LIVE: From Pedro Juan Caballero, Paraguay

Hey you guys, it’s me again!  Since I wont get the chance to say it on your actual birthday day... I’ll just start today by singing... ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU; HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU; HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEAR TJ AND GRANDPA AND ANY ONE ELSE WITH A BIRTHDAYYYYYYYY!!... HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO YOU!!’ :) Happy birthday you guys! I love you both so very much! This week flew by!!  Seriously, faster than any other week has ever flown by!!  In just 2 weeks there will be changes in the mission AGAIN!  We are very hopeful that we will have another 6 weeks together... this is such a happy companionship! This week we went to go and visit a girl named Sunilda, she was baptized almost a year ago and she is awesome! She would come out and do visits with us all the time. But for the last few weeks, the adversary has been working really hard to distract and discourage her. Making it seem harder to do those things she needs to do, especially the commandment of keeping the Sabbath Day holy and getting to church.  And in this fight she’s battling with the adversary, she had a dream that hit her really hard and I just wanted to share it with you guys...  :) She said that she was dreaming that she lived at her old house out on this big ranch in the middle of no where (it’s the place she grew up).  In her dream, it was a Sunday and she was sleeping... She dreamt that I had come with my companion to knock on her door and bring her to church with us.  She said that she hadn’t heard us and just continued sleeping.  In her dream my companion and I had opened the door and entered into her house only to find her on the couch sleeping... "Not doing anything productive” she said.  Then she continued "I wasn’t reading my scriptures, I wasn’t getting ready for church, I wasn’t at church, I wasn’t praying... I wasn’t dong anything I was supposed to be doing and I felt like that was a sign to me that I need to get to church, that I need to continue preparing for the second coming because you never know the hour, or the moment, that Jesus Christ will come knocking at your door and when your time for preparation has ended." She expressed such an increased desire, more than she ever had before, to keep the commandments and prepare herself!! :) “for behold this life is the time for man to prepare to meet God”!! :) Alma 34:30-34. 2 Nephi 9:21-24. Sometimes as a missionary, you set out planning to teach, and instead, you learn.  It really made me ask myself "if the Lord were to come right now... would I be prepared?" "Am I in a place where I am progressing?"  I just think it’s one of those things we should all think about and check ourselves to make sure that we aren’t forgetting to use this time to prepare for the next life, to follow such very special and important commandments: to exercise our faith, repent, read the scriptures, pray, and go to church! :) Those things really do help us prepare and progress.  They are commandments for a reason, they give us wings and lighten our loads and illuminate our path so we can progress and not regress! :) I promise that the Lord loves every one of you so very much and I love you all so very much!  Keep up the good work!! :)  Besos for everyone!! :) Hermana Fardos