July 29, 2013

Hola familia! I'm just going to say it now -- I'm grateful I have you forever! You are my life and I am so truly grateful for your influence. You give me determination and hope in everything. I completed 5 months in my mission on Saturday...Crazy right? also I ate ceviche de octopus today....

Well this week there are a few things that I am so grateful for -- The law of chastity. I can not express how many times I have thought to myself in the last two weeks of the importance of this law and this great blessing. The family is so important and Satan is doing all he can to destroy this beautiful gift we have. The world sees it as a restriction, but my testimony of this divine guidance has grown to an extreme over the past little bit. As families and individuals we are able to have peace and true love one for another as we follow the guidance given to us. When we don't protect our minds from harmful things actions follow and always always always there is regret and pain. Thanks to the amazing examples in my life I can see the blessings from following the plan of the Lord. The word of wisdom -- another thing I am so grateful for. Really for the same reasons.

We had the opportunity to teach a man this week named Santiago. It was a great lesson, and I felt really good about it, but as I thought about it I was quite saddened. What we talked about, we have talked about with others before, but it really hit me this time. He was really quite sad and the topic was that he felt that he couldn't change. So often we feel this way. The natural man really is so strong and many times it seems completely impossible to overcome this state. Many times we may feel hopeless that we can never become better, however, as we put our trust in the Lord, we know that we can. We can change our nature and become God-like. We can become better. It takes time and it takes A LOT of patience, but we can change. I definitely am learning this for myself.

The thing that the Lord is teaching me the most at this time of my life is patience. I'm certainly a slow learner, but He's working reeeaaally hard to teach me this Christlike attribute. Gonsolo ni Gustavo didn't come to church this week which was really frustrating. They are the two that can really progress, that have such potential, that refuse to come to church. It's really hard, but we just have to keep trying.

This change is over at the end of this week. I can't believe it really. It was longer than others -- 8 weeks verses 6 and it feels like 4. Elder Cook my first zone leader and Elder Felt my current district leader will finish their missions this Sunday... it will definitely be a sad day. I have such great respect for worthy Priesthood holders who actively strive tolift and help those around them. I have great respect for these two young men. 

Well I love you all so much. Keep being good, keep working hard, don't do drugs :X

Love Bug

July 22, 2013

Happy birthday, Bubby! I loved seeing your pictures. What a beautiful nephew I have. Keep growing and having lots of fun and adventures. Be good for mommy and daddy and grandpa and grandma. We all love you so much. I`m sad that I`m not there to celebrate with you, but I trust that you`ll be well taken care of. Loves!

Well, this week was good. Sunday I gave my first talk in church! Woof! I talked about the Book of Mormon and the importance of it in our lives and how we have to have a testimony of the Book of Mormon in order to have a firm testimony in any other aspect of our religion. With the Book of Mormon we know that Joseph Smith was a prophet, we know we have the Priesthood keys on the earth today, and that we have a prophet who recieves revelation for us today. As members of the church, we have to follow the invitation that is in the introduction repeatedly. Read, meditate, and pray to know that the things in the Book of Mormon are real and true. A testimony is somthing very fragile, and if we don`t nourish it often, it fades away. A testimony of the Book of Mormon is key in our conversion to Christ and to His gospel.

Something cool that happened this week: We have an investigator named Gonsalo. I visited him twice with Hermana Diaz and we really didn`t have a ton of success. With Hermana Villanueva we have visited him 3 times. The second time we went to teach him was completely different. He had read the pamphlet and had questions and was eager to learn more. We assigned him a passage to read in the Book of Mormon and when we went to teach him again he had read it. Many times the main problem with investigators is they don`t want to act. They want an answer, but they don`t do what they need to do to recieve an answer. We ask them to read the pamphlet for our next visit, or read a passage in the Book of Mormon, or pray, but they won`t do it and then they don`t understand why they don`t understand what we`re trying to teach. It`s really difficult. But there is a change when they act for themselves, not soley are acted upon. It`s just like in our own lives. Many times we want change, we expect change, but we don`t do what we have to do to experience it. He has accepted the invitation to be baptised and has accepted a date in August. We are hoping that he can continue to progress...if only he would go to church! 

quick thing, the new blog for our new mission presidents is kurtandkathymarler.blogspot.com

Another thing: for my birthday I would love to recieve handwritten letters from my family members and friends of testimonies and (appropriate) spiritual experiences or experiences that have helped shape who you are and or helped to grow your testimony. I`m asking now because I know it takes a while for the mail to get here. Mom if you could give people the mission home address so they could send them I would be grateful.

