Thoughts from Sister Hall

 

This week was a rougher one. Me and my companion are really struggling to find people to teach.... Jenny was traveling all week so we didn't have the chance teach their family at all.... I've kind of felt like my whole mission I've been running and running and I haven't gotten anywhere. So I push myself even harder, and still... not really anything. I absolutely love the mission, I love the work. I LOVE Bolivia and I love the people. I know that the Lord wants me here... I'm pretty sure He's trying to get something through that hard head of mine. Some weeks are like this in the field... You win some, and you lose some... And it's not about the numbers and it's not about the baptisms... But numbers and baptisms would sure be a nice bonus, haha.

Okay, I'll stop being a giant bummer now.

This week I had a pretty cool spiritual experience while teaching a woman here named Teodovina. She's awesome, in her fifties-ish, and she uses traditional Bolivian dress. She ALWAYS has a smile on her face.

Now, a problem for the missionaries here in Tarija is teaching investigators that don't know how to read. We currently have 3 people that we're teaching that don't know how to read, Teodovina being one of them.

We taught her on Friday, but we were kind of in a hurry, so we just shared a scripture with her. I shared a scripture from John 10:14-15 which talks about Christ as the good shepherd and us as His sheep. I read it and she was just... Blown away by it. She explained that because she can't read, she doesn't always get to hear things like that. She said that with the world the way it is "no one is just going to walk up to you on the street and share things like that.

Then she kept asking me "and what else does it say?"

"And what else?"

"And read me another one."

It was so humbling to me to see what I had taken for granted my whole life. I have had the scriptures in front of me my whole life and I took them for granted, if I didn't take them as an inconvenience. I haven't learned how to value the scriptures until I began to use them as a missionary.... I am so grateful for Hermana Teodovina and her example to me.

On a less spiritual note...

About a year ago, there was a companionship of sister missionaries in my area that gave food to stray dogs. They were followed around by a GIANT group of stray dogs wherever they went.

To this day, there are two dogs (named Pepe and Richard by previous missionaries) that if they see us, they will follow us the entire day until we get home in the nighttime.... If we go to a lesson, they will wait for us outside, and then when we come out, they will continue following us.

All of that sounds real cute, but the other stray dogs do not like Pepe and Richard... They attack Pepe and Richard... And Pepe and Richard don't do anything... And so we can't really go anywhere without stray dogs attacking us.

So on Saturday, we had Pepe and Richard following us... and we had to go to a lesson, so we HAD to get them to stop following us... Or else other dogs would have probably killed them.... And bitten us too... Me and Hermana Nahuel started throwing towards them to scare them into leaving....

And I totally hit Pepe in the face with a rock. A big rock. And it was the funniest and saddest thing that has ever happened to me....

But don't worry though, Pepe forgave me pretty much immediately after. He still followed us home.

*SIGH* Pepe and Richard.