Week 40 (Jun 25, 2012): Ita Enramada

Querida familia,

I am starting my time in Ita Enramada. It is SOOO different than Ñemby but I know that it is my time to be here and that I finished my work in Ñemby. There are a few poorer areas but the home are HUGE here and everyone has cars. I felt really out of place my first couple of days and just gaped at the homes as we walked around. Paraguay is a country were most of the people are extremely poor or extremely wealthy and I was in for a little bit of a shock when I left Ñemby! I am really close to downtown Asunción and we can look across a river on the edge of our area and see Argentina!

It was so hard to say goodbye...so many of the members were so kind to me as I left and came over to drop off food and letters and things like that before I left. Hna. Leanor gave me a purse that she has that she thought I might like...this is coming from someone who barely has anything. They are so humble and so giving. Marcos and Elias were baptized this past Saturday...that was really hard to tell them that I wouldnt be there and it is hard to explain why I cant make an exception for just an hour for them, but the rules are there and I am here in Ita Enramadad where the Lord needs me.

We are working with a guy named Gilberto right now. He is 21 and loves the lessons. He has a lot of finals this week so we will need to work on helping him still read his Libro de Mormón... we are stopping by every day to drop off cards with different short scriptures to read. He is preparing to be baptized the second weekend in July!

I am so excited to start working here even though I miss Ñemby so much! We went over to the chaple my first night and a bunch of the RS sisters were sitting in a room watcing a cooreagraphy of some Paraguayan dance and were all dressed up in long red skirts. When I asked Hermana Parini, the gospel doctrine teacher, who is about sixty or seventy years old what they were doing, she said, "Hermana we are adding a little bit of spice and color to the RS!".

The ward is great. My companions name is HNA. Andrade and she is from Mexico. I know that the Gospel is true and I know that I have a hight title to live up to...missionary...representativeof Jesucristo. I am so grateful Hevenly Father has given me this opportunity.

Amo a todos de uds.,

su Hermana Jones

"Mini Missioanries - All of Ita Enramada is very "chuchi" or fancy except for barrio Jukutu (same name in Giuarani). We can't be in their neighborhood when it gets dark because it is really dangerous (haha don't really mean that mom....only a little)

Week 39 (Jun 18, 2012): Leaving Nemby

Querida familia,

I will be leaving Ñemby, my first and only area, this Wednesday. I have been here for seven months! Woohoo!!!! It was really hard when I first found out, but I feel a strong confirmaion that my work here in Ñemby is "done"...at least for now...it never really stops because I will always remember so many of the people here. I love them so much...each and every one.

Noelia, Marcos and Elias will be getting baptized this Saturday!!!!!!! Noelia was a little nervous so they didnt get baptized this past saturday so I wont be able to be here for their baptizm, but I have been able to be here teaching and preparing them and that is enough for me! We are teaching them about tithing tonight with an activity that we have planned out. I am going to miss them a lot. Oh and we are starting to teach their MOM!!!!!!!

A quick story and lesson that I learned. We had a lesson with Antonlia abuelita the other day and had it in her daughters house who lives a 3 minute walk from her house. She told us she was going to walk home as we stood up to leave and so we asked if we could help her... but recieved the usually answer of, "no". We then walked over to Noelia, Marcos, and Elia´s house ( who live right in front of Antonia) and had a lesson for 45 minutes. As we left their house, I could see down the little hill that Antonia was slowly making her way up. With her heart attack that she had about three months ago and other health problems she walks with two canes and walks very very slowly. She had been walking and struggling back to her house for almost an hour when it takes us only five minutes to get there. We stopped again and asked her if we could ¨PLEASE help her get home and she got a little frustrated and said no.

As we walked away I realized how much we are all like that sometimes. We have sins that we struggle with that slow us down in our spiritual progression and dull the feelings of love and foregiveness that our Savior so freely gives us and as the Spirit gently prompts us to change and repent, so often we grudgenly say no and just like Antonia, take so much more time getting to where Heavnly Father wants us to be (spiritually and emotionally and temporally...in every aspect) because we are too prideful to accept the atoning sacrifice of our Savior. He pleads with us to come to Him and learn of Him. All that He asks is that we be like Him. Oh, I am so grateful for the Gospel. I know that it is true and I know that my Savior lives and loves me. I want to follow Him and be like Him.

