An Elders Tale by Elder Chriss

Argentine rain!  Check out his feet!

This was a rock solid week in my opinion. Me and my companion broken the area record and my personal record of 30 lessons with a member present this week!! Lets just say that we are walking and talking a lot. 

I´m not sure if I mentioned this member before, but we have a member in our ward named Natalia, who is preparing to serve a mission. And in her mission preparation she has decided to go out with the missionaries every day for as long as she can! Let's just say that we are blessed to have her helping us out here in this area. Also she is a great testimony of a person who is converted and wants to help the work move along. Now I'm not saying spend your whole day with the missionaries ( if you are a missionary then yes spend you day with another missionary) But we need to do everything to help this work move along together! 

The sad part is that we didn´t get people in the chapel this week.. it's really hard that you spend your week working so hard and people don´t go to the place that you spend all week talking about. I kind of feel like a car stuck in the mud. We floor it and in the end we don´t go any where! a lot of Rpms and no traction for the tires! But the good thing is that there is always the next week to put everything we have into the work and keep looking forward.

  

This week we had the great opportunity of having interviews with President Ayre, He is such a great guy and really just vibrates with the spirit. He is kind and knows what to do in the moment. I could just talk with him forever. His wife was also there and she is just so much fun, Her interview is to see how we are doing in the head. The mission isn´t to fond of having their missionaries go crazy. But it's was a great time. 

Also I had a super fun time going on divisions with an Elder in my district named E. Sanderson, He´s from Utah... yeah I know shocker... But we had a great time. One thing you will learn on the mission is that the craziest stuff happens on divisions. We had this guy come up to us and ask us to bless his door... Bless his door that people would be able to enter through it safely... We had a great laugh on that one. I was so glad to go out with him and work. He is a great elder and will do great things in his mission!!!

Lately i have been studying a lot in the Christ like Attributes section in PMG (preach my gospel) and I found a scripture that really put in perspective of repentance and humility/obedience right now! It's in Alma 5: 27. I love this scripture because it helps me remember that we don´t know when we will die or when will need the help of the Lord, but in the moment I want to be sufficiently humble to the Lord. Which includes obeying all of his rules and being who HE wants me to be. That's my spiritual dulce of the week hope you enjoy it!

Still haven´t gotten my packages from home, but I know that all I need to have is patience with Argentino Mail... Darn mail. Well that's about it for me this week. I hope you are all doing well and have a good week. I will talk to you next week. 

Write Me!!!

With a lot of Love!!!!

Elder Taylor Michael Chriss

Elder Sanderson and Elder Chriss

My sweet friend, Lilian, in Elder Chriss' ward feeds him every Sunday and sent me these pictures! Lasagna and ice cream, yum!

Araña gigante!  He said it was 3 inches, yikes!

Temple P-Day!

Today was fantastic! This morning we woke up at 5am and took 3 buses and a train and made it to the 10 o´clock session in the Buenos Aires Temple. It was a long trip but worth it one hundred percent! The temple is actually not that big, but it is beautiful! The place is covered in spires and awesome windows. There is a super cool fountain in front. Now 

The whole thing was in Spanish so that made things a little bit interesting. But it is a great testimony of the spirit that even though I wasn´t able to understand everything completely, I felt such an overwhelming feeling of peace and love. I´m not going to lie this week has been pretty stressful, good but stressful, and the temple helped me a lot to get back on track. 

  

This week we have been teaching like crazy, looking for new people and talking with as many people as possible. We have several investigators, the only thing in their way is Marriage.... I´ve come half way around the world and one thing that hasn´t changed is trying to get people married so that they can get Baptized.... Ha ha. 

We do have one recent convert that is awesome. Her name is Elisabeth, She is great really nice and is doing great. She lost her husband a year ago to cancer and it was really hard on her family. She has told us that she feels such a great peace in her life when she reads the BoM, I would like to add my testimony that the BoM truly can bring peace to our lives, always. we just need to read it!

  

This week I also had splits with E. Venegas, one of my Zone Leaders. He is great and we had a great time working in my area. We didn´t have much time to work because we were running all over the place to get some things done. With him I did my first Baptism interview. I was interviewing a man named Ezequiel. Now Ezequiel is a great guy very humble and what's to be part of this Gospel. His past is not the cleanest and had several things that he was repenting for.

Now this being my first interview I tried my hardest to be listening to the spirit to help me do the interview. It has been on of the most spiritual moments ever. Looking at this man with a past and feeling that he was ready to be free from his sins and was ready for baptism. It is such a great feeling to watch as you see people embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ in their lives and become better. 

  

This really makes me think of myself and how if I truly embrace the gospel I can be who the Lord wants me to be and who I need to be. I´m so grateful for all of your prayers and all of your support that you send me.  I do love you all so much and I hope you are doing great.

Con muchisimo Amor 

Elder Taylor M. Chriss

Just found out that today is Hump Day for Elder Chriss!  Exactly one year from today we will be hugging him at the airport!

Extermina Cucarachas!  Goodbye cockroaches!

