A week of Divisions

This week has been a very busy week. I have done divisions twice this week so I have been doing a lot of traveling this week but I have learned a lot from people we have taught to the missionaries I have been with.

First this week started of with a lesson called a do or die where if this person did not understand what we taught we were going to drop them. The last lesson we had with him went horrible and all the others we tried to answer his question of why we have suffering in the world and everytime he just didn´t understand and the last time was more of a heated debate. In the end we gave him a 2 Nephi chapter 2 to read and pray about it. We thought he wouldn´t read it so we prepared an amazing lesson....then he read it and recieved an answer so we had to come up with a new lesson on the spot. I learned many things from this experince but mainly always have faith, and if we really actually study, search,and pray we can find answers.

Next I did divisions with Elder Perez due to traveling we ended up having to pass time in a city where he started the mission and went and visted some of his converts and people he worked with even though it was really short, I can´t explain how cool it was to see that reunion, and we even had a lesson with one who wasn´t as active and it was really great. I can´t wait to have that reunion experince with converts that I will have later on in the mission or just with people I worked with that are active now.

While i was on divisions with Elder Perez we taught about the atonement and i remebered a quote that the general 70 from our confrence shared with us that I wanted to share. God is  just god and will never require more than we can do but because he is just he will never accept less than we can do either...now think about that for a while that was a really intresting thought.

After I had divisions with Elder Call and had one of my most successful days ever. Surprisingly like everyday everything fell through so we ended up contacting which we usually don´t find a lot of success but we found 3 famalies and 2 of them recognized us 1 from his really tall height in the bus termianl a few weeks ago, the other happened to be a sister of another family we are teaching and recognized me from helping out with their littler girls birthday party. Anyway we taught all 3 famlilies the same lessons but they were all completely diffrent because they were to the needs it was amazing. We had a really fun day.

The next day me and Elder Sorensen had alot of luck contacting as well we went from teaching no one these past week to having to do divisions with members so we can hopefully teach them all becasue they all want us to come at night.

Anyway Hope you are all having a good week. Remember to keep the faith, do your best and remember for any part you are lacking that is why we have the mercy of Atonement and to use it.

Love you all

Elder Holt

Personal Prayer

I am really short on timet his week. I just found out someone that I found and have a baptisimal date will be getting baptized in one of my old areas which is really cool. I want to talk about personal prayer. We had a confrence where the question was is how can I get more out of my personal prayers. Because of time I am going to list the steps and simply say it helps a lot and I have seen tons of fruits from doing these things President Smith instructted us.

1 Start with a hymn
2 Think and if you can write what you are going to say in your prayer
3 Pray with faith believeling you will recieve a response but most importantly act on the answer.
4 end the prayer and write your feelings.

This is best usted before and after scripture study and remember to as to understand what you are going to read and ask the questions you want to recieve answers.

He then said to meditate on it all day then at night give a report about your prayer and pray for these things.

Simply I can say I have really learned a lot and almost every study had questions answered, and have felt the spirit more. A big thing for me is prayer was a big struggle for me and i had this question and it and others were answered in this confrence. Cool part is I didn´t even tell president smith about these questions. This has happened the last 2 confrences and in General Confrence. Elder Sorenson also when he expalined what he learned in his study helped me find an answer as well.

Anyway tell next week.

Love you all

Elder Holt

Mentoring

I don´t have a lot of time to post this week. After writing the family and president I got a little distracted on lds.org. You know you are a missionary when you could spend days on the site and don´t want it to end. Anyway this week I have been rereading my journal and I wrote a lot about a college professor of mine and how he talked about mentoring. This has been a lesson that has been with me ever since and how we need to look up to good examples learn from there accomplishments and failures. This somestimes doesn´t have to be a big person in leadership such as the Apostles and Prophets. That is whose biagrophies wow I am sure I botched that word but spell check is in spanish so you all get to deal with my poor english. HAHA. Anywa I have been reading them and it has been intresting. We also have great leaders such as mission presidents, bishops, but even more we have great parents, brothers and sisters even if they are younger, aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousins who write us great emails when we need them.  We also have great friends as well that will always be special in our lives. In the mission we also have zone leaders, district leaders, companions, and our trainers, and of course we even end up learning from members and the people that we are teaching.
In the end our best mentor can and always will be Christ in 3 Nephi 27:27 it talks about how we need to become like him.  (I am pretty sure that is the reference if not correct me in the comments) Anyway we need to develop chirstlike attributes and also look at those in others this will help us in the end find happiness and peace in this life and the life after like it says in the introduction of the Book of Mormon.

Well that is really it for this week and do to the lack of time but hope you all have a good week.

Love,

Elder Holt

Changes in Rosario

I am really short on time so this won´t have what I really wanted to say but I will have more time when I get to my new area in Dolores with my new comp Elder Sorenson from Salem, UT...It is going to be a fun next transfer and the area is suppose to be a really great area. This will be a huge change from where I have been in Rosario. Rosario is a great place and I hope to return but it is very challanging area.  The people here are very diffrent, and things have happened this changed which are really weird. I have seen things I thought I would never have seen or never wanted to see.  I am just going to end with sharing a thing a learned about the atonement from Presiden Smith when he was training us all during interviews. He was talking in life we all suffer from one thing or another but we suffer from our own choices or the choices of others. We truely learn the meaning of the atonement when we are not suffering for our mistakes. It is when other people do things we can´t control, or we have to see others especially the ones we love suffer. I don´t have my notes by me so I can´t quote it exact but this is so true. The true power of the atonement came not because Christ was paying for his own sins he was paying for ours. He also had his agency like all of us he didn´t have to pay for that. This is something I don´t think we will fully ever be able to understand is the Atonement of Jesues Christ, and his pure love. Rosario has been a very good experince for me and I have learned, and grown a lot. I am out of time but in the next few weeks I will try and share more of these experinces, but simply like it says 2 Nephi we can´t know true happiness with out understanding the concept of unhappiness. As difficult as Rosario has been it is probably one of my favorite areas and I hope to return and work here again later in the mission. I am also looking forward to my new change which was really unexpected because I was told I was going to be staying at first but I know God has a plan and even we don´t know what it is when we try and listen to the spirit and access the atonement we will know in his time.

Love you all