I love you all... les quiero cada uno de ustedes. ¡Que vayan con Dios!

amor,

su Hermana Jones

Antonia- The first time my WHOLE mission that I have seen her smile! That meant a lot to me. At the end of the lesson she said... God loves everyone like you both love me. Where I know that He loves us SO much more, I felt a sacred sense of trust from my Father in Heaven and felt really grateful that I could meet Antonia.

Hna. Leanor- we still dont know where Vincente is, so that was hard. She gave me a very sweet gift of one of her purses...

Our neighbors...they dont want to come to church or hear the lessons, but we have become really great friends and I love them a lot.

Hna. Leanor, Hna. Franco and Mariela- Hna. Franco has always helped us and come to lessons with us when she can. Mariela has become good friends with Noelia and is coming with us to a lesson with Noelia, Marcos and Elias tonight!!!

Hno y Hna Cabdevilla- the parents of Mauricio (best friend is Carlitos who was going to be baptized)...we had luch with them yesterday and with the Hna Bracho... oh and her daughter Flopìe in the picture... the most shy girl I have ever met but FINALLY she will give me kisses on the cheek and thinks we are friends!

We live next to the familia Lanzoni (our landlords and munos activos)& they have: mandarine, mango, lime, bannana, and avacado trees. Picking mandarins on P-day...I ate four to six every day for a week. :-)

Week 38 (Jun 11, 2012): Finding Lorezo and Claudia

Dear family,

It's been a great week! I cant remember if I told you, but Carlito's dad said that he doesnt want him to get baptized. We are working with the Flia. Cabdevilla to try and help get his permission. Keep him in your prayers!!!

Noelia and Marcos... if we get their Moms permission first, will be getting baptized this Saturday... it is going to be a crazy week getting everything ready but I am so excited! As we were sitting in sacrament meeting I look over at Marcos who was sitting next to me and he was reading in Jacob 5! The alagory of the olive tree... ummm hahah but after church he told us he had to get home to do his homework. "Oh, you have a lot of homework from school this weekend?", I asked him. "No...in my Libro de mormon!". Noelia has made a lot of friends at school also.

We have started working with two new FAMILIES!!!!! That is a missionaries dream. The first family is Mirta and Arnaldo with their two beautiful girls Zira and Gudalupe. They are great parents and are preparing to be baptized the very first weekend in July.

The other family we just found yesterday named Lorezo and Claudia who have a little boy named Santiago and a little girl named Valentina! He had asked us to come teach them about three mONTHs ago but we couldnt find their house and after looking for two days for a couple of hours... we gave up but by a miracle he passed us on the street the other day and we taught them the first lesson yesterday!

Ah, I love this work. Keep praying for missionary experiences and they WILL COME!!!!!!!!! This is the Lords work and it is our work... our sacred opportunity.
I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH... ¡LES QUIERO MUCHISIMO Y DISFRUTEN LAS FOTOS!

amor,

su Hermana Jones

Fotos:

1.Beautiful Paraguay- Barrio Ca'guazu
2. Hna. Arnell, me, Celeste, Pati, and ... Marcos right after church yesterday :)
3. Celeste wanted to take another picture outside and once we got out there EVERYONE wanted to be in the picture which I was fine with... I love my ward!!
4. Hna. Arnell and I with Noelia and Marcos. Noelia doesnt have a skirt so luckily Hna Plummer left one behind that she will be able to use!! She was SOO excited about her "For the Strength of Youth" booklet.

Week 37 (Jun 4, 2012): Happy and Safe

Mi querida familia,

This has been a great week! They are closing the cyber early so I wont be able to write a whole lot, but wanted to tell you that I am happy and safe andddddd that I am soo grateful to be a member of the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. I know that this is God´s church and that He leads and directs this work. He is the head of this church and leads us through His Prophet, Presidente Monson. I love my Savior and learn every day how I can show Him that I love Him as I keep the commandments and serve those around me.

Sure do love you all so much.

amor,

su Hermana Jones

Fotos

1. Walking to a lesson. It is gorgeous here!
2. Marcos y Noelia, this is right after we had a lesson and watched the Restauracion. They felt the Spirit really strong. Thanks for the CTR rings Mom! I always have some in my backpack and they were SOOOO excited! I told them that they were from you and that made them happy.
3. Quiero presentar: MIDIUM!!!! and her two little girls, Nuirim y Niyum. They will be baptized with other missionaries in the future. It is so hard to stop visiting someone, but its not so hard when you remember and feel that in some day, the missionaries after us will be able to help her get baptized.
4. I hope you can see the bug in the jar. I want you to know that yes. I put him in the jar all by my self haha! His body is almost as long as my hand! Ahhhhhhhhhh!

