Letter Dated February 27, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like a pretty interesting week.  Some good snow storms and such.

Yea, so actually we had another pretty good week.

Antontia is for sure getting baptized Friday. So we are pretty excited. We are just getting things ready for it.

Also we are still trying to get Yessid to get baptized. They have lots of good friends in the church.  We just got to help him understand the spirit.  A bit of a challenge sometimes, but he is going to go to the baptism, which I think will help out a ton.

Then unfortunately Gaby and Natalia didn't go to church this week.  But they have PROMISED to go this next week and to go to the baptism of Antonia.  So that will be Fantastic.

We had 5 people go to church this week.  Yessid went with his wife.  Melina (the daughter of the elders quorum president, she is going to get baptized in like 2 weeks, we are teaching them).  Antonia. and the Mom of member went who we are trying to start teaching. So we got lots of good things happening this week. We were pretty stoked.

Actually, right now I am in Bahia Blanca, writing. I gotta do some stuff with my visa. But I'll be back in Castex by Wednesday. So that's good.  I don't have a ton a ton of time to write.  But I wanted you to know that everything is going good out here.

Elder Wagner is from a small town next to the coast.  I don't remember what his city is called.  But that's all good.

I thought it was funny that Abby doesn't like Nate.  Just wait till she sees the real scary guy, hee hee hee.

Anyway. Have a good week.

Love ya'll

Elder Obray.

Letter Dated February 20, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like everything is still going pretty good at home. That's always good.  Tell Nate happy birthday.  He's like 30 now right?  Man, I'll be honest, he's getting old,  ha ha.

Yea, so I haven't explained many of my pictures.  But they are all fro m Quequen, so sometime you will see pictures from Castex, but I gotta finish Quequen first.

Alright, so.  This week also went pretty well.  We had some great things happen.  Well Yeesid  is pretty close to the same.  Or I haven't noticed a lot of progress.  He keeps reading and praying, but he wants something more.  We brought the Stake mission leader to a lesson with him to help us out. We had a good lesson, but we are kinda stuck.  Really I don't know what else we can do. We have explained things to him very clearly.  And he understands. But he is looking for a bit more. Really he just doesn't have a testimony yet that the Book of Mormon is true, and that Joesph Smith was a prophet.

So now I am finally getting to some Castex pictures. You'll get all Castex pictures next week.

So we just keep trying things with Yessid.

Antonia progressed really well this week.  She even dreams about getting baptized.  Cool huh?  She wants to get  baptized this week. So we are going to try (we gotta do a lot of stuff before she can get baptized)  but she accepts everything, and loves the church.  Her health is doing better as well. She has been sleeping a lot better. So I am happy for that.  She  went to church this week.  We are pretty excited. 

We also got a few new investigators.

1st Gaby and her 11 year old daughter Natalia. They are neighbors to a good member family.  The 11 year old is awesome. She describes things in a good way.  When we asked her how she felt when she was reading, she said "its like Jesus is standing right in front of me giving me a bug hug"   Well, I can't think of a better way to describe that....  Anyway we taught them 3 times this week. Which is great. They didn't go to church though.  Probably cause the dad doesn't really like the idea of them going to the Mormon church..... But we are going to keep on working.

So those are the best  investigator stories that happened.  Now for other exciting news.  Elder Stutz got transferred to Necochea! So he is now gone.  I already have my new companion.  He is from Texas.  Elder Wagner.  He has 6 months in the mission.  He is a great kid. 

So now you know.  Everything changed once again.  So, yea that was fun.  We said goodbye to a lot of  people for Elder Stutz.  Elder Wagner was actually in the same MTC group as Elder Stutz.  Weird huh.

Thanks for sending the shoes.  I hope to see them some day! Ha ha. I'm sure I will in a few weeks.  

Anyway, that's all I got for you this week.  Enjoy your week. 

Love ya

Elder Obray

Letter Dated February 13, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like you guys are doing a bit of missionary work!  That's awesome!  Keep that up.  We always stress to the members here to look for and pray for opportunities to share the gospel, cause God will help us to achieve the righteous desires of our heart, and that is one of the very best things we can do is share.

So I'm glad your week went well.

Our week out here went really well.  A lot of pretty good things happened.

Alright, so this week.

First we continued to work with Yessid.  We didn't get a lot of progress, he has read a lot and prayed a lot, but he still doesn't feel like he's gotten an answer. So it's a bit complicated.  But he did go to church for the full three hours.  We were happy about that.  But we still can't commit him to baptism.  But we will keep going.

Alright so now on to the really cool stuff that happened.

