GOODBYE FIORITO!! :(

Hey family! I´m writing ya´ll from LA PLATA now! We had some transfers this week and I guess that it was my time to go! Wow.. hard to say goodbye after 7 1/2 months in an area (and I´ll add that it was decently hard to pack it all up) and being so used to the life there! Yesterday was pretty tough saying goodbyes, but I´m SUPER happy for what I was able to do and so grateful for what I was taught there. I feel like Fiorito was the best thing that could have happened in my mission and that I left a better, more capable missionary. I´ve now been assigned to be a Zone Leader in Villa Elvira! :) haha que basura no? When Presidente Stapley called me, I just gave a little giggle and said okay, that I´d love the calling. I´m with a CAPO from Peru se llama Elder Mines. We got along great from the beginning and both have super high hopes and desires for what we want to do in the area. It has been a little bit beat up lately so the first priority will be to gain confidence and we already promised to work really hard to start showing a better example to the Zone. We had about a 2 hour train ride to our new area... I actually haven´t been in my area yet.. but I think it´s nice! It was so good to see more of Argentina and so how much empty space there was. We´re more in el campo I guess, but a good mix of city also. I´ll make sure to get some pictures and to actually arrive in my area- I think then I´ll be able to tell ya´ll a little bit more.

Alright just gotta let you all know that miracles happen!! This last week was one of those weeks where I just stood back and was open mouthed at what the Lord had done for us. I was talking to our Zone Leaders last week and they were pretty down because we hadn´t reached our goal of baptisms and they were wondering why. They were saying how much we need to show that we believe and can baptize. They asked us to do all we can to have a baptism and to get everything going so we can work harder next month. Elder Juarez and I were invited to baptize this last week, when looking at people who could, we had zero. On Monday though when we went to the temple we fasted that doors would open up and that we would be led to someone who was ready to be baptized. We had been working with a young kid named Bruno for a couple of weeks and felt like he could be the one. We made plans to help him gain a testimony and started the week. When we passed by Monday night, hope was low... he hadn´t been following through with commitments and just wasn´t showing very much interest in it. Tuesday: we had a little conversation with his mom who was really against the idea of the church through the whole process of teaching him! This is where the real miracle took place. We found her extremely kind and open to what we were saying and eventually was able to see how important this choice would be in Bruno´s life. In the end she gave consent to allow him to be baptized!!! :) Wednesday: we came super excited to teach and committed him to read and pray every night. (which he did and continues to do!) Thursday: we showed up at the house and found a different Bruno Cabezas!! I was so amazed at the change that he had had in his life- he just looked different! Then I knew that we had helped someone to come unto Christ and even more how tender the mercies of the Lord really are. Elder Juarez and I were just amazed at how much the Lord had blessed us and showed His love for the desires that we had! Friday, Saturday were just great days continued in our teaching. Sunday!! Sunday was a hard day, but an incredible day! I felt like there was a ton to manage so at some points I felt like my head was in the clouds. Between saying goodbye and enjoying the baptism of Bruno I was filled with a lot of different emotions. In the end, a lot of love was felt in the heart!

Elder Juarez, Bruno and Elder Jolley.

A couple new baptism presents.

Bruno's Baptism Day   •   Sunday, August 26th

Hey... time is super short and we´ve gotta go take care of some things before we get to work. I want you all to know that I´m so so happy, I´m thrilled to be a missionary and haven´t been more excited to work harder before in my mission. I´m learning and loving this special message. I also testify that God lives and answers according to our desires and humble prays. I know that He has a plan for each of us and that He helps us to achieve what is TRULY best for us. I thought that I had a plan for what I wanted to do in Fiorito, but when leaving I looked back and learned that our Father in Heaven did greater things and made a more faithful and convinced servant of Elder Jolley- for that I will praise and testify of His sacred name all my days! He lives and will manifest that to us. (Alma 12:10)

With all my love to my family!
Elder Jolley

A new found pancho for Elder Jolley

Dear Family!!

