Yay for Transfers!

May 19, 2014

I'm running out of creative titles.. 

So I'm leaving my area! And I will die in.... San Luis! My area is called Pringles but its pronounced "preen-glaze". Am I craving American chips? Yes. I leave on Wendesday and I'm so excited! 

My new companion will be Hermana Lybbert! She came with me to California back in the day. She's from Washinton and went to BYU Idaho. She's super sweet and I'm super excited to get to know her and learn from her. This transfer will only be four weeks long and then comes the 8 week transfer to welcome in the new mission president. And then I'll be home! Crazy! 

It is going way too fast! The week was unbelivably fast! For P-day we went and toured a winery. ha! It was cool. But I probs won't ever do it again. It smelled way bad like drunk people. But it was cool to see how they make wine. Made me never want to drink it so that's good! ha. 

We had zone meeting this week and then a talent show in our branch. Hermana Barney and I did a special presentation of "chin heads". Everyone loved it! I'll send the video soon when I have a better computer in San Luis! Woohoo! It was a lot of fun. 

Today we're going hiking, so you'll get lots of cool pictures next week! 

Sadly, I have to leave, but David Olivera is getting baptized next week! A miracle happened with him this week. He still was waiting for his answer and wanted to know that God loved him before he got baptized. So we promised him that that night, if he knelt down and prayed and then waited a little to listen for his answer, he would feel it. He said he prayed and then woke up at 2 in the morning because he couldn't sleep. He went downstairs and saw a man dressed in white. The man told him that God loved him and had a special purpose for him. He felt peace and told us that he wanted to get baptized as soon as possible. Sweet huh! He is way excited! I'm sad I'll miss it, but I know it will be beautiful! 

Well, I love you all and I hope all is going well! I am praying for you always! 

Good luck with everything this week! 

Hermana McKenna Lawrence 

Yay for Exchanges!

This week was way great! Full of more meetings and more learning and more work and more fun! 

We went up to Tunuyan, the area of the other sisters in our zone, and did exchanges! It was super fun and we saw a ton of miracles! 

Right now, in our area, we are focusing on the Olivera Family. They are Jehovah´s Witnesses, but they are not attending right now. The dad, David, is the most interested and we are sure he will be baptized really soon! He came to church by himself this week, but we are working on getting the family more involved. They'll come around soon! They have 3 of the cutest little boys ever and they are our best friends! Alejandro (8), Neuel (4), and Diago (2)! 

I am getting way excited to talk to you on Sunday! 

And this next week we will have a lot more time to stay in our area. So we will work really hard and teach everyone and their dog about the Gospel! 

I feel like I learn the same thing every week, but deeper. ha. This week I learned again that the Gospel really is soooo simple! All God asks us to do is keep His commandments and everything will turn out the way it's supposed to. Our Father in Heaven loves us, so He sent His Son, Jesus Christ to be our perfect example. And if we follow Him, we will be happy. Being an instrument in the Lord's hands makes me the most happiest I have ever been, and I know that will stay true forever. 

I still love being a missionary! 

I am continually grateful for your love and prayers! 

And I love you all so much! 

Hermana McKenna Lawrence 

Yay for being a Missionary!

April 21, 2014

I can honestly say that it is still exciting to get up and start a new day every day! I love being the Lord's servant and I will serve Him forever! 

This week was Easter! But Argentina doesn't focus on Easter as much as it does, the Semana Santa or Holy Week. Most everyone is Catholic so they focus a lot on the dark day of Friday.Friday there was literally no one out side. They don't eat meat all week, only fish, and then on Sunday they have a huge Asado to make up for all the meat they didn't eat in the Semana Santa. haha. Sunday didn't really feel like Easter at first. The talks in Sacrament meeting had nothing to do with Easter and no one even said Happy Easter.. Hermana Barney and I ate chocolate eggs and THEN when we went to our leaders meeting, the leaders had brought back packages and letters from the office, so I got my birthday package with the Easter Eggs in it!!!! Woohoo! Right on Easter! Thanks for making Easter feel like home! Also, I got the debit card, so now I can buy a jacket. ha. Thank you so much! 

This week was super great! Hermana Barney and I are working so hard! We found a ton of new investigators this week, left behind some that weren't progressing and had the baptism of Lourdes! She's 13 and super sweet! The baptism was beautiful and she had a lot of great support from the branch and her family! It was a great weekend! 

I'm so glad that you all had a great Easter! You all look so great and so big! Austin is HUGE! It's getting close to that day and I'm getting all the mixed emotions that come with dying on your mission. ha. Excited, sad, nervous, and overwhelmed. ha. But I know that when the time comes I will be ready. We are coming home more and more exhausted every night because we are giving it our all and we feel so great! 

