October 26, 2015

Hello my sweet family! 

Well what a marvelous week it has been!  I´m going to start this week´s letter with just a couple of scriptures!  First of all, we´ll be reading in Moroni 8:17.  It goes like this...

17  And I am filled with charity, which is everlasting love; wherefore, all children are alike  unto  me;  wherefore,  I love little  children  with  a  perfect  love;  and  they are all  alike  and partakers  of  salvation. 

Here, Jesus Christ is specifically talking about little children.  I LOVE this scripture.  How wonderful is it to know Christ has a perfect love for all the little children in the world (especially Uruguayan children).  And I always thought this scripture was only meant for little children until I came across Doctrine and Covenants 78:17.

17 Verily, verily, I say unto you, ye are little children, and ye have not as yet understood howgreat  blessings  the Father  hath  in  his  own  hands  and  prepared  for  you; 

It turns out we are all little children!  So what does that mean???  That Christ loves you with a perfect love, that He is filled with charity for YOU, that you and everyone else in the world are equal before His eyes!  How great it is that we are all little children!

So this week, I would just love to share a couple of cute stories about some kiddos here in Uruguay.

On Tuesday afternoon, for the first time, we visited Maria Elena (the less-active member the Lord helped us find a couple of weeks ago)!!!  Wow it was so fun because her daughter-in-law and her cute son, Facundo (who´s nine or ten) were also there.  We read the story in the Book of Mormon when Nephi gets pumped up to go back to Jerusalem to get the plates.  We focused in on 1 Nephi 3:7 and the importance of OBEDIENCE.  Facundo loved reading in the Book of Mormon, and Hermana Maria Elena was really happy because she said Facundo is really shy in school and never wants to read.  The Book of Mormon brings miracles!!!

On Friday night, Hermana Marsh and I had a cute Noche de Hogar with the Fernandez family!!!  Hermano Fernandez is our ward mission leader and Hermana Fernandez is Primary president!  Our ward has a temple trip coming up in November, and the Fernandez family members are going to get sealed!  So we had a temple-themed Noche de Hogar.  Only one of the Fernandez kiddos was present in the Noche de Hogar...Maximo.  He is six years old and so cute!  We were taking turns reading from a Liahona article about the temple, and Maximo mentioned he wanted to take a turn reading.  His mom looked surprised and said, "Are you sure?  You don´t know how to read yet."  But I guess Maximo knows how to read a little bit because he began to slowly sound out all the words.  And oh my goodness, hearing a six-year-old Uruguayan start to read is so adorable.  He´s really got rolling his "r´s" down (at times when a word had an r, he would roll it for like five seconds or so), and his parents were just so proud of him!

On Saturday night, Hermana Marsh and I visited Sofia and Lucia (they got baptized just a couple of weeks ago).  Lucia answered the door and welcomed us into their home.  Sofia was taking a bath, so we had a little bit of waiting time before we had the lesson.  We told Lucia that while we were waiting, SHE could be the missionary and teach us her favorite scripture in the Book of Mormon.  Her face lit up and she immediately knew what she wanted to share...2 Nephi 31:10!  She then explained the only way we can truly follow Jesus Christ is through the commandments.  What a grand missionary she will be!

10  And he said unto the children of men:  Follow  thou me. Wherefore, my beloved brethren, can we follow Jesus save we shall be willing to keep the commandments of the Father? 

A couple of other little highlights from this week:  Hermana Marsh is a rock star and is basically fluent in Spanish already!  I really love her and am so grateful Heavenly Father put us together at BYU and HERE in Uruguay!  We have some progressing investigators!  Hermana Noelia came to church for the first time yesterday!  And Hermana Gabriela (a contact who we met when we were asking for help to find an address) is praying every day and reading the Book of Mormon.  And our ward is AWESOME.  And woops, I forgot to tell dad, but our ward is the 19 de Abril ward (his birthday)!  Our bishop (Obispo Espindola) is so willing to work and the leaders and members are doing their best to bring others unto Christ.  Life is good, so good!

Love you so so so much!

Hermana Dixon