August 22, 2011

This week went really well. my new companion is really cool and a great missionary. So I am happy even if he doesn't wash the dishes he uses. lol I bet I am going to get sick or something. we had a good week. lol it is really a strange feeling not being able to talk to anybody in english. lol I have passed a couple of days not hearing any english. but I am learning a lot now. and I think I am nearing fluency. not super close but closer and I can understand quite a lot now. 


but this week started out slower. Elder Towner left Gualeguaychú and so before he left he said goodbye to all of the people he cared about. which was pretty sad in a way. he was near to tears in some of the visits. I hope to develop this type of love for the people. so that is what happened from Monday to Wednesday. then my new companion, Elder Romero, came Wednesday night. and we had some hard days of working. Lately I had been a little bit discouraged about how not many people were progressing in our lessons and stuff like that. but yesterday we had an awesome day. we went to church as normal. and got back as normal. we visited our recent convert and she has been having a lot of trials lately. so we visited her. her testimony was as strong as ever, even in the face of adversity which was really awesome to see. lol they have the funniest little daughter named Patricia who is 7 years old and is just soooo funny. she laughs 24/7 which is way fun. we had a youth activity at the church this week and she came with her older sisters and she looked really sad and bored. so we played with a basketball. and I played volleyball with the other people. it was quite fun. oh and we also ate chorripan which is pretty much the same thing as eating braughtworst and bread. lol but they don't have sauerkraut and there isn't much spices in the meat which is kind of boring. but it was good anyway. I really miss spicy food. 


oh and so our awesome day. we visited the lady and went back to the apartment to eat lunch. after we left and went to visit julio. Earlier we had tried to visit him with a member named victor. victor has cerebral palsy and is at times hard to understand. But he LOVES to help us with missionary work. we invited him to come back and visit julio with us. but since we were running late we couldnt stop by. lol and Victor was there waiting at the house for us. such an awesome guy and also really intelligent. So we talked with Julio and his wife and then we taught him about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It was really cool being able to help out with the lesson and to have a member with us. it was so impressive to me how God prepares the people for us to meet. Julio has progressed a ton. we taught him and a lady that I found with another Elder while we had been doing some contacts. we stopped by and began talking with the lady. and then her boyfriend came into the room and we talked with him too. lol and then came in the aunt and began to talk as well.and then another lady also. (lol I just tried to talk to my companion in english. lol whoops). 


but anyhow we were talking and they had a ton of questions but were very accepting of everything we said. I was the only American there. lol everyone else were Argentines but the topic came up that I was american and the aunt started talking to me about how she had tried to learn english and how much she would have loved to learn it all. but she quit learning english. then she asked me out of no where why couldnt we drink coffee. lol and then I took off. lol It was so cool. i didnt notice till after the lesson that it was the gifts of tongues that was helping me speak. but I told her perfectly why we couldnt drink Alcohol and tea and coffee in spanish. and she understood all of it and it seemed to me that she accepted what I had said. 


I started out by telling her that our bodies are gifts from God and that he wants us to care for them. and also that when we care for our bodies we recieve blessings. but it was real cool to see how the Holy Ghost helps us missionarys speak. we are going to keep teaching this family. but it was just really awesome to be able to speak with her. lol I even made some spanish jokes. its just so cool to see how God performs miracles. 


I have seen quite a few miracles in my mission so far. these miracles are peoples hearts changing and turning toward God. alot of people depended on miracles to believe a church to be true. but that really kind of defeates the purpose of faith for me. so I think that the miracle of a heart changing is really big and is a miracle that will last forever! It was really good to hear from you all. sorry I dont have much time right now to write. Thanks for the emails and letters. My testimony is really growing a ton on the mission. I love you all. Spanish is awesome. paul keep learning Chinese. that is really awesome! oh and we played soccer with a bunch of latinos today which was really challengeing and I found out that I really stink at playing soccer. the church is true!


well see ya later, 
Elder Gibbs


PS oh and also I taught a bunch of missionaries arabic and I wrote their names in arabic!