Week 39: WE ARE A BRANCH

Hey everybody! 

This week was super awesome, but super crazy! I wasn't able to write yesterday because we showed up to the Internet place, tried logging on the email site, but the site wouldn't load. Everything else loaded, just not the email service, so that ended our pday quite lovely. The entire week was a long hunt for a new house for a chapel, and-or a new room for us to live in. But after a week long hunt, we have yet to find anything, the hunt goes on.  One thing I found today in my personal study is D&C 90:24¨Search diligently, pray always, and be believing, and all things shall work together for your good,...¨. I liked it because if we believe and have the faith things will work out for our good. Things wont be perfect, we wont just receive everything we need right then. But with our faith things will pass, even hard things for our good. So if something doesn't go your way, if you don't get what you need, its not because God doesn't love you but rather, he is helping you, learn, grow, and everything is for your good. Just like this week we have been praying hard, working hard, to find a new chapel or house. But after 7 days of hard work we found nothing, sure its not the result we wanted but its what the Lord needed for us. So keep your head high, search diligently, pray always, and believe things will work out! 

Also this Sunday the family group of Pueblo Nuevo officially became the Branch Pueblo Nuevo. We are officially part of the church!! It was super awesome, our mission president came out with the district president. It was a super awesome experience. There is still along way to go for the branch but its super exciting!!! 

But the week started off good, Tuesday morning when my companion and I decided to go by some breakfast. We left the room, went to the store next door, came back and then realized that we forgot the keys inside our room. But it was ok because our family group leader has a spare key. So we called him, and he happened to bring the spare key to his work, so we had no way to get into our room through the door. After some thinking and processing we went to a member who had a Peruvian ladder, and we climbed up through our second story window and got in, wasn't sketchy at all. 

Another fun room story, we got back to our room one night, and we found an intruder, a bat had found his way into our room and couldn't find his way out... Another funny story of the week is that while my companion was showering I was getting ready and said a prayer, when I heard the phone start ringing in my pocket. I just thought it was our district leader and that it wasn't important so I let it ring through and continued my prayer. But when I finished I looked at who called us and it was our mission president, I let him go to voicemail. 

This week we were teaching a new investigator who we had just found and we gave him a Book of Mormon, and told us he didn't have time to read it because he had so many other scriptures and books to read, then he pointed over to his desk where he had all the books. But it was literally only the bible. He had soooo many books... 1 ok. Peru also had finals this week, and won both of them. They haven't lost a game in over 25 games, so they are looking really good going into the world cup, our hopes are high, Russia here we come! 

My companion also went tshirt shopping this week, so we go into the store, and ask them if they have any shirts in XL, they bring some out, my companion holds it up to see the size, and it looks small so he looks at the tag and it says Large. So he mentions it to the lady that is not an XL because it says its a large. She then tells us no that's the brand name and that is actually an XL. Then we asked her how much it cost- she looked at us started saying 30 but cut herself off and told us 45. Jacking up her price because we were gringos, we left and will never return. 

We also narrowly escaped a very vicious dog, for no reason it started growling, then full speed just came running at us trying to bite us. I think I ran faster than Usan Bolt, we will never walk down that same street where the dog lives. Then yesterday we went to a beach called La Grama. Its a very rocky beach it was super fun, had adventures as a zone. That's about it, it was the very best week ever!! 

Love, 

Elder Luke Gruber

 OUR NEW BRANCH

Week 38: Good Luck

Hey all, 

This week was the bomb, although all week I have been struggling with a sore throat and with a really bad cough. But that didn't stop it from being the best. My personal study helped me realize that Harry Styles has been reading the doctrine and covenants. D&C 68:11- Its a sign of the times. :P This week I also hit some luck, Monday night walking in the streets I saw a glimmer on the ground and sure enough, under some dirt I found a Sol (basically a quarter). Then on Friday, I was walking again, and I kicked a little bit of dirt, and once again, Bam, I found another Sol. I hit the jack pot. 