Hey! :) Hope that your week was good and that ya´ll keep paying your taxes!! Haha... not to shabby! I'm convinced on the whole government tax thing. :) How you guys have a few more trips this summer with school starting and all that! I can´t believe how fast time is going and what time we´re already in.. It is weird to come back every Monday and try and skim past all that has happened.

We had a good week in Fiorito and a fantastic day today! I´ll talk a little bit more about the temple. I´ll try and give a run down of the week. We got pretty wet this week and were stopped in the work because of it. When it rains, Argentina turns into a ghost town. We had a few great appointments that fell through from the rain so it was a bit of a bummer. It was a good time to evaluate how we plan and get more organized so that we never have to stop being successful :) We´ve heard that the La Tormenta "Santa Rosa" hits pretty hard in August. So when it rains it usually wants to stay for the whole month! Ha, our apartment has a little lake in the entry way from all the rain. We were able to work a little bit with a couple families, Walter y Silvia, Lorena, Santa y Maria and some menos activo familes. Our focus this week has been on helping our investigators get the the temple. They are all moving along pretty good, just trouble getting to church. Walter y Silvia had told us that they would come to church, so Sunday morning we left early to go and look for them, but turns out they couldn´t go, but luckily they sent with us their 3 kids!! a Being "parents" for the day was a little weird. I learned the parents appreciation for Primary and other Sunday School classes. We had to go in the bus with them from their house and when we finally got the church we got in, introduced them to the teacher, pushed them in the room and shut the door and didn´t see them again till sacrament meeting! :) How inspired is this church! ;) Nah... kidding, all is a huge exaggeration because the kids were so good. They are reading the Book of Mormon and the teachers told us after the meetings that they knew everything and were answering all the questions! Ha imagine that!

THE. TEMPLE. Wow!!! Seriously you can only imagine this place. We pulled up in the bus this morning and I was speechless. There was such a beauty and magnificance to the place that truly made my love grow even more for the temple. They estimated that there were about 8,000 people there today! We got there at 10 o´clock and got in about 2 in the afternoon, but worth every second! The inside is gorgeous and so peaceful! It has a blue and gold theme like the Argentine flag, with dark wood in the whole building. I was so grateful to be back in the temple! I know that it is the house of God and His spirit is there. Argentina is being so blessed by this event and is opening up doors to people that are prepared to return to this building. In the celestial room, I saw so many people just cry because their temple is constructed again and overwhelmed by the peace felt as they held close their families. What a blessing to have the temples of God on the Earth. Families truly can have a better vision of what this life is about and how we can live it better. I thought a lot about the different rooms of the temple all leading up to the experience in the Celestial Room. It truly gives an idea of what things will be like... not an idea that we get from reading, but that we can actually be there and feel it. Please go to the temple this week! :) I know that we´ll be able to feel our Heavenly Father there and He will lift the burdens of the world off our shoulders and let us enter His rest even if it´s just a second and we can go out feeling more capable to be a disciple of His son Jesus Christ. They live and love us!

With all my love to you and my thanks for our eternal relations!
Have a great week
Elder Jolley

Pictures from the Beunos Aires Argentina Temple~

Familia!

Hey! Wow thanks so much for all your letters. I´m with a few Elders right now and we were all just talking about how these days are just an extension of Christmas! :) ...but then Christmas would be something else too because we all getta talk... It all works out so that it is good! First off another sweet shout out out to my boy Skyler! Hehe... these last 2 weeks have been so good. He completed the "Crimson Chin" this week!!

Well what a week it has been. I´ll start off by sharing something that I don´t know if I mentioned last week or not but came to have a strong testimony of Ether 12:6! It was a pretty tough week for us in Fiorito last week. Our Zone Leader was talking to me and helping get us excited and have passion for the work that we do. He shared this scripture with us. Elder Juarez and I this last week have really worked hard to "receive our testimonies" and the Lord has truly come through for us and I can´t explain how much love I have felt this week and how much His hand is involved in our work!! We worked hard and really worked to get the standards. I learned and important truth, that preparation is a key to our success! We have been working hard in the morning hours to improve our teaching abilities and to be more unified as a companionship and in return we´ve been able to feel a greater cantidad of the spirit in our lessons. Personally I´ve been able to have a greater focus on those that we teach and it´s been a real testimony to me that we can speak with "power and authority" so that these great people begin to strengthen their faith in Christ.

