¡¡Feliz Año Nuevo!!

Wow 2013.. that came quick! I´m also very surprised that we´re already a week from the call that we had. I have to thank you guys so much for all the love that I felt, the call really was so great for me! It´s incredible that even though it has been a while since we´ve talked we´re able to keep the same random humor and the same love for one another! Very sorry for the English. Elder Villalba made a comment to me after, something to the effect of "che, you speak worse than I do!" Haha I thought it was funny that he caught Ryan's comment about being Trunky! Ha. He sends you all muchos Saludos. Recién today I got the package from Navidad! :) Thank you so much!! The tie is joya! I love it and all the letters and WOW! The pictures are incredible! Thank you.

This week we were able to get a lot done!! Tons for the time that we were given. We were able to visit several of our super Investigators! Right now we´re teaching a part member family, the Flia. Cejas. The mom is a member and the husband and several of their kids are not members. They were a reference from our Stake President that he has given to us like 3 times.. We tried to work with this family when I first got here, but they didn´t want to hear anything, so when we heard from him this time I was a little hesitant, but I have gained a great testimony that the Lord is constantly preparing His children. About 2 months ago they were finishing up some family trials so it would have been hard for them to see the importance of the Gospel. Right now though they keep telling us, "Right now we feel like we need this in our lives and the more we listen to you guys the more our trials are resolved." Roberto especially is so aware of the spirit. We´ve been inviting them to read the Book of Mormon- he isn´t a man of many words but he knows how he feels. He explains to us so enthusiastically that EVERY time he reads the Book of Mormon he is filled with peace and feels like a huge burden is lifted from his life. They are an incredible family. This week we´ll be doing a lot more to involve the kids and help the family to be more involved in the Gospel.

Our other investigator is Gabriel Yoma. He is a glass-worker. He´s got long hair and I think he was a hippy cause he works the peace sign! Ha. He´s a special friend of ours! He was a reference from our bishop and has been so glad to accept us and the best part of Gabriel is that he listens to us! But more than just listens, he ponders on every word that we say. He has been going through a hard time.. he´s in "a war of words" between us and the other church he goes to. The other day we were with him, a lady passed by his house and told him that we were of the devil... Merry Christmas to her! We were a little worried for him, didn´t want him to be stressed or confused so we decided to just chat with him, try and be in his shoes for a minute and we were able to be led by the spirit in a way that I´ve never experienced before. We knew how to open his heart and how sweet to be able to provide the Gospel of Jesus Chirst in the hearts of these people. I love to be a missionary!! :) Very thankfully I´m going to be able to continue to see the work continue in Villa Elvira!! :)

Transfers came and I´ll be staying with Elder Villalba- this also means that automatically I´ll be staying another transfer after this one. (repeat of Fiorito.) I´m very thankful for the blessing that the Lord has given me. I remember thinking that Fiorito was the hardest thing that I¨d been through, and like Pres. Eyring says, the trials that seem hard to us right now will seem very small compared to the things that the Lord will give us to capacitate (?) us for our future! Come what may, if our foundation of Christ is firm, supported on the solid principles of His Gospel we will become sanctified by Him and be able to reach our potential. I´m not ready to say "Give me, Lord, that mountain to climb" but I´m ready to follow Him and be obedient to His counsels! :) I look forward to a successful time here in Villa Elvira! 

Holidays here in Argentina, the end of the year mainly, we get to be with the members for most of the time. I think I mentioned in the call that we spent our Christmas with a great family. The Flia. Marazita nos invitó a un Asado de Pollo que estuvo riquísimo! Before I leave here I´m learning how to do Asado so that we can enjoy when I get home. It is something very common in Argentina to do, Asado with ALL the family. The next day our next door neighbors, the family Gatica, invited us to do an Asado also and tonight for Año Nuevo, we´re going to a huge "family reunion" again with the family Gatica again with the Asado. Asado = MEAT! :) It is just a huge BBQ with all the Cow that you could ask for! I´m trying not to loose the tradition of eating this holiday season!

I love you all and wish you the best of this New Year! :) I hope that we will all begin this year by coming unto the Savior. I know with all surety that if we are humble and recognize our need for Jesus Christ everyday of our lives we will be inspired to know how to follow Him and will receive the fulness of His blessing! -Mosiah 4:5-8 Con mucho amor familia!

