When I am praying, I need to pray for my investigators. As I´m walking in the street, I´m looking with my eyes but trying to see with the Spirit, if I´m supposed to go talk to the guy, or tap that woman on the shoulder. It´s crazy and it´s hard and it´s amazing and I literally don´t know how to explain it. But that´s what he told me to do. Think of the investigators first. So that´s what I started doing, because  (sad as it may be) I wasn´t really doing that yet. But something that I realized, is that as I´m studying and focusing on the needs of the people I teach, my own testimony is strengthened. I get my "spiritual feeding" too. As I pray for my investigators, and pray to know how to help them, I´m showing God that I´m willing to do what He wants, and not what I want. It´s a process - everything in the mission is a learning process. I hope that this all makes sense. But the point is that I can slowly feel myself getting lost in this work. And I hope that eventually I can be totally lost, because at that point I don´t think I´ll have to say anything about it. So really, President Ardila is the best. And the mission is also the best.

So here´s the thing - my companion needs to go to the mission offices in La Molina, which is 1 hour away from here. So its cutting our time a little short. I am going to come back and be able to write more I think, so until then know that I love you so much!!!! I have more to say but not enough time right now. But I will send more, I promise. I LOVE YOU!!!!!

Hermana Scott

 

 

PART 2

 

Hello again, querido familia!

Okay, I don´t really have a ton of time, but I just wanted to tell you one more thing.

So we are teaching a boy named Isaac who has a lot of problems. He is 16 but he has problems with drugs and a girlfriend who doesn´t help in that regard, and needless to say (in missionary terms) he has a problem with the law of chastity. We work with his family all of the time because the family is huge, and there is a mix of recent converts, less-actives, inactives, and non-members. So we see him a lot. But he doesn´t really like to talk to us, and doesn´t really see a problem with smoking weed and cocaine (or whatever you do with cocaine...don´t judge, I´m just a missionary). We are trying so hard to find a way to make a difference, tell him something that will help to realize there´s more to life, but he just doesn´t really care. It´s really hard for me, and sometimes I just feel so sad while we teach him. It´s something that is a blessing and a curse about missionary work...you come to love the people so much, and it is just so sad when you just have to watch them suffer. You can see in his eyes that he isn´t really happy, but he just doesn´t know what to do. AHH, it kills me. He´s just a baby!!! 16 years old. It is my prayer every day all day that we can make a difference in this boy´s life.

Anyway, life is good. All is well. I love it here and I´m learning Spanish! Last night I talked on the phone to our district leader to give the weekly report on numbers and stuff, and I talked to him (BY MYSELF - big girl!) about Isaac and what we can do to help him for like 20 minutes!!!!! I can´t even tell you how proud and happy I was...our district leader talks so fast you´d think the world was ending and everything he says is his last words. But yeah so that was cool. Everyday is hard, but there are miracles when we look for them. The mission is really the best.

I hope you are all well, sorry I don´t have time to email you all personally but just know I love you more than words can describe!!!! Talk to you soon!!

I LOVE YOU!!!!

Con much amor,

Hermana Scott

Straight from the heart

(This email was received Monday 9/30/13)

Buenos dias, familia!

Holy cow, I honestly can´t believe it´s Monday again. Seriously, this week flew by. That´s what everyone told me, though...the days are long, you sleep easily, but the weeks fly by. That is becoming very true.

Today is my feliz cumple mes!! I have successfully survived 2 months here in Peru. This week is exactly 9 weeks. If you say I have 16 months left, that sounds like a long time, but if you say I have 69 weeks left, that really does not seem like any time at all. It´s flying by, and it´s just going to go faster. It scares me a little bit.

