Cuando Llueve, Llueve mucho (when it rains its pours... more or less)

Hola Elder Damitz!

And it came to pass that the week was good in the eyes of Elder Chriss! haha yeah we had a great time! Me and my comp E. Damitz are working really working hard to find the people that the Lord is preparing for us in our area. We had several great opportunities to grow and get better.

   

Now as the title says, when it rains it pours.... First off we had like 5 meetings this week. which never happens (meetings are more rare here) First off in San Fernando (mission office) with all of the Zone and District Leaders, which was great and I loved all the things that we learned about. Secondly Zone meetings and ward meetings sooo it's pouring meetings.

  

Another type of rain that we are having is well, rain. The other day we were in our Zone meeting and it started to rain. We all look outside and groan, because none of us were expecting rain, so we had no umbrellas or coats. Then in the middle of the meeting our Zone Leader gets a call. He tells us that all of the colectivos (Public Buses) are not working.... we live very very far from our the church that we were in.... so let's just say that we got very wet.

  

It was a great week for my district! We had three baptisms as a district yesterday! I have been blessed to work with great missionaries here in my district. I was given the opportunity to interview the candidates for baptism and it was super cool so see the fruits of the missionaries and their work. As I have said in the past the mission is growing substantially. And it's great to be here to see it. The Lord is moving forward with his work and is preparing the world for his coming. 

I love you all! Email me, I love hearing from you.  Have a good week, stay cool and love one another.

Love Elder Chriss

Another MTC Gang photo!

BOCCA!!!

Pictures sent from Natalia before Elder Flores left

Capos (studs) de Mision Buenos Aires Norte

Ciao Elder Flores!

Hey every one how are you doing this fine day?  Another week passes, wow the weeks are passing by really fast... I don´t like it.

It has come to pass another transfer, hence the Email on Tuesday. And guess what more changes for Elder Chriss.  My companion E. Flores has moved to another area, of Parque Brown which in fact is where I spent my first week in Argentina. I have a new companion named Elder Damitz from California. He is super smart and is a hard worker. I´m looking forward to working with him.

This past week was a good ole week of working. And I´m going to tell you the truth.... not much happened. We taught several lesson to a lot of people but nothing grand happened during the week.

But at the end of the week we had the farewells for the departing missionaries. And me and E. Flores took some investigators to it. We had a great time.  I had the opportunity to see a lot of people that I known from other areas. First of I saw Elder Stout! Who is doing great (is a district leader) and is having a lot of success still in Parque Avellaneda. He brought Ari (son of JOSE!) to the farewell! I love that guy I´m so happy to find out that Jose is doing good and his family is coming closer to Christ! I got to see the whole gang (MTC) which what awesome. And I said good bye to my misson Father E. Pastrana who will be returning home to Kaysville UT. I saw lots of people and in the end it was great.

We were at lunch the other day and my companion was a little down and was telling the family how he failed to baptize this transfer and how he felt like a failure. The Hna told my companion a story I will never forget. She said " There once was a missionary who told me after one year in his mission that he only had one baptism. After he had served his entire mission that one baptism was his only baptism in his mission." Now in this mission having only one baptism is odd because baptisms are a lot more common." She continued " That missionary only had one baptism, but the young girl that he baptized found and married a returned missionary, had 5 kids, all of which are missionaries, and her husband is currently a bishop." She looked at my comp and told him "I'm that one baptism." As missionaries never must we feel that the work we do is wasted, because it is all worth it in the end. This Hna is the wife of the our bishop and is such a great example to me. I know that as long as I´m working hard and doing all I can to serve the Lord, I´m having success and as long as I´m obedient and following my leaders the blessings will follow.

l love you all so much! I hope that you all have a fine and dandy week. I will talk to you all later.

LOVE,
Elder Taylor Chriss

The WONDERFUL Lilian once again feeding my cute missionary son!!!

MTC District and roommates together again one year later

March Madness!

Elder Chriss and Elder Lines enjoying Taylor's favorite Helado!  Elder Lines is one of the senior missionaries serving in the Mission office.

Well it's your favorite time of the week! THE WEEKLY EMAIL OF E. CHRISS!!! 

That's right it's already March.  I´m not really sure what happened with February, but it just seemed to disappear!!! 

I have to say that it was a great week! We as always have been working our butts off here. Every corner of our area we have walked and we have been talking to as many people as we can! Another big thing about this week is that I have officially completed one year in the mission. Wow I´m kind of sad to think that I´m half way done with my mission, mainly because i want more time. With this in mind I will have to work as hard as i can so that I´m not losing a second of this time. 

   

This week of hard work was very interesting. We are as a mission focusing on contacting more people, the idea is that the bigger the net we throw the more elect people we will find. We are seeing great growth in our investigator Milagros, and we are hoping to see her baptized soon. I had a great opportunity to have divisions with and Elder this week named Elder Mejia, he is from Mexico and I have known him my entire time here! We had a great time in his area and we found several great new investigators. Our mission is growing a lot and we are doubling our numbers from past months, it is really cool to see the growth in Buenos Aires.

