Every Word

Today for P-day our district visited a public garden, and it was pretty cheap to enter, only 2700 pesos. It was nice and we got to see a lot of cool plants and walk around, talk and take group pictures.

I’ll send some pictures when I get them. I found some crazy pepper plant and my whole district told me that it was super spicy, but I love spicy food... especially spicy peppers. Anyway, it was really good! Later I itched one of my eyes and I cried a little. :´(

Earlier this week we had a great Zone meeting with the President. He told me that he liked my haircut, so that's pretty good. Everyone has started telling me I look like Leonardo Decaprio again. Ha! 

The Zone meeting was focused on using “inspired questions” to help our investigators think, feel the Spirit, and learn, as we gain a clearer idea of their needs. We had a good practice session. We also had a Preach My Gospel section hunt, and the winners got to choose from various prizes. I was trying to win the Nesquick chocolate milk mix, but was too slow.

We had fewer lessons this week but met some new people and one new investigator went to church with us yesterday. Tonight we will be having a Family Home Evening with a member family. Some investigators and less-actives will be there. We plan on talking about families.

My companion laughs soo weird, it is the funniest laugh I've ever heard!

Every time he laughs, we all start laughing! 

We have been visiting a new investigator named JR. He speaks English all right, and has tons of instruments sitting around his house. Last night we had a really spiritual lesson and he told us how he needs the peace in his soul that our lessons bring. We explained about how our spirits need the scriptures, need prayer, need to go to church, or we get weak. Jesus said, not by bread alone lives man, but by every word that proceeds forth out of the mouth of God. 

I have to give a talk in our ward next week. I've pretty much finished writing it. It's about Missionary Work (Surprise, surprise) and it's going to be fantastic.

Have A Great Week

Love Elder Z

Where's Waldo

We have had a lot more lessons with members present this week and the lessons are always better with members present. 

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned it yet but we have a baptismal date with Iligia Rodriguez (Oscar’s mom) and she is reading the BOM every night, going to church every Sunday, and Praying to receive her answer. Awesome. When people do these 3 things they are golden. The rest of the Rodriguez family has been busier but Damian, the 12-year-old son, has been going to church with his Grandma, Iligia. He still says he wants to be Mormon and serve a mission.

Juan Carlos has been progressing quickly and though he came from an anti-Mormon Christian church, he feels that this is The True Church! The 1st visit we had with him, he asked about baptisms for the dead and we talked a little about the Temple and showed him Corinthians 15. He got REALLY happy, and talked about how his cousin had died and that his church leaders had told him he was going to hell because he lacked baptism. We told him if this were true all of them would go to hell because they lack the authority to baptize! He told us that he had been having dreams in which his cousin had been asking for him to help him and that somehow Juan Carlos could do something. He feels that he should be baptized for his cousin! We just got to get Juan Carlos baptized first! Great guy! He has been studying the BOM, praying and going to church every Sunday (3 times as of yesterday).  We asked him if he received his answer yet and he told us about a weird dream that he had.  He told us that in his dream he walked to church with only one shoe on! Haha He wanted to know what it meant...

Earlier that same day, while looking for Waldo in my Where's Waldo book I bought (Donde esta Wally?), I had mentioned to Elder Reeve that trying to find the true church is like trying to find Waldo, thanks to the great apostasy! 

The last page is the hardest because it is filled with hundreds of Waldos...

The only difference between the rest and the real Waldo is that the real Waldo is missing a shoe. I know this sounds weird but I had literally been thinking a lot about this that same day, and I started laughing so hard when Juan told me about his dream!!

We also have been teaching an old man named Nelson, who is also going to church, reading, and praying. 

The cool thing is that all these people are not only going to church but stay for the whole 3 hours! We are planning on getting a lot more baptismal dates this week! 

Well there are more people to write about but I’m out of time...

Love you guys! Elder Rod Zierenberg 

Another Crazy, Great Week.

Another Crazy, Great Week.

The sad day has finally passed and I can no longer say I have never tasted alcohol...   We had a lesson with Jenni, a less active, and her non-member friend, Rebeca.  We met up the street from Jenni’s house, in her father's Peruvian restaurant.  After the lesson I noticed some little goblets of ice cream. Jenni noticed that I was studying the Peruvian desserts and quickly brought some goblet of ice cream to our table.  My companion took a spoonful of vanilla ice cream and I saw what looked like some caramel colored juice drip from his spoon. As he went back for a second spoonful I tried my first and tasted something alcoholic... It tastes the way it smells. I looked to my companion with surprise and said this is alcohol!!! He looked at me and he knew it was true!  I ate a spoon of alcohol with Ice cream!!!!  Man, I was more mad about loosing my Word of Wisdom streak than anything else!!

