Happy Halloween

Hello there Everything's great here in Plottier (in spanish pronounced P-low-ti-er)

I don't really have too much to report on this week, it wasn't all too exciting. A member yesterday told me that Halloween is Satan's new year and condemned me for ever celebrating it, so that was fun.

We did intercambios with the district leader in Progreso, which is in Neuquén, and Elder Shupe came and did them with me here in Plottier. He's a good Elder that I had met when I was in San Martín and he was just starting the mission in Bariloche. He's a good guy and we get along great so we had a good time.

Also in district meeting in Senillosa we had to eat apples tied to a string blindfolded as our companions led us with their voices demostrating companionship unity. Pics will be attached.

Also, yesterday was a great day! My companion and I have been working super hard and have commited ourselves to baptize this transfer, and we haen't been seeing the success we wanted in our area. Yesterday morning we went to go pick up an investigator, Nestor, and walk to church with him, he had said beforehand he would come and was excited. But when we went to get him, there were all asleep. So we went to church, and there was another investigator that came always but needs to get married before she can get baptized. And so we kept going and I was thinking about how we hadn't seen what we wanted eventhough we had put our faith and trust in the Lord, and I said to myself. don't doubt, it'll all work out. A few minutes after that, the same investigator Nestor showed up with his less active girlfriend to sacrament meeting! (the last meeting in our area). It was an answer to my prayer almost immediately. I love being a missionary!

Love you all and hope you're well!! :)

Elder Grondel

Eating an apple blindfolded haha

rain

Hello there

It is raining very heavily as I type this message in a cyber café in a town called Plottier. But this week was fantastic.

The main highlight was the leadership council we had this Wednesday. We talked about a lot of things, but the main focus of it was faith. We talked about a couple different scriptures and did a lot of different things, but the main message was for us to have more faith. It was super spiritual, and we were able to feel a lot of good things that led us to grow our own faith, and then be able to do a similar thing with the missionaries in our zone training to lift the faith in the zone. Things aren't going too well here, and so we're trying to get it going, and I truly believe that this is going to help a lot.

I feel like I've talked about this before, but our mission President was a fantastic missionary when he served about 40 years ago. There's a talk by Elder Gene R. Cook, actually a BYU devotional from 1981, called Faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, in which Elder Cook talks about when he was a mission President, and there was a missionary that showed great faith and was able to accomplish many miracles in his mission. One of those miracles was being sent to Paraguay, where about 20 people a month were being baptized, in a whitewash, when two missionareis that don't know the area go there together, and baptizing 18 people in 3 weeks. He could do it because of the amazing faith he had and has in the Lord Jesus Christ. Tha missionary is our mission president. So, if anybody knows how to change things, it's him. The council was very powerful, and his wife even shared the letters that he wrote to her from that period of time when he was baptizing many people on his mission. It really helped us see that it is possible, and we're going to do it. My comp and I prayed a lot to set a goal for the rest of this transfer, and we're excited to work as hard as we can to reach it.

Other than that, it rained a lot, we found some new people to teach, and we're going to see some miracles here pretty soon, I know it.

Love you all, have a great week!

Elder Grondel

sorry no pictures, I will on that this week

what

Hey guys how's it going?

Everything's great down South here. La verdad, I don't remember mucho of what happened this week, but here we go.

Basically most of the week we were looking for new people, found some good news, one of our investigators is really interested, but didn't come to church. The thing we did different this week was intercambios with Senillosa, another city much smaller than Plottier about 30 minutes more towards Chile. I went with Elder Bramell over there, and it was great! I met him in Roca about a year ago, and it was great to work with him again. He finishes this transfer, so we got him excited to get it everything he's got a make some miracles happen out in his area. He's a good guy.

Also, during our district meeting this week, my comp and I were doing a practice with oen fo the assistants about using a meeting with the bishop as a way to find new people as it says in Preach My Gospel, and it did not go well haha. Not exactly the easiest things to explain and invite someone to do the first time that you meet them. But it was fun.

Other fun things..................this week we should have the council meeting thingy with President, which is going to be great! Always I good time.

Love you all and have a great week!

Elder Grondel

PS I'm an uncle again! Woo!! Las familias pueden ser eternaaaasss :)

pics
my comp's camera isn't the greatest, but this graffiti says we are the hope of the world :)

Week number something of quite a few

Hello there

This week was pretty great! We did a lot and it went by pretty fast, but I'm getting to know my new area pretty well and I'm excited to see where this transfer goes.

Most of the week was spent just meeting new people members, investigators, less-actives, and teaching them a bit. Here in our zone we have 3 districts: one here in Plottier with another companionship of Elders, one in Progreso a bit closer towards Neuquén with 3 companionships of Elders, and another in Senillosa, which is out the other way towards the east with 2 Elders and 2 Hermanas. So we went to a few district meetings and things are going alright. The zone hasn't been doing that well recently, so we're trying our best to lift everyone up right now. But we've got some good district leaders, so things should work out.

On Saturday we also had a mini zone training. It was mini because we normally have the leadership council the first week of the transfer, get the study plans and everything from President to do the trainings, but this transfer, President is going to Ushuaia(the very very bottom of Argentina) to have a meeting with all the mission presidents in Argentina and the apostles, and doesn't get back till the 3rd week. So we're waiting till then to receive all the material. Anyway. We had a mini training about the talk by Elder Yamashita about Ambition for Christ, and it went super well! So we're excited about that.

The assistants came to the training, and we did exchanges with them her in Plottier. I went with my old comp Elder Clemens again, because he was in this area about a year ago, and it was great. We had a really good time and I learned a lot as always.

Yesterday was a normal day at church, there is an entire family that Elder Clemens found last December in the which all have gotten baptized except the parents, and they came. They're great and the parents just have to get married to be baptized, so we're working on that.

Other than that, not much too exciting has happened, I'm doing well. Love you all have a great week!!

Elder Grondel

Plottier

Hola familia!!!!

Weeeellllll I got transferred! I just got here to a city called Plottier, which is a smaller city outside of Neuquén. I was very sad to leave my favorite area up in the beautiful mountains of the Patagonia, but I'm excited for this transfer. And I finally got a latin comp! His name is Elder Juarez and he's from Buenos Aires. I met awhile ago in one of my first areas, he's a great guy and we're going to do a lot of good things together. We're zone leaders together, and the zone has a few small districts that are quite spread out, and we've got a lot of work to do to help them all out. It's going to be a great transfer.

This week went by super quick doing a lot of different things, but the highlight was definitely General Conference! It was so great, I feel like we just had it about a month ago, but time just keeps going by faster and faster. One of the talks that really stood out to me was Ronald A. Rasband's about spiritual experiences and everything. It was so great to hear his testimony of how things have gone for him as an apostle, and how he has held on to the Lord more than his whole life. I loved how he pleaded at the end that we don't forget those spiritual experiences. That is so important. I have met so many less active and inactive members and investigators that have let disputations, contentions, and other insignificant problems overpower and drown out the spiritual experiences that they have had in their lives. Our minds may forget them, but as we reflect in sincere prayer, the Lord will help us to remember those experiences that have brought us to where we are today.

Well that's enough soapboxing for today. I love you all so much, thank you for your constant support, I truly appreciate it!!!

Elder Grondel

Last picture with the zone in Bariloche