  

There have been several times on my mission where I have felt the help of my Heavenly Father but this week I had an experience that it was undeniable that I was receiving help. We were passing by people in our area and we were talking with a very nice member who as a lot of resistance in her home. As we were talking a very angry man came and decided to tell us that there is no such thing as God and that we are fools for believing in this. He said some very offensive words to us and wanted to continue talking. At this moment I felt a boost, With the clearest Spanish that I have ever used in my life I stood up (we were sitting at the time) and told the Man, "I know that God exists, I know that Christ is my Savior, And no man and his words can out weigh what I know to be true." My companion and I told him to have a good day and we left. As we left he said some not so nice words which I didn´t understand, But nothing he could say could diminish the feelings I had. 

I´m so grateful for a Heavenly Father who strengthens us in our time of need. I would like to repeat what I said, "I know God lives and that his son Jesus Christ is our Savior." I can not deny it.

I´m so grateful to be a missionary, to be here in Buenos Aires Argentina. Thank you all for your love and I hope you have a good week. 

A shout out to my Grandfather who is in the hospital, GET WELL! I love you all so much and I will talk to you next week!!!

Con Amor!

- Elder Taylor Chriss

I received the following letter from Elder Lines this week:

Dear Sister Chriss,

What a great son you have shared with us!  Believe it or not I got to spend a couple of hours with him today along with his companion.  His companion had literally worn thru and thru his meager shoes and so we went shopping.  Elder Chriss was a lot of help and I could really feel the compassion he has for his companion, Elder Flores.  They had to go with me to my other rounds through town getting business done along the way, so we had a fun time doing a lot of walking and talking.  He has a great spirit and attitude about him.  You have raised a  great son to be proud of.

Elder Lines

Financiero

Misión Buenos Aires Norte

I am so thankful for the wonderful people put on Elder Chriss' path to love and watch out for him! 
~Lisa 

The Family we live with!! A party for their anniversary. Funny thing is that they lived in Utah for several years next to the Home Depot on Highland Drive!!! Small world!

Lunch with some of our zone.

Wonderful Natalia Roldan posted this picture of Elders Chriss and Flores at a birthday party with the following caption, "Me encanta haber compartido este dia junto a ustedes!! Me divertí mucho hoy!!Son unos capos!:p"  Translation:
"I love to have shared this day with you! I enjoyed much today!They are a few bosses!"

It's startin to get Chilly!

Elder Chriss and Elder Flores having lunch with a recent convert and the cute sister that goes teaching with them.

It's starting to get colder here in Argentina!!!! We still have those super hot days but every once and a while we are feeling some coldness!!! I´m so excited for Winter. 

This was a great week. We are seeing improvements in our área and we are loving it. First off we had two great investigators in church this week, One named Leandro, who said after church "Wow I want to be baptized." I don´t have problems with that. We are working really hard to find all the people that the Lord has prepared in our área.

  

Talking about being prepared by the Lord, This week I did divisions with the Zone Leaders. I was with E. Odum and we were passing by a lady named Carmen. She is a super sweet lady from Chile. she ownes a Kiosco and has watched the missionaries pass by her shop all the time, never really paying too much atención to them. But after several bad things happening in her life she went into a spiral of depression. When she got the bottom of said spiral of ultimate sadness. ¡Ding dong! two thirsty missionaries wanting to by juice happen to pass by. She started to talk with them and felt the peace that we bring and grabbed on to it. They gave her a Book of Mormon and passed by every day for the next week. Though her eyes hurt each time she reads, she endures through the pain to read her new favorite book. In the misión for a person to be baptized they must have 3 asistences in the church. She only had one. When I went with E. Odum, He asked her a question really powerful " when do you want to get baptized" with out hesitation she said " Este Domingo" So with a call to President she was authorized to be baptized this Sunday. In all of my time on my misión I have never seen a more prepared person for the Gospel. She is a great example for me to "Seize the Gospel" when we find it.

  

This week was a good week, There isn´t much to say. I´m getting over a pretty bad stomach sickness (Presidents wife is in charge of Health) Hna. Ayre told me to stay away from the wáter completely.... that is hard because every one offers juice made with the wáter here. And I´m regaining my voice which was destroyed due to a bad cough. haha not the best week for my health. But I´m getting a lot better. The work is growing like crazy here in the misión. We are teaching around 2000 lessons with a member present each week! and around 50 baptisms a week.

  

I´m so grateful for this time in my misión, No matter how hard things are here or at home, this time is worth it. I know that I´m receiving super blessings and all that I love are as well. 

I hope that you are all doing good and hope to hear from you soon!

With lots of Love

Elder Taylor Chriss

  More pictures from Lilian.Elder Chriss sharing a scripture.

                                                                           

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