Elder Jolley

Christmas with the family Gatica

 Elders heading to the Mission home in Train.

 Elder Alvarado, Elder Jolley and Elder Lewis - family tree!

 Elder Villalba and I in our common clothes waiting for the other Asado.

With the flia Marazita working on the Asado

2013 ye haw!

FELIZ NAVIDAD!!

This will be the last time that I write you guys before WE TALK!! Wahoo! Time is still something that I don´t like considering because it flies! Si, I had heard about my new release date.. not happy!! But what are ya gonna do? Cutting the mission a little shorter is a hard thought to process when I had been hoping to be here and with the people even for just a couple weeks longer. I am focused and enthusiastic about my time serving here and it´s hard to think of things differently! I´m very excited about the things that are happening right now in the mission! All the missionaries are really looking forward to these next couple weeks. Presidente Stapley has really been inspired to set up "a process of santification" that we have started during the holiday season. Right now we really want everyone to be able to have the "vision" of what we can accomplish as missionaries and to be able to have a strong strong personal desire to listen and follow the spirit in our lives! The best Christmas present that we received this last week was the news that on January 7th La Misión Buenos Aires Sur will be going to the Temple!! :) Presidente has organized a special endowment session for all the missionaries! I´m thrilled.. not sure how else to explain it!! There couldn´t be a better place to go to receive instruction and receive "power from on high!" It has been awhile since I´ve been to the Temple so I´ve kinda got cositas in my tummy to get back there! Ha. There is a super great spirit right now in the mission!

As for this last week, GENIAL! :) Villa Elvira finally has started to explode with new possibilities and success that I haven´t seen!! We had una semana re buena aquí. It was kinda complicada during the week but turned out fantastic!! This week I had a few great experiences with intercambios that we did. This week we ended up doing 3!! We did one with our District Leader, Elder Hogenson.. from Canada! Cool, eh? We enjoyed talking about Mr. Big bars and Hockey! Ha I thought he´d know something about Strange Brew but no luck. We had a great time together! He works hard and we had a great time learning from each other. One experience I loved with Elder Hogenson was in a contact that we didn´t expect. We were going to visit a member who wasn´t there in the end but next door a man salió de su casa and asked us to come inside and share something with him! We entered in and shared about the power of prayer! Daniel se llama hadn´t had communication with his family for a long time and so being able to express himself to his Heavenly Father I think helped him out a lot!

On Thursday Elder Villalba and I received a call from our Assistants who were down in La Plata and wanted to do an intercambio with us. It ended up being such a great experience! Elder Villalba and I have been doing everything how we need to but what we lacked was the "fire-cito" that they brought with them. I learned more than anything with Elder Reid that in our lives, when we know something is right and we feel the desire to help others, we gotta go for it and the spirit will help us and will show us miracles. That day we were able to invite 3 people to be baptized and 3 people accepted the invitation! :) I´ve been praying a lot the past few weeks to be able to find people who would be willing to accept this invitation and this week truly was a miracle and an answer to that prayer! In the end of the week we found 5 incredible people who are now listening to us and more and more things are opening up! To be honest I have no clue what changed exactly?? We changed the way we plan and started doing things junto with our ward and from there I know that the Lord put in His part. It was a great change that we saw!

The last intercambio that we were able to do was with the Elders that share our apartment. We decided to just do it for the afternoon and turned out to be a great success! I went with an Elder Williams and we were able to have a couple really great experiences. We found 2 families that were soo accepting of us and from what I have heard they are capos!! Also I was so grateful to learn from Elder Williams. He and his companion have gone through some rough times and were a little discouraged. While we walked we got talking about the power of our calling and of the covenants that we´ve be able to make in our lives. I really felt the spirit as we sat there talking for a minute. Before we got to finish, we entered into a house of a menos activo and got talking with her. She had been through some hard times and really didn´t have much of a testimony anymore. Again we started to talk about prayer and in the lesson Elder Williams shared a powerful testimony of how he came to love prayer in his life. WOW!! There was such power and authority in his testimony.. it put esa hermana in tears!! She quietly thought for a minute and said that she would pray that night (when at the beginning of the lesson she showed zero interest!) I was so grateful for that spiritual experience, realizing how special it is to realize what we are capable of- when we know who we are and what we´ve been given in our lives!

