VISA has arrived

Hola familia!

Momma, I got the package and boy did it make my day! Thank you so much! I especially enjoyed the wedding announcements from Jordan and Judson. Congrats to both of them! I am so proud of you family for really making a missionary effort. Wow, I am amazed by how awesome my family is. If it helps, I fasted for missionary work too :). I'm glad that Dale got to use his new treger grill and have a real fiesta. I am further impressed by the awesomeness of my dad and little brother Tacos. You guys are champs for backpacking 5 days out in the wilderness. Tacos, Congrats for winning the siphon tube setting contest AGAIN at the fair. That is crazy business that you have got going on. Too bad that there wasn't a critter at the fair, but I guess winning the siphon tube setting contest again is a pretty big deal. Now all you have to do is write to me yourself and tell me all about it :).

The big news is that I have officially received my VISA to Peru! AHAHAHAHA woo hoo! I am heading out on Tuesday August 13. Thank you to all the family who have been praying so hard for it to come. This is such an exciting time and I couldn't be too much happier than I am right now. But as happy and over the top excited I feel, I feel almost as sad to leave. I have mentioned it to a couple of the members in our ward and they were so disappointed. I had no idea that some of the ward members liked me so much. I think that they just enjoy making fun of me and my failed attempts to make jokes and to talk to them in Spanish, but I'd also like to think that they are genuinely going to miss me, cause I will most definitely going to be missing them. Not only them but some of our wonderful investigators as well. I don't have a whole lot of them, but they are so dear to me. Before the news came to me, one of the senior couples in the mission advised me to spend 30 minutes in prayer. I didn't think it was going to be hard, and it sure wasn't. I just felt the need to express how grateful I was to have come here to Washington DC and to have had the wonderful experiences here. I felt the distinct impression that I wasn't going to be here for a whole lot longer, and not an hour later, I received the news that my visa had arrived. Heavenly Father sure knows what he is doing. I am amazed over and over again by how much His hand is in missionary work. I am so grateful.

Last Pday we went to Washington DC. It was awesome, and I loved all the cute little LDS families that we ran into, who chorused, "Hi Sisters!" We tried really hard to be good missionaries in that kind of an environment, but it got a little crazy sometimes. It was so cool to see the nation's capital with missionary eyes. I'll never see that place the same way again.

President Riggs has had us reading Alma 48-50 and trying to find ways to "Astonish the Enemy". (The enemy is Satan- not investigators. Just a clarification). Moroni fortified all the Cities so much that the Lamanites didn't even bother attacking because it was pointless. That is how President wants us to become. So strong and fortified in our testimonies that the powers of the enemy won't even bother messing with us because it is pointless. One of the ways I have decided to try to become more fortified is by applying some of the principles found in Alma 13:28-29. I am so impressed with my mission President here. He is just the coolest. He gave us kind of a funny analogy about how we should become a little bolder in our contacting. He said that if he is walking down a cracker aisle and he passes by Mango flavored Ritz crackers, he would think "oh that's interesting, I wonder how they taste?" but never spend the time or money that it would require to figure out how they taste. But if there is a Costco lady dressed in a white smock and a hairnet passing out samples you can decide for yourself if you are truly interested in he product or not. So, what President is asking us to do is to give them a sample of the Gospel in the most basic form to the people we meet on the street. Namely, the Restoration. He gave us the example of "Hi I'm president Riggs. What's your name?" <answer here> "Well it is really nice to meet you! In the year 1820 a boy named Joseph Smith had a question about which church was true. He prayed to God to know, and he received an answer directly from Heavenly Father. What would you do if God told you which church to join?" <answer here>. This totally freaked me out. I imagined everyone just thinking- these guys are psycho. But the response has been overwhelmingly awesome. You give people a sample of the message, and they can reasonably decide for themselves if it is worth their time, but this way provides a clear understanding of what we are offering. It is AWESOME. We just started this about 3 days ago and I can tell the difference in the work.

I love the Gospel so much. I love the Hispanic people. I am so excited to finally be going to Peru to serve there for the remainder of my mission. The Church is true and I have never been happier.

Les Quiero

Hermanita Christensen