Okay, first story is really funny. Last night, we had a family home evening with 13 people. It was so great and it reminded me of the Lattins and that crazy house. One of the brothers has a baby, who is adorable. We had just had this really spiritual lesson, and then the baby walked in to the middle of the room and just let out this HUGE fart. I seriously could not stop laughing. It was kind of embarrassing actually...I guess I´m still pretty immature. I was laughing at the baby, but everyone else was laughing at my reaction. What can I say, farts are funny.

Okay, serious now. This week was super hard. We did not have much success. In the mission, you have to be careful of how you measure success, because the people we teach aren´t just numbers, they are souls. That sounds cheesy, but it´s true. Our goal may have been to have 5 new investigators, but we don´t walk the streets thinking, "okay, gotta get one more, we need to beat the Elders this week" It´s not like that. That´s not how God thinks of his children, so we shouldn´t either. At the same time, it´s hard to feel like we aren´t making any progress. Plus, my companion and I argued a ton this week. I am not an easy person to work with sometimes...I am pretty stubborn, or really stubborn. I think I know everything. (I´ve always been a Daddy´s girl...haha, love you daddy) But it caused problems this week. That didn´t add to our level of success. I learned a lot about patience, and humility. I am constantly learning.

After a week with zero, yes ZERO new investigators, we were pretty discouraged. Not many of our investigators are progressing either. Yesterday, we prayed to be able to see a miracle. We prayed for humility, patience, and faith. It was a hard day, but we had some great lessons. The best was in that family home evening. We taught about the Restoration and the story of Joseph Smith. So remember, there were 13 people there. Two weren´t members, and one was already our investigator. The other was the wife of the guy with the baby. Actually they're not married. But anyway, 2 non members. We gave the most powerful lesson we´ve ever given. I just spoke in Spanish like I was speaking English, it was crazy. We just taught straight from the heart, and the spirit was so strong. It was one of those times when you just couldn´t deny the power of the spirit in that room. But we were about to finish, and my companion started to ask her if she wanted to be baptized. I was freaking out internally because I just didn´t know if it was the best idea in that moment....but she said YES. SHE SAID YES. What?!?!? It was amazing. It proved to me the strength of companionships, because she felt something that I didn´t, and it resulted in a miracle for us. The Lord blessed us in a way we never could have imagined. After a long, hard week, we were able to see a beautiful, yet simple miracle. This is the Lord´s work! I am learning that every day...The Lord works THROUGH us. We aren´t the ones that work miracles.

So things are good. Spanish is coming. It´s still hard, but it´s coming. I was pretty sick the other day. I hadn´t felt good all day, I had made a number of trips to the bathroom, and there was this moment when we were walking that I felt so sick...and I didn't know what to tell my companion so I just stopped walking, and in English said, "Stop please" Maybe that´s not funny to you, but looking back I think it´s hilarious. Life is interesting here, to say the least. But it is great.

I love you all so much. I hope that all is well, that the week was good, You are constantly in my prayers. Take care, enjoy the first week of October!! I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!

Con mucho amor, 

Hermana Scott

"I Can Do This!"

HOLA FAMILIA!!

I honestly can´t believe that it´s time to write again. The time goes simultaneously unbelievably fast and unbearably slow. With a short term perspective, it feels like this past week flew by. But in the grand scheme of things, one week doesn´t seem like much time when you´ve still got 16 months. It´s an interesting mix of emotions for sure.

That being said, I love it here. I don´t even know where to begin. The work is hard, and there are days that I don´t think I can do it, but with out fail, every day I remember all of the powerful blessings that I have received, and I know that I can do it. "Puedo hacerlo." 

Peru is like a dream. That sounds so cheesy, but its true! Its absolutely incredible. It´s beautiful. I´ve never seen anything like it in real life. I honestly believe with all of my heart that if I weren´t a missionary, I wouldn´t be able to handle some of the things I see. People live in crazy conditions, and we walk into houses that are barely even houses. Dirt floors or cement floors, one faucet for "showers" and drinking,...like I honestly don´t even know how to explain it. Some people live on hardly anything, but they´re the happiest people I´ve ever met. It warms my heart, and makes me feel like a horrible person because of how needy I am.