Also a member brought us lunch to our room this Sunday for lunch. It was rice with some potatoes and tuna. Then also a soup, the soup looked normal, so my comp started eating it, then went to take a bite out of the meat, but the person who prepared it didn't really care to de-hair the meat, the piece of cow was covered in hair. It was super nasty. 

We also almost died coming back home from Paita today, we were driving in the car, going super fast at like 90 km. When out of no where a stray cow jumped into the road and the driver had to hit the brakes pretty hard and get out of the way. It was pretty crazy, but all is good! Peru plays tomorrow!! They haven't lost a game in over a year, so the pressure is on!! and the world cup is coming up soon!!!! That's about it, everyday here is the best day ever!!!! 

Love, 

Elder Luke Gruber   

Week 37: Burning Room

Hey all, 

This week was really good, it started Tuesday morning with a funny story. We were in a lesson with a new investigator teaching him a lesson, when all of the sudden my companions face goes white, and he looks at me and whispers "hurry up, we have to go", he wouldn't tell me what it was but we quickly finished the lesson and busted out the door. I assumed he either had a bathroom emergency or we got a text saying something was going down. I asked him as we are sprinting to our room what happened, he said "Our room is burning down!!! I left the stove on!". But we got back and everything was good, it gave me a good laugh because my companion freaked. 

Then that same day we got a call from our pensonista, she went to the hospital in  an emergency so she couldn't feed us. So I decided to try and cook some chicken. I bought some raw chicken, but quickly realized we didn't have the tools to cook it. We had a small saute pan, a spoon, and an old unsharpened knife, and no running water to clean anything. But I fried a little bit of chicken, offered an extra long blessing over the food and ate it, it turned out really bad, but was quite the experience. We then found out or pensonista went to the hospital because she got bite by a poisonous spider, everything is good now with her. My companion and I made some Peruvian pancakes this week, with out a packet or anything. We made it for some members, we couldn't try them because we were fasting but they turned out pretty good. It was the first time they had ever eaten pancakes. 

That's about it for the week, I also gave a talk this week on tithing and fasting. I have official been put on the team of finding a new chapel for the church. We are also looking to buy some land to build a chapel. Its kinda fun, something not many people can say they have done, gone chapel hunting. Make everyday the best day ever! 

Love, 

Elder Luke Gruber

Week 36: Baptism

Hey everybody, 

So this week was the bomb!! And it ended with two of the best things in the world. First off we had a baptism for a girl named Pierina, shes 15, her mom and siblings are members but 10 years inactive. She was taught by the missionaries for over 2 years, but her mom wouldn't give her permission. After a year without the missionaries, we came back 2 weeks ago, and her mom said yes, so that was awesome, we didn't think we were going to get permission but after lots of praying and work she was baptized. 

Then yesterday was skype, which is always the bomb! Today was also transfers, but both me and my companion are going to be staying here in pueblo nuevo, it should be another awesome transfer with lots of hard work. We have been focusing our work on getting the members ready to become a branch. A few cool things this week that we did is that we went out contacting with the Ukulele and a hymn book and contacted by offering to sing them a song, it works really well and lots of fun. We also did a district activity called ¨Cancha de oro¨ (field of gold). We brought this soda called Oro to soccer fields where people were playing, stopped the game and offered ever body free soda. With the catch that if they wanted the soda they had to listen to a small message. We got a lot of references and hopefully one of them will progress. That was about it for the week, this next 6 weeks are going to fly by but be a blast, everyday here is the best day ever! 

Love, 

Elder Luke Gruber

Few funny quotes of the week: 

We contacted a door and asked a lady ¨If Jesus were here right now at this door, what would you ask him?¨. We ask that a lot, because we can answer their question and they are a lot more interested in what we have to say. BUT, the lady said she would ask Jesus ¨What are you doing here, shouldn't you be in heaven?¨. She ruined it, me and my companion almost lost it laughing, but were also kinda annoyed. 

A very common thing is we teach people Faith and Repentance, its a short but important lesson. So we normally ask ¨What does faith mean to you?¨. 9 times out of 10 the people respond ¨Faith means to have faith¨ or ¨Faith means to have faith in Christ¨. They don't understand you cant describe a word, by using that same word in the definition.