The spirit really has been such a blessing in my life this week. I´ve been a witness of his power and I´ve been touched by his peace on many occasions. What an incredible blessing that we have WHEN we know how to live worthy of His companionship and understand what the spirit can do for us! I loved a scripture in Jarom 1:4 (can´t download it.. if you will that´d be great mom!) Only when I decide to listen and when I decide to exercise faith can I be in perfect communion with our Father in Heaven!

 Jarom 1:4
And there are many among us who have many revelations, for they are not all stiffnecked. And as many as are not stiffnecked and have faith, have communion with the Holy Spirit, which maketh manifest unto the children of men, according to their faith.

I love you guys tons and can´t wait till next week! :) Hope that you all have a great week!

Mucho Love!
Elder Jolley

Howdy!!

Wow.. Una semana ya pasó?? How weird the time that flies by. This week has seriously been so short! One of my goals lately has been to use my time wisely! In the mornings I´m trying to get some journal writing in.. exercise (la pansa lo mandaba) and being on time for studies. It has been a struggle to get everything coordinated but I´ve seen great blessings as I do things as they should be done and in the time frame that they should be done! It has helped me to be more effective and surely has helped me to realize how focused I can be! As Diciembre continues to fly by and as we get busy in our work I´ve been taught that every second has to be taken care of preciously! I have a ton of time left on my mission and what I´m doing is part of a great work, I intend to use every minute of it.

This week we had a great meeting with President Stapley and he helped the Zone Leaders in the mission understand a little bit as to what he wants to happen and what he knows is important for us to do- He has really been inspired by our Heavenly Father to have a fantastic Vision of what we can achieve and who we can be as missionaries. For the work to keep going and keep strong, working with the members of our ward is very important and Elder Villalba and I have the great blessing to work side by side with the Stake Presidency! What a great opportunity that it has been for me!! I´ve been learning and listening a lot to experiences that they have had and what they do to be able to help others progress in the Gospel. I feel greatly tutored as I am given new leadership opportunities! I´ve been trying to be more obedient to the things that we´re recommended to do. Sometimes it´s easy to be prideful and think that, "No, I have a better way!" and not follow exactly what we´re told to do. Really the way has been given to us - and it´s easy if we believe that our Leaders are men called of God! So we got to work and changed and were obedient to what President Stapley knows is the right way. We ended the week with 6 church meetings with different groups of ward and stake leaders. We were asked to come prepared to help the leaders know what the missionaries need to do and how to do it! It was a complicated week for our area but a very productive week in getting everyone on the same page! We´re strugglin right now in our area a little bit. We´ve been out trying to find those who are interested but sometimes they´re difficult to find. For that reason we´re really excited and really confident about the work that we´re going to be doing with the ward, the best way to do missionary work is when we teach and the members are converted to sharing their testimonies with their friends! We´re doing good though and keep moving forward with faith! Thank Heaven for that wonderful principle that we have in our lives! Moroni 7:33 is one of the greatest scriptures!

I love ya´ll very much and am excited for the time that we are entering into.. Christmas time is such a great time to renew promises and devotion to our Savior for the maravilloso don that He gave to us, freedom from our burdens and a return to be with our Father in Heaven again! This Christmas I want to give more to Christ and show Him my gratitude by using His Atonement as my motivation in hard times! I can´t wait to talk with ya´ll and hope you have a great week!

