The Power of Prayer

Yesterday the whole mission got together to say goodbye to Presidente Alliuad and Hermana Alliaud. It was a super special conference. 

 Presidente teaching the doctrine of a good mate

Among other things President gave us a motivational speech for what he and the Lord expect from us, we were able to hear the crazy story about how Presidente and his wife met one another, Presidente taught us how to prepare a good mate, and I think that most touching part was when Presidente said a prayer for all of the missionaries. When he finished the prayer the story in the Book of Mormon when Jesus prays for the Nephites came to my mind. After their experience the Nephites testified, "no one can conceive of the joy which filled our souls at the time we heard him pray for us unto the Father." I can really echo those words now. With the prayer of Presidente I could really feel the great love that he has for all of us missionaries, how much he thinks about us and is concerned about our futures. 

In the work, Elder McCleve and I are teaching Kevin the son of a less-active member. He is super fun and really loves learning about the gospel. Last week we were not having the success we want with finding new investigators, we were coming along badly in the week with no new people to teach. Then Saturday evening after panicking a little and feeling bad, thinking that we were going to finish the week without a single new investigator, we kept contacting and the Lord blessed us to find several families that were interested in hearing the gospel. We finished the week well. 

Have a great week!

Elder Lulich  

Elder Fantham (my son)

 Presidente y la Hermana Alliaud

 Elder Mendoza (my second comp)

The Stress of Moving

I don't have time to write but just want to let you all know that I am doing well. This week, after a lot of stress, we were finally able to move to a new apartment. I never had to deal with paying rent or bills or deal with a landlord or look for a new place to live so the whole process was pretty stressful and new for me. I kept on thinking," I'm a missionary I should just be worrying about people slamming the door in my face I shouldn't have to think about these things now." But it was a good experience because I´ll probably have to deal with those things after my mission. And it also helped me combat my uncomfortableness with talking to people over the phone. 

Have a great week and don't get mad at your landlords! or anyone else for that matter.

Gimme a High 6!

Hola Familia. Estoy espectacular! 

Right now we've been working with the son of a less active sister named Kevin. He´s super cool. He's ten years old and is always cracking jokes and laughing. Just as an example of how cool he is, in one of our first visits to his house he put his hands flat on the table and asked us, "How many fingers are there? Now you´re not going to say ten now" (Kevin has a little extra finger on each hand). Now when we go visit him he has us give him high 6's. He´s so fun and also has the desire to be baptized. His mom wants him to be completely prepared for baptism and get to know well all of the gospel before being baptized, so we still were not able to set a baptismal date. Not being able to know when Kevin baptism will be was quite a test in patience for me, but I know that he will be baptized. 

Espero que estén muy bien. Los amo a todos! Besos! 

Tyler 

Here´s a picture of the elders in my pension in Carlos Paz. We went there today to climb a hill to a cross. It was a lot of fun and a beautiful day to do it too. It had been cloudy all week but today we had clear skies.

        

Zapatos Rotos

So my comp and I became famous this week. Wednesday was the 25th of May, when Argentinos commemorate the day that the founders nation declared Independence from Spain. And every year on may 25th church members get together and celebrate eating locro, a traditional soup. a few weeks ago my comp and I had decided that we needed to do something special. So with the help of some members we took an old song called "zapatos rotos" and changed the lyrics so that it would talk about missionaries. It was quite a success in the activity. When we started to sing, a lot of the members laughed and joined in with us. After our song other members also started playing the guitar and singing popular songs of "folklore", a music style here. Some members also danced. The best part was that none of it was planned, but it turned out being a very special moment. 

Oh yeah, we turned famous afterward. A member filmed the song and put it on Facebook. It got shared around with the other members of the stake and the last time we heard, the video had about 4500 views. What?! That was a surprise. 

The other great thing that happened this week was the baptism of Lucas and Mateo Polanco. Lucas is 8 years old and Mateo is 11. They are the two youngest of a family of 11 kids, all members of the church now. We are working with the family now to help them all come back to church. I baptized Lucas and Elder Mccleve baptized Mateo. Lucas has so much energy. It´s been a new challenge to learn how to teach kids and think of how to keep their attention with games and pictures, but I love it.  