This week we were blessed to find 7 people who accepted the invitation to be baptized!! Wahoo! :) A couple of these people found were a huge blessing for us that came when I was on inter-cambios with one of our Zone Leaders (the photo: Elder Orellana de Chili). Doing inter-cambios with him was such a blessing for me and also to help us evaluate some things that we can be doing better. I´ll talk about it a little later though. Anyway the first is a great family that we found named Lorena, Santa y Maria. (combine those names and it´s the name of that one boat. Ha) They are a great family and we´re barely starting to get to know them so we´ll have more information for ya later. Also Elder Juarez and I found another family a little while ago but decided to pass by again on Saturday. Come to find out they had been waiting for us to make contact again and so from that we were very excited. They called all the family to listen and we had a great chat. They are SUPER CATHOLICS! They are "gonna stay catholic, die catholic and nothing is gonna get in the way of that!" That was at the first of the lesson. The spirit was there so strong as we got to know them and truly listened and sought to be a help. Something that I´ve always loved that I heard a while ago is that, as all of us are representatives of Christ, when it comes our time to share our testimonies or to teach His doctrine it is most affective when we teach Salvation and not just principles. If we go about it in this approach the Spirit helps us to see what it is that they are looking for and what it is that they need to do. We talked about Eternal Happiness and what it is that we must to in order to qualify for this great blessing. The last person we taught is José. He is a brother of a menos activo member. We are trying to work with both of them right now but felt really strongly to invite him to be baptized. In the beginning of the lesson with José he started asking a lot of great questions, Why are you guys in this church? What has this church done for you? -Really very interested in CHANGE. He has had a few struggles in his life that I think he is ready to be done with. All were lessons extremely guided by the spirit. I have come to realize how dependent we are, and how merciful the spirit is as a missionary! So with all of them we came to the invitation to church.. All accepted.. None came! UGH.. Que bajón- enserio la fiaca aca me mata! Pero segimos adelante y adjustamos nuestros planes para el domingo q viene. :) Por favor oren para que estas personas tengan el deseo a asistir e ir a la capilla!

Time is flying! To wrap up I´ll share a little bit about the inter-cambio that we had. I was really excited to go with Elder Orellana- He´s a capo and has a reputation of being a great teacher, something that I want to become as well. So I was all ears for him. We had a good time and ended up walking a lot, not many people were home. We took care of a few things and then headed home for the night. Comp study in the morning was GREAT! As district leader I´ve been slacking a little on inter-cambios in my district but from this came to see the need to have them. He was pretty direct with me when sharing, "Elder Jolley, you need to stop thinking so much! You seem lost in thought most of the time and now more than ever you need to be out of your mind." Boom.. really a blessing to have heard that. He continued to share with me Mosiah 4:9

9 Believe in God; believe that he is, and that he created all things, both in heaven and in earth; believe that he has all wisdom, and all power, both in heaven and in earth; believe that man doth not comprehend all the things which the Lord can comprehend.

Elder Orellana and Elder Jolley

When all is said and done this is what our lives come down to, this is the solution of our trials and how we come to reach our full potential! I was so grateful to refocus my thoughts on a loving Heavenly Father, i spent a while thinking about the love that Mom and Dad have for us as kids and then just imagining the love of a God. He is so tender in His reproof and so genuine in His support. I felt like I should fast the next day and was truly humbled as the trials and weaknesses that I had been facing disappeared! I am thankful and bear testimony of a loving Father in Heaven and of the power of fasting. We will grow closer to Him and He will unfold His matchless power in our lives. I love Him and know that He loves each and every one of us! I testify of the Savior and how far He is willing to go to help us realize what God "comprehends" for us- what we are meant to be.

Todo mi amor
Elder Jolley

¡Querida Familia!

