Week 58- Born to be Great!!!

Dear Friends and Family,

 

Wow, I am not even sure where to start.

 

Last Monday, Elder Cook came. 

We even ran into him later that day and were able to take a picture with him!!!

 

Something that really struck me is that he said, ''You are exactly where you are supposed to be.'' It was something that kind of hit me different because this week was hard for some reason and also really rewarding. I'll try and explain it all.

 

So recently, I have been realizing that my time left as a full time missionary is very short and I feel like I have way to much to learn and do in the time that is left. It kind of left me a little frustrated and then thinking about the plans we had to visit the sisters this transfer, well they all kind of crashed and burned. We did a lot, but there was always something that went wrong. I spent a lot of time praying and reading and really just pondering. It was so much that the sisters who live with me started to ask if I was alright because I was a lot more quiet this week thinking about everything.

 

1. Well, on to more exciting news. My family went to Mexico this week! Which is not the exciting part. But what was neat is that I got to return to Puerto Maldonado for 3 days where I started my mission. It was incredible. I walked off the plane and felt connected to my family because it reminded me a little bit of Mexico and Hawaii (where my little sister is!!!) So I am sending a few photos...

 

2. Pedro! I opened the area book first thing when we got to the room of the sisters in Puerto and saw that they were teaching a recent convert named Pedro. Pedro didn't get baptized my very last week there because he was in the hospital. The sad part is that when we went to visit him, he only had 1 leg. I was in shock. It made me a little sad, but I am so excited that he really stuck to what he knew was true and despite his difficulties of amputating his leg, that he continued strong and still continues with a smile on his face in his wheelchair.

 

3. The Aguilar Family. There are the parents, one of the twins, and then Percy. The parents were inactive when I started to visit them! They now are going to church every week. The twins are preparing to go on missions and Percy (he's not part of the family, but works there) He wasn't even a member when I was there. The really sweet part was when we walked by, the mom runs out and gives me a HUGE hug and says wow I was just looking at your picture that you left us and thinking about how much of a blessing you were. It touched my heart. The other nice part was one of the twins told me that I had lost weight! :) Always a plus!!!

 

4. John! He's the one next to me. Someone had told me that he was no longer coming to church.... I was way sad to hear the news. Until I saw him at church when we went to a reunion. In fact, he is a ward missionary and super active. The people got confused with the wrong John. Anyways, he walked out and looked me in the eye and said ''I can't thank you enough for the lessons you taught me.'' It left me speechless. I just wanted to hug him... but couldn't because I'm a missionary. But it brought tears to my eyes. You know, the more time that passes, the more that I realize that I really don't do a whole lot. The Lord and the Spirit do so much and lucky me, I get to be SOOOOOOOO incredibly blessed. I get to know all of these people and share my love for them, but what comes back? More love than I could ever imagine.

 

 

 

 

5. So we are walking down the street and I hear my name, ''HERMANA LANG!!!!!!!!!!'' I look to my side and I see Ruth. She is a little girl that I met at the beginning of my mission and was never able to get baptized. When I prayed so hard, I felt like the fact that I would not abandon her. Time has gone by but when I saw her in the street that day, she ran and gave me the biggest hug! I haven't seen her in a very long time, but you know what? Friends never abandon each other. I showed the sisters where she lives and I hope that things go well, but if not, I know that I will find her again and that someday, she will be able to be baptized like she desires so much.

 

 

 

 

 

 

6. Yuri. He had a lot of problems with alcohol. He said he didn't believe he could stop drinking because he had tried SEVERAL times. Well we met him and 2 weeks later he was baptized. Well, to this day, he still hasn't drank! When his friend called and said I was in Puerto, he didn't believe it, but it was so great to see him as well!

 

Wow, how blessed am I? Just when you start to feel down on yourself, remember that you were born to be great and that you truly are great even if you can't see it. I was just so fortunate this week to be sent a lot of little reminders that Heavenly Father loves me and is happy with the things that I am doing, even if I can't see it ALL of the time. 

 

7. You are not here to suffer. I got to see Yaneth the other day here in Cusco. She is someone that I taught that suffered from depression and abuse. One day, I stopped and almost yelled at her that she was not there to suffer. It was SOOOOOO harsh and I wasn't sure how she was going to take it. Well, now that she has been baptized, she told me about the 180 degree change that has happened in her life. She said, ''You know what Hermana Lang! I will never forget those words, you are not here to suffer, because it is so true and I am so much happier than I could have ever imagined. I just had to take a leap of faith to get there. Those words hit me and helped me to have the hope that really I could have the kind of life I always wanted.'' Yaneth reminded me of a good lesson, that I am here to be happy!