Mucho love!
Elder Jolley

Elder Jolley and Elder Villalba

Ah my family!! :)

What a relief to be able to sit back and hear from you all, thank you so very much for all that you share and for the spirit that you bring into my life. I have been thinking a lot this week about families and thought a lot about what Elder Packer said, "The ultimate end to the Gospel of Jesus Christ is to see a family happily united and sealed in the everlasting covenant." When I think of this I am grateful for the many memories that I have of home! :) I hope that I never loose sight of what the Gospel has done for me. This week has been fantastic, we´ve had several days of being with church authorities and that comes with a lot of new things to learn and a great new spirit to help us reach our potential. We were able to meet with Elder De Giovanni, Elder Ceballos, and a couple other area 70. It has been a fantastic week!! I am realizing again how much I love being a missionary and how much I don´t want to stop this work. It has been such a rewarding experience for me and to help me understand what is it that I need to work for in my life in order to be happy! I had a great experience today reading back through my journal. Hermana De Giovanni in our meeting that we had on Thursday shared with us the many times that we are going to down or discouraged or when we just need a spiritual boost, that we should always "return to our tree of life!" In 1 Nefi 8 Lehi describes how precious and how unexplainably delicious the fruit that he partook of was and how it literally was able to fill him with joy. Así es when we have the Church in our lives we can literally think back to experiences where we have felt like Lehi and "return" to that happiness that we desire. Last Sunday I wrote in my journal that I just felt in a rut.. not really knowing what Heavenly Father had next for me. As I continued to read the following days i noticed that each day the Lord had done something to help me find my way back to His love! In the end I was able to learn a great great lesson, that was needed, to seek His will over mine! When we live a Christ-Centered life, we seek to know what He knows, love as He loves, and we will find that more and more we will be following in His footsteps.

20 Wherefore, ye must press forward with a steadfastness in Christ, having a perfect brightness of hope, and a love of God and of all men. Wherefore, if ye shall press forward, feasting upon the word of Christ, and endure to the end, behold, thus saith the Father: Ye shall have eternal life.

I am beyond grateful for all that we are given from our loving Savior! Although it doesn´t seem anything like Christmas, I trust the calendar. It will be a great gift that we can give to Him this year to comprehend in each of our lives how we can seek His will and then in love follow the way that He marks.

Right now Elder Villalba and I are being greatly blessed to be able to find new investigators in Villa Elvira!! Surely (leave out the slowly) we are finding new people who we are praying hard will continue to progress. Oh we had a super great lesson with Javier this week! We went with an Hermano in our ward and were able to help Javier understand the importance of reading, praying, and attending church. Javier has been through some pretty rough situations lately and to help him focus on 3 things that would help him to get closer to God in his life I believe really helped him! It was great too being with Elder Villalba, I am very grateful for the example that he sets for me, with an inspired question we were able to not just teach "lesson" but we were really able to teach Javier so that those things would be meaningful to him! Unfortunately all our investigators bailed on us Domingo in the morning so we felt a little bit alone in the reunion.

Super sorry but we´re late on time today and it´s time to get to the work! I love you all and thanks for the updates that I get! :)

Have a great week and we´ll talk with ya soon!

Elder Jolley

Hola!! Buenos Días!

Happy Thanksgiving!! Wow... that came and went really quick! It has been another super great week in Villa Elvira and super entertaining with Elder Villalba. He´s such a funny hick! He´s from Entre Ríos y is a total worker... don't know how to say that better but ya get what I mean! I LOVE the extra dose of Argentina that I get with him, the culture, the accent, the weird sayings- all of it is SO SO good! We´ve been able to have a really productive week and are gonna be able to get lots of things done together. He has about 22 months in the mission (along with half my other companions) so it´s really nice to again have the experience on my side and to be able to learn from him. He has a really direct and clear way of working that has helped us to be more efficient in our missionary efforts! Haha in the picture, last night we did a little culture exchange.. he dressed me up like a Gaucho and I hooked him up with some Nike! The Guacho has some really unique ways and strict forms of life. The hat I have on is called a Boina and the pants are like the "Wranglers" of Argentina, they're called Bombachas! I love being able to learn more about the culture and the lifestyle that is lived in el Campo de Argentina.

