Starting out with transfer news: I'm staying here! Not too big of surprise since I've only been here six weeks. My companion, Elder Salazar, is off to the cold mountains of Huaraz. It'll definitely be sad to see him go, he's a great companion and I only spent four weeks with him! My new companion is named Elder Alarcon, from Chile! I'm actually pretty nervous to lead this huge area after just four weeks, so wish me luck! It'll be interesting to see what this means for my future in the mission, too; Elder Alarcon finishes one transfer before me, so it's pretty possible that I'll get changed one more time before I finish! Haha we will see...
Last Saturday, we were having kind of a rough day. Things weren't really going our way, and lots of appointments were falling through. As we walked to another appointment, a guy in the street casually said, "Elders," as we passed by. It seemed kind of strange to us (lots of people do that, but most are drunk people that are trying to be funny, I guess, while he was obviously not), so after the appointment fell (of course haha) we went back a talked to him! He was cleaning an adobe brick wall out of his house, so we helped him as best we could in our shirt and tie, and as we worked, we talked. Turns out the sister missionaries visited his family two or three years ago, and they were getting ready to be married and baptized when they found some unfavorable information about Joseph Smith on the Internet. They stopped progressing and, when the wife was hospitalized for a sickness, the visits with the sisters kind of came to an end. We visited them twice this week and they're such a great family!! We connected with them right at the start. Many of the same doubts arose in these first two visits, but we're determined to help them!
We were up super late every night this week, getting our room 1000% clean for Sister Rios and finishing our whiteboard project, which took way more time than we thought! It looks pretty dang good though! And we have a new rule of no shoes to keep it perfectly clean haha.
My mind has been super focused on the family I mentioned, the Becerra Guerrero family, and their difficulties this week. It seems to be a pretty complicated issue, but it really isn't I don't think! In Christ's day, "Many of the people therefore, when they heard this saying (Christ proclaiming himself as living water), said, Of a truth this is the Prophet. Others said, This is the Christ. But some said, Shall Christ come out of Galilee? Hath not the scripture said, That Christ cometh of the seed of David, and out of the town of Bethlehem, where David was? So there was a division among the people because of him." There have always been, and always will be, divisions among people when it comes to identifying prophets, even when identifying the Christ! People make wrong conclusions based on partial information, and others spread false rumors and twist facts, their only motive being defame the prophets! It's important the declaration that Moroni makes that, in order to know of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, and consequently of Joseph Smith as a prophet, one must first have "faith in Jesus Christ." Why?? Because "if ye shall believe in Christ ye will believe in these words, for they are the words of Christ, and he hath given them unto me; and they teach all men that they should do good." One who truly has faith in Christ will not be able to deny the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon, and of the doctrines restored by Joseph Smith! I know that the gospel of Jesus Christ was restored by the prophet Joseph Smith, allowing us to return to the presence of our Heavenly Father!
Love you lots!
Elder Tanner Hart
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