 

8. Rita! She was baptized this Saturday. It was so lovely. Her best friend came to support her and she was just beaming. She said, you know what, there were so many trials for me to get here, but God helped me and here I am.

 

So I hope that you were able to meet some of the wonderful people that I have gotten to know over this year in Peru. Just as these people are so dear to my heart, so are all of you.

 

I hope that this week treats you well. I love you all and thank you for your support! 

Love Always,

Hermana Carly Jo Lang

Week 57- Chilling in the Airport

Dear Friends and Family,

I am kind of short on time this week.

1. Elder Cook came yesterday along with Elder Calister and Elder Waddel (Pretty cool, right?) It was super awesome, but unfortunately, reason 2 will explain why I don't have a ton of time to let you know the wonderful things that I was able to feel and hear there.

2. I am sitting in the airport, on their internet right now waiting for my flight to Puerto Maldonado... Internet in the airport is kind of expensive, but it is the only free time we have, so that is why I don't have a ton of time to write, but I promise to fill you in with everything that happened next week! So be excited! haha

So this last week was crazy. We were supposed to go to Quillabamba. So the plans were to leave in a bus at 3am to go there because that is when we always go apparently. Uh... complete disaster. The first night, we slept through completely. Totally fine. We'll just go the next day. So the next day, the Zone Leaders came to pick us up and take us to the bus stop where we would travel in a van to Quillabamba. I am SOOOOOO grateful the Zone Leaders were with us. When we got out of the taxi, it was AWFUL. Everyone was touching us and trying to drag us into their van so that it would be full and they could leave. There were some that we really weren't sure that they had any intentions of going to Quillabamba at all and then others that I'm sure the driver was fine, but it was full of drunk men and there weren't even 2 seats together. One of the elders who had traveled to Quillabamba a lot said that they always traveled in one company. So we went to see the van and then he looked at us and said, ''I'm not so sure you should travel tonight.'' My companion and I felt so uncomfortable and we felt bad that the Zone Leaders had paid for the taxi to the bus stop and wasted their time at 3 AM... and one of the zone leaders said, ''Hermanas, if you don't feel good, get in the taxi and we'll go home. Don't feel bad about it.'' So we got in the taxi and left. We immediately felt relieved. Who knows what would have happened, but the spirit really does protect you.

Miracles that happened because we didn't end up going to Quillabamba? Rocio and her mom Fidelia now want to be baptized after years of investigating the church. We also were able to find a girl, Analia, that I had taught before and she wants to be baptized September 7th. It was pretty crazy. Luisa (she was one who I also taught before and felt like she lived in hell on earth) she now says she wants to be baptized with her son Davis too! Elizabeth is also the mom of another member who is slowly deciding that maybe she wants to join the church too. CRAZY!!!!! None of this would have happened if we had gone to Quillabamba.

Trust in the Lord with All thine Heart. We trusted... and look what happened! Not always is it easy to trust the Lord. We had OUR plans, and luckily this time it was easy to follow the Lord and let Him change our plans because we all felt super uncomfortable and unsafe with the situation, but what happens when that doesn't happen? When you feel that gut feeling, the spirit whispering something, we must act and not hesitate. That is when we can say we have trusted in the Lord. We most likely will never know the what if's of the other situation. What if I had traveled to Quillabamba in safety? It is possible, but the what if's of life don't matter because they don't really exist in the end. It's just curiosity and as they say, curiosity killed the cat. The only what if's that will matter in the end is what if I had followed the spirit and done what I was prompted to do? Well, the answer is simple, you would have been blessed. I am so grateful that this time, I was able to see the blessings of following the spirit. The what if's of what if I had done what I had originally planned really don't matter to me. I am just grateful that the Lord loves me enough to change my plans. I hope that this week you will feel the Lord's love and listen to Him and TRUST Him.

Love Always,
Hermana Lang

Week 56- DULCES

Dear Friends and Family,

Hermanas Parraga, Horlacher,
Lozano, and I

So awkward moment of the week. We met a 16 and 17 year old who were having lots of problems because they were living together. So we decided to teach them about chastity. We began the lesson and it was super spiritual. There happened to be a little girl that lived in the house too and she was playing around. Well, I let her play with my backpack. In one of the more serious parts of the lesson, I was bearing my testimony and the little girl in the middle of my testimony asks, ''What's this?'' I turn my head to the side to look and then my mind went blank. I had no idea what to say. In her hand, she had my tampons that I always have handy in my backpack. Uh...... That is when my companion said that they were candies and I took it from her hand and put it in my backpack. You could tell that the little girl really believed they were candies and was way sad that I wasn't willing to share. Oops. But after that, I was so mortified that it was way hard to get back into the spirit of the lesson.

