Fotos:
1- The garden of Richard and Adelaida en Tacuati from seeds we provided. We are so excited and so are they!
2- Pedro Garcia’s house and property in Tacuati. He is the Group
Leader for the church, is a breadmaker, and they are a wonderful family.
3- Cheryl teaching Brisa how to make lemon poppyseed muffins.
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Happy 4th of July! 🍉
We have had a good and busy week here in Horqueta.
The big news here is that President and Sister McMullin completed
their 3 years of service as Mission President of the Paraguay Asuncion
North Mission and have returned home. We grew to truly love and
appreciate this good family and their devotion, service, and sacrifice
for the missionary work here in Paraguay. Our new mission President,
President Evans and his family arrived last Friday and we have two
meetings with them today in Concepcion - one at 1:30 with the
missionaries and another at 6:00 pm with as the District Presidency.
We are excited to meet them.
We went to Tacuati yesterday for the first time in nearly 3
months. The members were quick to remind us that it had been 3 months,
but we patiently explained that the Mission President asked us not to
travel there after the murder of the mayor, and then with the elections 2
Sundays in a row it was not safe for us to be there (they get a little
rowdy during election time). We enjoyed our Principles of the Gospel
Class and Testimony meeting with the members - 25 in attendance. They
are such sweet and humble people and really want to enjoy all of the
blessings of the Gospel in their lives. We then went to the home of
Pedro Garcia and Miryan for lunch. We had beef, pasta, mandioca, black
beans, cabbage and tomato salad, and bread (Pedro is a panadero) with
fresh fruit juice. It was delicious! We then had a Priesthood
preparation class with Sergio, Juan, Alberto, and Pedro. It was really
good and they all participated. We focus on the basics such as “what is
the Priesthood”, what are the offices and duties of the Priesthood,
what are the Authority and Power of the Priesthood, etc. We usually
teach the same principles 2 or 3 times to make sure that they all get
it. (Juan and Alberto are both young deacons in the Group). We then
went with the Elders and the branch mission leader to teach a lesson to a
recent convert (Adelaida) and her husband Richard. It went well, but
one of their big dogs was very friendly and wanted to play. Funny but
quite a disruption.
On Thursday we went to lunch at the home of Pte Avalos in
Concepcion. He and his family are so wonderful. It had been nearly a
year since we last visited them in their home. We had a wonderful meal
and helped prepare the meal. Cheryl helped with the green salad, I
stared the grill for the grilled pineapple, and I peeled the grapefruit
for the grapefruit juice. We really enjoyed the time we spent with
them. His brother moved to SLC and has married an American girl and
they have several young children They are planning a visit to Paraguay
in Julio. It would be fun to meet them.
We had branch council Friday night to finalize our Branch Mission
Plan for the Rama Horqueta. Unfortunately the President was working so I
led the council. We had a good meeting and our plan is nearly ready
for the next 3 months. We are starting to see a little more enthusiasm
among the leaders of the branch.
We love our work here in Paraguay, and are so blessed to
be “lejos”, or far away in the north of Paraguay. It is much more
peaceful here, the people are humble and friendly, and we are learning
so much. We expect things to happen overnight - but they don’t. We
expect to have everything we need or want - but we don’t. We don’t want
to have bugs in our house - but we do. We are eating new kinds of food
everyday - and we love it. We probably should be afraid of some of the
things we see and do - but we know that the Lord is watching over us.
We get frustrated, often, with the leaders and members - but we love
them. We miss our family so much - but we know we are where we need to
be.
We pray that you will all be safe and sound.
Love you,
Jerry and Cheryl
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