I know the Lord is helping us in this great work! I feel His hand everyday in the miracles we see and the happiness we see in the people we teach. I love being a missionary and I love teaching the Gospel to everyone I see! I will be sad when it all ends, but right now I'm just loving life! 

The work keeps advancing, the Gospel is truer than ever, and Jesus Christ is my Savior! I know if I follow Him, I will be happy. He lives! For all of us! 

I love you all! 

Hermana Lawrence

Yay for Conference! Boo that there's no more:(

April 7, 2014

Holaaaaaaaaa!!!! 

This week was super great! A lot of stress relieving and now I'm ready to jump up and work hard this transfer! 

Transfer doctrine says that I'm staying here next transfer! With my new companion Hermana Barney! She is from Utah and came out the same time as me! She is super sweet and cute and we will have a lot of fun and work super hard! I'm way excited! 

I'm feeling a lot better! The bruise from my fall is gone, the cold and flu is finally gone, and I'm feeling healthy and happy! I'm even eating apples every day! 

Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday we were down in Mendoza having fun! ha. Hermana Dote had to do some paperwork for her Visa so we went down Monday night and stayed in the apartment of the Mission Nurse, Hermana Ashby! She is my best friend! She told us stories about her son and her fiancee and tried to set us up with her other son who is in Peru on his mission. ha! 

Then Tuesday, we had Leadership Council with Presidente Avila and all the STL's and Zone Leaders of the mission. It was super great! Gave me more excitement to keep working! We learned a lot about Baptism and how it is a Sacred covenant, and how we need to help our investigators to know that it is a covenant for life! They talked about that a lot in the General Woman's meeting last week too! I loved it! It really is so important! And it feels so good to fulfill our covenants and help others. 

Tuesday night, all the Sisters from the mission came to the mission home and we ate a super yummy dinner and then slept in a hotel! The next morning we woke up, did yoga with the nurse and talked about health. ha. Then we played some fun games and got dressed to start the conference. They taught us about not hurting our companion's feelings, about communication, companionship inventory and later about why we are here and our role as Sister Missionaries. I loved it, learned a ton and we all got to relax and just let out all the stress we had inside of us. ha. I feel like every sister missionary should be able to go to a spa for 2 days in the middle of their mission. No, but seriously, I feel a ton better and I'm so ready to get down to work this transfer! 

Thursday and Friday we worked hard and had some awesome lessons! We had a surprise baptism on Saturday because the Elder's investigator Soledad moved into our area last minute! So she was baptised on Saturday and her daughter, Lourdes,. wants to be baptized next week! woohoo! So we are going by to teach her a couple times this week :) I'll send pictures of the baptism soon! 

Conference was amazing! Sadly, we had to watch it in Spanish, and I didn't understand a lot of it, but it was amazing to see that the same Spirit was there! They are still the words of God and I know that everything they said was true! I can't wait till they are up on LDS.org so I can print them! 

I love you all and I hope that you have such a great week! Keep on keeping on and you are in my prayers always!!!!!! 

Love love love! 

Hermana McKenna Lawrence 

New adventures and not so new, but equally great companion!

Dear Family, 

Remember when I told you I was coming to be with Hermana Lopez?? So I get off the bus and my new companion, HERMANA DOTE, came to get me! They all heard wrong on the telephone and it got passed to me as Hermana Lopez.. hah. We don´t even have an Hermana Lopez in the mission! ja! 

It is so good to be with Hermana Dote again! It feels like we weren´t even apart ever and we just picked up back where we left off! We´re already friends and we already know how to teach well together so that made the transition super easy! 

Our area is BEAUTIFUL! Freezing cold and right next to the mountains! The fruit here is super good, so I´mma eat good this transfer :) The members in the branch are incredible and all the young women love us! The dogs here are kind of nicer.. but still scary. It´s a more rural area, but still nice and there aren´t too many bugs so we´re good there too! :) 

Unfortunately, the internet in our area is realllllly stinky... so sorry but I won´t be able to send pictures this transfer... I´m going to go print them out so you might get some in the mail in 2 months! ja.... sorry...... 

We´ve had a lot of meetings this week so we had to travel 3 hours back to Mendoza and then an hour to another meeting in Tunuyan. So I haven´t gotten to know everyone we´re teaching this week.. but we should have more time this next week!

We teach primary in our branch because there are not enough people to do it. ha. But it was sooooo fun! 