I hope you are are doing well. Have a great week

Elder Lulich       

Milagrasos

Elder Teban, Me, Elder Aniel, and Elder Chapple.

I'd have to say that this week has been one of the best of my mission. On Tuesday I got to do an exchange with one of the zone leaders Elder Chapple and we were able to visit several of the people that we are working with right now. I learned so much about how to help the investigators progress and how to show my love for them. On Thursday we had a multi-zone conference and I learned a bunch there too. Leaving the conference I felt a little sad. It was one of the last conferences with Presidente Alliaud, he's going to be leaving in June. Presidente Alliaud is the best mission president he is really a friend of the missionaries and has a great love for us and trust in us. He always says," I trust in you because the Lord has trusted in you already." It was also sad because at the end of the conference we all listened to the last testimonies of the missionaries that will be finishing their missions this transfer. Among them were Elder Chapple and also Elder Hansen, my district leader in Parque Liceo. 
The biggest highlight of this week was going to the temple on Saturday to see the sealing of Ronan and Rocio. It was a surreal experience being there in the temple with them after having taught Rocio about a year ago. I was amazed by how far the two of them had come. Conversion really is a miracle. Ronan told me jokingly, as he had before, that it was all my fault and he´s going to show up in the U.S. one day to drop off his kids with me. 

I really love the mission and the chance it gives me to see the work of God more fully. 

I really hope you all have a fantastic week. 

Elder Lulich

Knock, and it shall be opened unto you

This week has been one of many miracles. Elder McCleve and I were able to find a bunch of new investigators. What we did different was invite many more people to let us into their homes to give a prayer. One finding experience kind of surprised me. We knocked on the door of someone we had contacted last week and even though he wasn't there his family was. His mother opened the door and invited us in, we entered the house and I could hardly tell what was going on because the lady was talking about a mile a minute with us and her two daughters and grandchildren that were in the house. Just as a side note I´d say that one of the biggest lessons I've learned as a missionary how to listen, really listen to the people and figure out it what situation they are in. But anyway she gave us a cup of mate cocido and invited us to eat some pastries (which is basically the breakfast of Argentina). Once we were able to get a few words in, we found out that the family had met the missionaries before and had very special memories of them. We ending up having a nice talk with them about why we go to church, and now we have a time to go back this week. It´s amazing to live these little encounters that God plans for my companion and I each day as we talk to the people.

Below there is a picture of us with Gabriel and Yesica, a family that we have been teaching since the first week I got here. They've gone to church several times and are progressing very well, they've just got to get married! This Sunday Yesica went to the classes at church for the first time instead of just the sacrament meeting and it was so nice to see her there talking with the other members. They´re closer than ever. 

I hope you are all doing well. You have my prayers

Fun with the Itturiaga Family

A Welcome Testimony

Favorite moment of the week. In a visit to a recent convert we just happened to drop by when she had some relatives there. We had planned on watching the video of the first vision of Joseph Smith with her and after talking with the family for a little bit and getting to know them we decided to stick to that. After the video we asked the family members what they thought and what they felt and they began to ask us questions. My favorite moment was when the recent convert Claudia shared her testimony and helped answer the questions of her family members. I noticed that when Claudia spoke her familiy was really able to understand what we were teaching. It was really special to have that unplanned moment to testify and also to be accompanied in testimony by a recently baptized member of the church.

When we share the things that we have learn and felt from the holy Spirit we are strengthened and we can help others. I know that when it comes to testimony, when there is more given, there is gained. I know that this mission that I´m in is blessing my life and the life of everyone that listens to the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ that I share. And I know that this message is the truth there´s no way I can deny it.

I realized just now that the only pictures that I took this week were of receipts of apartment bills so I´ll send you all pictures of last week´s p-day. We went to the sisters´ area, Santa Rosa, and hiked to a waterfall in the hills.