At the same time, some people live in really nice homes (comparatively, at least.) Even here in Peru, there´s a split between the richer and the poorer. It´s interesting.

I totally wish I could just sit here for hours and tell you everything about everything, but there are some things that I really want to tell you. 

First of all, we have a pensionista, who makes all of our food. Three times a day. She is amazing. She has literally nine children and all of them are girls. They are the sweetest family, and the mom (Hna Angelica) is amazing. I just can´t get over how much she does for us every day. Her youngest two daughters have stolen my heart...seriously, I´m in love with them. Their names are Tooti and Valeria. Literally, her name is Tooti. Haha I will have to send a picture sometime. I am honestly just in love with them.

So, remember how I´m obsessed with Texas? There is a family in our ward, and the son just got home from his mission recently. We were at their house one night, and I was looking at his stuff from his mission, and he had a flag that people signed. I was convinced that it was the Texas flag, so I was like "YOU SERVED IN TEXAS????!!!??" In English and everything. Everyone looked at me like I was an idiot, and he said "No....Chile." I don´t know if I´m actually stupid or something, but do those two flags look alike? Because I could have sworn it was Texas......well, needless to say, it was embarrassing on many levels.

So you should know that I love all of the people here. Every person I meet, I think, how could I possibly love another person as much as I love you? Then I meet someone else, and it´s just this endless cycle. But we are teaching two sweet women, one is a less-active member of the church, and her sister is not a member, so it´s cool to be able to teach them at the same time. We always have spiritual lessons with them. But one day, we were doing family home evening with them (Dad and Daniel - just a night once a week when you have a spiritual lesson, play games or have dessert as a family), and Hna Max´s grandson was there. We started with a hymn, and literally none of them knew the words or the tune, but they wanted to sing all three verses. It was so funny, I laughed throughout the entire thing. Not because I was making fun, just because it was the sweetest thing. (also hilarious though)

Next week, I´m going to tell you all about our investigators. But yesterday, two of our investigators were at church, and two less-active members that we´ve been teaching came as well! That was a huge blessing, and I just couldn´t stop smiling.

Really fast - I had an experience this week.. I was studying with my companion, and I just could not get words out. For whatever reason, I just literally could not express my feelings in the beautiful language of Spanish. I just started balling, and kept thinking "I can´t do this, I can´t do this." I sometimes feel like this is the hardest thing in the world. In some ways, it is. I am a million miles away from home, speaking a language that I don´t know, teaching people that just don´t want to change, getting doors slammed in my face and weird looks because I´m the only white girl for miles. In that moment, I felt like there is no way I can do this whole mission thing for 16 months. But, I prayed. I prayed for a really long time. My companion was super nice, she really comforted me and said a lot of nice things (from what I could understand, at least.. ;) ) but I didn´t feel any better until after I prayed. And in that moment, I felt the love of God in a way that I never have. I have been called of God, to preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ. He called me to speak Spanish, in this country, to teach these people. It´s hard to explain exactly how I felt in that moment, but I knew with all of my heart that I can do this. It will not be easy, and I will struggle a lot, but the gospel is true and I´m just here to share the good news with these people, and love them with all of my heart, because they are children of God. He knows I can do it, so I´m going to have faith in that and just do my best.

Thank you for the love, support and emails. I love hearing form you guys. I miss you all so much! But I know these 16 months will fly by. Take care of yourselves, enjoy the week, and know that I look forward to hearing about all that happens in the next week. I LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Michelle Scott

Mission photos 8/29/13

Group photo 9/2/13

Extreme measures

Hola familia!

This is so weird, because I never thought I would say this, but it is actually hard for me to type this in English. I never really speak English here so when I actually get to speak English its hard!

But this week was SO good! I dont even know how I could explain all of it. I dont have a ton of time but ill do my best to hit the important parts.

