I'M GETTING SO OLD!!!! :P (Mission Age, That Is..) (Week 22/ Month 5!)

Hey guys!  How are you all doing? :)

Hope all is going great! :)

This week has been good and very productive.  I had a lot of exchanges, but I loved it!  I went on exchanges with Sister Rolfson twice this week and an exchange with Sister Nicholson.  Both sisters are so precious and have such sweet spirits!  I had wonderful experiences with them!  Sister Rolfson has such a strong testimony, and she has such a beautiful Spirit!  :)  We were teaching Margarita, whom is a new investigator, and during our lesson, she was wonderful help!  Even though the lesson was in Spanish, she was wonderful help, and I was able to translate a bit for her.  Sister Nicholson and I got to give four Temple tours on Thursday together, and they were wonderful!  She is a beautiful teacher, and her testimony is radiant!  I had a lot of fun with her. :)

Guess what?! WE HAVE A BAPTISM DATE!!!! :D  MY FIRST ONE! :D  Margarita, whom we picked up as an Investigator this week, wants to be baptized! :)  She has a baptismal date for May 2nd!  And we are so excited! :)  We went and visited on Wednesday, which was kind of a last minute decision, and showed her the new #GraciasAQueElVive video (You should watch it in Spanish!  It is the best one! ;D)  She loved it!  She felt the Spirit!  She has such a strong testimony that God loves her, and Christ lives, so it was a wonderful experience!  On Saturday evening, after watching the Womens Broadcast, Hna. Bello (a member) invited us to come over and teach Margarita!  Sister Rolfson was with me, so I was the one who pretty much taught the lesson.  (Thank goodness my Spanish is AWESOME! :D) The Spirit was so strong and so powerful, and Margarita was so open to our message.  I wasn't planning on inviting her to be baptized, because I was just not sure if it was the right time.  But after she prayed to know if what we taught was true, and she said yes, I felt the Spirit confirm to me that I needed to invite her.  And she said yes! :D  I am just so excited, and I am so happy for her!  So please pray for her! :)

Womens Conference was wonderful!  The Spirit was so strong, and I learned so much!  The family truly is so important.  In the world today, the Family truly is under attack.  And my family means everything to me! (Shout out to mi Familia! Te quiero!)  We really need to stand our ground and defend what we hold so dear to our hearts.  I know that it will only get worse, and our time is running out!  We must prepare our families for the worst, and we must be strong.  During the conference, I wrote a list of things that I want to apply once I have my own family, and I have made a promise that I will make sure these things will be put into practice always in my family.  So I would encourage each of you to make a list of things that you are currently doing, or wishing to do with your family, to ensure that your family is strong for what comes instore!  (EXAMPLE: Reading scriptures daily, praying daily, FHE, and attending church weekly, etc.)  So that is my invitation for all of you!  So.. Do it. :)

If you didn't get the chance to watch it, WATCH IT!  If you can't watch it.. LISTEN TO IT! :P  :)  I promise that what was shared will touch your heart!  Also, share the new #BecauseHeLives video!  It is so awesome!  I LITERALLY watch it 5 or 6 times a day! It is THAT good! :)

Thank you so much for everything!  I love you guys! :)

#BecauseHeLives (English): http://www.mormon.org/easter?cid=HP_FR_3-27-2015_dMIS_fMRMN_xLIDyL1-A_

#GraciasAQueElVive (Espanol): http://www.mormon.org/spa/pascua (This one is the best! ;))

Con Amore,

Hna. Rachel Duncan

Spanish of The Week:

Que chistoso!:

(K-Chee-stow-so)

How funny! or That is so funny!

So excited for #genconf! :D

♪ Called to Serve Him, Heavenly King of Glory, Chosen E'er to... ♪ "...IS THAT DAVID ARCHULETA?!" (Week 21)

SUP! :D

How are you all doing?!  Hope all is well!  Well, this has been a PRETTY eventful week! :D  (None to say the least..)

