Always improving

LUIS GILLON, Argentina — FAMILY OF MINE WHOM I LOVE SO MUCH!!!! How are you!?!? I hope you had another fabulous week. I know I sure did! It has been a little crazy but great.

I would like to tell you how my morning started off today. A lady from our ward came over and taught us how to stretch out and then gave us massages.... I WAS IN HEAVEN! How blessed are we?!?  Gotta love tender mercies of the Lord ;)

We had a great week with lots of miracles. I would just like to tell you one, not that numbers matter, but this made me so happy to see on Sunday. We had 103 people attending sacrament meeting, eight of them being less active members and four of them being investigators! WOOO! Miracles. We haven’t had that many people come to church in a while. I love seeing people come to church and feel the Spirit. The Familia Velasquez is continuing to progress and are getting ready for their baptism in 2 weeks! WOOO!

Hermanas Newman y Mills with the Velasquez family.

I sent a million and five pictures and that took up a lot of my time to write this email so I will make this another quick one. But I just wanted to share an experience I had a couple weeks ago. I don’t know why but I forgot to share this.

We have interviews with President every 3 months. We always talk about how we are doing, if we are still worthy and what goals we want to make. I made previous goals to finish reading The Book of Mormon in Spanish and be writing in my journal daily before our next interviews. Well, interviews came around, and I found myself improved, but I had not completed my goal. I have two lessons I learned from this experience, but let me finish the story first.

President looked at me with his usual smile on his face and asked me how I was doing and the normal stuff. I replied that life was great and I loved serving here. He soon got to the goals part. He looked at me and simply asked, ¨How are your goals going? ¨ I sheepishly said that I hadn’t completed them. I told him that I was sad that I had to tell them that I didn’t do them. How sad it was to tell my mission president that I hadn’t completed my goals! I was horrified. Well, my mission president, being the awesome man he is, chuckled and said, ¨Hermana Newman, I didn’t say you had to be perfect at your goals. But... did you at least improve?" I told him that I had and that I was almost done with the Book of Mormon, just had a little bit left to go. With a big grin on his face he said, ¨Well that I am happy with, hermana. That is the point. To always be improving!"

Sara and her companion doing some planning. Without power. Again.

I learned two lessons from this. First (if we take this true story and just change the mission president for the Lord), I learned how loving and merciful the Lord is. He takes imperfect people like me, loves me, helps me to feel good, and gives me encouragement to keep going and be better! He doesn’t expect us to be perfect — he just expects us to improve daily! That’s the beauty of it! And the cool thing is, He is there every step of the way. We don’t have to wait 3 months to have the interview. We can just get down and pray to our Heavenly Father and he and His Son will help us.

Second, I learned something about preparedness. Now don’t get me wrong, I tried my hardest to accomplish my goals, but yes, I did fall. But during the meeting with president, I just looked at him and said, ¨President, I am having a hard time telling you I didn’t complete my goals. I never want to have to tell my Savior I didn’t complete them. ¨ As I sat there and looked into his eyes I KNEW that from that day on, I had to try harder and do better. I am aware I cannot be perfect, but I can be better and I can be prepared. I can be prepared for that day when I see my Savior's face. I want to be ready with a big smile on my face ready to say to Him, ¨I did it. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, and I have kept the faith!¨

Idaho-born Hermana Newman representing the Beehive State in Argentina.

This story might not make a lot of sense or matter to some of you. But it was a big wake up call to me. We can always be doing better. We should be pushing ourselves to be better. If you are comfortable in where you are right now, GET UP and do something. If we are comfortable, we are not progressing. Remember: ¨Ripe things rot, green things grow.¨ Do what you have to do to grow. It will not be easy, but it will be the best thing we can do. We are all in this together. We are here to help the Kingdom grow!

Have a great week. Make miracles happen. Go be those instruments of the Lord. Write me next week and tell me about the missionary moments you have or miracles you see! Love you with all my heart!

- Hermana Newman :)

Changes and enduring to the end

Luis Guillón, Argentina — Wow. What a week.... to say the least. I have been on quite the roller coaster ride. With way more ups than downs! But what I mean is lots of emotions and changes this week.  

First things first: drum roll........ Débora was baptized on Saturday! I couldn’t be happier for her. She is amazing! She is definitely a strong member already and only has 2 days as a member. I will miss her a lot!

All the sisters that worked with Debora pose for a picture

Because yep, I got transferred. 8 months in Columbia 3rd and then chau. 6 months in Banfield 1 and then chau. And now I am in a place called Luis Guillón. My zone is called Monte Grande. I don’t know anything about it, because I have only been here a couple hours. It is pretty close to my other area (30 mins) but different zone. Funny story: Hermana Kent is in Banfield with my Maryland companion, Hermana Crotzer. Yep my ¨daughters¨ (trainees) are companions now.