Elder Villalba and Elder Jolley

This week we were trying to get things going... little rough! Taking over the area wasn't hard but having to plan and arrange things solo for a week or so brought a lot of "blanks" to my mind. We got by alright though! We got out in the week only being able to see our investigators each one time... that was a bummer! Right now Javier and Gonzalo are at that point where their interest level can go speedily up or begin to fade pretty quick. We´re trying to do everything we can to help them keep going on their commitments and to continue to invite them to do that which is most important! They both are a little hesitant in baptism for a couple reasons, mostly they are just caught in the thougts that they don´t feel ready! This Sunday though Gonzalo was able to come to an hour or so of church and "lucky" enough one of the lessons that was taught was about the Spirit of Promise!! I was so grateful that he was able to be there for that lesson. The teacher explained to the class that when we embarque (? haha) on a covenant or ordinance that the Lord wants us to make we have the promise that we will know that what we have done is the right things we´ll feel the surety that what we have done is accepted by our Heavenly Father. That was special for me and I also hope that it was for Gonzalo. It has been one of our goals and something that we´ve felt strongly that we need to do in Villa Elvira is to work closely with the ward members! We have an incredible Bishop that is a convert hace dos años! He is excited and so willing to work! We have been working on making plans with him to improve the work. One of these plans has been to take a member to every lesson that we have, it makes a huge difference and is helping the members to get more excited about the work! We met with Javier on Saturday and were able to bring the secretary of the ward with us, it was a great blessing to have him there and we already have plans to have him help us with Javier in the coming week!! Things are steadily continuing to progress, we´re trying to do everything we can to work hard and strengthen the church where we´re at to make sure everything is ready for the success that we´re praying to have!

For Thanksgiving here in Argentina, we were a little bit busy to even think about it. Half-way through the day Elder Williams (the other american Elder in our apartment) remembered that it was Thanksgiving! We stopped for some sandwiches and Sprite for lunch and then quickly headed back out to work! I did enjoy some candy-corn and some of the treats that you guys sent in the package! (I´m saving the stuffing and potatoes cause our bishop said that he would bring us back a fish from his river trip.. see if we can have a 5 star meal here soon!) In Argentina it isn´t really celebrated, but the Thanks was given.

Enjoying Thanksgiving Argentine style

I loved reading today in 2 Nephi 33 about Nephi´s strong testimony of the power of "The words of Christ" that he had received.. plainly.. from the spirit. He promised us that the same spirit would show us and tell us all things so that we would not be detoured in our testimonies. He pleads with us to believe in Christ and then trust that what he has written comes from the same Christ. I loved when it says that the words will persuade us to do good. Many times we will read or hear or experience things in our life that cause us to wonder, In Ether 8, Moroni also testifies that when these situations come we can have complete trust that by reading and praying over the Book of Mormon we will not have a doubt what is right and what is wrong in our lives!

 26 Wherefore, I, Moroni, am commanded to write these things that evil may be done away, and that the time may come that Satan may have no power upon the hearts of the children of men, but that they may be persuaded to do good continually, that they may come unto the fountain of all righteousness and be saved.

I add my testimony that these words persuade and instruct any man to do good, to love, and to believe in the Savior of the world. These are His tender words and messages that He has for us! I know that Christ lives, a pesar de todo sepan que Él vive and this can be our sure foundation!

Have a great week! 

Elder Jolley!

Querida Familia! :)

Ah.. Such a relief to hear from you guys and to be able to hear a little bit from you guys! Thank you :) you always know how to bring a smile to my face! Things sound like they are going great for all and I´m excited to be able to share a little of the Thanksgiving spirit- Argentine Style- this week! Here, it´s funny, Thanksgiving, everyone knows about it and what it is, but it isn´t really celebrated like we do at home. From what I remember last year, our day was normal and we ate noodles... it isn´t the Turkey that you´d expect but it was good! For this week I don´t believe we have/or will have any crazy plans. I loved what ya said mom, it´ll probably be a day of "Giving Thanks" to all those around us. Please travel safe and know that I give thanks for all of you! :) So when it comes to be my turn going around the table that my Savior, this Gospel, and my Family are all that I could ask for. I can´t wait for pictures and loved the picture this week, I hardly recognized "little" Candy, she is WAY different and SO beautiful!!

