Elder Acor: 4/22/24

 God's Greatest Miracles

¿Mabetekopio? ¿Iporã?

I hope you are all doing fantastic. This week was really good for me! One of my favorites in the mission for sure. Doesn't mean there wasn't difficulties, but they add to the experience. Also I hit 21 months as a missionary! Isn't that crazy?

Starting off with last Monday. It was very different from all my Pdays in my last area. We stayed here Villarrica because it was raining a ton. It didn't stop raining all day so we had a very chill day. Very different but kinda a fun change.

Tuesday we have our district council in a city about an hour from here called Coronel Oviedo. Again very different from my last area. Tuesday was almost amazing because it was nice and chilly. I can't say it was cold but it was chilly. I really wanted to eat Mbeju and our last lesson we went to they were making Mbeju so that was a huge blessing.

Wednesday we were able to go out with a return missionary from our branch. That was a blast. His names Guillermo. Something to know about this area as well is that we get a ton of referrals. So we work online a bit so we can visit some of those people, or so that we can plan videocalls with them. We got one referral and we contacted him and he said he lives in Villarrica. At night we went and visited him. He was a good hour walk from where we were. We had a really lesson with him and he felt the spirit super strong. Then Guillermo went and saved us and picked us up in his car.

Thursday we did a ton of work online. We have about two hundred people that have sent us requests. So we are trying to contact them all and see who interested and who's not. We are honestly seeing lots of success with videocalls. Lots of people are surprisingly open do making calls with. The only thing is that everyone lives super far away from the chapel. We are going to try and continue working hard with them and hopefully we see success.

Friday we were able to go out and work with another return missionary. It was super fun. He took us in his car to the lesson and then after went and bought us milkshakes which was pretty awesome. Then we ended up finding a family of young adults which was good and we could teach them all a bit. We are excited to continue passing by them.

Saturday was I think one of my favorite days on the mission because it was such an adventure. Here in Villarrica we also are responsible of another branch called Paso Yobai. It's about one hour away in a car. In a slow big bus about two hours. So in the morning we were off on the bus to head to this town. We made it and we were able to eat lunch with the branch president there who's name is President Torrez. He's literally such an amazing disciple of Christ. He went and walked to the chapel with us which is an hour walk from his house. We went and did a ton of visits to the members of the branch which was a blast. Also everyone in this town speaks almost only Guaraní so that was a crazy adventure. The gift of tongues works for every language let me tell you. We also were able to teach some friends of some members so hopefully they can start progressing. I think I said last email, but sometimes it's a bit overwhelming with how much work there is to do. God has but two branches in the responsibility of two young missionaries. We are working hard and trying to see miracles in both areas, and all the small little towns around. We had to wait a bit for our taxi, so learned that there is a ton of gold in Paso Yobai. Our branch president has dug about a 70 feet deep hole to reach the gold. Kinda crazy. He showed us the hole and let's just say I would never go down there. We then headed back thanks to a taxi driver who we've made a deal with to bring us back for a cheaper price. Then we had a fun branch night where we played some fun English games.

Sunday was a but crazy. We got to church and our councilor asked us to give talks because the members that were going to give talks didn't show up. I chose to talk about the promises of President Nelson. Especially the promises of seeing God's greatest blessings and blessings of the temple it went really good. I even talked for like fifteen minutes.

As I said I gave my taught about President Nelson's promise about seeing God's greatest blessings or miracles. I chose that because I truly saw that this week. Especially working in the small town of Paso Yobai. Growing up in Utah obviously the church is all I knew. I never questioned it. For me almost everyone I knew were faithful strong members. Serving a mission has been a great blessing for me to see that even if there are not one hundred or more members in a church building you can have five in a sacrament meeting and still feel the same spirit. Talking with President Torrez, who has been branch president in Paso Yobai for over seven years and also has only been a member for nine, I realized how strong of a testimony most members have. Thanks to this one man, and his faith in Christ, he is able to keep the branch going strong. He even told us if it wasn't for Christ his body would have probably given up on him after one year of being president. He works as a farmer for his family and that's it. That's the food and money he makes is with his farm yet he has one of the strongest testimonies on tithing. He gave up a whole Saturday to go visit members with us. God truly is giving strength to the members of his church to give us faith, strength, courage, hope, happiness, and so much more. These are the miracles President Nelson was talking about. I have seen God's greatest miracles.

That's everything for this week! I love and appreciate every single one of you for your love and support of me. Remember that God will work miracles in your life if you allow him to. Have a fantastic week everyone.

¡Chau!

Love, Elder Acor