Dear Family,
Don't worry, I'm not going to extend, even though I would love to! I think I'm needed back home more than I am needed here. Plus many missionaries should be getting here once the school year ends in the states. So this past week was kind of long and slow. There were many moments when we just had all of our lessons canceled and we walked around contacting and trying to just find someone. There were some great moments during this week. Many of our investigators made huge improvements.
First off, Araceli came to church with her mom yesterday and she will be baptized really soon now. She is a super fun girl and just LOVES coming to church and participating in Primary. Her sister and two cousins came too. We filled up the primary with just investigators and less actives! ha ha! It hasn't been too hard to fill up any class recently because every week we have less and less members it seems . . . We were around twenty yesterday in sacrament meeting.
So Elder Cruz and I have been very worried these past few weeks about our ward. Our bishop is kind of discouraged and the members too. We've had several activities and no members showed up! Sometimes we have activities with just investigators now! So we were praying and studying the scriptures to find an answer and it came in a really interesting way! SO we were walking through the villa (the sketchy parts) when a lady starts screaming in English "Oh my! oh my! Hello! Hello!" We look over and Elder Cruz mutters, "This can't be real! are you kidding me?" The lady was one of the members in his last ward in Avellaneda! She came up and told us that 6 families from that ward will be moving into our area!!! We went to go see the land they had bought and there is a lot of service to be done till they can live there, but it's going to be amazing to have some new members in our ward that is struggling so much! Within these 6 families we have the bishop, the Elder's Quorum president, first and second counselors of the relief society, the secretary of the Elder's quorum, a member of the high coucil, a future missionary, and other members! I'm so excited!! But in order for them to move into their property, we have to clear the land of the waste high weeds, build the houses, put up a fence, and install the plumbing system and the electricity. Then we have to move everything from Avellaneda to here! It's going to be quite the process! But it's going to be worth it in the end. My only worry is what is going to happen with the Avellaneda 2nd ward. ha ha!
We found a great investigator this week with the help of a member. Her name is Alicia. She is a quiet woman who has serious back problems. She needs an operation but doesn't have the means to get it done. Her only true desire is that her family is happy and safe and she is willing to do everything to do that. We talked a bit about the will of God and told her about the blessings of obedience. She accepted the invitation to be baptized. We will be going back on Wednesday to see what she has read and how she's felt while reading the Book of Mormon.
This week we found an 19 year old kid named Jorge who has had his own house since he was 16. He is very calm and really down to earth. We believe that he may have had some serious family problems and that's why he moved out so early. He was really anxious to come to church and to learn more about our message. He said that he would be baptized after he learns a little more. We gave him a goal to be baptized on the 18th. We haven't been able to talk to him again yet.
The Ugarte family is a part member family that we had dropped a few weeks ago until Claudio, the father, showed up late for church the other day. He came yesterday again too! We have been visiting them again and telling them the importance of being an eternal family, but his wife is against the church. She's quite Evangelista (don't know the translation) and doesn't support the idea too much. We are trying to see if Claudio can bring the children to church because he has a 9 year old son who isn't baptized. We'll see what happens.
Our investigator, Melisa who we found a few weeks ago has been reading quite a bit of the Book of Mormon and she really likes the story of Nephi. She said that it amazes her how he can just keep going when all the odds are against him. I love the story about Nephi and his brothers because it applies to so many of the people here. Many people are suffering so much because of their trails and they often don't think there's a way to keep on going. Melisa said that it gave her more strength to keep moving forward and to not let the circumstances of her life get the best of her. She has about 6 children all under the age of 8 and is 7 months pregnant. Her ex had beaten her and he showed up this past week asking to stay with her again. Being desperate for money to be able to feed her children, she let him back in. She told us that he was beaten up by the Argentine police and sent home after a few days in jail to take care of his family. She said that he's been a better man since he's been back. We're a little nervous to have him there, but he seems to have been humbled quite a bit. We pray for Melisa a lot.
Alright, I'm out of time. there was so much to write about and I couldn't finish. We just have so many investigators it's hard sometimes to talk about all of them. I think my mission is quite different from Trevor's because we teach a lot more people. Having people to teach isn't a problem. It's finding people who progress that is the real trick. Kevin's mission will be more of a challenge to find people. I was talking to a Chilean elder the other day and he said that Santiago Oeste is a rich area and they baptize less, but the members work really hard to try and find investigators. I think we'll have three missions very different from each other.
Well, I have to go. I honestly am so grateful for my mission. It's sad to know that I've got so little time left. My advice to any missionaries in the field or getting prepared to leave is to not waste a single second! Just hit the ground running and don't look back!
Love,
Elder Blake W. Cowan
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