I love them all...

Rio Yasica in Jenna’s area in Madre Vieja

Family!!!!!

I had a great week this week. I met the people we're teaching this week, and I love them all. I truly care about each one of them. (No pictures this week 😢)

This week I finally got scheduled to go to the hospital for some tests so I can get my residency card. And I finally realized my breakthrough in deciphering Dominican Spanish when I had conversations with the Uber driver, the doctor, and the lady who lead us through the hospital. I did not catch every word but I finally feel like I'm getting somewhere.

I am in San Cristobal, which is close enough to the capital that we enjoy some capital perks, but it's far enough outside the capital that the people are still friendly and let you talk to them. It's a lot richer than my other area so I get lots of big, pretty houses to contact.

I finally got the Liahona magazine with the April general conference talks! It's been a blast. Elder Uchtdorf made a point about how as we improve our study of the scriptures, we'll be able to talk about it more naturally with other people (or something to that effect) and I can testify of that. I used to get stuck when I had to tell people what the Book of Mormon is because I had a super limited understanding of its power. But now I know what it means to me, and that makes it a lot easier to share with other people.

I'm so excited for Paulino and Marisol! They're the most lovely people, and they really want to get baptized. They've been living together for 3 years, but now they're working hard to save money and get their paperwork so they can get married! It is so stinkin’ expensive and complicated to get married in this country, and so people just move in together. They also stopped drinking coffee and come to church every Sunday. I'm so excited for them!!

I love you family! Have a great week!
Love,
Hermana Ludlam

Diligent Worker in the Lord's Vineyard

Jenna now lives in San Cristobal, next to the capital!

Hi family,

I'm in San Cristobal! It's close to the capital. My new companion is Hermana Acalá. She is from Mexico. They are whitewashing my other area. It's been a crazy past 24 hours. (This means that both sister missionaries were transferred out of Azuá and Jenna spent the night cleaning and packing to move today. She is about 1.5 hours away from her first area now. She is exhausted!)

I am tired.

I am an AUNT! Congratulations to Grant and Rebecca!! And happy birthday to Grant!! And happy Father's Day to fathers.

I don't have a way to upload photos in this area, sorry. I will try to find an adapter.

This Friday was the second time Hermana Rubio and I woke up and there was a bazillion fly larvae things worming around the floors. We spent a few hours flooding the house and sweeping all our problems out the front door and down the steps into the streets. Now I'm not in that house anymore.

This week I read in Jacob 5 in the Book of Mormon, also known as the Allegory of the Olive Trees (or the Allegory of Our Savior's Love). I always skimmed over it, thinking that the symbolism of grafting wild olive branches into natural olive trees was too deep for someone like me to understand. But this week I read it and I understood it and it made me happy. I want to be the kind of servant that works diligently in the Lord's vineyard. The Lord of the vineyard stressed that time is running out and it helped me feel the urgency that Elder Cook wanted us to feel when he talked to us in the CCM (Missionary Training Center in Mexico).

Landmark: La Catedral de Nuestra Señora de La Consolación

I love my family very much. Have a great week.

Love,
Hermana Ludlam

I love that blue book!

She ain't heavy, she's my sista!

Fam,

The beach at Monte Rio

I went to the beach today for a zone activity! We had to hike a ways to get to the pretty part with white sand and blue waves, and I got bitten by flies, but we had the whole cove to ourselves! We climbed over some giant dead coral thing and on the other side was this slope with a gazillion giant conch shells bigger than my hand! There wasn't anywhere to walk except ON the shells because there were so many. Most had been bleached out, but I found a nice orange one and I cleaned it so now its pretty and gleamy.

Our mission president challenged us to read the Book of Mormon in 65 days. I am super behind but I love this opportunity to read it all the way through in a short period of time because I get this cool bird's eye view of what's actually in that book. Its a very special book, and I LOVE when I get to introduce it to people. It's exciting when they get it! and say stuff like, "Well, entonces, this is a super important book!" and I don't really know how to affirm their statement, so I just kind of point at them and say, "Si!" or "Exactamente!"

Golden Girls

I like how the Book of Mormon is clearly written for our day. Not just that it has a bunch of prophecies about our day, or that our society can relate to a lot of the problems Nephi's people have, but also because Nephi just kind of knew exactly what to write, and what to put in the plates and what not to put on the plates. As I've been reading the Book of  Mormon, all I can think about is how God is super masterful and how carefully everything in history was orchestrated and the final product is this super slick blue paperback tool. I love that blue book and I know its true with all my heart. I know the Book of Mormon came from exactly where it says it came from, and that Joseph Smith translated it with the power of God. I know that what the Book of Mormon teaches is true. It's worth every effort you make to read it.

I'm finishing another transfer here, so it is likely that I'll get moved to another area, and I will have a new companion.

Have a great week!

Love,
Hermana Ludlam

Minister again and again

Here's our little chick with her chick!

Hi family,

 Another week out here in the field. This week we got wet crossing trash river. It has a super strong current, but we're tough. We gotta get to all our citas (appointments)!

This week, I thought about all our inactives (as we contact and knock doors, we only find more) and I found some good advice in the Liahona. Bup also sent me Hinckley's talk on Find the Lambs, Feed the Sheep, which I thought was great. It talks about what every new member in the church needs. This month's Liahona had a good article on ministering. There was a line in there that says: "You have to minister again and again as you help someone turn back to God and again rely on the Savior and His Atonement."

I considered that statement an answer to prayer because for some reason, I always kind of thought as long as you have one big life-changing experience, you'll be good to go. Or if only I could just write a super, good, powerful letter home, it'll solve any faith crisis. But obviously conversion is not a one-time event, it's a process. Helping my inactives is going to be a process, too. Lots of visits and lots of ministering. In Alma 43:42, it says nourishing the seed requires diligence, faith and patience. I will hang tight.

And because of your diligence and your faith and your patience with the word in nourishing it, that it may take root in you, behold, by and by ye shall pluck the fruit thereof, which is most precious, which is sweet above all that is sweet, and which is white above all that is white, yea, and pure above all that is pure; and ye shall feast upon this fruit even until ye are filled, that ye hunger not, neither shall ye thirst.

The Cat Climber strikes again!

I try to remember this as we're teaching Cristian. He's a golden investigator, and this last week, he had a 2-hour long lesson with Hermana Rubio and our Hermana Leader. They told me it was an awesome lesson and the spirit was so strong! But his mom doesn't want us over more than once a week now and it's having an effect on his faith. He doesn't even want to be baptized anymore! Sad day. We're going to have to patiently work with him until he feels ready for baptism again.

We have attracted a cat that climbs up a tree to get to our balcony and climbs through our window (we leave it open to let it air out at night) and always eats our bread! She digs through the plastic bag and we wake up in the morning to find bread all over the kitchen floor.

Love you all! I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Love,
Hermana Ludlam

A little wet, perhaps?

On the road to Finca 6

 

My cute comp mopping the church

Crossing Trash River