Debora's family

And I am here with Hermana Mills. She is from South Jordan, Utah as well but lives closer to the Jordan River Temple, so we never knew each other in the states. She seems awesome and is a fireball. Love this girl. SO crazy! I don’t know what Heavenly Father was thinking putting us two together because we are just one big ball of fun and craziness ;) I will write more about her next week when I know her a bit better.

And shock. I will know be serving here as ¨capacitadora¨ or Sister Training Leader. I think Brittany was that in San Diego as well. Should be interesting and keep me very busy as well!

This week was great. Like I said the Baptism went well. We have another date for 28th of June so that will be awesome for my companions there in Banfield 1. This morning I had tons of things I wanted to tell you but know I am sitting here with a head ache and can't remember anything whoops :P

Hermanas Newman y Kent being silly.

Last night was crazy trying to pack. We didn’t have electricity. so imagine this silly Hermana Newman trying to pack in pitch black. Luckily,  I found a lil candle to help out a bit. I got it all packed and am now here with in my new area and ready to learn what the Lord has in store for me to learn and do with my new brothers and sisters here in Buenos Aires! :) Let the adventure begin!!!

I am going to keep it short and sweet this week. Lucky me, I am a very simple person and I can do short and sweet very well ;). 

I shared something this week in church, because I gave a talk about enduring to the end. I thought a lot about what I should say to the members as the last thing I would say to them for a while. I prayed a lot about it and came to the conclusion to talk about enduring to the end and my testimony.

We learned from a Seventy this week what it truly means to be active in the church and it has a lot to do with perseverance. If we are not doing something, we are not progressing. And we all know we need to progress to return with our Heavenly Father. He made it very clear to us that we need to help the members to be DOING, not just sitting back comfortable. We all are a team. A team works together and progresses together to make the basket or the goal right? So just the same: we need to work as a team and get to the Celestial Kingdom together. It is a doctrine.

Brave Hermana Newman (she doesn't like birds on her) with a parrot.

 Super basic, but also very important and I think a lot of people forget that, myself included. Before my mission there were some things I let others do and I just sat back and watched but that’s not how the church works!

Alrighty, I better get going, but I love you all to pieces have a great week!

Tear it up! Smile lots... Life is good!

-Hermana Newman :)

Reflections on the Atonement

TEMPERLEY, Argentina -- Hola hola hola! How is my wonderful family doing this beautiful sunny (or maybe snowy for you) Monday? I hope this email finds you all doing well with big smiles on your faces. Life is So good... no? Yep. Life is good! 

This week was good. A little tricky at times, but good. We found a few new investigators and are praying that they can start progressing. It’s interesting to be a missionary because you can’t rely on yourself for anything. You have to rely on others for EVERYTHING! It’s been a learning experience for me for sure. We have to rely on Heavenly Father and the Holy Ghost to teach and find, we have to rely on the people we find that they will choose to come unto Christ and progress and then we have to rely on the ward to befriend these people. 

Long story short... I have learned that in the church -- in the gospel -- we are not alone. We always are working in unity and helping one another. We can’t think just about ourselves. Nope, we need to serve and help others. That is how we are going to make it back to the Celestial Kingdom, together. :) 

The Atonement was on my mind a lot this week as well. 

First off, wow, how blessed are we to have the Atonement!! Priceless! Hermana Calderon and I have been working with lots of people and all of them are completely different! We have a less-active with schizophrenia, an investigator with a crazy family, members who have health or marriage problems, and of course, people whose hearts are so hard they can't even receive our message right now. Everyone is different but EVERYONE can and needs to use the Atonement. 

My whole life, I have learned about the Atonement and how important it is. And yes, it is important, but I don’t think I really understood how important it is until I came on my mission. It is a gift from our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ! We need to take advantage and use it daily. 

I read this morning in Alma 7:11-13. He died and suffered for all of us so we can be happy and learn to become like him. This week I have increased my understanding of the Atonement, and I am so grateful for my big brother, who died for me. 

What a blessing. I feel blessed to be a missionary who gets to share the message of the Atonement with these people here in Argentina. 

I really saw the Atonement in action this weekend, when the elders had a baptism of four people! It was amazing to see these families change and come unto Christ. If I were to show you a picture of these people I am sure almost all of us would think, ¨hmmm... really? Are they ready?¨ 

And that’s where the Holy Ghost and the Atonement come in. 

God knows who is ready -- not me or my companion or anyone else. It was amazing to see these people take out all their piercings and change into white and enter the waters of baptism. The Spirit was so strong I can’t even do it justice by describing it. Happy day we have four new members in Banfield 1!  We are also on the search to bring more to the fold :) My favorite part!! Well, I hope you have a wonderful week!