Estoy tan feliz que ustedes pudieran tener una vacación tan lindo en Mexico! Tambien que pudieron disfrutar en la cultura Latina... es hermosa no? Tengo indecición si voy a volver a la cultura Americana. Gracias tanto por compartir su semana conmigo, agradecido que ustedes están en casa. Tequila me suena... haha Elder Juarez le gustó su descripción de Mexico. Me miró y dijo... "eh.. es cierto que te puedo decir?"  haha. Nosotros esta semana tuvimos muchas experiencas muy beneficiosas tanto por nosotros como Fiorito. HAHA me reí tanto despues de haber visto Escolíto!! Che flacito no te quemes, haha siempre hagas así. :)

What a week that it´s been for us! We´ve worked hard and even better we´ve been shown A LOT of weaknesses in ourselves and the area that right now we have the blessing to "rise to the occasion" and be able to fix! It´s been a little bit colder this week and we´ve had some rain, but for the most part we were able to, everyday, be out in the field serving the Lord. Ha I´ll share an experience with ya´ll that ugoes pretty good with your vacation that ya had! I don´t know if you saw down there, but Mexicans LOVE their chilies.. We were at the house of Juan Garnica (our convert) and were sharing a great lesson with them about the temple. Well his wife is the owner of a vegetable store... Verdulería? Elder Juarez asked her if they had anything spicy! Haha she brought out these HUGE chilies and he got a huge smile on his face and ended up buying about 30 of them. Entonces in our week we´ve been eating a lot of chili. Now I´ll do a little comparison for ya. Jalepiños... for babies. Locotos... for people without a lot of common sense. These BURN. When we were with Juan and the family, Elder Juarez downed one and started crying (he grew up with the stuff though) had a little prideful moment... I ate a lot of hot sauce packets at Taco Bell in my day, what´s a Locoto gonna do? I ate a little peace and chou.. me fuí. I was red, my lips were on fire and my stomach was all the above. Family: Taco Bell isn´t anything to base yourself off of! I ended up going back to the Pinch and just sitting down to try and get the burn off! It was a funny experience that we had together! Today as a Zone we all ate a Chili (picture) haha we had Elders throwing up and others just sitting down with fire coming outta their mouths! My lips and arms were tingling for like 20 minutes. Crazy crazy chili!

Well we also did spiritual things. This week we´ve been super focused on getting things ready and prepared for our temple trip THIS SATURDAY!! So excited to enter the temple again. A few Elders have gone already and say that it is the most beautiful thing they´ve seen. I´ll tell you all about it in the week to come! :) We´ve had to do a lot of the organizing, right now our Rama is passing through a huge trial! The members aren´t responding to their responsibilities and aren´t willing to communicate with each other.. It creates a tough situation for the Church to grow and for us as members to receive the blessing that we need. We´ve had to pass by and calm several members down and as well try to keep ourselves calm with A LOT of love in our work. I´ve seen a huge theme this week, Love is key in what we do. We had our 2nd SUPER SATURDAY this week :) We had a theme of Juegos Olimpicos and it turned out really really well. Members were able to bring investigators and we also, as a Rama, went and delivered flyers to every house in Fiorito. It was a HUGE success for us! :) but during our activity we had a couple struggles with the participants getting "animated" about the games and I had a super humbling experience as I fought off getting frustrated. There were times when I wanted to throw in the towel, "why in the world would we go to this much trouble when they're just fighting against us", that type of feeling. I gave myself a couple minutes to think about "what Jesus would do" and realized how many times we as people fight against Christ. So many times things are so clear, but we complicate the work of our Father in Heaven. Again a special learning experience of the Atonement. Never once would our Savior have thought, "why in the world am I going through so much trouble when all you do is fight against what I´m trying do?" I was very grateful in the end and grateful for this lesson that I was taught. Our Savior is so merciful and His love is never-ending! :) I know that we must love what we do and who we serve.

Mario and Miriam are doing great.. we keep crossing paths and haven´t been able to meet and have a good lesson in awhile, but we´ve talked and kept communication with them. It´s good, but better to talk! Ha. We´ve been blessed with several great references from members. One is a CAPO! His name is Fabian and has 22 years. He is a Remis driver (a taxi basically). We´ve met with him a couple times and are working to be able to talk with him more, his schedule is super complicated, but the other night we snuck (?) in and found him and his family working on building an extra part on their house. We dropped everything and helped em out for a while, it was a great service project that we were blessed and definitely guided to have. After we finished they were very grateful and let us talk a little bit. Their family is super! We shared with them about the Book of Mormon and it was a great lesson, they committed to read the book and we really felt like it was a heart felt commitment. I saw the power of service in opening the hearts of the people. Really we are able to share the love of Christ in a special way when we give all and a little bit more to help those around us.