Not much new happened this week! Still working with Yasmin and Maria! We haven't been able to teach Yasmin for almost 2 weeks! But a miracle did happen! :) Yasmin and Emilia came to the Temple/Choir thing on Wednesday! :) It was wonderful! Unfortunately, we didn't get to give them a Temple tour because Emilia was really sick and it was cold outside... But we hope we can give them one soon! :) 

Maria wants to get baptized! :) We taught her the first lesson and she says she wants to get baptized! We are so excited! She wants to get baptized in May, but hopefully as we teach her, she will want to move her date sooner! But I am sooooooo excited! :) She is so ready! :)

We got to go to the Temple with Janet (a member we visit) for the first time! It was so beautiful! She was so nervous and so excited! We stood in front of the doors for a good 30 seconds and just let her soak it all in, and then opened the doors. The look in her eyes was priceless! I could tell that she was overwhelmed with the Spirit, because she had tears in her eyes. :) But she loved it! I LOVED IT! :) Hna. Bullough, Hna. Roos, Janet and I all got to do baptisms. It has been awhile since I have done baptisms! It was really fun! :) I was sitting by her before we did baptisms and asked her what she was thinking. She said, "I think I want to come here every week! And I think I want to come here sooner with Jorge! (Her husband)" They are both preparing to get sealed! They just have to set an appointment and get their work done! So I am really excited! I love her so much! She is one of my best friends here! :)

So if you have not heard yet about this... Here you go!

So yesterday we had a mission wide training for the new Easter inititive!  It was awesome!  I am SO excited for what is in store!  The video is really cool too! :)  It comes out this Saturday, so make sure you watch it, and SHARE, SHARE, SHARE!!! :)  Anyways, so after the training, President Orgill asked us to "stretch" and stand up and we started singing "Called to Serve".  Before I go on, I should mention that Sister Orgill told us we HAD to sit in the front pew or else "We were going to regret it."  At the beginning of the meeting, I was really confused... Haha :)  But anyways, we start singing and Sister Orgill comes with someone to the stand and it is...

DAVID. FLIPPING. ARCHULETA.

DAVID ARCHULETA.

David Archuleta was literally 5 feet away from me.

Did I mention that I saw David Archuleta?  In the flesh?

Yeah.

Cool Right?

:D

Anyways!  So yeah!  I got to meet David Archuleta!!!!!! :D  Woah!  It was so cool!  And yes, he did sing. ^_^  He is indeed, an Angel.  HE EVEN SANG IN SPANISH!!!!!! :D  AND I UNDERSTOOD IT!!!!! :'D  It was so awesome!  He even talked to me! :)  (Kind of?)  He was helping take care of chairs after we took some pictures and someone was trying to take a picture with him, and he had chairs in his hands, and he was like, "Uhh..."  So I was like, "I GOT IT! :D"  And he said, "Oh, thank you Hermana.... Duncan?.."  :D HE KNOWS MY NAME! hahahaaha ;D

It was awesome!  :)

This week has been really good! :)

Hope you guys are doing great!  Thanks for the support and love!  You are all so amazing! :)  

Te quiero! <3

Hna. Rachel Duncan

It is March.. And it is 100 Degrees Outside... :P *Whimper* (Week 20)

Hola everyone! How are you? :)  I hope you are all doing great!

It is so freaking hot.

Ugh.

