Demons and Break Dancers
I’m sorry I didn’t write an email last week everyone! We were mega busy all day and then we were on divisions (splits) all week so I never had time to write my email. But I got a lot to write about and a ton of pictures!
So to explain the demon of the title, we were heading to a recent convert’s house to teach him and check up on how he’s doing with, you know, “perseverar hasta el fin” and this guy pulls up on a moto and gives us Popsicles and tells us to come to his house and teach him. He seemed a bit drunk but nothing we haven’t done before so we said why not. Horrible decision. We go to his house and sit down in the back and the guy brings his mom. He sits down with us for a second and then is like “I’m gonna get you guys a soda.” so we talk to his mom and she is like “You need to give him a blessing. He has an evil spirit inside of him. He does crazy things at night and I’m scared for him.” To which we just kinda stare at each other and don’t even know what to say. The guy comes back and gives us some soda and just starts yapping about the scriptures but has like a perfect knowledge of it. He was directly quoting Old and New Testament and reciting like perfect stories from the BoM. He was even talking about the book of Enoch. Mind you again, he is drunk and coked out of his mind. I kept telling my comp we gotta go but he was like “idk how”. The guy is like pray with me and recites almost an entire Psalm and after that I just stand up to leave and even though he was telling us to stay I was like “no we have been here for an hour. We gotta go.” And after I said something along those lines to him, he becomes completely sober for a second and goes “How do I get the priesthood, Élder?” I was genuinely speechless and just left as fast as I could and my comp came with.
Thursday night was super rainy and so we went and ran to find shelter at this tiny museum here in JVG. As we sat under the roofing? I don’t know what to call it, there were 2 guys practicing a break dance routine. My comp was like “Let’s talk to them” so we chatted with them for like an hour while it was pouring rain. One guy is named Ricardo and he is wanting to learn English so we talked to him about missions and how most Latinos who serve missions end up learning English because of how many white comps they have. He seemed really interested so we have since taught him twice. His friend also seemed interested but we haven’t had contact with him but want to teach that guy’s girlfriend as well because he told us that she has been going to every church trying to feel the Spirit. When he told me and Baker that we both hit the 😏 to each other.
We had Zone Conference 2 Fridays ago and it was really good! My comp and I woke up at 2:00 am which we were excited about😁😁 and took a bus to Salta (5 hour bus ride) and were the first one’s at the church building so we talked to the old couple who makes food for everyone. We helped set up a bit and then everyone started showing up. I talked to my boo thang Elder Nickle a bunch and overall it was a fire conference! All of the talks were great and my MP dressed up as a fly fisherman to give a lesson on always finding new people to teach.
That Sunday there were a total of 13 people besides my comp and I because the power and water cut out in JVG the night before. I gave a talk though so I’ll try to get that linked at the end in both Spanish and English!
That was basically it for that week. That’s the other reason I didn’t write an email.
Sunday after Church we bought tickets to stay the night in this other area in our Zone called Rosario de la Frontera and then do P-day the next day and had an hour to make cookies and Rice Krispy Treats and pack because after P-Day we did divisions. I swear I’m not a Stereotypical Sister Missionary, Rice Krispy Treats are just easy to make. We got to Rosario at perfect timing because this guy that the ZL’s have been teaching wanted to get baptized right at that moment so because my comp is DL he got to do the interview. The guy has an amazing testimony and seeing his baptism was really cool! They even made me do a little talk about the Holy Ghost. On PDay we did another Zone P-day and tried to do a hike. I say tried because we ended up just following a riverbed and getting lost but I got a ton of good pictures! The Hike is called the Medialuna and it’s a cross on top of this mountain/hill but we didn’t know where to go so yeah. We also had a dog following us the whole time so we called it our Spirit Guide. Once we finally got back to the church building in Metan we checked for ticks because we were in brush for like 3 hours (I had like 8 but there are 0 cases of Lime Disease in Salta, Argentina but still). Then we went to lunch, celebrated my ZL’s birthday, had District Council and booked it to the bus terminal to go back to JVG where my ZL lost his phone. On the way home we got to watch part of Top Gun: Maverick on the bus and it made me miss movies.
So the rest of the week we did divisions and I was with one of the ZL’s, Élder Hicks. He is a goated missionary with I think over 30 baptisms and he leaves in May to go play college football somewhere up in Utah. I led the area because I was the only one with the phone but it wasn’t too hard. I also got to talk a ton in lessons which has helped with my Spanish and confidence with the language. Élder Hicks taught me a ton and is really focused on always listening to the Spirit and a bunch of times each day if we ran out of plans or just trying to figure out what to he would ask “What’s the Spirit telling you, Élder Curtis?” Which was really helpful because I have been trying a ton to learn how the Spirit speaks to me and following promptings that come to mind. I’ll talk a bit more about that in mu Spiritual Thought though.