Well we hit transfers this week! I´ll be staying in Villa Elvira (VERY excited to be able to stay) and Elder Mines was changed to Avellaneda. It has been a super fast 3 months with him and it goes by faster every transfer! I´m gonna miss Elder Mines and for all the things that he helped me to become.. companions truly become answers to our prayers! I heard the other day something that I loved and was reminded how true it is. When we pray for patience, God doesn´t give us patience, but rather gives us opportunities to be patient! I know that our Heavenly Father truly answers our prayers in this way! I attached a picture that we took today of all my companions in the Mission so far (menos Elder Juarez who still is in Fiorito). I am now with an Elder Villalba from Entre Rios, Argentina! An incredible Elder that I´ve known for some time and am excited to work with him now! In Villa Elvira we are only improving from here, we are gonna work so hard to help our Zone continue to grow! Elder Villalba is bien Gaucho, del campo- directamente! :) He loves to sing old Argentine "folk" songs... it´s awesome, I think we´re gonna get a long great! :)

Elder Lewis, Elder Mines, Elder Jolley

Elder Juarez and Elder Merritt

This week we were able to get things moving along even more in Villa Elvira. In my setting-apart blessing there has been a line that has been on my mind for a while that I´ve been working to follow through with right now, it said "Don´t be short in your duties." Right now I´m trying to understand all that I can do and all that I should do in the work and to do it effectively and diligently.. a little bit slower in work, but already we´ve been able to see a lot of blessings start to come in our area. We were able to FIND!!! YES! :) haha it felt great to be able to find a few more people to work with. I never realized how much I missed the action of balancing a bunch of investigators and trying to manage their progress and having to be on top of our schedule. We´ll get there soon! Right now Gonzalo and Lenn have kinda fallen off the "fast-track" towards baptism. Lenn is working a lot right now- 13 hours a day and it doesn´t leave us much time to find or even communicate with him! Gonzalo we´re still working with him and is continuing to grow and be stronger and stronger.. I think that is the best way to explain what´s going on with him right now. He´s getting the "profound teaching." I´m sad that we´re not seeing as much progress with them, it bites when the enthusiasm that these investigadores have going towards baptism levels out a bit. We are very very happy with the work and the progress that we´ve seen with Javier this week though! Poor guy has hit a lot of speed bumps since we´ve met him (sometimes I feel like the missionaries are a curse to the people haha). But with all the difficulties that he has had I´ve been praying hard that he would be able to find more interest and more support in the church, that when we would teach him he would feel the spirit! We only were able to find him one time this week, but it was such a funny lesson. He had people coming and going throughout the lesson and we saw that he wasn´t very focused. Finally we sat him down and finished the lesson and tried with all the spirit and conviction that we could find to invite him to church and to our surprise he looked at us and said, "Chicos, I was already planning on going. I was gonna make sure that you guys were still gonna go." Ha student became the master on that one! Well Sunday turned out to be a very helpful day for Javier.. immediately he started chatting with the bishop y otros hermanos de la Iglesia. He was a natural! :) It was a great and really successful end of the week for us.

Elder Jolley, Javier, and Elder Mines

So to explain the other picture that I sent, we were at the Bishop's house on Saturday doing a service project weed wacking a bunch of weeds and raking up trash when Elder Mines screams for me to come and look at something... I found my first spider in Argentina! Qué Asco! I didn´t like the service project after I saw that monster.. tried to keep my cool, but every few seconds I was scanning around my feet to make sure nothing was crawling towards me.

Well I hope that all is and will continue to go well for you this week! :) I loved this week being able to focus my studies on understanding the characteristics of our Savior. I put myself to study how He was and how I can become and loved how great the scriptures teach us about Jesus Christ. Truly by studying and deciding to follow His example we will find experiences every day that will help us to be more like Him. Everyday we are required to go through many, many things but each has an easier way handled! He truly lived. His was a perfect life because it was lived perfectly. I know that He lives today!! He will teach us and guide us the principles and techniques that He continues to use to lead a more perfect life! I know that the Book of Mormon brings joy to our hearts and a better knowledge of the Son of God.

With all my love,
Elder Jolley

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

Hey!!

Phew! Glad that you guys got the package! I have been worried that it would have gotten lost. Glad that you liked the little regalitos! :) I thought that they were pretty cool and I´ll definitely be getting more stuff to send/bring back in the future! Sorry Mom and Dad, I was in the middle of writing your guys letters, but Aubrie and Gustavo came a little early and wouldn´t be coming back so I had to give what I had. I promise a couple letters for you guys too! Perdón. (P.S Skyler... Argentine Cotton ;) so ya know it´s good!) I hope scarfs are in style for you guys... if not you can be a couple maricones that support your brother! haha.