This week has been so wonderful!  I feel like Hna. Bullough and I are working so well together, and I just love her to pieces!  I have learned so much from her, and I continue to do so every day!  right now our goal for this week is to be obedient to time.  We have always been trying to do so, but that is our goal for this week!  :)

We have a new investigator! :)  Her name is Maria!  She is sooooo sweet!  And we only met her yesterday... AT CHURCH!  her story is pretty cool! :)  She came with Hna. Maquina, the RS Pres., because I guess they work together! Anyways, Maria awhile ago was visiting a friend at a hospital, (whom is a member) and the missionaries came over every day to visit her.  While she was there, the missionaries would teach lessons, and after having only listened to them once, she knew that it was true and she wanted to learn more.  Hna. Marquina introduced her to us, and we stayed with her for most of the day. :)  Luckily, it was our conferencia del Barrio! (ward conference) and almost every talk given was about important covenants that we make!  Like.... BAPTISM! :D Yay! :)  The best part of it all was that there was an actual baptism right after church!  She was sooo excited and she wanted to come so bad! :)  It was wonderful!  The whole time we were at the baptism, all she could say was, "QUE LINDO!" (Thats like saying cute or beautiful)  After the baptism Hna. Marquina asked us if we could have the Elders give her a blessing because she has knee problems, and she was so excited.  After she received the blessing the only thing she could say was, "Tengo calor! Que es eso?"  We explained to her that it was the Holy Ghost, and she was brimming with joy that she was about in tears!  She was on Cloud 9! :) After the baptismal service we introduced her to Sister Shelly, a sister that works in the Mission Office, and she was talking about how she was so excited to be baptized and that she wanted to go to the Salt Lake Temple as soon as she could!  At this point I was just dying inside because I couldn't believe my ears!  I had only met this women only a few hours before, and she was already inviting people to her baptism!  She is 100% GOLDEN!!!  She told us that she wants to get baptized as soon as she could, but all we have to do is teach her!  So we are planning on meeting with her on Tuesday!  We are so excited, and we are so grateful for this tender mercy that we have received!  I am so excited for Maria!  Please keep her in your prayers!  Her spirit is so strong and so amazing! :)

A recent convert went through the Temple for the first time this week!  It was wonderful to see her there!  I could tell she was really scared and nervous, but I know she felt the Spirit!  She really enjoyed it!  Hopefully we will be able to go with Emilia some time soon!  We are really hoping she will be able to go! I know that she wants to! :)

Yasmin is still making slow progress, but she is getting there!  She hasn't gone to church for almost 2 months... And it makes me sad!  But we are not giving up hope!  We know that she is progressing, and that is all that matters!  She is more open to praying and she has been very accepting to everything we teach her.  The only thing she truly struggles is knowing that God answers prayers and that he loves her.  That is a normal thing for investigators, but as a member for my whole life, I just want to grab her and shake her and just say, "GOD LOVES YOU! JUST ACCEPT IT! BELIEVE WHAT WE TELL YOU!!! AHHHHH!!!!"..... But that is not very appropriate now is it? Haha :)  And really what we tell her really determines nothing.  We can tell her as much as we wanted to, but she is the one to determine what she believes and what she accepts!  That is why we have agency!  And as a missionary I am learning about agency every single day.  I have a very strong testimony of agency, and I continue to grow because of it!  And I hope that you all do to! :)  

I am so excited for General Conference this next few weeks!  I am just really excited because all our 'gators and Recent Converts will be there!  It is so exciting! :)  I love General Conference!  Not only because you get to listen to the Prophet and the Apostles, but you get to hear The Lord speak to us through them.  It is completely different when you think of it that way, right? :)  

I love you guys!  Hope you are all doing great! :)

Adios! :D

Hna. Rachel Duncan

SPANISH OF THE WEEK!: (Sorry I have been forgetting lately... :P)

Dia Feliz San Patricio! (Dee-uh-Fell-ez-san-pat-ree-c-oh)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

P.S:  Congrats to Julie and Sarah!  So happy for both of you!  I wish you both the best!  I wish I could have been there to wish you congrats on your wedding days!  :)  

Week One With My Companion and She is Trying to Kill Me.. :D ( Week 19)

Buenos Dias! :D

Como estan?!  I hope all is well for you guys! :)  How is life? What is happening?  :D