Week 36 (May 28, 2012): Pure and Quick to Believe

Dear family,

Hermana Ojeda recieved her visa finaly for Argentina and left for the airport at 2:30 this morning. Ah that might be ONE of the hardest parts of the mission for me is saying goodbye to people. I love her a lot and will miss her, but I know that is where the Lord needs her and so am excited for her at the same time.

Noelia and her brothers are really excited to be baptized and I was thinking a lot this morning about the requirements for someone to be baptized and as I studied in Doctirna y Convenios about each of these different requirements, I realized just that much more how "pure" and quick to believe and repent kids are. We took them to a baptisimal service the other day and when we asked them afterwards what part was their favorite part of the baptism service, Marcos said "when she went down into the water!" and Noelia agreed. She started to cry during the service and you could tell that they both, Marcos and Noelia, could feel the spirit. Marcos asked us..."Christ was baptized, wasnt He?"..."but He didnt have any sins so why did He get baptized?". If we could all be like "the children" we would be so much more humble and quick to follow Christ and so much happier! Their Mom is going to come to church this Sunday!

Mauricio Cabdavilla is doing a great job inviting his friend, Carlos Denis (13 años) to church and he came again yesterday! We had a lesson with Carlos Denis and the flia. Cabdevilla and he is such a great kid! He accepted a baptisimal date the 16th of June! He was a little nervous to pray during the lesson, so Mauricio loving said told him, "thats okay, this is the page (in the pamphlet) that teaches us how to pray and I can teach you how and the next time you can pray!". He is a shy kid but spends almost every day with Mauricio at his house doing homework and hanging out and the Flia. Cabdavilla is one of the strongest families in the Gospel that I know so he is learning by example! We will be meeting his parents and sisters this week and sharing with them!

Vincente has been having a lot of problems lately. We havent seen him in over a week and his mom also. She went downtown today to look for him... sometimes he leaves when he is frustrated but we are really woried right now for him. Hno. Miguel offered to go with Hna. Leanor to look for him. Keep him in your prayers.

I love this Gospel. I love my Savior, Jesus Christ, and am grateful for the knowledge that my Heavenly Father will love me no matter what. Each and every one of us, He has a plan...and it is so much greater than we can imagine!

love you all,

Hermana Jones

Fotos:
1. We blew up 50 balloons for Hermana Arnells birthday while she was getting ready sunday morning and then surprised her!
2. La familia Gomez- Hno Gomez was working, but we eat with them every saturday. A familiy with a big, big heart and with a dad who has never grown up! ahah They take really good care of us. Hna Gomez is the relief society president!
3. in order: Hna. Arnell, Noelia, Hna. Ojeda, yo, Elias, Isryel, y Marcos! They are all reading their Book of Mormons and will be baptized on the 16th of June! I love teaching kids... they
4. Hna. Correa and her daughter daisy- it was her birthday and she loves brownies so we surprised her! She was really happy!
5. It was so good to see Hermana Plummer and her VERY American parents. I forget sometimes how much I stand out with my hair and think I am Paraguaya already!
6. Hna. Ceci and I - a recent convert. She is so funny. We had a lesson about family history work and afterwards she was really excited but said that she thought it was a little overwhelming with all of her family that are not members.
7. 2:30 en la madrugada! I hate hate hate goodbyes...and I stood on our porch waving until we couldnt see the car... like I always do :)

Week 35 (May 21, 2012): Meeting Noelia

Mi querida familia,

Its been a great week.

We have found a lot of new investigators. Oh, by the way, I am starting my fith transfer in Ñemby and I was so relieved that the Lord still wants me here in this area. We are still training Hermana Ojeda, but she just got news that this next Monday, she will be flying out to Argentina to start working in her assigned mission. That made me really sad because I love her so much. She is the really sweet one in our companionship and I love being in a trio because you learn so much from eachother.

We have also been starting to work with a little girl named Noelia. She is the cousin of the less active member that I told you about last week named Juan. She loves the Book of Mormon but it is really hard for her to read. We gave her the "For the Strength of Youth" pamphlet and she was so excited and showed it to her mom. She just turned 12 April 17th and reminds me a lot of Alexandra. She just is really really happy and has a huge smile. And she looks like she is going to break she is so skinny. haha Anyways we have had a girl named Mariela in the lessons with us and she is thirteen years old and they are best friends now. That is a missionaries dream. Noelia lives about a thirty minute walk from our house in Bario San Miguel and lives in very very humble circumstances. She came to church yesterday in jeans and a nice shirt. I wanted to give her one of my skirts but it would just fall right off! She loved the church the other day and she is excited to get baptized in the beginning of june. She has her Moms permission and we are just trying to teach her Mom now!

