It's been a while but I can finally write you all an email. The schedule's been a little weird this week because of different meetings we've had and our zone leaders had so I get to write you all today but I think normally you'll hear from me on Tuesdays. Monday is our Pday but we have to use the internet as a district/zone on Tuesdays when we have district meeting to keep each other in line and make sure we only use 30 minutes. I thought we'd get an hour out here but I guess the mission rule is 30 minutes. Ah well, such is life.
Next week when I don't have so much to catch up on I'll attempt to send some pictures. This time using the internet passes so fast though! Thanks everyone for your letters and emails-it's great to hear from you!
My first area is called Volcan and it's in the mountains an hour or two from the Costa Rican border. God is kind to me and it's a huge blessing for me to be here in Volcan because it's in the mountains so it's not boiling hot like everywhere else in Panama. I've been wearing jackets every other day because it rains all day and we were actually pretty cold by the time we got home. But I feel very lucky to be here.
There's a member family from America living here and they gave me the URL to a website where they keep a bunch of photos of the area and the missionaries so you all can see what it's like: www.flickr.com/photos/young-in-panama
I hope it works because it's beautiful here and it'd be nice if you could see what it's like. We had lots of orientations and meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday, and then once I got put with my trainer on Wednesday we had a 10 hour bus trip to get to Volcan from the city. We stayed overnight with some sisters in David, and then continued the next morning. Overall it was a long first couple of days but I'm glad to be settling in.
My trainer is from Honduras and her name is Hna Rodriguez. I'm learning a lot from her about the doctrine, how to be a good teacher, etc. She goes home in September so we think I'm probably going to "kill" her or in other words, be her last companion. She's nice but I feel kind of lonely sometimes because I've discovered that I only speak church Spanish and not regular life Spanish so it's kind of hard for us to get to know each other. Plus everyone else around has different accents, and it's usually hard to hear them over the rain and they talk super fast so most of the time I only have a very broad idea of what's going on and I don't feel very useful. I want to be a tool in the Lord's hands but I feel very ineffective a lot of the time. But I'm studying and learning more Spanish every day and with time and faith I know it will get better.
The members and nice but there are only one or two really strong families. The branch attendance is usually around 30-50 so we definitely have work to do. We have lots of investigators and people to teach, and lots of walking from appointment to appointment. The people are very friendly on the streets and life is much slower here than in the city or the U.S.
I feel like a lost puppy because I just follow my companion around and do what she does and I don't know where anything is or how to do anything still. But she is patient and I am learning. I'm still trying to understand the importance of this work and to come to feel like the sons of Mosiah did where they couldn't bear the thought of any soul perishing.
I've been studying faith more because I know I need to increase my faith-faith that I can learn, faith that people will be receptive and that some have been prepared, faith that they'll progress and be baptized and that I can help them do that. I know that I have faith, but it definitely needs to be strengthened. I've been studying it a little bit in the scriptures and I keep reading dad's zone conference talk about faith-it's great.
Today I read Jarom and Omni because I'm slowly reading through the whole Book of Mormon in Spanish. This time I was struck by how around 200 years of history was covered by 6 or 7 people in only 4 pages. A lot of the writers in these two books just said something like "I'm writing to obey the commandments of my father, but I don't have anything else to add. All the prophecies are already written." It seems to me like they didn't do their best. Yes, they were obedient to the commandments and that's awesome, but they didn't do all they could have to write in the record. It's like me and my mission. Yes, I obeyed and came on a mission when I felt like the Lord asked me to. But merely obeying isn't enough. I have to obey and give my very best, my whole heart, might, mind and strength and give my soul as an offering to the Lord (end of Omni somewhere....verse 26 maybe? I don't have my scriptures out sorry). So I'm going to try to do that every day, even when it's raining all day and it's hard and everyone thinks we're crazy and our investigators don't come to church. Welp, these are my thoughts and now I'm out of time. I'll try sending pictures next time :) Love you all!
Love,
Hermana Dance
Omni 1:26-yup, I found it.
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