Well I love you all. Keep being strong and diligent. Seek for the good through the clouds.

Love Hermana Butterfield

July 15, 2013

Well hello all! I hope all is well in the great states!

So funny story, no one here can really pronounce my name...hardly ever. In sacrament meeting yesterday the first counselor announced that for the next week Hermana Bootuerfiel has the first talk and Hermana Villanueva has the second talk. Over the past couple of weeks Hermana Villanueva has been working with the members in how to say my name. In a chorus (of mainly the young men) of various members they said Hermana Buh der fild! So the counselor tried again...fail. So once again the almost in unison Hermana Buh der fild! It was hilarious. After a few aproaches he looked at me and asked if I understood and continued on. Hahah I almost died laughing.

This week we had interviews with President Marler. I really do enjoy interviews. We´re able to go to the offices and learn together and separately. We have our interviews where we can discuss concerns we have and get to know one another a bit better. President Marler truly is a great man. Very humble but very driven to do all he can to help the mission grow and the missionaries progress. 

This week was good. We are really starting to try and work with the members and the presidencies of the organizations in our ward. It´s really sad when you see a ward struggle. We´ve determined something. When there are members who aren´t active, it´s usually because of one of two things: they have done something that they are ashamed of and really only need to repent, or they have lost their faith because they have stopped doing the simple things - reading the scriptures, praying, and well, assisting church meetings.

These three things are one of my favorite things we teach to people. They are three things so simple in our lives, but so vital for our spiritual progress. When we pray, we know God. We can feel of His love for us and be guided. When we read the scriptures, we know Christ. We learn of His life and His teachings and how we can progress to be better. When we assist our church meetings and worthily fullfill our callings, we know the Holy Ghost. We are able to feel of His peace as we worthily partake of the Sacrament (which by the way has been on my mind a lot lately. For so much time I have taken for granted the blessing of the ability we have to partake of the Sacrament. I invite you to study this topic. To be honest, I felt terrible because I was so ignorant of what a blessing it is, but the beauty of the Gospel, WE CAN REPENT (: ) These three things are so easy, so simple, and I know when we remember to do these things, we are happier because through them we are able to recognize our true divinity.

We are working with a young man named Gustavo. He has accepted a baptismal date which is awesome! It´s really hard to meet with him to teach but he has a great faith. We need to teach him about the Word of Wisdom...sigh... 19 years old and every Saturday he enjoys his whiskey with his buddies. Shoot dang it! But, we have faith that if he can learn about the word of wisdom, he´ll be fine. He has such great potential in his life and there are such profound blessings we recieve when we comply with this commandment.

hmmm...ok another funny story. So when we are in the offices for interviews, we get to play games as a zone with the assistants and Sister Marler. One of the games we played was just so stinkin hilarious. I will try to explain...It´s kind of like Big Booty, but in spanish. It starts with the King and he says, the king wants to marry the queen . The queen says, the queen? And he says, then with who? and she says the name of one of the other players who is a number. No one wants to marry the King and the whole time you´re trying to confuse one another because if they mess up they get sent to the last seat and the goal is to be king. Well at one point Elder Hales was the King and I was the queen. This lasted for about 3 or 4 rounds. Elder Chacon was pestering Elder Hales not to let it get him truky talking about marriage. It was really funny. I will have to teach you the game someday...brace yourselves, it´s in Spanish haha.

Well, I love you all so much! Keep being good, keep being strong, and continue to spend time with one another. All we have is our agency and our time, and let´s be honest, there´s nothing I´d rather choose than my family. 

Hermana Butterfield

July 8, 2013

Happy fourth of July! It sounds like you all had a blast! I love hearing about your adventures and the times that you have to grow closer one with another. There`s a quote that I love that`s something like this -- we have two things in this life. Time and agency. -- I'm learning that how we spend our time is so important. I regret not spending the time I should have with you all. At times we lose focus as to what is most important in this life and I know for a fact now that first is our Father in Heaven and our families. We can spend time doing other things, but if it`s not with our family or something that is bettering our ability to feel love and peace for one another, it`s just not worth it.