Exitos y cuidense!! Te amo! 

Con amor,

Hermana Newman :)

Baptism and daily bread

TEMPERLEY, Argentina — Hola familia, Feliz Febrero!!
 

Can you believe it is already February? I can't! Craziness! I always say this but it is true... time is just flying. Transfers are next week already. Wow.

Hermana Calderon and I are hoping to stay together one more transfer at least in this area, but you never know. I will update you on that next week.

This week has been great. We just got done bowling with our district. Way fun! I haven’t been bowling in forever, and of all places I got to go in Buenos Aires!

We are at a different cyber again today in another city because of the activity and unfortunately, they won't read my camera card, so I can’t send pictures. Bummer, because I have some I wanted to send.

Especially because... Evelyn was baptized and confirmed this weekend! Wahooo!

Everything went well and it very nice.I am having a hard time describing it in English ... in Castellano, easy... it was muy lindo!! (very cute).

I love baptisms. They are wonderful. Always something crazy, but you can always feel the Spirit. My first baptism with Jennifer was crazy because nobody showed up until like 5 minutes till.

This time, people came on time, but we almost flooded the church. Ha-ha no joke.

We went running at the church that morning so we could turn on the water to start filling. My companion said it would be fine to leave and come back after we had showered and gotten ready. I thought, "Ok it should be fine. In Maryland it took 2.5 hours to fill." Ha Wrong-o! Here, the fonts are much smaller. We got to the church and I opened the door to see how the font was. Bahhhh! Water to the very top. I had to quick take off my shoes and go a little ways in to start draining the font. Oh dear. Good times :) Got to love being a missionary!

But yes, everything went well and she was happy as can be.

What a blessing it is to be baptized. I can’t remember a ton about my baptism to be honest, but I can remember how happy I felt. That’s how I feel every time I see my investigators go into the waters of baptism. We have some other investigators that we are working with. Right now, a few of them are being stinkers and not progressing, but we are praying that they will kick it into gear soon.

One of my favorite parts of this week was just seeing the Gift of the Holy Ghost in my life. There were many times, but I can remember in particular two times where the Spirit led us somewhere we needed to be at the right moment.

First, we were walking around deciding where to go and who to visit, because our plans and backup plans fell through. Hermana Calderon and I both thought maybe we could visit a potential investigator nearby. We were almost to her house when a sweet little old lady said, ¨How are you doing? Who are you girls?"

We explained that we were missionaries of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and that we had a message to share with her. She invited us to sit down and share it with her right then and there in front of her bakery. We shared a short message about the Restoration and she invited us to come back in the following week.

My favorite part was just before we left she said, ¨Thank you hermanas. I was feeling really sad and was praying for someone to help me feel better. You are an answer to my prayers. I know that God sent you over here today."

Yes. Yes m'am!! We are here for a reason! I can’t even describe how I felt. What a wonderful experience. I love that we can be put in the right place at the right time.

Next was right after that visit, we decided to visit a less active member: Hermana Galvez. Such a sweetheart. We began talking (also about the Restoration) when we heard a knock at the door. Her neighbor had come over to visit. So we invited her to sit down and talk with us. We talked about families, prophets, Jesus Christ, the Atonement, apostasy, all of it. At the very end, we told her that she could know all of this was true by reading the Book of Mormon and praying to Heavenly Father to know for herself. Right as I was about to mention the Holy Ghost she said, ¨I feel something in my chest. I feel peace and happy. I don’t know what it is but I like it. ¨ I just gave her my big ol´cheesy Hermana Newman grin and explained that it was the Spirit testifying to her.

I feel like I am not doing a very good job at telling my stories or expressing myself today. Sorry. I hope you can understand what I am trying to say. Everything is going well here in Argentina. We have had some rainy coolish weather for a few days, which has been quite lovely. Working hard and trying to bring more people unto Christ.

How are you all doing? I hope sooo great. I miss you all and love you even more. Hope you know it!

Before I go I want to share a little video with you.


I had the opportunity to share and translate this for some people in my ward yesterday because it is not available in Castellano. I love it! Such a great message and reminder of the small things we need to be doing daily. Just like we need to eat, we need spiritual nourishment as well. It's a process, for sure, but I know that if we do the small things EVERY DAY and make them our priorities, we can and will be blessed and will become closer to our Heavenly Father and Savior.

Remember who you are, who you represent. Go out and give it all you got! Have a wonderful week.

Love ya - Chau!

-Hermana Newman

Wet, crying and clean: my first baptism

COLUMBIA, Md. — Hola, mi querida familia!! Feliz Diciembre!

Holy Smokes.... December? Since when? Craziness. 

