Hola Familia y Amigos!
In honor of valentine's day tomorrow let me tell you a love story.
We have been teaching a couple Erika and Richard for a while now. They have been married for almost two years, but about two months ago something happened that ruined their relationship. They love each other and want to work things out but it's been hard. Erika's cousins are LDS and they invited them to a Family Home Evening. They loved the spirit they felt with that family and agreed to start meeting with the missionaries, me and Hermana Lema. So the lessons normally go a little like this. They sit as far apart as possible. We teach. They cry. We teach some more. They smile. And by the end of our time there they are smiling, laughing and enjoying each other's company. But then we come back after a few days and it's like we are starting all over again. They have pain in their eyes and they don't know if they can repair the damage that has been done. They like meeting with us because they say that there is a peace and happiness in their home when we are there. One lesson I remember promising them that if they would read the book of Mormon together and pray together that they could have that same peace and happiness When I promised them I could feel in my heart that what I was saying was true. When we left the house I got nervous. What if they read together and it doesn't change anything, what if they pray but not with real intent. Needless to say I lacked the faith that I had in the lesson. But the next lesson something miraculous happened.
We got to the house and they were both smiling. . . Odd. . . we started with a hymn and at the end of the song I looked up for my hymn book and they were sitting, TOGETHER, and Ericka's head was on her husband's shoulder! WHAT!! So we pray and ask them how their reading and praying has been going. Richard reaches out, takes his wife by they hand, kisses her hand and then tells us how ever since they have been reading and praying together they have been able to face problems in their marriage and things are going so much better!!! AAAHHHH!!!! I have never in my life been so happy to see two people holding hands!! I could have got up and ran 5 miles right then and there.
It's true, this gospel really does bless families. Families are central to Gods plan for us on the earth! AH!! So exciting. They still have a ways to go, they want to get baptized. Erika is ready but Richard isn't really digging the whole Word of Wisdom, no drinking, business. This is a huge problem with all of our male investigators. One investigators Elmer explained it to me. He said that not drinking beer with your friends was like if he were dancing at a club and a beautiful women came and started dancing with him and he pushed her away. What would they think? Basically he said, You aren't a man unless you do the things men do, and men DRINK!
So this is a problem we face constantly. The men here drink and they drink alot. We leave our apartment at 11 in the morning and there are already tons of groups of men sitting on the side of the road getting wasted. . . yeah. . .
This week really was great though, Zoryda pushed up her baptismal date to the 18th! Sweet! And Another one of our investigators Fernando is getting baptized on the 25th. I am excited for these two because they have both been coming to church every Sunday for some time now. Fernando reads and loves everything he learns. He is solid! I'm so excited for him.
All in all life here in Peru is going great. It isn't perfect. I still struggle with my Spanish. At this point I can speak well enough that people usually get what I am saying. But I know my grammar is terrible and I know I speak ridiculously. Which drives me crazy. Hermana Lema doesn't really get why I get upset sometimes, so the other day for language study I made her speak in English and would only respond to her in English and I had her teach me the lessons in English and what not. After 30 minutes she was frustrated and I felt better having my point made ha-ha.
Thank you for all your love and support. I really love getting letters ha-ha so don't be shy.
I love you all!
Love Hermana Sadie Taggart
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