General Conference

Hey fam,

I can´t believe that another conference session has come and gone. Its so crazy to think that the last conference session was my first week here and now another six months has passed. The time goes by so so so quickly.

Well first off, i love conference as usual! We got to attend all of the sessions in the stake center. But unlike the last conference, this time i was watching in español. I understood all of it, but it wasnt the same because normally there are always those certain phrases that i love to write down, but it was a little harder in spanish, but better than anything i was really able to listen to the spirit and what i needed to hear. My favorite session was the Sunday Morning session, i dont know if i really had a favorite talk but i learned a lot about the atonement and i felt the spirit very strongly. In the morning with my companion when we were walking around in the streets we were both just thinking "the people just dont understand that a prophet is going to talk to us today!" to be honest its kind of frustrating to think that the people dont realize how blessed we are to have a prophet and the apostles to guide us in these days. We had several investigators in the conferences...some of them were old investigators who werent really progressing...but maybe something in conference will have touched their hearts.

One of our investigators who went, Sonya, really enjoyed the conference. I dont know if i talked about her in my last letter but i feel major deja vu in her house. We have developed a great relationship with her. she says everytime she prays to know what church is true she thinks in the first vision so we told her that that is her answer. But anyways she received the missionaries like 10 years ago and she asisted the church for like 1 year. But then she stopped going because she had some problems with commandments and such. But anyways she went to the conference and we told her if she could come back for the second session that she should, but she just told us she didnt know if she could but she would see....so then in the afternoon on sunday...she came back AND she brought her sister! haha it was so great. She said...wow the people outside are so confused, they think that you mormons only believe in joseph smith..but really you guys believe in Christ and all of this is about Christ. Its great to have people actually understand. Anyways im excited to work with her more.

We have some other investigators too that im excited to work with but we will see. I dont have a ton of time to give a lot of details but ill keep you updated. We have one investigator who i taught my first weeks in the area but she was very positive, and now she is super interested...but she got sick this weekend so she couldnt go to the conference. But her boyfriend is a missionary and she was thinking about changing religions and she wants learn a lot more. And we have some youth that we arent teaching but we have been waiting for permission for their parents for like 6 months now and they might be baptized in abril but we will see.

Anyways its been a good week. We´ve been chased by dogs a few times..haha. i have a belief that satan has power over dogs...i bet that the positive people are always the people who have dogs in front of their houses that we have to skip haha...We also worked with the Fam Gonzalez this wee as the family missionary. They were great. Their oldest daughter is almost 18 and she wants to serve a mission and her mom is nervous to have her go but really excited too. THey are a great family. This week we are going to work with the Familia Orellana. They are one of my favorite families here in the ward so im excited for that.

Things are good. Thank you so much for your prayers. You all are always in my prayers too. Im so grateful for this experience and the opportunity to be a missionary. It is so incredible the experiences i have to defend the truth and share the gospel with the people here.

Until next week...ill try to send pics next week because today in the morning we went on a hike to la laguna verde en apaneca. And IM SUNBURNT haha

Con todo mi amor,

Hermana Groneman

Quick Week

Hey fam,

I dont have a ton of time left to write so sorry beforehand if this letter is short. But thank you so so so much for the support and your words of advice from everyone. I really have the best family on earth and im so grateful for your support and your prayers for me.

This week was hot as always. Im just waiting for when the rain comes so that it can cool down just a little bit at least.

As far as our investigators we are just working with a few to progress..but i dont have a ton to say about them, we are still working on finding a bunch of new people. Its hard because sometimes people are super positive the first day when we teach them and we are super excited...and then the next time they dont want anything or they run away from us haha or things like that. With the time i have here in the area i dont really mind knocking doors that yeah ive already knocked or talking with people ive already talked...but sometimes i feel bad for my comp because i swear everytime they are like..."oh yeah the last time we talked with you" and they point to me and then they dont want anything..haha but oh well. Its kind of incredible how many people i have met and talked to in this area.