How was everyone’s Thanksgiving? I hope SO good. Mine was excellent! We did service in the morning, then I got to go help cook at a member's house and we ate at our branch mission leader's home. They are awesome! Then, a family gave us some papusas later. Needless to say, I had a lot of food. 

We weren’t allowed to proselyte on Thanksgiving, so we had a lot of plans with the members. Unfortunately, many of them called and canceled. :/ So what do you do as a missionary who cannot go talk to people on Thanksgiving? Volleyball at the church! :) Turns out a few other missionaries in our area had people cancel too, so we had a little activity at the church. It will be interesting this month because we cannot proselyte on Christmas or New Years Eve/Day. 

This week was fabulous. Many reasons why it was so fabulous, but at the top of the list, JENNIFER GOT BAPTIZED AND CONFIRMED :) Wahooooooooooooooooooo! 

She was baptized on Saturday and confirmed Sunday in church. It was a great baptism. Weird because it was my first, so we weren’t exactly sure how it would go. But the Spirit was very strong. It was awesome, too, because it was all in Spanish! :) Man, I love Spanish, have I mentioned that before? ;) Let me tell you a little about the baptism:

Jennifer had a lot of support from the branch. Quite a few people came, which was great, especially the young women. (She is 15) Hermana Crotzer and I had a lunch appointment in Elkridge that day, so we drove there to visit and eat with a family. Then we had to rush back to Ellicott City to start filling the font. Quite the new experience for me — never done that before. After a while of playing and messing around with water temperatures, we got it down and the font was filling up. It takes about 2-3 hours to fill, so we were there early. We got everything set up, made some cutesy stuff (I love being a sister) for Jennifer and waited for everyone to arrive. 

Remember, we are in a Spanish branch, so everything is on "Hispanic timing". Our branch mission leader and the Riveras said they would meet us at the church 30 minutes before the service to get ready and take pictures and such. Well 30 minutes before and it was me, Hermana Crotzer, a bunch of empty chairs, a full font, and an empty church parking lot. Talk about scary! 

I was a little nervous, but everyone ensured us they were on their way. Sure enough, about 5 minutes before the service was supposed to start, everyone showed up. They about gave me a heart attack, but no worries, I survived. 

The service was beautiful. I loved watching her go under the water and come back out with a big smile on her face. But my favorite part was "behind the scenes". We took her back into the bathroom to change and she had the biggest grin on her face. She started squealing so I gave her a great big hug. She started crying and would not let go. I stood there, in the bathroom of the church, with a soaking wet teenager hugging me. I pondered for a second how special this day was for her and how it will change her life forever.

Finally, she looked up at me and said, "Hermana Newman, I feel amazing. Why do I feel this way? Why am I so happy?" It took me everything not to cry. So of course me being me, I laughed instead of crying and replied with a big grin, "Why do you think, you silly girl?! You are feeling the Spirit!" She smiled and just kept squealing, "I feel so good, I love this feeling. I am baptized!" This simple moment between this young girl and me made such an impact on me. I want to feel this way all the time. I want to be squealing jumping for joy, saying how great I feel because I am a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints!! 

The service was ended with a musical number on the violin, and Jennifer giving her testimony. Her testimony was short and sweet but POWERFUL. Wow. I can’t even describe the Spirit that was felt in the room. I am so glad that I have this opportunity to be her missionary now and forever. What a great blessing that is. Her journey has just begun. I am excited to work with her family more and get them all active and members of the church. We need more strong families in our branch, and they have great potential to be one! :)

We are working hard to find new investigators and work with the members. It’s a little hard because we haven’t found a new investigator for quite some time. But we are still looking! We visited with one of our other investigators this week and she informed me that she has been off coffee for more than 15 days. Woo! Gotta love La Palabra de Sabiduria! 

I have said this soooo many times before, but I LOVE watching people change their lives and follow the example of Jesus Christ. We are still working through some stuff back in Honduras, which can be tricky, but I know this sweet little lady will be baptized no doubt! She always tells me how much she loves The Book of Mormon. She knows it is true and loves to read it. The difficulty now is she is having eye problems and eye pain, but can't go see a doctor :/ Let me tell you, working with these people has made me seen all the things I have and take for granted. I am SO blessed. I have had quite a lot of humbling experiences out here and she is one of them. She has so many trials, but yet she doesn’t let it get her down and she has enough faith to realize this message is the truth and she wants it in her life. I will be thrilled the day I hear she is baptized! :) She is so solid.

Well, this week has been great! Looking forward to another one! :) How is Utah, by the way? Cold? Any snow? I miss my snow!!!!!!!! It's cold here, but no snow. Lame. I love it here. Every second of it. Have a wonderful week and remember who you are, and whom you represent. Go find those people who need the gospel! There are so many out there who are waiting for all of us to do our work and spread the gospel! I love you with all my heart. 

Con amor,

Hermana Newman :)