Being taught by the Spirit

Dear Family,

I realized when they talked about our earthquake in conference that it has been more than a month since it happened. Time is disappearing like things disappear into Mary Poppins bag! And last night I was in the middle of my prayer (which was really long and emotional due to what I learned from conference) when I got interrupted by the strongest aftershock that I have felt. It felt as strong as the earthquake, but it was like two seconds long. I am never going to be able to forget that life shaking event if I keep getting shaken every week.

I saw the theme of the importance of teaching and learning the gospel in our homes. There were so many talks that talked to parents and I felt so grateful for my parents, thinking about all the times when you have done exactly what the apostles were counseling parents to do. And then I thought, being the first child, in the things that maybe you didn’t know, but that you learned and can help me to do when I have children. I got pretty emotional during Elder Ballard's talk and even teared up a little bit, thinking about my mom and my relationship with her. So Mom, I am ready to listen to all the advice you have for me.

The Spirit taught me a lot during President Monson´s talk about teaching to help people with their problems. I encourage you all to study it to learn how to more effectively teach. Ben, that means you! Look for the “Problem”, “Doctrine of Christ”(which brought the Spirit to all of us), “Testimony”, “How he gained his testimony”, and “The Solution.” It is a great model to follow and I am excited to put it to practice. I´m going to be searching for problems to solve now. And now that question, was that teaching model the intent of President Monson´s talk? No, he was talking about death and how Christ overcomes it. But when we are listening to the Spirit he teaches us what we need in our personal lives. It was an incredible experience to be taught by the Spirit while listening to the words of the prophet of God.

Packer´s talk makes me want to understand the priesthood better. When I heard the talk by Elder Perry I thought of Mom, Dad, Matthew, and Jonathan. And Elder Scott´s talk was for the Chile Santiago North Mission as our focus this year is in the Atonement. I know that all the answers to our unhappiness and problems in life can be solved by studying the life of Jesus Christ. He overcame everything that we will face, we just need to find out how he did it.

Miguel, Orlando, and Daiana moved this week. We helped them Friday. I really think that they found this apartment as a result of the kid´s baptisms. The bad news was that it is right outside of the ward boundaries. And their parents looked so hard to be able to find something close by the church so that they could keep attending there. Well, we talked to the first counselor in the bishopric last night and he said that they should just keep attending here and moses smell the roses we were happy to hear that. They had been discouraged all weekend about not being able to go to Compañía anymore and having to start over again in a new ward. They went to all the sessions of conference with us and it gave me a glimpse of what parenthood is like…a headache…but a happy headache.

Rodrigo and Claudio went to all of the sessions too. Even the priesthood session! They loved it and Claudio is going to be baptized this week. Pray that he keeps going without smoking, he has one week smoke free. And Rodrigo should receive the priesthood this week too!

Bernardo the investigator that we found last week, attended all of the sessions Saturday and his progress is incredible. We are excited to baptize him at the end of April.

Pray for Robinson, that his parents will open their hearts and let him get baptized.

I love you,
Hermana Arnold