The best thing is that we found a lady named Antonia, we found her trying to avoid a HUGE rain storm. We saw the deadly clouds and knew we would be 100 percent soaked if we didn't get into a house. SO we did warped knocking which is we ran house to house trying to find one.  Cause we only had a few minutes.  And it started to pour right as we knocked her door and luckily she let us in.  Whew.  So then we taught her L1, which went really well, she accepted everything, even a baptismal day.  She even asked us where the church was!  And we fixed a cita to pass by in 2 days.  Which we did, and she was waiting for us!  Which is odd.  So we taught lesson two and talked about how she felt.  And she told us she read and prayed and felt really good while reading and praying.  Alright so we were happy.  Then we passed by again on Saturday.

So Saturday we passed by.  And she told us her story, right.  So apparently her husband and son died in a car crash. So she was struggling. Then one day she asked God to send her some people that could help her.  And the NEXT day we knock her door. She saw it as an answer to her prayers.

So she went to church on Sunday. She liked it a lot.  We were pretty excited that we could actually be a small part in this whole thing.

I hope that all made sense, cause I'm not re-reading it.

So that was the coolest thing that happened this week.

Then I don't know if you remember Enrique, we kinda dropped him for a bit, but we talked to him Saturday night.  And he went to church, (which was a huuuuuge surprise).  Well he kinda forgets things. And couldn't remember what the sacrament was.  So when they passed the bread he said very loudly for a silent room, hey whats this?  Then with the water, Oohhh Gracias esta Frescito. or wow thanks its nice and cold.... ha ha.  I almost laughed.  Well I thought it was funny.  Maybe its just cause he is like 65 and kinda a funny guy.

So we had  3 people in church. We were happy.

Anyway we actually had a lot of other things happen.  That was pretty good.  But you got the best of it all.  We did see hail the size of golf balls that was cool.  Some where even the size of a tennis ball. Crazy huh. Yea we hid under someones patio, ha ha.

Anyway hope you guys all have a good week this week.  It's already transfers week.  I doubt I'll leave, but maybe Elder Stutz.  Apparently we are getting 40 new missionaries this transfer!  Which is a ton.  We will have 200 missionaries here now.

Enjoy.

love ya

Elder Obray

Letter Dated February 6, 2012

Dear Mom and Dad;

Well sounds like a pretty interesting week. Glad I wasn't home and sick, ha ha, that would not be fun....  But other then that it sounds alright. Girls camp will be interesting with the new change.

So this week in the field was a bit interesting.  I don't think quite as much happened, ha ha.

So. 1st we did divisions Tuesday after district meeting and it went through Wednesday. I went to General Pico which is like an hour north of Castex with Elder Himebaugh. Elder Himebaugh is from South Jordan Utah. He learned Spanish before his mission though, so he speaks really well. He only went to the MTC for 2 weeks then he got put out here. Crazy huh. Anyway he is a way good missionary. We worked hard. Found some new investigators. And it looks like they should have a baptism in a few week. That will be great for them.

I got back to my area late Wednesday.  So Thursday through Sunday I worked in my area.  We had some decent success, maybe not as much as I would like.  But we did alright.

So We found one investigator named Jaun Carlos who is interested, but only sort of. So we are trying to find a way into his heart. But its a bit hard. But he did say he was going to read and pray. So we shall see what happens.

With Yesid, well, we taught some more, but we really are in the same place. He reads, he prays, but he doesn't feel like he needs to be baptized in the church. Really he just isn't so sure that the church was restored by Joseph Smith. So we shall see what happens there. This week he is going to try super hard to read and pray everyday and ask specifically if Joseph Smith was a profeta of God, and if the Book of Mormon is true. So he should get an answer.  But who knows. I think he might have already gotten an answer, but maybe he's scared to follow his answer.

Those are the two biggest things that happened.  We didn't have any progress with anyone else. 

Flia Mason, a family in the ward gave us a HUGE bowl of canned apricots.  They are really good.  Just so you know.  They are fresh two, just canned.

We did find out something interesting. We have a list of members right? And on the side of one name, Teresa, it said her husband was dead right? So we passed by one day and she was there (she is an older lady) and we talked. She told us she wants us to pass by and talk with her husband.  So we thought she was crazy.  Elder Stutz had passed by and never seen her husband before. So we passed by and he was there... we were surprised.... i guess he wasn't dead after all.....

Anyway.  Hope everyone feels way better this week.  Just so you know, that flu isn't in Argentina yet. Hurray! 

Have a good week ill talk to you next week.

Oh, I think the pictures are of Quequen, a catholic church. They have cool churches. And a kid Nahuel. His dad is M.A. I think I wrote about him a few times.

Anyhow. 

Love ya

Elder Obray