My companion and I

So miracle. Remember way back to the beginning of my mission? When the dog bit me? Well, my companion and I went to the store the other day and someone called out my name. I was kind of confused and looked at them and at first couldn't remember where I knew these people and then it hit me. They were the owners of the dog that bit me. They are in Puerto Maldonado for 15 days and then in Cusco for 15 days. They invited us to come by to visit them in 2 weeks when they are back from Puerto again. What a tender mercy. And.... unfortunately, they told me that their dog had died.

Well, last little bit of news, Rita is still on track for this Saturday. She pretty much was already Mormon, she just need someone to tell her that everything she already was doing were the things that God desired for her life. She now has a huge family inside the church and she says she has never been happier. So cute.

Well, I am out of time this week, but I love you all and thank you for all of your support.

Love Always,

Hermana Lang



My companion and I

Week 55- Everything is perfect!

President Harbertson, me, Sister Harbertson

Dear Friends and Family,

 

So I have learned a LOT this week. It has been a great week despite all of the trials that have happened.

 

First off, last Monday was great. In the night, we traveled 6 hours to Juliaca. The only problem is that our bus left late and then when we got there, we couldn't get inside the room of the sister missionaries and so we went to where they eat. There, we could sleep 2 hours sitting at the kitchen table... SUPER comfortable. Well, then we called the other zone leaders to let them know when we were coming and one of them told us that President had come to Puno and Wednesday was a training meeting.... there went our plans to visit some of the sister missionaries that day and then Friday that all of the Leaders of the mission had a council... uh, that means we would lose one day of work and have to come home one day early. So we quickly re-planned our schedule and decided we could spend a half day with all of the sister missionaries in those zones... which there are 9 of them in the Puno area. 

 

So Tuesday morning was great. Tuesday evening, we visited 2 sisters that we wanted to help out most. I went with the gringa because she is struggling with her Spanish and we wanted her to be able to express all of her feelings which she did. I have decided that listening is exhausting. Wednesday morning, I got up with the flu.... it was AWFUL. We went to the training with President and he and his wife immediately noticed I was not well and told me to rest in another room. The poor other missionaries that saw me that day that don't know me probably thought wow, this sister missionary doesn't look happy... well obviously that day, I wasn't so much hahaha.

 

The cool thing is that in the afternoon, President asked if I wanted a blessing. I told him yes and he and the 2 Assistants and 6 Zone Leaders gave me a blessing of health. There was so much power that you could feel and I immediately felt much better after the prayer... not all better, but I didn't feel like I was going to faint at every moment.

 

My companion and I

Well, we ended up staying with those 2 sisters the whole time and then Thursday night we came back and the bus took 9 hours to get there and not 7.... It wasn't fun because the seats were small and I couldn't put my legs in front of me. We were crammed in little balls in our seats and my legs were dead when we got back to Cusco. We felt so happy to be back ''home''  in our clean bedroom. 



Friday morning, we had a training meeting with all of the leaders and then after that we had interviews about our visits and the sister missionaries. President is SOOOOOOOOOO smart. He helped us a lot because we didn't know what to do really. But something I have learned and am still learning is that charity is ALWAYS the answer. He helped us to know how to be direct and still love the sisters and gave us a lot of ideas of what we could do.

 

My companion and I. Marci, and Martha (our pensionista)

The thing is that everything was NEVER perfect in my eyes, but our crazy Pensionista always says Everything is Perfect, so we started to say it jokingly when something would happen. The thing that changed was never the situation, but we found that our attitude changed and we were ALWAYS happy and what we realized was that after all, everything really was perfect. Perfect doesn't mean that you don't have frustrations or pains or illness, but it does mean that you can be happy always and we truly were happy. I found myself laughing when I was super sick, half passed-out on the floor. Life is about being happy NOW and not happy when....  If you can be happy now, you will find that everything really is perfect and that God is perfect and has a perfect plan for each and every one of us.

 

Well, exciting news!!!!! Rita is going to be baptized the 17th. She is so wonderful. She came to church yesterday and said you know what, THIS is my family and my home and I feel so lucky to be a part of this. And then she was writing down EVERYTHING that she could learn at church including the words of all of the hymns that we sang. She made so many friends. I feel so blessed that I didn't even do anything, I was just blessed to have the opportunity to know her and to be able to watch her come closer to her Heavenly Father.

 

Well, I love you all and thank you so much for all of your support... I cannot believe how fast time goes by and everyone reminds me here that 6 months isn't long. I feel like time is shorter and shorter but I learn more and more and know that it is all because my Heavenly Father loves me so much. Love you all. Have a wonderful week. 

 

Love,

Hermana Lang