Fast and Testimony meeting was amazing! I felt the Spirit so strong and the Saints here have incredible testimonies! The church really is the same everywhere and it really is led by Jesus Christ, himself! 

I´m so glad to hear that the Temple Dedication and Cultural Celebration went so well! I´m so proud of my family! Thank you for being such a good example to me! 

Well, I love you all and I LOVED your letters this week! I am printing them all out and I just sent some letters home on Friday! Hopefully you get them soon! 

I´m glad you got my Tang! It´s wayyyy better than what we have in the States! ha. I love it! 

Love you love you love you!!!! Thank you for everything! 

You´re in my prayers!

Your missionary,  

Hermana McKenna Lawrence 

Yay for more surprises!

Dear Family, 

This week has been nuts! On Tuesday, I got almost the worst sunburn of my whole life. Then Thursday, surprise! We wore scarves because it was freezing cold and raining! We had to unpack all of our winter clothes again! ha. From Thursday till Sunday it was freezing and I don´t think it ever stopped raining. And today, HOT. Again. 

We came home soaked every day, but I had fun because I got to wear my cute rain boots :) There was absolutely NO ONE on the streets and when we knocked on doors, no one wanted to let us in because we were sopping wet! They told us "go home, you´re going to get sick!) haha. 

One lady, Neli, told us that the Lord has seen the sacrifice we´ve made, and we were good for the day. ha. My companion and I later talked about the sacrifice the Savior made for us and how what He did was way harder. ha. So we worked even harder the rest of the night. :) We didn´t see a ton of success, but we know the blessings are coming! 

Thank you everyone for the birthday wishes! My birthday was great! And so was this week! 

On Monday, we got locked in the chapel with the Elders from our zone and had to wait a couple of hours for the Bishop to come let us out. ha. But Tuesday, we got back to work and worked hard! 

Apparently, mission birthdays are to get fat. In district meeting, we had facturas, at lunch, we had a huge plate of Peruvian party food that they only make for special occasions, my companion bought me ice cream, an investigator gave me coke and cookies and then lunch on Friday was another celebration with cake! ha. My diet starts today. 

But my birthday was really great! We worked hard, arrived at our apartment exhausted and satisfied :) and sun burnt. 

Miracles of the week: 

- the other day we met this little girl in the street. Her name is Sofia and she is like 7 years old. She stopped us and said, Hey what are you doing? So we told her we were missionaries and she said she loves to help the Father in her Catholic church! She told us she believes in God and Jesus Christ and we asked her where she lived. The next day we stopped by and met her mom, Antonela who is pregnant with another one :) She was super excited to meet us and so grateful that her daughter stopped to talk to us in the street. We have another lesson with them this week! :) 

- on Wednesday we walked a ton and hardly found anyone. We were on our way to visit a Potential Investigator when my companion said wait. We stopped in our tracks and around the corner came this lady and her daughter. We talked to them and 30 seconds into the conversation, the cars in the street we would´ve just crossed, crashed. The Lord really protects His missionaries! The lady´s name was Cristina and she told us that she was a member and wanted to take her 9 kids to church, but didn´t know where the church was in her area. She´s not in our area, but I know the Elder´s will take good care of her where she lives :) 

Yay for miracles! 

This week in my studies and observations I have been learning a lot about how much the Gospel blesses families. On a mission, we see so many families every day, some of them happy, some of them not so much. Obviously, no family is perfect and we all have our problems, but it is not a surprise to me that the happy families are the ones who include Jesus Christ in their home life. They read the scriptures together, pray together, and have weekly Family Home Evenings. I know we were blessed with families to help us to learn to do these things. We all have personal problems but we cannot get through them or learn to get through them without our families. And it´s those small and simple things that make all the difference. I don´t have my family with me right now, and as a Missionary, we have time set apart permanantly to read and pray. But I have noticed a huge difference when I do it just because I´m supposed to and when I do it because I remember it has eternal consequences. I know sometimes it seems like no one pays attention anyways, or it takes to long to do it, but I am extremely grateful that we read and prayed as a family before the mission. And I am grateful for the knowledge I am gaining on my mission of how important that was and is for the rest of my life. I know you will recieve blessings as you continue to set aside that time to read the scriptues and pray together. It really is of eternal consequence. :) 

"Y así vemos que por pequeños medios el Señor puede realizar grandes cosas." 1 Nephi 16:29 - sorry I only have my Spanish Scriptures. But it says that through small means, the Lord can bring to pass great things. God works through the small and simple things. But Satan knows that too. And he will do everything he can to get us to not remember those things. 