What a week! Wow, time is flying by and it´s hard to believe that we´re coming up on Christmas again, after receiving the fall/halloween/thanksgiving package, I´m so grateful for everything that you have already sent to me. I got a kick outta the shirt and am glad to be supporting Riser from down here! We are all enjoying in our Pinch the great treats and all the food that you have sent our way.  I´ll do my best to think of any NEEDS that I have this week and will email you back with greater details next week! :) This week we have been busy trying to keep things progressing in Villa Elvira, I think finishing up everyday doesn´t really show the greatness of the week that we are able to see Sunday. Yesterday was a needed day and gave us a lot of happiness to actually see what we accomplished throughout the week, how we changed and what the Lord was busy doing along side us. Thank Heaven for Sundays and for the great perspective that they give in our lives, for everyone. We were busy trying to find, open up new ways to help the ward and to manage the Zone. I feel like I´m starting to get a hang of things now.. in the beginning it felt a little bit like I was running blindfolded, but now I´m able to understand my responsibilities and can begin to "magnify" them. Slowly we´re progressing and I personally can see the Lord teaching us what the right thing to be doing is! Our Zone right now has been progressing greatly, the missionaries are seeing their true potential as they continue to work hard. I´m very grateful for their efforts and it is great to see the excitement as the work of the Lord moves along.

This Tuesday I went on an intercambio with one of our Disrict Leaders, Elder Pender from Canada (good roots there). It was such a fun experience! In their area they work on bikes so I had my fun that day with the pants tucked into the socks, the sweet helmet and a beach-cruiser. :) Argentines have great style with their bikes and I hope you can imagine the added Missionary touch to it all! Haha I enjoyed learning from Elder Pender and was impressed by his ways of teaching and the peace that he brings into an appointment. He´s a great kid! That day we were able to get a lot of things done and were able to invite 2 of their investigators to be baptized who before had been pretty closed to the idea of the church! They have some pretty difficult family problems and what better than to apply and come closer to the Savior's teachings to change the circumstances. We saw their hearts soften and feel the hope that the Restored Gospel provides. I LOVE being a teacher of this Gospel and helping people to understand the things that have been understood in my life! We are excited that that area in our zone continues to progress and work hard! Wednesday and Thursday were pretty normal days for us. We met with Gonzalo and Lenn a couple times and they continue to do well. We figured out a better way to plan- there has been a lot of evaluation on our part- to help all those that we can talk to progress. Especially we were focuesed this week on the experiences that our investigators would have in the Church. We prayed a lot and asked for the Lord's help, when we did something that He could fill in the spaces where we weren´t able to! We wanted to help Gonzalo this week be able to feel "at home" in the ward and to look and feel like a member of the church. After praying we decided to focus on putting everything in order so that he would have friends, people to help him and messages to uplift him this Sunday... what MIRACLES the Lord does in our lives. We provided the shirt and the tie and the Lord provided a Primary Program!! Ha you can always count on the niños! :) In their program they talked about making the right choices, being baptized and being eternally happy!... I love that the Lord knows exactly what say and how to say it! It was the best Sunday that we've had in Villa Elvira and we left feeling so grateful and convinced that Gonzalo also felt a lot closer to our Heavenly Father. Successful plan!

Elder Mines and Elder Jolley with Gonzalo at the church on Sunday

Great part of the week was the interviews that we had with President. He is such a great man and I am so thankful to be able to learn from him. What he had to say was just right for me and for the next steps that I need to take in my mission to be able to keep serving. I want to run and most of all that my heart be overjoyed when I am in the service of God! This couldn´t be a more needed event in any young man's life, but especially in mine! I am thankful for our Savior, I want to be like Him and find peace knowing that by always falling back on Faith, Repentance, being worthy of our covenants, searching for the still small voice in our lives and just enduring to the end we WILL become like Him. That is my greatest joy! :)

I love you and hope that you have a successful and fun week! Please keep this work in your prayers! :) Thanks for all that have been offered!

Con Amor
Elder Jolley

Elder Jolley with a child in his neighborhood

(He's my best buddy!)

A ride on the train with the Elders

The Elders enjoying food at their pinch