My run-in with the international police

Well this week has been hectic.  On Monday night we got a call that my companion and I had to go to Lima because I have to go to Immigrations and Interpol.  So Wednesday morning we get up and get ready while they installed our new water heater (YESS!!) and then went to Lima.  We chilled at the offices, then to immigrations, then back to the offices.  All of the new missionaries were reunited again.  It was a good time.  Then we stayed with other hermanas and woke up bright and early to go to interpol.  Highlight there, I met a guy from Holland, who grew up in Brazil, and went to an American School and is now studying in Peru....probably the coolest person I´ve ever met.  Then we went to the bus station, but Hermana Rios forgot her ID so they wouldn´t let her get on the bus.  Therefore, we have to wait for an hour or so for the missionaries in the office to bring her an ID.  Then our cellphone died on the bus.  It was quite a day.  Then Friday, we went back to Lima for a multi-zone conference and interviews.  Just a reminder that my mission president rocks...that´s all.  And I ate more those three days than I normally eat in a week....it was awesome.  So because of all that, we didn´t get a whole lot done unfortunately this week.

 This is our roommate reunion (minus Hermana Russell who decided to serve a mission in Salt Lake)

 

And us waiting at the bus station.

 

Next week on emails from Hna. Ahern: I will write a descriptive email of the mission life and peru...for those of you who want to know. 

 

 

In a side note, Hermana Ahern got to talk to Elder Halverson for a few minutes while she was in Lima to go to Immigrations and Interpol.  Just a small bit of "home" makes her feel better and ready to go again. 

 

She says she loves Hermana Rios and they are hoping to get one more transfer together, but aren't expecting that to happen.  I'm so proud of her and so glad she is so happy serving the Lord. 

I Know That My Redeemer Lives!

Well....I don`t have a lot to say.  Not a whole lot happened this week.  I talked in church on service.  That was fun. Then Friday was the day of "Señor de Los Milagros" for the catholic church so all of Chancay was decorated in purple and white, and there was a giant parade with a giant image of Christ on the cross.  It was something.  It was really sad actually, and I just want to let everyone know that Christ lives!  He died so that he could overcome the death, and that`s what`s important, that he was resurrected.  He doesn`t want to remember that painful experience, and we shouldn`t focus on that either.  Through Him we can overcome, through Him we are clean, and through Him we can live again.  Of course we will always remember the sacrifice he made for us, but we don`t have to dwell on His death, He is not dead, He lives.  If we turn to Him and our Heavently Father in everything we do, we can live with Them and our families forever.  This church is true, and the blessings from living the gospel are infinite.  I love you all and pray for you!  Have a great week!  

The Island of Misprint T-shirts

Well I´ll start by explaining the title of this email.  Everyone here wears t-shirts with English writing on them, but what´s funny is that the majority of the time, they don´t make any sense whatsoever.  And if they do, there are a bunch of mispelled words.  But the people wearing them obviously don´t know English, so they don´t know.  It´s pretty funny.  

  But this week has been pretty good.  We went out to a part of our area that is separated from where we live where we had contacted a guy the week before.  We didn´t know if he´d even be home or if he lived with his family.  Turns out his family has 12 people in it! They unfortunately don´t all live there, but the children that do live there love us and the dad loves us.  We just have to work on getting the mom to love us.  

  Then we had a lesson with two other couples.  With one we set a baptismal date.  They had attended a few other churches, but never really loved any of them.  We introduced the Book of Mormon and by the next visit, he had read to chapter 14 of 1 Nephi.  

  The other couple, she had talked with missionaries two other times.  She says that every time, they show up exactly when she most needs it.  She says that she doesn´t believe in coincidences, but she doesn´t believe in miracles either.

Then we got to watch conference.....I´m sure it was great, but I didn´t understand all that much of it.  I obviously need to learn more Spanish.

Keep on keepin on!  And keep sharing the gospel with everyone!  Have a great week!

Me and Mrs. Jones

And by "Mrs." I mean "Hermana" but that didn`t go with the song.  But we had work visits from our Sister Training Leaders this week.  I went out with the mission renowned "Hermana Jones"  she`s mission celebrity because she baptized a family of 8.  It was hectic planning for two sets of missionaries.  But it was a good time.  They came, they ate, we tracted, they left.  Overall it was a hectic week.  We found 10 new investigators.  We set two baptismal dates this week, but last night we got a text from one saying she didn`t want to continue.  That was bullet to the heart.  So is the life of a missionary I guess.  But the elections were yesterday so Chancay was packed with people, so we got some good contacting time.  We also didn`t get to watch conference, so that`s a bummer.  But we get to watch it next weekend.

