Hey there friends!

It was a great week in the Peru Arequipa mission! My companion and I worked super hard this week. We contacted like CRAZY. We talked to everyone. Strangers walking by, taxi drivers, people selling milk on the street, store owners, everyone! We saw a lot of miracles come from this. We have a lot of new investigators that are interested in our message! Hopefully this week we'll be able to meet with them and teach them more.

So last week I celebrated my birthday! It was so crazy, theres a tradition here in Peru that when its your birthday everyone cracks eggs on your head and throws flour on you and shoves cake in your face. And thats exactly what happened to me! I'm grateful that I'm only celebrating one birthday in Peru haha. There was a member who bbqed for us which was awesome! Later that day we had an activity with our ward and then a baptism! It was a great way to spend my birthday.

I have learned many things in my time as a missionary, but one thing that I think has changed my perspective on life is our agency, or our ability to make our own decisions. We make decisions involuntarily all the time, and we will always involuntarily choose the option that will make us happy. I've been thinking a lot more about the decisions I make, bigger decisions and small ones too. And if I'm making these decisions so that I will truly be happy, not just happy in the moment. Sometimes it's easier to make the decision that brings temporary happiness, or maybe it's not completely morally correct instead of choosing the right. There's a scripture in the Book of Mormon, in Mosiah 3:19 that says, ¨For the natural man is an enemy to God, and has been from the fall of Adam, and will be, forever and ever, unless he yields to the enticings of the Holy Spirit, and putteth off the natural man and becometh a saint through the atonement of Christ the Lord, and becometh as a child, submissive, meek, humble, patient, full of love, willing to submit to all things which the Lord seeth fit to inflict upon him, even as a child doth submit to his father.¨

The ¨natural man¨ that is talked about in this scripture is the voice in our head that tells us we're too tired, or too lazy, or too busy, or too scared, or not good enough, and entices us to choose the wrong, or choose what might not exactly be the right thing to do. The natural man is an enemy to God. Because of this, we have to put off the natural man. We have to accept the fact the God knows us better than we know ourselves, therefore His will is better than ours. We have to submit ourselves to His will if we truly want to be happy.

I'm extremely grateful for the time that I have as missionary, for the things that I have learned, and for the opportunity I have to preach the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.

I love you all! Until next week (:

¡Cuídense!

Hermana Celardo