"If heaven is boring, I do not want to go"

Hola hola! How yall been? It was a good week! A little slow, but definitely full of its fair share of miracles, laughs, and learning! Let's make it happen.

MILAGRITOS:

• I dont know if this was a miracle or a jajajajaja of the week. Let's say it's a miracle? Well, a couple weeks ago we were knocking doors in the rain and we found Roberto who was so old and so nice and he talked to us for like 10 minutes in the rain in the dark. We had two lessons with him this week, and in the first one we explained that plan of salvation, where we can live with our families for eternity, if we are baptized and make covenants with God. We asked him "have you been baptized before?" and he said "yep, in the catholic church when I was a baby" and we said cool okay. then, the next lesson, we brought a member of the congregation to help us teach and in the first three seconds Roberto told him that he had been baptized in our church, and we were like "sir no you were baptized in the catholic church" and he started to tell us where he was baptized, and the names of the elders who taught him, and his great experience in the temple, and how much he loves our church. So yeah, that was a whole surprise. No wonder he agreed with everything we said in that first lesson gahaha. But anyways he's reading the Book of Mormon every day again and he came to church this week so we'll call that a win.

• We had a lesson with our friend Yanina, and at the beginning she invited all of her kids and nieces and nephews to listen to "the word of God" so we had a bomb lesson with like a million kids who by the end were all chanting "I wanna be baptized!!" So yeah. That was kinda awesome.

• Then, a couple days later, Lucas (one of the kids who wants to be baptized) and Yanina came to church! It was awesome, cause apparently Yanina knows everyone in the ward, so everyone was super happy to see her. A missionary's dream really.

JAJAJAJAJAJAJAs of the week:

• It was AWESOME because it was the primary program, and Lucas (who's 8 years old) just decided to go up on the stage and hang out with all the kids. He stood up when everyone stood up to sing and sat down when he was supposed to, and other than that looked just wide eyed at the whole congregation cause he didnt know a single word to any of the songs (but it's okay cause like 8 out of the 10 kids in the primary didn't know the words either) and he just vibed. Then for the second hour, the primary had a party with food and treats and played games the whole time. Lucas came straight up to me after with a marshmallow/gummy kabob thing in each hand and like four marshmallows in his mouth and said "I want to get baptized!!!" so. we may have to work on our priorities and why we come to church, and then we may have ourselves a baptism for him gahaha.

• We had a lesson with this lady and at one point we said "do you want to go to heaven and live with God and Jesus Christ?" and she said "is it boring there? I feel like it's gonna be boring there. So no." We then explained that we didn't think it would be boring, and she came to the conclusion that she wants to go there, but if she shows up to heaven and it's boring she will be leaving. Also this lady speaks perfect english and refused to speak spanish so I taught the whole lesson in english, except for the scripture which we read in spanish cause I didn't have english scriptures, teaching in english was super trippy.

SHPIRITUAL SHPEEL:

We had a lesson with a fam this week, and they're pretty familiar with the church and apparently (we found out this week) know just about everyone in the ward. We had a conversation that went a little something like this.

Girl: "Do you know Martín? He goes to your church"

Me: "yeah! Martín is the best!"

Girl: "yeah! Except, he got baptized, but he's gay"

Me: "well that's awesome!"

The mom: "what do you mean that's awesome, what's your church's stance on that?"

Me: "that God loves all of us, doesn't matter who we like, boys or girls"

The mom: "But....."

Me: "but nothing! God loves literally every single one of us, no limits, no excuses. There's no "but" ever. We also believe that God has given all of us the same commandments, whether that is to not kill other people, to not drink alcohol, to serve one another, to have relationships between a man and a woman. Because He loves us, He expects us to keep those commandments, no exceptions. But first, before any of those commandments is the truth that God loves us."

Now that is translated and I'm sure it didn't come out as eloquent when I was speaking, but that was the gist of it. And I've been thinking about that conversation a lot recently. How many of us are thinking, "well God loves me, but..." or "God loves everyone, except..." or "God loves my friends, but not me" GAH HEYYYYY IM JUST HERE TO TELL YOU THAT'S NOT TRUE!! God loves us. God loves me. God loves you. God loves your grandma. God loves Justin Beiber. God loves your gay sibling. God loves my neighbor here in Uruguay that killed his wife. God loves people who are trying to be better. God loves people who aren't trying at all. God loves the person who smokes 40 cigarettes a day. He loves the dude covered in tattoos. He loves the covenant keeping mother of five children. He loves the president of the United States. He loves the presidents of all the countries. He loves those people that live in all the countries. He loves YOU.

No offense, but if you've ever thought that you don't deserve to repent, or that God doesn't love you, I really truly don't think you're special enough to be the exception to God's plan. But you ARE in fact special enough for Him to love you.

Because God loves us, He gives us commandments. He said "In the gift of His Son, God hath prepared a more excellent way" That excellent way is the one Christ gave us. Hope and joy and love and peace and some commandments to help us feel that hope and joy and love and peace. In Helaman 15:3, it says "for behold, they have been a chosen people of the Lord; yea, the people of Nephi hath he loved, and also hath he chastened them; yea, in the days of their iniquities hath he chastened them because he loveth them." It's called high love, high expectations. How many times have we been told we are a "chosen generation" or a "chosen people"? We are given commandments because God KNOWS our potential. And he literally has given us the blueprint to live happy and live happy FOREVER. So obviously, each one of us has the agency to choose what we want. But the "more excellent way" has been laid out. It's been laid out because of love. So if you don't get anything from any one of my emails I send on the mission, I hope if you're reading this you know that I love you. And that God loves you. Profoundly, deeply, perfectly, and individually. And NOTHING. Absolutely NOTHING you do will ever change it. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about it.

And I have had different experiences than each one of you, so I can choose for myself and you can choose for yourself and I'm not gonna judge or think less of you or tell you that God doesn't love you or you shouldn't get baptized or shouldn't repent (because He does and you should do both of those things). If you have made choices different than I would have made, AWESOME! That is quite literally what makes us human. Because God loves you, I also love you. So I hope each and every one of you have felt that love. And that you love Him back. Because He is worth loving. And following. And trusting. And becoming more like Him.

That's all! I love you all!! Have a great week!

- hermana allen