100 Contacts

November 7, 2016

Hola Familia y Amigos!! 

Well, I had another crazy week with another trip to Bahia... yay :/   I'm so sick of bus rides J.   But this time was really fun and so worth it!!  This is the first time I’ve traveled to Bahia when it was light outside and I’m not asleep... Little did we know there is a pretty part of Argentina in the middle of nowhere that has little hills that are the closest thing to mountains I have seen in a year!   

Enjoying another long bus ride - I should be earning frequent rider miles :)

Beautiful Argentine countryside and mountains

The closest thing I've got to mountains here...I miss Utah :)

So the reason for going to Bahia was I had my first big leadership meeting with Presidente Cifuentes, all the zone leaders, district leaders and sister training leaders.  We had the meeting in president's house and it happened to be on the hottest day we have had this "spring." So with like 50 + missionaries crammed into the basement, we were all dying of heat.  President and the assistants talked to us about a lot of things but focused on the goal that we have as a mission for the month of November.  President wants every companionship to do 100 contacts (knocking doors or talking to people in the street) this month.  But like I mentioned before, we only count the contacts that we can set up an appointment with to go back and teach them.  So as we talked, we estimated that we have to talk to about 5 people to get one to set up an appointment with us.  And we have seen the pattern in the mission that from every 10 contacts, we get 1 progressing investigator and from every 10 progressing investigators, 1 gets baptized.  SO, basically what that means is that of the 500 people I'm going to talk to this month, 499 are going to reject the gospel or progress a little, but only one will be baptized. 

A little daunting and intimidating right?  RIGHT.  But, I'm so grateful for President Cifuentes and all that he teaches us to help us progress and work more efficiently and not just wander around every day.   I feel like I have a purpose and I'm dedicated to the goal he has given us and ready to find some new people to teach!! 

There's a quote in Preach My Gospel that we read in the meeting that helped me understand the importance of reporting our work to our leaders as missionaries and more important than that, to the LORD. 

“When performance is measured, performance improves.  When performance is measured and reported, the rate of improvement accelerates.”

As leaders, we have to check up on our missionaries to help them progress, know that they have our support and help to reach their goals; but at the same time, we aren't going to pressure them into doing anything.   As we lead with love and by example, we can all progress together.  Also, it’s so important that we report to our Heavenly Father what we did every day.  Not only as a missionary, but in real life too.  He loves us so much and has blessed us with every new day of life.  To thank Him, we should use all that He has given us in the way that He wants.  I invite you all to talk to God every night and tell Him what you have accomplished that day and ask for guidance and help to do better tomorrow.  

OK, sorry I'm going to stop my little rant now.  I just love being a missionary.  Also, it was super fun to see some long lost friends from the mission in the meeting - Elder Lee, Elder Holmes and Hna Darrington.  

After being in Olavarria for such a LONG time...I had lost contact with the rest of the mission.
It was fun to see Elder Lee (from Draper)...

...Elder Holmes (from my group in the MTC)...

...and Hermana Darrington :)

There were seemingly a million more other missionaries there too, but I don't know any of them because I've been here in Olavarria for half my mission. ;) hahaha. 

Well, I hope you all have a great week!!  I love and miss you all!  Thanks for all of your support and love, I feel it every day on the flip side of the equator. :) 

Con amor y muchos contactos, 

Hermana Bartholomew