So first my companion is from Mexico. She is so sweet and we get along really well. We are different in a lot of ways, but it doesnt really matter because were here for one purpose, and that purpose is the same. Its hard when I am frustrated or confused because um, no hablo espanol perfectamente, so I cant really accurately express my feelings to her. It gets hard but she is patient and helpful and understanding. 

So I have to tell you something absolutely ridiculous. We live in the second story of a building, but we live with members of the church, and we have to walk through their house to get up to our room. The structure of buildings here is so interesting. So the people we live with live on the first floor, our room is on the second floor (after you walk through the house) and our bishop lives on the third floor. Another person lives on the second floor, but we just have that one room. I hope that makes sense. So one day, we couldnt get the door unlocked to walk through to our room. We tried everything, we pounded on the door and called the people but they were so asleep that they were basically dead or something. It was ridiculous. We had gone outside to run, and since it was like 6.50 am they were asleep. Anyway, it was so annoying and I know I need to be thankful for them, but REALLY? We were trying to get in for almost 2 hours. And thats wasting all of our study time and preparation time and everything. Anyway, since the bishop lives on the third floor, I resorted to extreme measures, and jumped out of the window in their kitchen to the small little porch that is right in front of the door to our room. It was an experience. I dont know how to describe it...it was just "an experience". It was higher than was probably a good idea to jump. I like hung out of the window, holding on to the edge, then just dropped down. Definitely not the best decision Ive ever made, but it worked out, we got into our room and continued the day. Daniel, I didnt land like you would have, but I did an okay job. Except my heel hurts a little bit, but I really am okay., Missionaries do crazy things.

Anyway, everything here is different from America. Literally every single thing. Dogs and cats just roam the streets, peeing and pooping everywhere. They keep the streets pretty clean which is nice, but theres always puddles of pee on the sidewalks. Roosters live in peoples houses! So thats a nice wake up call every day. People live in the smallest, dirtiest houses, but its just not a problem for them because its all they know. People make and sell food on the side of the road, sometimes it smells so good but we cant eat it because wed probably die. Not really, but wed probably get really sick because they do a lot of things differently.

AH I am sorry I just did not leave myself enough time. I love our investigators. As dumb as it sounds, I cant remember them all by name yet because we teach so many people, but theres one boy that we are teaching named Gustavo who is so so cool. He has so many hard questions about the church that make us think harder about the doctrine than we ever have. In our first lesson with him, he told us that he wanted to be baptized if he found out the church was true. The first lesson! It was amazing. He is just a very sincere guy, with a lot of interesting experiences and thoughts about life. He went to church on Sunday too, which was awesome.

It is a lot harder to teach in Spanish than I thought it would be. I honestly know a lot, but I dont know enough to say all that I want to. I get a little flustered sometimes, but the people always say that they can understand me which is good.

I am learning so much. Just from talking to people I learn the language. Its interesting to compare what I learned in the CCM to what I hear in the streets. I love the moments when I understand, but sometimes I just kind of zone out and think to myself "I dont speak Spanish I dont speak Spanish I dont know what youre saying because Im American..." Ya know, stuff like that.

I want to tell you more about the people we teach, but I will do that next week when I have more time.

There is so much to say! I love the food so much. Its so rich in flavor and theres so much of it which of course is good for me. Except yesterday we ate like 18 pounds of beans, and obviously there are consequences with that... :)

Next week I will tell you more. Im sorry I didnt use my time wisely enough, but I will send pictures and tell more fun stories next week I promise!

Also about the address, its the one I posted on Facebook. I am in the lima east mission. And all letters and packages need to be sent to the mission home, which I posted on Facebook! Dont forget that!

Thank you for your love and support. I miss you guys so much, I miss our house and moms home made dinners. but I am so happy here. I love being a missionary. Thank you for being the best! I love you! And I will talk to you next Monday!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Michelle Scott