Recognizing the spirit

  February 2, 2015

This week has been busy busy as sister Aguilar, my new companion has come in and i've been helping her get to know the area and all of the people we're working with not to mention preparing Claudine for baptism this saturday! She feels a little bit nervous because she got baptized catholic 2 years ago and has a fear that she is breaking a promise with God. What made her change her mind in the first place was learning about doing baptisms and other temple work for the dead. I guess she had a twin sister who died when she was 4 and so thinking of doing temple work for her really touched her. She already wanted to be a missionary for the catholic church and said now she'll just be a missionary for the mormon church:) She and Godelive are so faithful and  won't be surprised if Confiance and Emmerance at least start coming to church more after this.

  Claudine loves sister Aguilar along with everyone else. She is like another Sister Tranchina- she has a lot of fire and love for this work and the savior! she is from Lima Peru and her family joined the church 10 years ago (she was 11) when the missionaries rented a room in their home and taught them the gospel. I love hearing her conversion story and it's powerful in this area where there are a lot of catholics. She knows her scriptures like nobody's business and inspires me to memorize more references. Everyday feels so blissful and we laugh more than I've ever laughed with a companion before. missionary work really is missionary fun:) We love taking the youth out with us to help them decide if they want to serve missions.

  I learned something unexpected this week after an unsettling encounter with an ex-mormon who was a convert from Ireland, got married in the temple, had 5 kids, and after 29 years of faithful service, woke up one morning and decided he no longer needed religion or politics or anything because "the kingdom of heaven was within [him]" He is the boyfriend of a german woman who has a 10 year old son we were trying to teach but he didn't give us a chance to teach the 10 yr old. He says the book of mormon is an inspired work yet doesn't believe it is from an actual record and he doesn't believe Joseph Smith was instructed to restore the church. By then end of his ranting and bible bashing and tearing down our religion I just felt sick to my stomach. the meeting was a stark contrast from the lesson we had just come from at Temple Square with Brandon and Brother Jones where the spirit was nearly tangible. As I prayed  for understanding, I realized that I needed to learn what the spirit didn't feel like. No matter how sound the man's intellect one, I just didn't feel good talking to him, and as he sat there sipping his glass of wine claiming he found real happiness, it was clear that he simply did not want to keep the Lord's commandments. God sets the terms for repentance and salvation and if we follow them and stay true we will find joy in the end. It's our choice if we want this peace and happiness or if we want to be subject to the misery of the devil. Strong words, but they're true. Truth is eternal, not relative. Just because you don't believe in gravity doesn't mean you won't fall when you step off the edge of a cliff. I'm babbling at this point but I'm just grateful to know by the fruits of living the gospel that it is true and that this church is everything we claim it to be. The Savior stands at the head and his authority is in His church. The fruit of the spirit as found in Galatians 5:22-23 is love joy peace..etc. and when you feel these things you know you're feeling the spirit, when you don't you can know you're not! It is God's main source of communication with us. I invite you all to look at your lives and pick one thing you can eliminate so that you can feel God's spirit more in your daily life! It is well worth any sacrifice:)

Love,

Sister Pearson

Pictures!

​Temple square with Claudine! She told me on the way home that when I first came she thought "why is this little teenager coming to teach me, I'my older than her!" Sometime I forget that I look really young... remember when people used to ask us if we were twins all the time Jane?

​In the words of Godelive "this is african food!"