I have a big testimony that the Lords hand can be seen in our lives in the tiniest ways. I have seen so many times these past couple of days the smallest tiniest things that happened that I KNOW was because Heavenly Father knew it was important to me. I wont even give the examples because they were things that were so small that you would laugh, but Heavenly Father, being a perfect Father, made sure that I was blessed in so many tiny little ways just because He loves me so much. I love Him and I love my Savior, Jesus Christ. I love the Gospel. I know that it is true and ther is no other way to be happy and return to live with Father in Heaven other than throught the Gospel of His Son.

I love you all so much. More than I could ever say. Thank you for your prayers. I know that you pray for me, my companions andn the people I work with every day. My family here in Paraguay. Prayers are heard. They are answered. Thank you for all of your love that you show as you live the Gosple.

love,

Hermana Jones

ps.Daddy, happy birthday! ahem... sorry HHAAAPYYY BIRTHDATY DADDY. LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!

Week 34 (May 14, 2012): A Mission - Hard but Sweet

Mi querido familia,

I sould think of a better subject line, buuuttt... "i love you" is the only thing I can think of when I write these letters. It was so great to see all of you but as I talked to each of you, it was just confirmed even more that my time and place in life right now is serving the Lord in Paraguay. I love it here. We just had our stake conference a few weeks ago and it was really neat to listen to a sister who had just gotten back from her mission. In her testimony she said that the mission wasnt hard but sweet. She went on to explain that it is like a sugar cube (okay weird but hear me out!). It is hard...but in the end it is just sweet. I dont know if that made any sense, but I hope it did! Every day there is something that is hard for each missionary but at the end of the day as I sit down to write in my journal, I can only think of all of the blessings and miracles that we have seen and have been given. And you cant even remember how hard it might have felt at the moment but are just filled with a solem gratitude that you have the opportunity to serve the Lord and litterally fight for your brothers and sisters. I am learning to do that... it is hard in the moment but so "sweet" in the end. And I love it and will always be so grateful to Heavenly Father for sending me here to Paraguay.

One of my favorite families in the ward, the familia Cabdevilla, have two kids, Mauricio and Flo. Mauricio is your age Nick and you and Spencer would seriously be best friends with him! I can see him sitting there and playing chess for hours or RIsk. Ah how I Miss that game hahah.

Well, Mauricio brought his best friend to church yesterday! I was so excited for him!! Hno. Cabdevilla even said that they were talking to his parents to see if he could recieve the missionary lessons so that, as a missionary, made me even more excited!! Hno. Gomez, the young mens president, is kind of loud and very funny and practically asked me in front of Mauricio´s friend, Carlos Denis, if he was going to be baptized! I wasnt sure what to say because it was his first time to come to church and we had barly introduced ourselves. haha Hno. Gomez said it kinda-of jokingly but you could tell he was kind of serious and Mauricio was really embarassed. hahah I was excited that he invited a friend.

A quick neat story... do you remember the grandma, Antonia "abuelita" who is always kinda cranky? Well we felt like we should visit her the other day and we ended up having a miracle! Her neighbor´s son, Juan, had come home. He was baptized a long time ago and was a local missionary for a couple of months but has not been home for a longgg time and has not been to church for almost a year. We finally met him and talked to him about why he had not been to church. He didnt say much and as we invited him to come to churhc the next day, he seemed really reluctant to tell us that he would come. Well... HE CAME!!! We didnt have a single investigator in teh congregation but Juan came and I was sooo excited!

As we were talking to him afterwards he looked around and asked us if Charlie Aldier, a 12 year-old, who has not been to church in a long time also. Come to find out that he baptized this boy...and so now we have Juan to help us get Charlie come back to church and other members to help us with Juan!

I love you all and I love this Gospel.

¡Que tengan un buen semana!

amor,

su Hna. Jones

Jess can you send me Monicas and Hollies mission addresses please?! Thaks!

Daddy, After church during lunch I get to play the piano and have been playing a song that Hna. Arnell has called, "My Kindness Shall Not Depart From Thee" by Rob Gardner. You would love it... they are the words of the Lord to the Prophet Joseph Smith when he was in prision.