Last night we found algunos antiguos investigadores. Walter y Silvia and their 4 chicos. We had talked with them a few months ago and they asked for time to think. Well with the temple open house and all the blessing we are seeing with this event we took them a special invitation and ended up teaching them about eternal families and what it is that Christ has asked us to do in order to receive this blessing. The spirit was SO strong and we really felt their interest and their need for what we were sharing. We started things back up with this family and are praying that they will come with us to the open house this Saturday! (feel free to join in :) ) They need to go. I know that if they do we will see some baptisms.

This week for us and for the District has been pretty... challenging. Lots of pruebas that we are facing. I´ve been fasting and praying to know how to be a better example and to help the other missionaries reach their full potential as missionaries. Our Zone Leader shared with me something that I loved. He referred to Ether 12:6. No testimony is received until after the trial of our faith. We have been tried and it has been a true battle for us. He explained that we must trust in this promise. He said, "Elder you have passed through a trial and now it is time for your success." What a great and motivating invitation. I´ve been thinking a lot about Magnifying my calling and the importance of going and doing... not waiting for a step system to say what we need to do- only do it! The faith that we have takes us to new heights and levels of what our Heavenly Father wants for us. I was given a new excitement and am working hard to magnify my calling. :) I invite all of us to do the same. Trust that trials will come, but don´t have to stay because the time must come that our testimonies will grow. It depends on us and our faith in the Savior as to when we give all we have to grow in testimony!

I love you all and am thankful for your example and your fun experience that put a smile on my face! :)

Con mucho amor

Elder Jolley

 

The Elders enjoying their Locotos

(Letter from July 30th)

Dear Family...

A mission is to learn, I have learned to watch my phrases such as "I´m glad to be here" because I find out that that means a sweet trip to Cancun!! Haha no I´m super surprised, but super happy for you guys to be able to take get away as a family and enjoy some sun en Cancun! :) My companion got a sweet smile on his face when I told him and in English told me, "MY HOME!!" haha I´ve been teaching him sweet phrases this week and his accent is getting better! A quick funny: This week we had to buy some treats for an activity that we had, I suggested lazily that we buy crackers or something like that... Elder Juarez looked at me and told me that "the children don´t want crackers they want caaandy!" haha we´re getting along super good and getting a lot of work done as well (I´ll put that in there to avoid the idea that we´re just playing with accents here). I´ll be looking forward to hearing about all the fun that you all are having! :)

This week passed by quick and before ya know it we´ll be starting the Temple Dedication!! We´ve been focused on families this week and working on organizing ourselves in such a way that we can use this event as the greatest missionary tool! We are feeling a spirit that is different throughout Argentina as the Lord continues to prepare this people for this sacred blessing of a dedicated Temple to our Father in Heaven! We have been anxiously passing our flyers to everyone that we can see and have been able to aprovechar many opportunities in teaching the people more about the temple! Earlier in the week we passed by a house and met with a lady name Patricia. We put ourselves to talk with her for a little bit and found out that her dad was really sick and wasn´t expected to live very long. We testified of the power of the Resurrection through our Savior Jesus Christ and promised her of the peace that is found in the temples. Unfortunately she wasn´t able to meet with us that day. Yesterday we passed by to see if she and her husband had had time to read and make plans to go one of the days, we found the husband Abel. Directly he told us that they had no desire to go! Come to find out they had lost all confidence in religion because of several things that happened in the past. We talked to him for a minute and was touched by the way he explained the times when he had felt Gods love in his life and how much he missed that "peace that you just can´t explain." We promised him that by stepping one foot inside the Temple he would be filled with that peace! I am forever grateful to be a missionary- thinking back on that moment I was grateful to that we were blessed to promise such a thing to a man that needed our Heavenly Fathers love so badly. I am beyond excited for the temple... I miss it so much! I´m grateful for the promise in D&C 109 that we have though that sets this place apart and gives us the peace even when we are apart from it.