I just want to share a kind of funny cool experience that i had this week. We were in intercambios so i was with one of the hermana leaders but i was working in our area. There is a family of recent converts but they are also inactive (the family diaz) and in all of my time here we have always been visiting them. They always receive us and everything but hardly ever go to church. But this last week we contacted the mom and the brothers and sisters of claudia diaz and we are going to start working with them. We had an appointment with them and when we went to teach them they had other preachers in their house from a different church...super awkward...and they told us to enter and join with the other preachers and we could all talk....yeah super awkward.. We had the appointment with them but i guess these other preachers are friends of them so they couldnt say no. So anyways there was the investigadores, familia diaz (menos activos), us and our members, and these other preachers. The other preachers were basically giving the lesson and really the things they shared were actually good things, but yeah we tried to share comments too and it was just super awkward. But at the end of the lesson the investigadores (the mom and her husband) said that they want to learn more from us and that they have always seen good things from the mormons and in the example of her daughter and how her daughter has changed since she has become a member. I just imagined how mad satan probably was in this moment haha. I felt like when they always say that we are on the team of the Lord and in the end the Lords team is going to win haha. It was great. but yeah the brother and sister of Claudia diaz went to church this sunday and we hope the next sunday the whole family can go. I dont know if this story made sense but yeah haha.

Also this saturday the familia orellana (miembros) and going to be sealed in the temple. Hermano marvin was our ward mission leader for a short time and literally this family is so important to me and i cant even explain. Weve always been encouraging them to go to the temple and its been a struggle but i have seen how their testimonies have grown and when they called us the other night and told us they have their reservation for the temple on saturday i just started to bawl. I literally couldnt be more happy for them. technically the rule is we can only go if they are our conversos or if we reactivated them...but i am praying that presidente will make an exception to the rule, but this family really means so much to me. But either way im so happy for them.

Anyways i dont really have much more time. Thanks for everything. Hopefully i can write more next week. But i love you all so much and thanks for you support. Really your emails meant a lot to me.

Hermana Groneman

New Companion for El Espino

Hey fam...wow another week has come and gone and another week of ups and downs

Really i feel like I dont have much to say this week. We are really still just trying to find new people to teach. Knocking door, contacting in the streets, working with the members, just trying to find people. But we have found some new people this week who have a lot of potencial i think. There is one lady who received the missionaries years and years ago and she asisted church for one whole year but never was baptized....we are going to see what happens with her...but i feel serious deja vu in her house. Seriously like i feel like ive already been in her house teaching her but she doesnt remember me and i dont think i went there with my other companions...but who knows. Also we found another women who was really interested to hear that we have prophets and apostles and she really wants to go to conference. Super interesting when we were teaching her though because the lesson was really great and we could really feel the spirit...and then all of a sudden her husband came home and interupted everything and turned on the soccer game and was yelling GOAL and all of this stuff trying to distract the lesson but the woman didnt pay attention to him at all and just kept focused on us and the lesson haha. We´ll see what happens with them.

I dont know im really enjoying the work right now just with my companion and everything. During the day i feel good doing what im doing...but the thing is is the people just arent progressing or arent interested. We had a multizona this week and i learned a lot and there is a lot for me to improve. But we also talked about baptisms and such. I havent had a baptism in like 3 or 4 months....and i dont know i was pretty down on that. But i dont know. Its so frustrating because i want to help people change and i feel like im working but i dont know why we arent having success. And the truth is i feel like we are working harder and teaching better now then when we were back in october and november and december when we had baptisms..

But im not gonna focus on that part..being down and such. because we are having changes here in this area. The members are starting to work more. The familia misionera is we call them in church on sunday during sacrament meeting and then we visit them during the day on sunday and plan with them how we are going to work during the week. They have to give us references and one person in their family has to leave with us every day during the week. Really it is a big sacrifice for the family but i really feel like they are blessed and its helping the ward to get more excited. The bishop and his wife hardly didnt have any time to leave this week but they made sacrifices and it was really hard for the bishops wife but she is a returned missionary and it really strengthened her testimony. We had some really good experiences with them. Then in sunday during sacrament meeting they have to give their numbers or how many lessons and references and new investigators they found and share a little experience. It is really a great program and i feel like it is going to change the ward. Also we didnt have investigators that we were teaching in sacrament meeting this week so that was really disappointing...but we had some less actives. there were a few people that i have visited every single week that i have been here and they have never gone to church, but this week they went so it was some real miracles.

Anyways i dont have much more to say. Things are good, we are just working slowly but surely. Just working the heat every day. Im super super excited for conference this weekend. I cant believe it is already conference again. Last general conference was my first week here in El Sal. Super crazy. But invite all of your friends to conference. (MOM INVITE THEY NEIGHBORS OR WHOEVER DONT BE SHY) haha keep working with the missionaries.

I love you all and mom i love you more than the universe!!!

Good luck moving to georgia this week Colby and Janelle!

Thanks for all of your prayers!

Hermana Groneman