We asked Jenni and she confirmed that it was alcohol, and asked if that was alright in Ice cream. We told her “no” and she realized that it wasn't for her either.

Rebeca has accepted to be baptized when she receives her answer.  So that's awesome! We will set the baptismal date in the next lesson.

Juan Carlos, a reference we received and contacted, is progressing very quickly, and went to church with us on Sunday after the first lesson. He is thrilled about The Church and about the Restoration! He accepted to be baptized when he receives his answer and so we will be teaching him about The Book of Mormon and will set the baptismal date in the next lesson. 

The Rodriguez family has been a little busier but we just had a family home evening with them and a member family on Saturday. It was cool and we watched The Restoration video.

Everyone was super mad and sad when Colombia lost the soccer (fútbol) game vs Brazil. When Germany played against Brazil everyone here acted like they were German and cheered for every one of the 7 goals Germany made!  It was funny because everyone was so mad at Brazil that they loved watching Germany destroy 7-1. The good feelings for Germany has continued and everyone here is happy for the Victory.

I'm looking forward to this week and the work we will do to bring more brothers and sisters to the Light. 

Joseph Smith was called, ordained, and given the keys to begin what Peter called “the times of restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began” (Acts 3:21), and what Paul described as “the dispensation of the fullness of times,” in which God would “gather together in one all things in Christ” (Eph. 1:10).

Love

Every single one of ya,

Elder Zierenberg

Working Hard in Federman

My new companion is Elder Coronel from Colombia.  He’s a 28-year-old fellow and of African/Latin descent.  Elder Coronel and I have been working hard here in the Federman Ward, (in Bogota).  We have been receiving tons of references and contacting is a lot of fun.

As a missionary, daily and social experiences facilitate the development of a professional ability to talk to, get to know, connect, and gain trust from individuals and groups of people in minutes. I love talking to Colombians!

Elder Coronel and I have met a ton of new people this week. A special family in particular is the Rodriguez Family. We received their reference from a family in our ward and initially we contacted them by teaching them English.  They are very motivated to learn English and that has opened them to take the discussions. We taught them the Restoration and they were very interested and had a lot of questions. We talked about the Book of Mormon and they all wanted their own copy except for the wife (Angelica). Oscar (the father) and his mom (The grandma) were thrilled about Joseph Smith’s story! Oscar and Angelica’s 12 year old son, Damian, said he wanted to be Mormon and serve a mission after the first lesson!! The other son, named Gabriel, is 4 years old. Angelica (the mom) wasn’t present for the whole lesson and didn’t get to experience it was the others did. She gave the closing prayer and mentioned that she is Catholic in her prayer.

The next time we visited them we focused on her, using inspired questions, and she really opened up. She explained that she had had difficulty in having children a while back and had gone to some Catholic convention and prayed to ``The Virgin´´ asking for a baby. She explained that she felt a lot of peace and then a year or so later Gabriel was born.

Well, not wanting to talk about why we don’t pray to the Virgin, we explained how Jesus’ mother was a member of the church that Jesus formed, and that our purpose as missionaries was to invite her to find out what church is Christ’s true church. We expressed our desire for their whole family’s happiness and how we, having received our answer, want them to receive their own answers individually.

We then gave her a Book of Mormon and she said she would start reading it!  The next morning I studied a little about the Virgin Mary and about all of Jesus’ brothers and sisters. A question I’ve asked investigators here to think about is ``Who did Jesus and the Virgin pray to??´´

Cesar Zamora has been doing great!! He has stayed away from the drugs for weeks now!! He’s really gaining control of his life and is super happy!  He is an English Professor and still works in our area! We got to talk to him last week and will again tomorrow as well. I love his New York accent!

Sweet P-days... Elder Reeve, from Australia, Elder Quispe, from Peru, Elder Coronel and I will be battling in some games of RISK!!!

I found a box of Lucky Charm Cereal today and bought a ``?Donde Esta Wally?´´ (Where’s Waldo)!!!  There’s an awesome book, music, and tech store called `Panamericana´ near our apartment. It sells tons of products from the US.

Anyway!!

Happy Birthday Dad!

Love Elder Z