It is so weird that I have been almost been out for 4 1/2 months, but the weirdest thing of it all is the fact that practically 1/4 of my class is already engaged.  Way to go guys! haha :)  Congrats to all my classmates who just got their mission calls!  Sorry if I haven't personally emailed you, I would love to write all of you, but that is just kind of hard as a missionary.. haha :) But I'll figure something out! haha :)

This week has been great! :)  I got a new companion!  Her name is Hermana Bullough! :)  I love her so much!  She has helped me with so many things, and it is kind of a relief.  A lot has been going on lately, and it has been nice having her around! :)  We speak a lot of Spanish too, so that is nice! :)  

This week has been crazy!  We kind of had a change with transfers than what was expected, so we had a lot of work to do this week, and it was nice to be kept busy!  We did a lot of service this week too, and we have had a lot of opportunities to meet new people!  Plus, with Hna. Bullough, we are going to try to see formers that she had when she was in the area before! Well... We are going to TRY.  This week we have planned is CRAZY I think two days in a row we have 2 dinners planned with different people... So we may or may not be able to eat for a while afterwards!  But hey, Hna. Bullough said one time they had 4 dinners in one night, so if she was able to do it then, we can do it now! :) 

Amalia! (Emilia's daughter and Yasmin's sister)

Yasmin is making so much progress! We got to see her 3 times this week! So that is good! :) The first time we went to visit her we taught her about the commandments! We did the PB&J lesson, which was really fun. We asked her to be the "chef" and she was suppose to tell us how to make a PB&J sandwich, and we were pretending that we had no idea how to make one. She was very specific on how we were suppose to make the sandwich, and we did exactly what we were told, and it was really fun! Afterwards we explained all the commandments and how we should always follow him. I think she had an "Aha!" Moment, and she said, "I think we need to follow the commandments because he knows better than we do, and we don't see the whole picture." So she is finally getting it! :) We are super happy about it, and we are really excited! :) Hopefully she will be more open to being baptized! :)

Unfortunately...Ariana, Ernesto, and Iris dropped us. Their parents don't want us to confuse them, so they asked us to stop seeing them. We told Ariana that we respect her wishes and that we hope she remembers everything that she has learned. So hopefully she will run into some missionaries and want to be taught! :)

So, as I was saying earlier, we have been doing a lot of service this week!  And one day we were doing service for a lady, who is not a member. We were moving some stuff out of her storage unit and Elder Ortiz asked if I could hold onto their phone since I had pockets.  I said sure, and we got to work.  After we had loaded the truck and had left, I realized that I still had their phone in my pocket! :P  They were driving behind the lady and we were right behind them.  We had stopped at a stop light and Hna. Bullough then tells me, "Quick!  Go run out and give it to them!"  And I'm like... WHAAAAAT?! That is crazy! But I did it anyways, and ran out in the middle of oncoming traffic, and ran to their car, they opened the door and I threw it at them and ran back to the car.  

*DISCLAIMER*

There were no missionaries harmed in the process of this act.

So yeah.  This week has been great! :)  Hope it gets better! :)  Have a good week, and remember that I love you all so much! :) Talk to you next week! :) 

Con Amor,

Hna. Rachel Duncan

MIRACLES! MIRACLES EVERYWHERE! :D (Week 17)

Hello everyone!!!


So this week was great! I loved Zone Conference this week!  It was so helpful, and I learned so much.  I especially loved Pres. Orgill's training, and I feel like it has been very helpful for me personally this past week.  I am trying to apply all of these things that I have learned into my everyday work, and it has been wonderful. :)  I loved President Lutz' training, about avoiding distractions.  There are a lot of times where I feel like I am being distracted, such as when we are in stores and a song I know is playing, or when my thoughts wander to my family and friends, and at those moments, I pray to have the Spirit of discernment with me and that those worldly thoughts go away.  And most of the time they do. :)  I always try to have a prayer in my heart to be able to hear with my Spiritual ears, and to see with my Spiritual eyes, and I have witnessed marvelous things. 


