Chau, Villa 31. :/ (sent June 3, 2014)

FAMILIA!


It´s been forever! Eight days is far too long in between Pdays. :) So we´ve hit transfers again, and I´m leaving the Villa that I´ve come to love so dearly. I´m in a place called Liniers that claims to be part of Capital, but when most of the buildings are two stories high, there´s no way you can claim to be anything other than Provincia. :) I´m excited though. Elder Aróstica is my new companion from Chile, and he´s a stud.

Elder Adamson is staying with the Brazilian Elder Costa in my old area, and Elder Zollinger is headed off to Litoral where his old companion Elder Molina will be his Zone Leader. Haha, funny how things work out. Elder Costa gave me a letter that he wrote in English, and it was absolutely hilarious. It didn´t really make a whole lot of sense sometimes, but I didn´t tell him that. His English has improved so dramatically it´s incredible!

The last week in the Villa was a bit rough. It´s the weirdest thing spending three months in one of the most successful areas in the mission without a baptism, but I learned a ton. Elder Adamson and I learned how to be much more efficient in the work. We commited right before transfers to put everything that we had into every lesson, to do all that we could to help the investigators feel our devotion and love that we have for the Savior. By doing that, we were able to invite the Spirit a lot quicker, and the investigator had the best possible chance to accept the Gospel. I have good feelings about Juncal 1, and I think that the Lord was preparing it for an enormous wave of success.

I saw my old buddy Elder Valladolid from Matheu during transfers. He told me about several people who have finally been baptized after I´ve left. I was so happy I just gave him a giant hug. Missionary work is so much more fun and a whole lot more meaningful when looked at from the bigger picture. It was a testimony builder to me that the Lord continues to work with people, and doesn´t give up on them. Every single person has the opportunity to accept the Gospel, and our Heavenly Father will work with them patiently and diligently, as long as we do our part to be instruments in His hands.

Yesterday, Elder Adamson and I had an interesting experience. We were stopping by a recent convert, and were on our way out when her sister came in the room. She looked at us, and asked what church we represented. We hardly even answered when she began to talk, gradually getting angrier and angrier, until she was on the brink of screaming at us that our Church was of men, and the Book of Mormon from the Devil. She loudly and boldly declared a scripture from the Bible that supposedly proved us wrong, and then declared another that contradicted the very thing that she just declared. She refused to allow us to finish our thoughts, and the only thing I could think about was how the Spirit wasn´t there. While she was near rampaging, I separated myself from the conversation, and apologized to her son and the daughter of the recent convert for the bad feeling in the room, and encouraged them to pray to their Heavenly Father and worship Him in a calmer environment. Up until this point, we had tried our best to be as cordial as possible, by allowing her to interrupt us as often as she liked so that she could get her point across, but when I realized that we were wasting the Lord´s time, I felt impressed to speak up. I felt filled by the Spirit as I gently rebuked her for the way she was speaking, advising her to treat the Gospel of Jesus Christ with more respect. If the Holy Spirit of God is not with us when we declare our beliefs, it doesn´t serve anything. In fact, when we speak of the ¨Word of God¨ or anything as sacred, we are doing more damage than good if we do so in such contention and with such hateful intents. I´ve made it a goal to always speak kindly, directly, and full of Charity, because that´s the only way that the Spirit will testify to them of the truth.

I´m so grateful for what I´ve learned out here in Argentina. This week I was reminded of always being conscious to the presence of the Spirit. If it´s not there, neither should we be. I love you guys so much. I wish you could see what I´m seeing, but I´m so glad that you are serving God in your own ways. Keep faithful, and keep moving forward. I will never stop praying for you. Hasta la próxima semana. ¡Hurra por Israel!

-Élder Goff

P.S. No pictures today. I´m sorry, I left my camera cord in the new apartment because I´m a fool. :P So I´ll send them next week. Also a short video if it works. :)