Pablo Nogues

Another tender mercy!!! I received a friend request from Lilian Graciela. She let me know that she lives in the neighborhood where Elder Chriss is serving, her husband is Bishop Godoy in Taylor's new ward! She took this picture of him and Elder Flores yesterday. They will have lunch with them every Sunday!

Hey all!!! I hope that everything is going great. Things here are awesome. 

My new area is huge! It's just full of fields and we haven´t even been to the other half of my area. It's like a mix between a villa and a farm. The people are really humble despite their situations. Our ward is pretty small only about 35 active members in church each week.... We are going to work on helping bring back those lost sheep. 

Our Pension is full of Cockroaches. Lets just say that I bought a lot of raid and cleaned like crazy in the pension. It's been awhile since any one cleaned anything. We live out side of our area so every day we have to take a bus to get into our area. 

The bus passes every 45 minutes so it's a little tricky and it takes about 1 hour to get there on foot. Me and my comp are working hard, We aren´t the most compatible but I´m doing my best to fix that.

   

This week we have been working a lot with investigators, I´m wanting to start by helping the less active a bit more. It's just sad when each person in the ward has like 2 callings. But I´m loving this place. The Bishop is great and is really willing to help us out here. 

My first week as a district leader went well.  I have to make calls each night to every one in my district, so bye bye to resting after nightly planning. I have 3 companionships in my district and they are all awesome elders. I´m definitely learning that prayer is the best thing in the world. I definitely can´t do this whole leader thing with out my Heavenly Fathers help!

  

We had a Zone meeting this week which was awesome, learned about being missionaries that live the higher law. Doing more than is asked of you. And at the end of the meeting our leaders told us that we will be going to the temple this up coming P-Day!!! I´m so excited to go to the temple. It's been way to long since I´ve been there. And the cool thing is that I will be going on the day one year before I return home. Talk about a boost to work harder. 

I´m doing good and I love the weather right now (cloudy) so it's all good here in BA!! I hope that you are all doing well. I love hearing from you and I hope You have a good week. 

Espero que tienen un semana de diez!!!

Lots of love!

Elder Chriss

Playing Soccer in front of Elefante Blanco

Cambios! (Changes)

Caio Jose!!!

As you can tell by the title this week. Changes or Transfers!! I am Here in my new area called Pablo Nogues. It's out side of the city and pretty big! My new comp is Elder Flores, he is from Peru and doesn´t speak any English... I´m so stoked to be with him. I´m going to learn a lot of Spanish real quick haha! 

Not only have I moved and need to get used to a new area but Elder Sweeny (One of the Assistants) called and I have been called to be a District Leader!!!  Wow I´m a bit nervous for this next step in my mission but I know the Lord will help me in this!  Now all I need to know is who will be in my district!!!!

 

It was pretty hard to say good by to my little ole Cuidad Oculta! It was super hard to say good bye to José. Now he knows that missionaries come and go and he is happy for me that I off to another area. Man he is rock solid. The other day we were talking with him and his friend and he just took the lesson and made it better. He testified and told them that they need to go to the church. Haha my last memory of him is him inviting his friends.

 

We have been having a bunch of success in our area and now I´m glad that I´m leaving because I´m leaving it better than I found it and that is my mission goal to leave every place I´m in better than i found it!!! 

Super cool thing also was that the other day a member took us into Elefante Blanco the old abandoned hospital. The people are super nice inside. All is well here in Buenos Aires, I´m off to Play so Fútball hope to hear from you soon, I will write more when I have more to talk about next time.

Les Amo 

Elder Chriss

Elephant Blanco

Goodbye Elder Stout!

Week of Miracles!

I have to say, that this was a great week! Come to think about it I´m pretty sure I have said that at the beginning of most of my emails... but that's okay because its still true. A GREAT WEEK!

To start off the week we of coarse got some more Argentino Ice Cream. Just to let you all know, the Ice Cream here is the best stuff in the whole world. You can buy a whole Kilo of ice cream for about 15 dollars U.S, But me and my comp, buy ourselves a kilo each. So yeah a great start to the week.

So here are the highlights to said Great week. First off Marcela was Baptized!!! We had a wonderful service and everything went well. She is feeling a lot better and we are Super spiritually pumped!! 

Now I´m not sure if i have told you about Tommy her son. Tommy is a capo! He is 10 years old and has a learning disability that has pushed his progression back to about 6 years old. He is really great and Is our friend. Tommy was baptized last year, and his mom wasn´t. Tommy was at a members house when we went to visit. The family told us to go and teach his mom so we ran over there and taught her the Gospel. Through this experience I have seen the blessings of members and missionaries working together. Now Marcela and her Son Tommy are members and are going strong.
  
Another thing this week is that we had president Ayre go out with us in our Area for the day, This was super cool. We took him through our villa and just taught many people with him there. The best part was that we would teach the people and after he would bear his testimony and the spirit hit them so strong. He really enjoyed his time with us in our area. Jose got a kick out of it that Pres. Ayre visited him. It was so much fun to go out with him.

Jose is doing great, he got confirmed yesterday, and he has been going out with us to several lessons. He has such a strong testimony of the BoM and of the Restored gospel. He said the coolest thing the other day to a lady who said that the church is just another branch of the Catholic Church. He said "It's not a branch of the church because it has the BoM and Prophets. What part of the Church has those?" Then he bore his testimony of the BoM. I´m so happy for him, he has truly found true joy in the Gospel.

