Nothing that a little bit of the gospel can't help!!!

May 8th, 2017 

Tuesday - Had a lesson in the morning and then in the afternoon we spent basically the whole day painting the Hermana’s house! It was pretty fun, I gave myself a white moustache and beard! Then in the night we taught Katerin (alejandros sister) (we taught her like basically everyday because her baptismal date is coming up soon, and we are gonna have Alejandro baptize her!!) 

Wednesday - we had a really good interview conference, we talked about faith and how in this mission 4 years ago they were finding 750 new investigators a week and baptizing 20 a week, right now were about 400 a week and 16 a week. Which has improved a lot with this new president, when I got here it was like 20 a change. Then we talked with Camila our convert, and she doesn’t really want to follow the rules in for the strength of youth, if she had some friends in the church it would help her, but she is getting a little rebellious, but nothing that a little bit of the gospel can't help! also I had an intercambio again with Belnap, it was pretty good.

Thursday - Back to back intercambios , I went with Elder Paulson! my homie from Rocha!!! haha we had intercambios back in La Paloma, that were only good because we were together. Now today we actually had a ton of success, and found a lady that will get baptized, during the whole lesson her friends were there listening and were talking sometimes and she said Hey! be quiet and listen this stuff is important and we should all listen to it! !! haha afterwards me and Paulson said, yep she's getting baptized pretty soon. Then we also had a really good lesson with some eternal investigators, and they said that they were coming to church! which they always say “ok well see”, but this time they were pretty firm in their decision. 

Friday - so we found an old investigator that said he was about to baptized but he had school and studies and stopped coming. So we’re gonna go by and start teaching him, he said he would like to start taking the lessons again! Then in the night I had to do 3 baptismal interviews for the Hermanas again! They are on fire over there, but they were super good, haha it’s cool being the one to do the interviews because everyone respects you and basically does what you say (not in a dictator style kinda way though) but even the members over there, I just recently noticed that. But it’s cool being able to interview people and be the voice for the Lord in their progression. 

Saturday - had a cool lesson with an atheist and she said she wants to know what her purpose in this life is, and that she’s been looking for a while. So we told her the way to find out is through prayer, so we’ll see how that goes! Then we got to futbol a little late and were not sure if people showed up and left, or if just on one came... but no one came!

Sunday - well I gave my first baby blessing today, haha Sister Lemos wanted me to bless her baby, and haha he was screaming the whole time, but it was cool, kinda hard to think though and feel the spirit when all you here is screaming. But Enrique and Ana didn’t come because company showed up, and the other investigators didn’t come because of reasons which I am unaware of. Then we had another lesson with the lady that we found after my prayer, and it was really good, talking about the importance of church and the Book of Mormon!

So yea another great week in paradise, found like 2 or 3 people that will be getting baptized next change, and helped another that will be baptized eventually! Also I ate 1 and a half bauru´s (a burger the size of 4) at the interview conference we had, I ate all of mine then Pres came over and said hey flaquito (little skinny guy) I’m worried about your health, eat this! So I’m kinda getting my appetite back being here in Durazno. I could barely eat 1 when I got here, I was struggling. But now it’s easy, but enough about food. This week was good and on this coming Saturday Katerin is going to be baptized!!! (Alejandro’s sister and he’s gonna baptize her) Also this Sunday we were present while alejandro and his mother were fighting about her telling him to come home for 2 hours before going to a play, and he was using some strong words. So I got sick of it, stood up and said: “we’re leaving” and looked at Alejandro and told him firmly “I never want to hear you say those words again!! and respect your mother, it doesn’t matter what the rule is, follow it because she has a lot more experience than you do, and she’s your mother!!”

But yea, it was a great week!

Love Elder Grigor

Having fun painting the Hermana's home 

Always keeping his sense of humour !!! 

Elder Grigor looks all grown up in this picture!!! 

Our friend Esteban sent these to us after Elder Grigor had lunch with their family. 

The missionaries are fed so well!!! 

Alejandro was BAPTIZED!!!

Tuesday - we had a couple lessons today, 1 with a new kid we found named Nicolas, he’s super cool but said he’s just kinda wanting to learn about the church instead of join it, but that’ll soon change! Then we had a lesson with a less active family that I think weight have to drop because they only want things from the church, they don’t go for the right reasons, and it’s been like that for like 10 years or so.

Wednesday - well today I basically ran out of money. When my comp spends money, I want something too so I end up buying something too but I’m going to start saving. Most of our lunches this week are in Santa Bernadina which is 40 mins walking or 20 pesos for the bus. (like a dollar) but today not much happened. A lot of people haven’t been home lately, it’s kinda weird. We are getting prepared for the baptism on Saturday and have been pretty busy.

Thursday - a day full of nothin´! But in the morning we had a good lesson with a girl named Jovanna, the 20 year old living with a 40 year old. Well she’s broke right now, and she has a smoking addiction so she started smoking ashes from her fireplace. Really sad to see, but we’re helping her out pretty well. We shared the hope and light of God with her, and she related to it pretty well. So we’re gonna try to help her to stop smoking really fast, she told us that she was going to stop but it’s hard to do that. 

Friday - The miracle day, haha so like 2 weeks ago we were contacting and I said a prayer to find someone that would talk with us, because nobody was opening up. So a mother and her teenage daughter walked by, and we were talking to them and the daughter looked interested, she was always about to say something and the mom cut her off. Then finally the mom said no for them both. So I kept thinking about that, and saying: “man those were them, what happened”. So today in the night we were contacting and we were talking to a lady, and right before inviting us in said she said:  “hey Paula (her daughter) come over here, you wanted to listen to this before right? Then we walked in and saw them both and had a best 2 years moment when Kyle calls (Haleluyah!!!!) haha so we taught them and we’re going by another day. 

Saturday - the BAPTISM!!!! Alejandro got dunked!!! haha it was awesome!!  The only bad part is I went to grab Elder Rodriguez while he was changing and they started without us. So we didn’t hear Alejandro’s testimony, kinda sad, but we asked them afterwards and he said that it was a great experience and he really felt a change!! Woo, then we had a lesson right after the baptism, and got back in time to play futbol at the church! (I also dunked on some kids playing basketball) but the rims are like 9 and a half feet)

Sunday - well Alejandro got confirmed, and we had a lesson with them in the night about the priesthood, because we are planing on baptizing the sister, and we want Alejandro to do it. It would be super cool if he does it.

So yea my week was really good, had some struggles like always but we had that miracle happen, and we got Alejandro in the water!!!! Finally!!! haha it feels good to see that happen. 

Love you all 

Elder Grigor 

Alejandro and Elder Grigor 

Elder Rodriguez 

Elder Grigor made a shirt with a Canadian flag on it 

Elder Rodriguez in a box :)

Elder Grigor doing some Nacho Libre moves!! What a goof!!! 

Practising for the baptism 

Elder Grigor, Alejandro and Elder Rodriguez 

Such a great day!! 

Sometimes we forget to see the miracles happening right around us

April 24th, 2017

Tuesday - pretty much the worst day of the week, so with every great kingdom there has to be a fall, so this week was ours. Well not even ours but the people’s. So we set up quite a few good lessons today, but no body was home, no one. Even people who are always home weren’t home. But we did do a lot of contacting and found a lot of people to teach later on in the week or the next week. But we did something sooo funny, so we kept passing by a house with a person who wanted to listen to us, who rented behind, and the landlord would never let us pass by. So I thought to try 1 more time. Then it was raining and we had our coats on, so my comps says go hide behind something and he’ll only see me, then he’ll let us talk to her, so he did it, And it worked!!!! haha he was insanely friendly and she came out. So I was fixing my shoe and my comps yells Elder Grigor! because he was standing there alone for like 20 seconds, so we went by and she said she would wait outside at 3 on Thursday for us!!!! 

Wednesday - Today was better, we had a lesson with Carlos, the man who Camila invited to church, and he’s progressing soo much, the only thing is that he hasn’t gotten a job so he’ll be heading back to Artigas, another department, and the missionaries might loose contact with him. Also we went to Lemos, and were helping Alejandro get prepared for his baptism next Saturday. Also we taught a new investigator named Jovanna, she’s in a really tough situation in life, and has had a lot of trials, but we’re helping her out. Also she always rejected the missionaries before, but now she’s more open and sees that we really want to help her!

Thursday - another tough day, not many people were home, basically none. And the one lady named Malena that said she would wait outside for us, and.... they’re moving to the sisters area... haha that’s like 4 amazing investigators that I’ve sent over to them! Other than that we didn’t have anything because people weren’t home!

Friday - Well the week continues... we had district meeting and we all introduced ourselves with something funny from our childhood, haha it was pretty funny. Then the day went decent, so I had to do 2 interviews for baptisms for the sisters, and 1 had fallen because some members smelled alcohol on him (but after drinking a lot you smell like it for a while afterwards (like a month) so they told me we only had 1, but I brought 2 baptismal forms just in case. I had a little feeling, and we left for a charla and they called me saying the president said we could do the interview! Woohoo… thanks holy ghost!!! So we did them and they both got baptized this Saturday. Then we had a good lesson before with Sofia, a 15 year old with a baptismal date, but here they accept anything then just don’t commit, but she’s really cool.

Saturday - We had another lesson with Jovanna, and she’s doing a lot better, but we figured out she’s living with a 45 year old man, which is weird because she’s 22. But she said he’s not the man that she wants to be with forever but at the time he was a great man but he changed. She also needed someone in that time, so we told her to ask god to give her the means to get out of this situation and move forward! Then we had a charla with Alejandro in the night and he said that he hasn’t read the Book of Mormon, and he had a cup of coffee last week. So I was thinking his date was gonna fall because he wants to be really sure this is what he wants and that it’s true. So we invited him to futbol and told him to pray if he wanted the 29 or the 6th. So he came and there were like 30 people there!! A NEW RECORD! (personal best!!!) and Alejandro said he wants to be baptized this Saturday!!!!!!!!!!! Wooooohooooo!!!!!!! 

Sunday -  Today was good, I gave a talk in church about tithing and encouraged the members to pay their tithing! Then we had a couple lessons throughout the day, we finally had another lesson with a less active family who’s daughter hasn’t been baptized and her daughter wants to be baptized and said she would come to church!

So all said and done, it felt a lot worse than it was, at times it feels like everything is going so wrong and we don’t know why. We have our own goals and are trying to meet the goals of other people, but we forget to see the miracles that are happening all around us. But yea this week was a little worse than the other weeks, but it was still really good.

Love

Elder Grigor 

Elder Grigor on the crazy bridge!! 

La pascua o Semana santa (Easter or Holy Week here)

April 11, 2017

Tuesday - pday! Basically just slept all day, haha me and merino pushed our beds together for the last night and watched a movie in the morning, then we went to gaucho and patos for the last time together, then did cyber…the usual! Then in the night we said goodbye to some people wth merino, haha he got super trunky and didn’t want to leave me. But it needed to happen.

Wednesday - I got my new companion today, Elder Rodriguez from Barcelona, España! He’s pretty cool, we kinda know each other already because he was comps with Elder Solano my second companion. But he’s cool and super funny, we get along really well. Also Elder Paulson is my zone leader!!!!!! haha he’s awesome. He was in my district in Rocha when he was training and now he lives with me!!!!, and haha he has yu-gi-oh cards and we play it all the time!!! It gets pretty heated sometimes! Some might say we’re ¨nerds¨ and I would say: heck yea we are!!!! Also Camila our convert is so awesome!!! We went to her house and a family friend was there and she invited him into our lesson and invited him to church. So we taught him and he said he’s been searching for the true church. He accepted a baptismal invitation, we didn’t put a date, because he might not be staying here, but if he finds work then it’s a yes.

Thursday - Well we’re getting to know each other, and I’m showing him the area, but we had a really long charla with these 2 girls, haha 1 was apostalic (don’t know if thats right in english) and the other ¨atheist¨ but we shared the restoration, and haha the apostolic said well I was believing it up until you said that it’s YOUR church that this happened to, like only you guys have the truth (well kinda..) but no, it’s Gods church. Then the other was paying attention but their dad doesn’t like us and they told us to come by when he isn’t around. Also we had a good lesson with Flia Lemos and my comp answered one of Alejandros questions and he really liked the answer, so he’s getting closer.

Friday - we had a cool charla with a girl named Sofia, and we put a baptismal date for the 13th, haha we gave her a pamphlet yesterday and she read almost all of it, (almost no one does that) then we asked her to explain it and she explained everything fairly well actually for reading it 1 time. She’s 15, we invited her to church too but she didn’t come (slept in) then in the afternoon we were walking to Santa Bernandina (and the charla fell through so we walked all that way for nothing) but we found a kitten in the middle of a field, so we grabbed him and found him a home, sadly we found his brother on the road a little farther up, but he was super cute.

Saturday - haha so we contacted this couple a while ago and have gone by their house a couple times and they’re renting the house behind another house, so every time we knock the landlord is there and doesn’t want anything to do with us. So we knocked on the door and the son said that she was sleeping, then the dad comes out ¨well advise her at least with theres people here for her. Then he came out and walked closer to us and looked up and said ¨OH YOU GUYS´ then turned around and walked inside, haha me and my comp laughed quite a bit from that because he came out just to do that. 

Sunday - well at first no one showed up, but we called the Lemos family and they came, then Camila came later (after we went to her house to grab her, then finding out she just left) and she brought her friend, but he left when she brought him, noooo!!! If only we had stayed!!!!! Then we had another lesson with our Jehovahs witness investigator, and boy they are hard to teach. But we have some questions that she doesn’t know how to respond. But it was good, then we went to Lemo’s house and put a new baptismal date for the 29th of April with Alejandro, (the birthday of their 2 twin babies) so that’ll be motivation for him. Haha he put a bunch of self goals before he gets baptized, so we went over the requisites for baptism and we saw that he’s already ready. He just needs more of a testimony on prophets, so we’re gonna watch the Tommy Monson video with him.

This week was really good, I got my new Español companion, and Paulson my homie came to the house! Well really this whole change was good, we found soo many people, and dropped a ton, but have found so many good investigators that have potential. All in all we found 52 new investigators this change, pretty unbelievable, and we taught around 90 lessons (including with members and less actives) . Man I love this area soo much!! So we’re gonna keep trying to keep it up this change. And hopefully we’ll be able to turn some of those new investigators into baptisms!! Also we’re gonna be playing yu-gi-oh a ton this change since Paulson brought it over, (y si somos algunos ñoños)

Love

Elder Grigor

Elder Rodriguez and Elder Grigor

The river over by Santa Bernadina 

The cat we found 

A crazy yard we found on Sunday - Life imitating art!!! 

Treeception !!! 

SUPER SATURDAY- NOT SO SUPER SUNDAY !!

April 11th, 2017 

Tuesday - well I had intercambios with Elder Belnap, he’s my MTC comp’s son (my mtc comp trained him) so we were already warmed up to each other, but we crossed the bridge again, (I almost ruined my underwear crossing that again). But we had a pretty good day, had a couple charlas and found a new family to teach in the night. We did try to find a future investigator and their landlord just screamed at us that they were protestant and didn’t need anything. So I told him firmly that we weren’t there for him. haha I don’t think we’ll be going back there anytime soon. 

Wednesday - I woke up at like 4 in the morning just to figure out that Elder Belnap could go back up to his area with the other elder that was doing intercambios too. So then I went back to sleep, but then there weren’t too many people home today, so we just contacted and joked around all day. 

Thursday - The activity!! haha so we started planning this activity for the ward to help strengthen it, and haha no one came, it was going to be awesome!! So basically our convert Camila came, and Esteban and the bishop, and thats it. Haha we even bought a bunch of things for object lessons but... no one came. So we are trying to strengthen the wards and get more commitment from them. 

Friday - so from this day forward all the days were good, today we found a new family to teach, a lot of the people we are teaching though are leaving on vacation this week. But we are teaching them and their 17 year old niece. She is a Jehovahs witness and said she knows her religion isn't true but also doesn’t know if there is a true one. But she’s progressing pretty well, she said she’s gonna pray and search to find her answer. And if she gets one she’s gonna follow it. Then we went to the Lemos´ at night to teach them. 

Saturday - SUPER SATURDAY!!!! haha so we came up with this thing called super saturday where you put all the best investigators on Saturday right before Sunday so they have a desire to go to church, and haha we had 3 lessons with members and 3 other lessons and found 2 new investigators. But we had a really good lesson with Ana, a fairly newer investigator and she said she would come to church!! Also we had a lot of others say they were coming!

Sunday - NOT SO SUPER SUNDAY - so no one came to church... haha we found out Ana drank a TON of mate the night before and felt horrible in the morning but said she would come next week, (only thing is she isn’t married) then all the other ones slept in. Also another thing we have found 3 awesome people that would probably get baptized, and they live in the Hermana’s area... haha so were basically just finding for them! but as long as they get  baptized I’m fine with that. 

Monday - so my comp was just saying bye to people, and we had a couple lessons, actually mostly lessons, haha 1 lesson was going pretty good then her neighbour(who didn’t like talking to us early because we taught them both before) she came in and we both thought ¨oh great!!¨ but at the end she actually helped out, the lady we were teaching said “if I’m going to get baptized it’ll be in the catholic church because everyone does it that way” Then her neighbour said “well if everyone jumped off a bridge would you do that, you need to look and she if thats the church you want, not just because everyone does because everyone could be wrong” Then she thought about that for a bit. hahaha well that was nice to not have to tell her that, better coming from the neighbour!!!