Hicks and I found a bunch of people. 3 are absolute GOATS. 1 kid is named Gael and he’s 13 and super smart and the sweetest kid ever. Élder Baker and I think he’s so good he doesn’t even need to be baptized and just be translated. We taught him all 3 lessons already to which he was super engaged, asked questions, knew principles, and even brought a friend to a lesson. We were talking to him about the Second Coming and he was like “I hope Christ comes soon. I saw a shooting video the other day and it made me sad. This world is really dark.” Then at the end of that lesson we asked if there is anything we can do for him and he said “Teach more people about the Words of Christ. Everyone needs more of Jesus in their lives because I know it’s helped me a lot.” We had interviews with our MP on Friday and he texted us the night before and was like “when can you guys come back so we can get to know each other better?” And then he wished us luck on our travels by being like “I hope that God stays with you, takes care of, blesses, and protects you in your travels.” Legit my comp and I almost cried. He’s just such a sweet kid and I hope he gets baptized. He really wants to come to church and learn more.
Another lady is named Valeria. Hicks and I were walking past her house and she comes out and talks to us. She told us that her Mom was baptized forever ago but has since past away and her daughter was baptized a while ago and that now she is interested in the church. She was super involved and asking questions in the lesson and seems really wanting to come to church.
The last guy is named Emanuel. We just felt like going to his house as we passed by and talked to him. We have since had 2 lessons with him and met his girlfriend. She was really shy the entire lesson and at the end we wrote down her number so we could teach her and when I went to go check later, I found out she is a super inactive member! We think she was super quiet because of that reason exactly and we hope to reactivate her. Emanuel kept asking super good questions and asking when church is. We’ll have to see if he comes next week because yesterday was District Conference and had to be at the church at 6 am to travel 2 hours to Metan.
Honey and Peanut Butter Sandwiches are the best thing ever and I will be eating them for breakfast for as long as I’m not sick of them. I did not cook anything new this week, however.
We got transfers coming up soon and it’s either I stay with my current comp 1 more transfer or my Zone thinks there’s a chance I might train next transfer. I’m honestly scared but you never know what’ll happen.
Spiritual Thought:
So I have been really trying to home in on trying to listen to the guidance of the Spirit and listen to Spiritual Promptings. With Élder Hicks there were 2 instances where he helped me realize a decision/ action was a prompting. They were super cool experiences which I won’t share but what I will share is what I learned this week in my studies. I was trying to study how to better realize and recognize Spiritual Promptings and stumbled upon an article that I read in the CCM that I completely forgot about! It’s titled “Struggling to Recognize the Holy Ghost?” By Jessica Zoey Strong and it was like this one part was meant for me to read just at this time. Maybe because I had already read it but it helped so much in helping see my question better. Sister Strong says:
“One day on my mission, my companion and I prayed to better recognize the Holy Ghost throughout our day. As we pondered, we thought about how we are promised to have the Spirit with us always. We realized that the Spirit’s influence was with us constantly. But we were so used to feeling it, we sometimes didn’t recognize it.
You may be so used to feeling the Holy Ghost that you don’t notice it. Or you may think that you never feel it at all! Ask yourself if you are looking for big, profound signs rather than for the gentle presence of the Spirit. Study the scriptures and the words of the prophets to learn more about the influence of the Holy Ghost. If you pray to recognize the Holy Ghost, you may start to notice all the small ways He is guiding, teaching, and comforting you.”
What she said was so true that I was looking for these huge signs rather than the still small voice of the Spirit! After reading that I have been praying to better recognize the Holy Ghost and have better felt His influence each day and it has helped a ton to better feel the Spirit in lessons and just when walking the streets. As I said a few weeks ago and as a talk I read pointed out, it is a lifelong endeavor to learn how the Spirit speaks to each one of us and one of the “languages” that I am trying to learn right now. There is no better feeling than when the Spirit is present in my everyday life and I urge you all to pray for and seek the presence and influence of the Holy Ghost in your lives. As you do the simple things that invite the Spirit everyday, I promise that you will know of His influence in your lives.
Please send me an email!
I wanna know what’s going on back in AZ or just wherever you are! It’s hot here so please make me trunky with how rainy or nice the weather is! Also I made a Google Photos Album to go along with the blog my Dad has up! Link to Google Photos. I hope all is well! I love and miss you all!
Missed the OG’s of 16A a bit more this week. Pray you all are doing great.
– Élder Curtis
I couldn’t get a link to my talk so if you want it in either English or Spanish, I guess you’ll have to email me🤷♂️
Lot's of Photos and Video This Week:
