Easter

Hola:)

Well this has been quite an interesting week. This Easter has probably been the least Easter Easter I´ve ever had. They didn´t even mention it in church, nor did we sing a single Easter hymn. But my companion and I made up for that by talking about Easter in every single lesson we had and singing the Easter hymns for companionshiop study. 

It was, however, Semana Santa and so many people were out of town making it hard to have lessons. Quite a few of our investigators are undergoing many trials so please keep them in your thoughts and prayers. We have also had to drop quite a few investigators these past couple weeks. We are having a hard time finding people that are really interesting in learning and actually acting on the principles of the gospel. But we have the faith that we continue to focus on service and working with the members that we´ll be led to have success. 

We have been trying to work more with the members in order to find people to teach. We haven´t had a ton of success from street contacting. This week we had a really great experience while visiting the President of the Branch and his family. We talked about how we could help them share the gospel and they accepted the challenge to pray together as a family to find somebody to invite over to come have a Family Home Evening in their home. They also told us of a few different experiences they´ve had from sharing the gospel. At the end of the lesson they gave us a the address of a person that was interested in hearing the gospel that lived in another area. This was one of the best experiences I´ve ever had working with the members. I would also like to challenge all of you to invite a friends of family members over to have Family Home Evening with the missionaries. It is a great way to unite families in the missionary cause. 

I would like to share a thought that I learned from conference with all of you, especially because it was just Easter. As I listened to Elder Bednar´s talk on the Atonement an idea came to my mind, "Debo actuar de acuerdo con la expiación de Cristo." or "I should act according to (in accordance with) the atonement of Christ." This thought has led me to a lot of personal introspection and revelation. In all of our actions we need to be thinking about and applying to atonement of Jesus Christ. It is through him and through this sefless act that we can change and that we can become the people we desire, the people that God desires us to become. When we feel like we can´t do anymore, through the grace of the atonement, we can. When we feel like we are giving all we´ve got but wish to give more, it is through the power of the atonement that we can give more than what man can give alone. I have a strong testimony that Christ is our saviour and that He died so that through him we could live. Because of this grand sacrifice that he offered for me I should act and live my life using his atonement. 

Que tengan una buena semana.

Hermana Ariana Fuller

Conference has inspired me

Dear Mom!

First off, conference has inspired me. I´m really going to take these next 6 months to try to apply conference to my life. While listening to Elder Ballard´s talk, I recieved the impression to send home a weekly message on something I learned during my studies, particularly something from Preach My Gospel. In conference they said that the members should talk to the missionaries about what they are learning and also study Preach My Gospel themesleves. So if anyone has questions, please send them to me! As a missionary, I am here to help you all be member missionaries as well, even if I am far away in Spain. This week I did the activity in Chapter 11 of Preach My Gospel, Keep Commitments, under Promising Blessing. I took all the commitments of the first lesson, The Restauration of the Gospel, and wrote down the promised blessing we recieve for keeping this commitment. The first commitment in this lesson: Will you read the Book of Mormon? Blessings we recieve from keeping this commitment: We will draw nearer to God, Strengthen our testimony of Jesus Christ, Feel the spirit, Receive strength and conviction to keep the commandments, Find answer to our questions, Recieve a testimony that Joseph Smith was a prophet, Recieve a testimony that this is the true and only Church of Jesus Christ in it´s fullness, Learn the doctrine of the gospel, and We will know that Jesus is the Christ. Wow. There are so many blessings that come from just reading this book. (Not to mention the blessing that if we read it in another language we will have the power to learn that language). My testimony of the Book of Mormon and of Jesus Christ have been so strengthened during the course of my mission. I have a strong conviction that everyone everywhere needs to read this book, because when they do, it will change their lives. I invite all of you to invite someone this week to read the book of mormon. I know that if you pray with faith and have the real desire to do this, you will find someone who will accept your invitation. 

This week we have changed our working methods to focusing more on working with members and service. This week we are starting a Quit Smoking support group (we have two investigators that we are helping to quit smoking) and a weekly Bible Study Class. 

María - María is our adorable Spanish investigator that we are currently helping quit smoking. We make her a "Quit Smoking Kit" with a bunch of things like little candies, a new toothbrush, air refreshener, oranges, etc. When we gave it to her she was so touched that she started crying. Then we all started tearing up. For me it was nothing to make this little kit, but to her it meant the world. We never know what the service we offer really means to other people. We are also helping our Muslim friend (that took us to the Masque) last week, quit smoking!

This week we also had 6 investigators at church! The most I´ve ever had in my whole entire mission. One of them was our Chinese investigator Jie. She is absolutely adorable. We haven´t been able to teach her much because she is really busy with school and always studying. But since this week is Semana Santa she was able to come to church. She is also reading the book of mormón and she is loving everything. We are hoping to start teaching her more consistently when she ends school in June. 

All in all the work is going and I am doing great! Learning and growing a lot everyday. 

ps.When you´re in Hawaii... can you send me a coconut?? haha

LOVE YOU!!!! 

Hermana Ariana Fuller