Well, looks like I had cambios, this always happens here in this mission, there is always a reason for every transfer or companionship, sometimes presidente has inspirations in his dreams on when and who and where will cambios be for the missionaries, seriously, I was so ready to stay in Machala another 2 or 3 months, my last Sunday there was the most productive and the ward council was actually easier to work with...this was the first time that I actually didnt want to leave, but when the Lord wants us to go, we go. I learned a lot about Humility and how we always need to have love be our motive when we do things, we also need to always have faith and act on the faith we have.
I am in Catamayo, a little province in Loja, the Sierras...I was so excited to be here, seriously! It is so beautiful. I will give you a little geograhical facts about Lajo. Catamayo, is about one hour away from Loja and it is on the border of Peru...Catamayo also a little closer to the costa, so the weather isn't nearly as cold as Loja or Cuenca, there are lots of high mountains and hills, so we are always walking up the hills. Also, to travel to the coast to the mountains, it take about 5 to 8 hours because they don't have freeways and they haven't quite figured out how to use dynamites to make the roads a little bigger to make the trip shorter..there is a view called buena vista, it is up on a hill where you can see the mountains and down below are long green grass fields, I am so blessed to be here, seriously!
So, the ward is not actually a ward, but a branch, and the capilla is really tiny! We are one companionship of hermanas among two other companionships of Elders, we are kind of outnumbered and this is my first time ever being in the same ward with Elders. Ya, our boundaries are all of Catamayo...its HUGE!
The people here are a little bit more tranquilo than the people in the coast, a lot more closed off, but the cool thing about the Sierras is that there are more married families. The bad thing about the Sierras is that people lean on the traditions of their fathers, which is catholicism, and so if they even think about changing thier religion, there parents or their grand parents are going to have it. It is incredible to talk to people on the streets and every other person I here say they're Catholic because of the traditions of their family...its something that they accept. I know that God is not a God of tradition, He is a God of commandments. This is definitely a new experience that I get to learn while I am here in Catamayo, Loja.
Actually when we got here, we didn't have a carpeta de area neither a program for August, so this was kind of a challenge, but with Hermana Cambal, she has experience opening up new sectors, it wasn't too bad. We actually were able to find people by talking to everyone and asking for references in every house that we enter. But this Sunday was surprisingly successful, I did not expect this much success. Church begins at 10 A.M and so we got up to wake up our investigators, and we talked to every single one and they all said that they could come. We actually invited one family to come with us 30 minutes before and they came with us. When we got to church, 9 people came to the reunion sacramental, that is the most I have ever had. The room for the reunion Sacramental is bien pequeño, this day there were more people that came to church and so there were seats outside of the sacrament hall, we didn't have anywhere to sit because there was no room, but we were happy that the numbers in the church were a lot better for the branch. I will write more next week about the investigators that we have.
Something that I learned this week is that our thoughts or impressions only come from two sources, Satan or Heavenly Father and always the temptations or inspirations begin with our thoughts, if we heed to the bad thoughts or actions or going to lead to maldad, but if we heed to good thoughts we are going to reap blessings and find that the spirit was speaking to us. The spirit is the only thing that can lead us to the right people and the right places, so we have to trust in the good thoughts so that we can have success. This week I have been trying to think more positively, because this is a sign of my faith...I think that is part of the reason why we had such good numbers this Sunday, but until next week, I am not going to let the cloud of doubt hinder the faith that I do have. Chou!
