Hermana Rachel Ruth Peters

Dec. 9, 2014
5 months down!!!

Hello to the Greatest Family in the World :)

How is everyone doing? Finals are coming up for some of you right? Good luck with that.. i am VERY grateful that i wont be having finals for a while :) haha and Michael, sounds like you had a wonderful time at the dance. you are such a beast to take her roses. i am sure she will remember that for the rest of her life :) and everyone should follow Sarah's example. She sent me a ton of pictures and i loved it! Thank you Sarah :) you are the cutest. and i still cant believe you are almost 16...

First off, we had transfers this past week and Hermana Holmes got transferred... We all kinda saw it coming, but it was not fun having to say goodbye to my mom on the mission. And can i just say, she is a boss. Her new assignment is to open and new area AND train again!! Wow. All i know is that i know i couldn't do that, and if anyone can, its Hermana Holmes :)

My new companion is Hermana Loza. She is from Columbia and is amazing. She joined the church 4 years ago and i already can feel her testimony radiating from her. She is so strong and i know that i will learn a ton from her. Especially with Spanish.. haha she doesn't speak any English... But i feel good about it all and know that this is who i am supposed to be with right now. I am very grateful that i get more time here in Santa Cruz too because i LOVE it here. The people here are like family to me and i am grateful that i get to spend Christmas and my birthday with them :)

So on Thursday i woke up feeling like i got hit by a bus, and all of a sudden had a horrible cough, and a stuffy nose, and kept losing my voice when i tried to talk. But i was not going to let this get me down. We had a zone meeting in Liberia so that was one hour i had to rest a little bit in the bus, which was good. And then i figured i could just kinda sit back and enjoy the meeting. But Heavenly Father wanted me to prove to myself that i have power of the natural man. I was asked to share a personal experience, and later to share a scripture, and then to do a 10 legged race thing. I was like okay of all days.. really?? but I was just fine! i got up and did what i needed to do. I said what i needed to say, and that's about how my whole day went, and the next day too. I really learned that all that i am doing here really isn't me. It is all the Lord. This is His work and He will make sure that His servants do all that he needs done. There was one point on Friday when i felt so weak, and just wanted to lay down on the dirt road and sleep. Right then i huge breeze came from behind, or should i say a whole bunch of angels that were giving me that extra push i needed to keep going. Don't worry, now i am feeling much better. OH also a tender mercy.. Thursday when i woke up feeling so sick i opened the little gift for that day and it was propel! Yeah it was PERFECT because i didn't want to drink water because i had a nasty taste in my mouth. So thank you mom :)

Saturday we had another baptism of a girl named Michelle. When i got here i thought she was already a member because she comes to everything, but turns out she wasn't and wanted to be. So we worked with her and got her all ready, and then we found out the reason she wasn't baptized is because of her parents. We have to get permission from both of them, and her mom did not want her to be baptized. We tried and tried to talk to her but she was either not home or sleeping. So ya long story short, we had a miracle happen Saturday morning when she told Michelle that she could be baptized :) So we had everything all ready to go, and we all went to the church. That morning Hermana Holmes and i had gone to the church to fill the font (the last time in this church before the start building the new one!!) but i guess i didn't plug it all the way because we got to the church and all the water was gone. The Elders had started filling it up again and everyone was just kinda sitting there waiting. Oh and also we didn't have seats because men had already come to take everything out of the church. Yeah what an interesting situation right? haha so as everyone is just waiting i was thinking about how i could speed up the process.. So i went and grabbed the garbage can, cleaned out all the trash and also cleaned it a bit and then went outside to where we have this little hose. So i started to fill up the can, then went inside and dumped it into the font. Everyone looked at me funny and then all stood up to help :) haha we found a few other things to help fill the font, and everyone was all laughing and smiling as we all filled the font with garbage cans and pans :) Also that same day a little 8 year old girl got baptized too. Her family is already members and they are one of my favorite families here :)

I thought about all of you guys on December 5 :) and sounds like you had a wonderful Dutch Chirstmas. I hope you all know that i love you so much and am so grateful for all you do for me. Thank you for the prayers and love. i really can feel them. I hope you all have a wonderful week! And go watch He is the Gift if you havent already! :)

I LOVE YOU :)

Love,

Hermana Peters

Saying a rough goodbye to my friend and trainer, Hermana Holmes
Yep, still wearing glasses because the wind is still strong and rough on my contacts!
It is still super hot, but I am promised it will get even hotter!