The Gospel is made of small and simple things, including small and simple blessings. I have noticed those a lot this week. From a little girl stopping us in the street to a cold day, the Lord has blessed us this week, even if it´s not in the way we expected Him to. 

I send my love and prayers your way! And some fun pictures! Love you!!!! 

Hermana McKenna Lawrence 

Yay for Order!

February 3, 2014

Dear Everyone,

This week has been great! This week has been a week of new beginnings!

We went to one of the Elder´s area called Lavalle and had an
asado! (like a big barbeque) My first one! Nobody could believe I
haven´t had one in my two months here. ha. The Argentine´s LOVE asado!
It was super fun and we were able to do some Zone bonding!

On Tuesday, we had Consejo, which is a meeting for all the leaders of
the mission that we have once a month. They talked a lot about how we
need to talk to everyone that we see on the street! Sometimes we
forget about that and just walk fast to our appointments because we
are late. But my companion and I have been on fire this week! We have
been stopping everyone on the street! A lot of them aren´t interested,
but we´ve found some awesome people because of it.

Especially because this is what happened this week. We both had really
strong feelings that we needed to start all over and look for new
investigators. None of our investigators have been progressing and we
felt like we can use our time doing more effective things. It was
really hard to leave them, but I know that they will be more prepared
soon. It took a lot of faith to start over, but we´ve already seen the
miracles!

Last night the Elders found this kid, Maxi, that´s been going to
church in their ward and attending the youth camps and really wants to
be baptized! He lives in our area, so he would go to our ward. They
passed us the referral and we´re going to visit him tonight!

Also, last night the Carballos in our ward invited us over because
their cousin was in town and isn´t a member. She recently lost a child
and was really confused about where she was. We taught about the Plan
of Salvation and told her that her daughter was happy and that she has
the opportunity to be with her again. How blessed we are to know about
God´s plan for us! It brought a peace to the room and she was able to
feel the Spirit and know that everything would be okay. She lives in
Buenos Aires, so hopefully she will be baptized up there soon!

We´ve been doing a lot of cleaning in our apartment and our area book.
(I don´t think either have been cleaned very well in 2 years) We were
scared to start it, but as we have made our apartment and our area
book cleaner, we have felt the Spirit more and we are more receptive
during studies and planning to the promptings and inspiration that the
Lord wants to give us. Now I understand why it´s so important to have
a house of order. :)

We did exchanges this week with the sisters from Mendoza! I stayed in
my area with Hermana Norr from Washington and we talked to so many
people! We saw miracles and had so much fun! And ate some really good
alfajores. (they´re like little cakes)

They have the best junk food here. Alfajores, facturas (pastries),
pizza. And ALL way better than the ones I´ve ever tried in the states.
If there was one reason I ever moved here, it would be for the junk
food.

This week we had a huge miracle with one of our recent converts in the
ward. Magali was baptized in November, right before I got here. But
when the missionary that taught her left, she got super sad and didn´t
want to come to church. We always passed by, but never could find her
and no one from the ward could find her or talk to her. On Thursday
our ward mission leader, Alan, invited us to go visit her. We went and
her mom said that she didn´t want to hear from us, so we sat down and
started sharing a message with her mom. She came out in the middle and
we instantly became best friends! She is the sweetest girl! She
started to share her story with us about why she stopped going to
church and why she distanced herself from everyone. She told us she
didn´t know why she came out, she just felt like she should. That
night she walked to the Bishop´s house to have an interview, and the
YSA group was there getting ready to go to a camp in Uspallata. So she
went home to pack and left with them. Apparently the camp went super
well because 5 of the YSA kids that were inactive left camp, deciding
to go on missions! It was sweet! Magali is coming back to church and
wants to come out to appointments with us this week!

This week has been crazy, but we´re excited to start fresh in our
apartment, in our finding,  and with ourselves. That´s the great thing
about the Gospel. We can always start over!

I love you all sooooo much! I am glad everything is going well and I
hope that it continues! We are so blessed! Thanks for informing me
about the Superbowl and relating it to missionary work! ha! I love
getting your letters and hearing how you all are doing! Keep on
keeping the faith and being examples! And have fun with the Mag´s this
weekend!

Love love love!
Hermana McKenna Lawrence

Ps. The message that we shared at the Baptism of Jorge was the
Restoration! It brings the Spirit every time! :) Love you Uncle Larry
and Aunt Laurel! Oh story for you! The other day, I cut a picture of
the prophet out of the Liahona in the kid section and I turned it over
and Uncle Larry´s face was on it! So I turned the page and it was an
article that you wrote! About your dad :) I loved it so I cut it out
and put it in my journal! It was a fun surprise.

I love everyone!