  
Now it's Monday again so that means its time for more ice cream!

Love you all so much!  Hope to hear from you. You can yell if you want but I´m not sure if  I´ll hear it, so safer to send an email!
 
Love you tons!
Elder Taylor Chriss

His new shirt.  He is becoming quite the futbol fan!

Another lovely picture of his area!

Lunch with the Elders from the Parque Avellaneda Oeste Ward

How Great Shall be Your Joy (D&C 18)

Elder Stout, Jose and proud Elder Chriss!

Wow This has been a great week! And I´m saying one of the best weeks of my mission! Let's just say I am so happy right now and so grateful for this opportunity to serve a mission!!! 

Now as the familiar song goes "I do believe in Miracles". This was a week of miracles and I´m super spiritually pumped. Now the good news is that José got Baptized!!! We are so excited for him and he is so happy with his decision. We had a longer road to the water than normal but in the end it was all worth it.
  
So we got José baptized.  But unfortunately, Marcela got really sick and was in the Hospital this Sunday and wasn´t able to make it to her baptism. We have rescheduled for the next week. 

But to get us to yesterday, me and my companion worked especially hard, to contact José every day. This last Wednesday we passed by him and he was feeling really sick and a bad pain in his legs. We shared a scripture with him and he didn´t really pay attention because of how he felt. So we decided to pray, he asked if i would offer it. So I prayed that he could feel relief from his pain that he would be able to make it to his baptism. After I had finished my prayer, he just sat there. After a good 2 minutes of silence, he got up and said that the pain in his legs were gone! It was so cool and exactly what he needed and he just got more and more excited for his baptism.
  
We had another good week on lessons and finding new people. I´m just so happy right now! 

Yesterday afternoon we visited Jose and he was so grateful and shared a scripture he found in the Bom that he liked in 3 Nephi, then he told us how he is the lost sheep in the 100. Man I´m so proud of him. After we got him all wet he told me that next was his son, then his wife and then his other son, next to be baptized. Ahhhh he is so great!   

Other than that it was a very Tranquilo semana. I am so excited to be a missionary, so excited to be in Argentina, and so grateful to have a loving Heavenly Father who is guiding us in this work. My scripture of the week is D&C 18 10, 13-16 I just love it so much.
 
I hope you are all doing well!  Let me know whats up in the neighborhood.

With lots of love
Elder Taylor Chriss

Elefante Blanco!

The Villas!  Taylor loves it here!

First week of the New Year!



Christmas morning in Buenos Aires!

Woooh 2014, Happy New Year everyone!!!! Man it feels so weird to think that another year has passed. In my opinion The best part of New Years is the opportunity we have to look back at what happened in the year and contrast of how we were and how we are now. Now I know that I have changed quite a bit, but I know that we all change. So fun activity for you all is think one year ago what you were like and the changes that you have made!!! And only think of the positive changes no need to be thinking triste (Sad). For me I know with out a doubt that I wouldn´t have been able to do the things I do now, one year ago. Spanish first of all is a pretty big example.... I didn´t even speak it a year ago. But also I really didn´t fully contemplate the gravity and specialty of the Restored Gospel. I truly love this gospel and am so grateful for a Heavenly Father who helps us through its message!!!

   
Now to start off this year I think that we had some pretty good miracles this week!!!  First off, Me and my companion have broken our record for lessons with a member present with a weekly number of 26 lessons. Then you add on our 12 other lessons and we are up to 38 lessons taught this week! We are so grateful for this chance that we had to teach so many people!

Also with our extra push this week on getting out and teaching we have been blessed a lot. One blessing in particular is an investigator named Marcela. We have been teaching her for several weeks now and she is just wonderful. Her son is a Recent convert and has a downs syndrome. Now she has a super desire to be baptized and there is nothing in her way of getting there. When we brought up the Law of Chastity she told the man she was living with that he needed to live in a different house, and when she was taught the Word of Wisdom she decided instantly that she needed to stop smoking. We are planning her baptism for this upcoming Sunday.

Now as we were in Church this Sunday, José came to us and told us that he wanted to talk to the Bishop. S o after the Meetings we had him have and interview with Bishop Cano. After the Interview Bishop came out and said that Jose will be getting baptized this next Sunday!!!! I AM SO EXCITED FOR HIM. We gave him a blessing also for his health, and I know that every thing is possible with the Lord.

I am getting better from my random Argentino sickness, still skinny as a corn stock. But one thing that will never change about me is that I love my mission!!! I´m so glad to be here in this area I know that the Lord is preparing people for this message and it's our job to find them! I know my Savior lives that he guides the church and through his teachings we can find true and everlasting Joy.

I hope you all are doing great, Let me know how y'all are doing!!

See you all next week!
Con un Corazon Lleno de Amor
Elder Taylor Chriss

Elder Chriss at the mission Christmas Party!  Hooray for new socks!

The best Juice in the world in many different Varieties

Elder Stout at the Internet café!