Well yea this week was another good week, just filtering out the teaching pool, and trying to find those prepared people, haha we’ve also been sharing the Prince of Peace videos with everyone we see. But we’ve got some good investigators right now who can start progressing and yea basically that its. We are kinda starting from scratch this change trying to do that, and it’s working, but people just need time to truly convert!! Also my comp is leaving me 😱 haha he’s going to my old area in Aeroparque! He’ll like it there, and my comp is Elder Rodrigues from Barcelona! So this will be a good change.

llloovveee 

Elder Grigor

Elder Merino saying goodbye to the families in Durazno

Goofing around with the kids!! 

Elder Grigor with his district in Durazno 

Don't take life too seriously !!!

April 3, 2017

Monday - My bday!!!!! We had a couple of parties and a family home evening with 2 families in the ward, and then the guys we live with surprised us with a cake!! It was amazing!

Tuesday - I had an intercambio with Elder Colson. He’s new, he’s been out about 2 months and he came here with Coral. I’m pretty sure they were in the same district in the MTC. We had a decent day, it wasn't that great until at the end of the day like 8 o’clock. We had nothing to do so I was contacting, and a guy named nacho(who actually kinda looks like jack black) opened his door and said he was atheist and a professor of philosophy. So I had an impression to say we were spirits before this world, and he said: “how’s that, how do you know that? Here, can you come in?  I want to hear this.” So we taught him and he agreed to pray that night, and we gave him the Book of Mormon. We explained it, and he asked if we could sing it and write our testimonies. Then he asked: “so how long does it take to get an answer, because if it comes in 30 years I’m not gonna be too happy!”

Wednesday - We had a good day, we started trying a new strategy in contacting and tried to give them the first lesson right there, and it’s working pretty well. We ask if we can explain 1 page, then we say a prayer and explain the whole thing pretty quick, so we talked to 1 guy (but he told us his wife is totally against it and he doesn't want contentions). Then another lady who works in compaña (in the middle of no where) and she’s only in her house 4 days out of the week and she lives in another part for 26 days... then we taught a menos activo (less active) lady whose family aren't members.

Thursday - Today was decent, we are trying to help out Enrique and Ana a lot to get them to come to church, but we’re thinking Enrique doesn’t want to. They are investigators from a while back but they haven't gotten married yet. 

Friday - Another decent day! Haha we tried teaching these kids how to pray but their dad came out and got mad at us and ran us off. He was a member and his family died and now he doesn’t like the church, (sometimes when things go wrong people blame the church. The church has nothing to do with that, it’s just there to help you when those things happen).

Saturday - Conference!!!! It was a really good day because (well 1 bad thing-I'm sick) but it’s conference! So I loved the talks. There were a lot of words I didn’t understand because they talk in weird words, but there was a lot of problems with the transmission. Sometimes the translator wouldn't say anything and would say things I couldn’t understand (I can’t hear him in English) or it switched to french 1 time. But it was still good, no investigators came but Camila came, she is our convert. Then in the middle of the sessions we taught a family of 4, a mother, 2 daughters and a ten year old grandson. They were all listening really intently but 1 of them was listening soo closely and following along so closely, haha at first I though she wasn’t going to pay attention because we gave her the pamphlet and she was on her phone. Then she opened it right up and asked what page are you guys on!!!!!! It was awesome and they understood soo well about the priesthood power being lost. Then we watched the priesthood session in english, and I loved the talks. Especially Elder Bednar and Elder Eyrings talks. 

Sunday - Wooooo!!!! the Lemos`came to church!!!! and she asked what happened to the classes and everything. So we explained and she said, alright we’re coming back next week too. The only problem is that she smokes, but her son and husband both accepted invitations to be baptized! Then I also really liked yhoon chau or however you spell his name, his talk was really good: about looknig up. Then we had another lesson with the Lemos family.

Monday - we had a zone activity today haha it was pretty fun, then we got a bauru and ice cream. But yea it was a great week.

So basically we found like 3 families that want to start listening to us. We also found 14 new investigators this week, working hard and finding lots!! The best thing is most of them are prepared or will tell us if they don’t want anything so we don't have to waste too much time teaching people who aren't ready YET to progress. Also the changes are in 1 week and I’m not ready. I want my comp to stay, we having fun together. 

Haha have fun everyone!!  Don’t take life too seriously. Learn to have fun, life can be difficult. It needs to be difficult or we wouldn't be here. So learn to find the fun in everything to help you along the way!!!!

Love You

Elder Grigor

Fun times at a Zone activity 

Elder Grigor & Elder Merino on their birthday !! 

Birthday Cake for the two missionaries 

HMMMM.....good cake!!!! 

Intercambio with Elder Colson

These shoes need to be burned! 

Elder Merino at our investigators home