 

Fun story (and by "fun" I mean near death experience):  This morning, Hermana Rios was showering and she turned off the water heater, but for some reason didn`t get out of the shower.  And 10 seconds later the water heater fell off the wall.  It broke, and broke the toilet on the way to the ground.  So now we get to take cold showers for a while, but if she would have gotten out, who knows what would have happened.  That was a happy miracle from the Lord. 

 

Have a great week!

 

Hermana Ahern

Wait...you can make that in a microwave?

Yes, that`s been the golden question.  I`ve found that you can in fact make a lot of things in the microwave, like pancakes and scrambled eggs.  That`s been my life.  It`s also been basically a party everyday here because there are elections this weekend so there is a concert every night in the plaza.  It`s a good time.  Also, because of the elections, we don`t get to watch conference next weekend like the rest of the world.  We have to wait for the next weekend.  That also means we won`t have church for two weeks, which makes it hard to invite people to church.  

  We still haven`t set anymore baptismal dates yet.  We are working on that.  We talk to a lot of people, but they usually aren`t home when we go.  Such is life in South America.  But we are going to find people.  The Lord didn`t send us here to knock on doors, he sent us here to baptize.  So everyone have  a great week, and hopefully I`ll have more to report next week! 

Love you all!

THIS.IS.PERU....BAPTIZE!!!

This week we had a zone conference with our mission president.  And he is the bomb, I´m sorry for all you missionaries reading this because my mission president is the best.  He´s on a Jeffrey R. Holland level awesome.  So we were just being jam packed with the Spirit and how to be awesome.  Basically anytime he talks to us I feel like Pain and Panic from Hercules, "WE ARE WORMS!"  He definitely knows how to motivate, He expects us to baptize, so that´s what we´re going to do. Period.  

We did in fact have our first baptism on Sunday.  And by "our" I mean a baptism that we helped bring about through working with the Spirit, because we couldn´t do anything without the Spirit.  It was really great, Hermana Rios and I sang and I had to play and sing at the same time, and also learn how to transition from one key to another....yeah, I´m pretty cool.  No, but we sang "How Great Thou Art" then transitioned to "I Believe in Christ" then back to the first.  The baptism was really great.  She was happy, we were happy, just a lot of happiness.  I definitely hope to have many more in the future.  But we need to find investigators first....but yeah that was the highlight of this week.  The church is true.  Have a great week!

good call on the first aid kit.  I took a little fall last week while we were running to our apartment.

We were trying to get to our apartment to change and grab a knife to get back to the church because our district/zone bought a cake for two of the elders´ birthdays, and there was a step and I didn´t quite make it.  All the dogs here are friendly, so we never have to run from them. ( I had asked her if they were running from dogs.)

I miss american candy.  I also miss bread.  There is bread here all around, but I haven´t bought any yet, and our pensionista doesn´t give us bread ever.  I have like a loaf of bread, but I miss biscuits and rolls.

We don´t get to watch conference until the next weekend, because its voting weekend this week.  Not that it matters, it will be in Spanish so I won´t understand anything.  But I´m excited. Yeah, I play the piano every week in Sacrament, and they don´t tell me the songs until about 10 to 9, so if I´m lucky I can run through them a couple times.  So far I´ve been able to play the songs fairly well, but I know there are a lot of hymns that I never played so I´m nervous for the day they pick one of those.  I have had to sight read a couple sacrament hymns because I never practiced any of those, but so far so good.  It´s actually pretty amazing, and this has to be a blessing from the Lord.  We have sung a couple songs that I never played before my mission, but for some reason in the MTC, they were stuck in my head so I started to play them, and the first week we sand one and last week another, and yesterday another.  They were "Lead Kindly Light", "The Lord is My Light" and "In Our Lovely Deseret"  And they were songs that I was super familiar with, but they would just get stuck in my head in the MTC so I learned how to play them.  and they aren´t super easy songs, so I wouldn´t have been able to sight read them.  Funny how the Lord works.

Hermana Jenna Ahern

Do you go to any church? No, I`m Catholic.

 That has been the interesting thing this week.  People still aren`t married, but there are also a ton of Catholics here, and also Jehovah`s Witnesses which is weird.  But We will ask people if they go to any chuch and they`ll say, "No, I`m Catholic"  Ummmm..... so does Catholicism not count as a church?  But it`s not very easy to baptize Catholics.  They get hung up on the fact that they`re already baptized, and they can`t get baptized again.  We still haven`t gotten anymore solid investigators, we contact a lot, but when we go visit, they aren`t there.  But we do have a baptism this week, so we are excited about that.  We also contacted a 17-year-old and he gave us this giant foam sign that says BIENVENIDOS. It was a little strange, but nice.  There are also elections going on right now, so there are a lot of rallies which is pretty annoying.  I`ll be happy when that`s over.  We have a training meeting for all the new missionaries, so I got to see everyone I came here with.  It`s the last time we will ever all be together.  It was great, spent the whole day in Lima.  Yup, that`s it, Have a great week!