This week went fast! We had our first multi-zone with President Marler and his wife on Tuesday. They are very special people. I can tell that they are going to help us work miracles in our mission. I loved something that President Marler said. He said something to the effect of that we aren`t going to focus on baptisms anymore. Our focus is the temple. How true it is. So often I am learning that yeah we can have baptisms, but ultimately if the goal isn`t the temple, they aren`t going to stick with the Gospel. It`s hard, but it`s the truth. I try so hard to picture the people we teach dressed in white and having the opportunity to be with their families forever. What a blessing to be able to share that with them.

We have a couple of new investigators this week. One in particular is a family. The mother, Luz, and her children Juli and Kevin. Juli`s husband was an old investigator we found in our binder. We actually went to look for him to see if we could work with him again -- everyone has their own time. But we encountered Luz. We have taught them about prayed and the importance of this commandment. We invited them to pray together as a family everyday to receive the promised blessings (3 Nephi 19-21). We saw Kevin (15) the next day while walking and asked him if they had done it. He said they had and that they felt really good when they did so. BAH! I am anxious to visit with them again and teach them more. They seem very open to the Gospel and I`m praying that they will be able to observe the Sabbath...it`s going to be a struggle, but I have faith that it will happen.

Saturday was a rough day. We literally had nothing other than contacts. My companion and I we both tired, we were cold, and we were rather discouraged to be completely honest. We were standing in front of a house that we had an appointment that had once again fallen through. We were talking and I was thinking about a quote that Hermana Villanueva had shared with me by President Hinckley that talks about how when life is hard we need to look through the clouds to find the sun. I was thinking about this quote when Hermana Villanueva stopped and recounted the same quote. Literally in that moment the sun peaked out from behind the clouds and for about 5-10 minutes we felt the sunshine. To be honest we didn´t have anything happen the remainder of the day, no lessons, no refrences, and lots of appointments that fell through, but we had felt the hand of the Lord in that small moment and we felt the love of our Savior. 

I invite and encourage you all to search for the sun through the clouds. At times it`s difficult, but their is always something to be happy about, something to find joy in. Many times it`s a small and simple thing, but that`s where we find joy. 

I also have been thinking about obedience a lot lately. There`s a promise in DyC 82:8-10 in cooralation with obedience. In Alma 10:5-6 (I think) I was thinking about how often we forfeit the blessings of the Lord because we simply don`t want to be obedient to His commandments. Let`s not forfeit our blessings by thinking we know better than God. I promise you as well, that as you strive to be obedient to his commands you will recieve strength and the ability to be better.

I love you all so much! I hope you know you are in my prayers and how grateful I am to you for your examples to me.

W

ith all my love,

Hermana Butterfield

July 1, 2013

Can you believe it´s July already? I feel like yesterday was June 1st! Time is flying. I love hearing about your lives! It sounds like things are going great. You are all in my prayers and I think of you often.

Well, this week was pretty great. In our goals we were kind of low, but it was better than last week. My companion is awesome and our ward is starting to get motivated. It helps when they have confidence in the missionaries.

This week we had a service project as a mission. We went to Central (a place in our mission) and went to a place that I think is like for the Government and had a meeting with the Mayor of Acaldi. He presented President Turk with a certificate and metal of some sort. The church is a friend to the people here. It was a really cool experience. We sang our national anthem and then the national anthem of Peru. At the end of their anthem it says ¨The God of Jacob¨. I thought that was really cool. Then we went to our assigned areas and swept the streets. It was long and for the first time in a week the sun came out so it actually got hot...not as hot as you´re experiencing though. 

We taught a young lady named Marcia one day this week. It was an interesting experience. She´s 20 and has received part of the lessons before...like a year ago I think. She believes the Book of Mormon is true and I honestly believe she´d be baptised, but her family is very catholic (like everyone else here) and she is afraid that they will (I think) disown her. She loves her family clearly, and doesn´t want to hurt them. We will teach her again this week. Please pray for her strength. 

Another cool experience: New President of the mission! He got here on Saturday. Saturday we were out tracting when we got a call from Elder Castillo -- assistant to the President. He asked when our ward met -- 8:00. "President Marler would like to meet with you and your companion before your meetings!" We got to meet him and his wife and they assisted our Sacrament meeting!!! We are the first missionaries to get to know him. So cool. He and his wife are very humble and just such great people. I can tell they are going to be great leaders.

Well, I love you! I hope you´re doing great. I pray for you often.

Love Hermana Butterfield

I read Alma chapter 5 -- very humbling experience but then I read chapter 8. I invite you all to do the same. Also 1 John 4:6-9 and 16-21