12 That thy glory may rest down upon thy people, and upon this thy house, which we now dedicate to thee, that it may be sanctified and consecrated to be holy, and that thy holy presence may be continually in this house;

13 And that all people who shall enter upon the threshold of the Lord’s house may feel thy power, and feel constrained to acknowledge that thou hast sanctified it, and that it is thy house, a place of thy holiness.

22 And we ask thee, Holy Father, that thy servants may go forth from this house armed with thy power, and that thy name may be upon them, and thy glory be round about them, and thine angels have charge over them;

23 And from this place they may bear exceedingly great and glorious tidings, in truth, unto the ends of the earth, that they may know that this is thy work, and that thou hast put forth thy hand, to fulfill that which thou hast spoken by the mouths of the prophets, concerning the last days.

I think I´ve told you guys about Mario and Miriam before? Maybe..? Anyway quick recap. they are a sweet family that we found that are soo cool! We´ve been talking to them weekly for about a month. They work like crazy so it´s been hard to meet with them en seguida but had a great lesson with Miriam and their kids this week (they have 3 girls, Mario was working). We talked about the temple and eternal families! Something that really touched them. Miriam was so interested and you could tell it was something that she wanted. Mario I guess is a little bit duro so it´s a big obstacle for them in getting married- He thinks it´s the same just being together. We have been wanting to help Miriam gain a testimony and be able to help Mario obtain his. We explained that we´re able to know if these things are true and if they are possible in our lives through prayer! In the end we asked her to pray, she wasn´t to much of a fan of the idea. But we promised her that it was important. She gave a sincere and humble prayer and WOW! The spirit was there soo strong. I couldn´t not saying anything so I blurted out.. "Wow, do you feel that?!" haha.. rookie. They answered yes and we explained that that is our Heavenly Father and that means He loves us. Such a cool experience with them!! We´re excited to help them get to the temple! :)

We have been working with the ward closely this week for our Ward Conference that we had! Turned out great and there was a special spirit that was felt yesterday. Something that Elder Juarez and I thought of this last week that we are starting up is a weekly activity called... ¡¡SUPER SATURDAY´S!! (Catchy eh?.. ;) ) We want to do more for our ward, we really want them to have a love for each other and a love for this Gospel. It is a fantastic thing that we have in our lives and it should be had with a SUPER huge smile on our faces! So every Saturday we´ll be planning a little activity where we do some fun family games and eat!! We´re super animados for what we´re going to achieve from this activity! Right now it is a Rama but we have in mind... Barrio!! We felt strongly that this will be something tha will increase the missionary work that Fiorito will have in the future. So the first week was a little bit of a bummer... We had 7 people and half were investigators! BUT not to worry we´re happy and we´ll getting the members going down here! We talked for a while and well.. it was a good first activity. :)

District Leader stuff is sweet! District meetings are not! Haha I taught last week for the first time and I´m grateful that the Elders in our District are such studs! They all nodded their heads and really held in there! haha no but really so far it has been one of the greatest blessings of my mission. To turn my thoughts to others and to be able work hard to be an example! I LOVE the Elders in our District! We´re working hard in our areas and are trying our best to be better missionaries each day! They are great examples to me and I´m excited to continue to work with them. Thank heaven but it hasn´t been cold here at all! We´ve been enjoying great temperatures all month and are usually walking around without jackets all day! What a blessing!

Well family, I love ya all ta death! I´m so grateful for you. I am grateful for my Father in Heaven and I give testimony that He lives. That He is patient and He is our best teacher. I know that the Book of Mormon gives us direction in our lives and I know my Savior cares for us and that His sweet spirit is our greatest gift. I hope this week we all can strive to find that peace that puts a smile on our face! :)

All my love, Elder Jolley

Elder Jolley with his new trainee, Elder Juarez

and President and Sister Stapley

Elder Juarez and I after hunting a HUGE fly with sauce pans.. we got him! :)

SUPER SATURDAY... #1