May 2-May 8

This was a really cool week. We had a thing called La Capilla Abierta this week which is basically where we open the church up and send invitations to all of Santa Elena to come and see how it is. In the chapel, there are posters where the sister missionaries explain the Restoration, BOM, and the plan that Heavenly Father has for us. Afterwards, they go to the baptismal font, where two elders explain baptism and how this covenant will clean them from their sins with the proper authority and start them on the path of everlasting happiness. Afterwards, they can see what the relief society does for activities and the things they bake and the bags and clothes that they make by hand just for fun. We had about twenty missionaries doing this with us from other areas in the mission. It was really fun to see other missionaries, especially the ones in our zone. The last transfer, there was only one change in the zone. Our zone is made up of 12 missionaries, six from Santa Elena and six from Hernandarias. I was with Elder Cubas that morning, the new elder in our zone, from Peru and we were passing out invitations in one of the areas in Santa Elena together and it was a lot of fun. I´m learning to understand people better and the native missionaries are really helpful, because they know quite a bit of English and when I have a question they can help me. Anyways, la Capilla Abierta was really cool and was an awesome experience and we received a lot of references for people to teach.

Cool experience: We taught a guy named Exequiel this week and he is 22 years old and used to play professional soccer for one of the teams in Argentina, but got in a motorcycle crash about a year ago and forgot everything. He was in a coma and had to re-learn how to walk and talk and do everything. Now he is okay, but he still is recuperating with walking and things like that. He shared a really cool experience with us. He said that when he was in his coma, he went up to heaven and saw Christ and everything was completely white. When he saw Christ, he came to him and gave him a big hug that was really strong. The next thing that happened was that he opened his eyes and was back on earth. He says he doesn´t know why, but now, when he sees people that are sad or need help or something bad happens, he goes up to them and touches their heads and afterwards, they feel better for some reason. He said that he was going to do it to us, but he felt like he didn`t need to because we were already okay and that there was something different about us. I don´t know what that is, because he technically doesn´t have the priesthood, but he has a strong testimony that it was Christ who he saw during his coma.

This is what happened this week with me. I don´t have too much time, but I am super excited to skype next week! Thanks for all of the stories Dad haha! I read them to my companion and he laughed a lot. You guys are the bomb dig and I hope that the weather warms up and that you all can have a great week! 

Love, Denver