This week has been wonderful, mainly because.... WE HAVE 4 NEW INVESTIGATORS!!!! :D  Yay!  We picked up 4 incredible investigators, who are GOLDEN!!!!  The first one we picked up is Ch.., whom was a referral from Pa..., a member in our ward. We met with him and his sister, whom we were originally trying to pick up as well, and Pa..., Mi..., and An... were there for the lesson! (All whom are members!)  It was kind of weird at first, because there were a lot of people at there house, so we waited outside and just talked to the members until they were done.  Unfortunately, Pa...'s sister in-law, had lost her baby due to a miscarriage, and the reason why there were so many people there, was because they were doing a little prayer ritual for the baby.  It was very sad, and we have been praying for the family. When Ch... and Ja... came out (the referrals).  We began by first talking to them, and getting to know them better.  I knew right away that Ch... was super interested, and his sister was NOT.  She would randomly leave during the lesson, and she really wasn't paying attention.  But Ch... was asking questions left and right and he just was so interested, and I know he wants to learn more.  But sadly, before we got to the First Vision, his mom and sister came and started bashing and saying, "Where is it in the bible?  If it doesn't say it in the Bible, it's not true!"  And I actually know a scripture in the bible that does prophesy of Joseph Smith, but we didn't want to make it worse.  For a good 10 minutes we just sat there while the members and the mom and sister argued about everything.  The mom was trying to pull her son away, and we said, "Wait, can we end with a prayer and with our testimonies?"  And Hna. Roos bore her testimony of all the things Joseph Smith witnessed and done and of prayer, and it was so powerful.  We ended with a prayer, and they left.  But we got only half of their address, and they were suppose to meet with us again this past Wednesday, but they never came.  We have no way of finding them, and we are going to keep trying, but it is just so frustrating when things like this happen! :P


This week Em... got really sick and had to go to the Emergency Room!  We were really scared!  She had gone to the doctor and he told her that she needed to go to the ER right away, because they thought she had a Ovarian Cancer.  She called us and we went straight to the hospital and stayed with her for almost 6 hours since her husband was at work and her kids were at home.  Elder Ortiz and Elder Delcamp came and gave her a blessing, and I think it helped a lot.  She had an MRI, a CAT Scan and a culture done and they found nothing wrong, just some severe digestive problems.  She is taking some medicine, but she is still in a lot of pain, so please keep her in your prayers!


The other miracle was when we visited Ar...!  She is one of the other investigators we picked up this week!  We contacted her about 3 or 4 weeks ago on the street by her house, and she seemed really interested!  We called her and she was open with meeting us, and we scheduled to meet her on Friday.  We met her outside of her house and started talking with her and we started the lesson, and then these 2 kids walked up to us, and Ariana said, "I invited my friends to come, I hope that is okay?" .......OH COURSE IT'S OKAY! :D We went back a little and briefly taught them what we already went through, and continued with the lesson.  As we read the First Vision together, the Spirit was soooooo strong.  It was amazing! :)  We invited them to pray to know if what we had taught them was true, and invited them to wait after they prayed to just sit there and to let the Spirit testify.  After they sat for a while, they all opened their eyes, and they were just glowing! :)  We asked Ar... how she felt and she said, "I feel like someone gave me a huge warm hug!"  And I was thinking, "YES!  HEAVENLY FATHER GAVE YOU THAT HUG!" :) It was so wonderful.  The other two, Ir... and Er..., said they felt the same thing, and it was just so awesome! :)  We are visiting them this Friday, and we are hoping that we can invite them to church this Sunday!  We met Ar...'s mom, and she isn't all for this, but she said that if Ar... wants to visit with us, she can, but I know that when we invite her to be baptized, it's going to cause some probs.... SO PLEASE PRAY FOR THEM!!! :D


Love you guys mucho!
Love,
Hna. Rachel Duncan