My name is Hunting Tanner, formerly know as Elder Tanner, and I just got back from my mission in the Argentina Bahia Blanca Mission and it was an amazing experience. Since I know the Bishop pretty well, he let me pick my own topic for today; so I want to talk about the things I learned while being on my mission. I learned literally thousands of things. From things of the gospel to learning how to cook to learning how to live with someone to handling money. There are just a million things that I learned but today I want to talk a little bit about about the five biggest things that helped shaped my testimony and shaped me to become the person I am today.
The first thing I wanted to share with you guys that I really learned is to rely on my Savior, Jesus Christ, and my Father in Heaven. If there is really one thing that I learned, it is that we really are sons and daughters of our Heavenly Father. As missionaries, the first lesson, the first principle that we teach is that Heavenly Father loves us and we are His children. And so just being able to testify of that every single day has really strengthened my testimony. Sometimes the mission will get a little bit lonely. We are not with our family, we aren't with our friends, we aren't with the usual people that we go to when we need help so it gets lonely sometimes. So I learned how to get on my knees and talk to my Father in Heaven. When I need help, I just go to him. So it has been really awesome to be able to gain a relationship with my Father in Heaven and know that He is always there to help me no matter what I am going through. Many people know the scripture in Mosiah 2:17 that reads, "when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God." For me, to love somebody, you have to want to service them. You have to want to minister to them. Being able to service my fellow beings in Argentina, being able to service my brothers and sisters there, I really learned to love God more and I have been able to feel his love towards me as well. Throughout these two years, I have really been able to gain a relationship with my Father in Heaven and my Savior, Jesus Christ, and that is something that I will always be thankful for.
Another thing that I learned and experienced for myself is how the gospel and the Atonement of Jesus Christ can really change the lives of the people. When I first went on a mission, I went with the desire to share the Atonement with people. It is something that I had a testimony of, its probably because it is one of the biggest things that I have experience. I just really know that it really can change peoples lives. So these past two years, every single day we go out into the streets and invite people to follow Jesus Christ. We invite them to follow Him and change their lives and I have just seen so many miracles from that, big and small. I have seen people who have hardships in their lives and don't know where to go and we invite them to follow Christ and the people that choose to follow Him, always find joy in their lives. Many of you guys know that my parents came down to Argentina to come, like look for me (*couldn't find the correct word*)..or come pick me up I mean, and I want to explain a little about what we did. My mission ended on Tuesday and everyone went to the airport to fly home so my parents came to pick me up at the airport in Argentina. So Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and a little bit of Friday we did a little tour around the mission. We got to visit some people that I met throughout the mission. We had a few dinners, we made empenadas, we made an Argentine asado--it was really awesome. So my parents got to know a little bit of what I experienced. And then on Friday night we left to Buenos Aires and we went to the temple on Saturday. And many of you guys might know, my mom said she explained this story a little bit in her talk a few weeks ago, when I was in Bahia Blanca in the Maldenado ward, I met a couple named Luciana and Romina and I want to share their story.
I met Luciana and Romina with my companion Elder Robinson. He had about one week before he was transferred. We were passing by all the less active members to see who will accept us in their house. And so Romina was actually a less active member. She got baptized in Chile when she was about 10 years old. And then her family moved to Argentina and then they just stopped going to church. So she didn't really know much about the gospel but she was a member. So one day we were just passing by her house and she opened the door to us and she said that we came at the perfect time. She said usually they aren't home and that they need us right now. She told us that a few days prior to this, they had a baby and the baby was born a few months early. So she was born just a tiny tiny baby and was fighting for her life in the hospital. And so they weren't usually home, they were in the hospital all day but there you can't really sleep over in the hospital so they had to go back to their house and sleep, so we caught them at the perfect time. They asked us if we could give a blessing to their baby. She didn't know much about the gospel but she said she remembered that her dad would give her blessings when she was sick and before school and things like that. So we said yes of course that we could go to the hospital to give the blessing, not realizing until after that we didn't even know where the hospital was. It was super far away and it wasn't even in our area or our zone. So we called the mission president and he gave us permission to go but he told us to go with a member so that he could drive us so we wouldn't waste too much time. So we went with the Bishop to give this baby a blessing and it was a really awesome experience. But sadly, a few days later, the baby, named Alma, ended up passing; and that was something that was really really hard for Luciana and Romina to handle. They kind of just shut everything out. They told us not to come back, they told us that they didn't believe in God anymore. So that was just something that was really hard for them. It was really hard for us as missionaries to see that because we knew that we had the answer for them. We had the thing that would make them whole again. So even though they told us not to come back again, we went back about a week later. We waited and gave them a little bit of space. We didn't want to disrespect them but we just knew that our message could help them. So we went back a week later and Romina opened the door. She looked kind of annoyed. They let us in, we sat down and I remember that the whole room just went silent. Romina started breaking down in tears and she just asked us why. "Why? Why us? Why did this thing happen to us?" And I remember testifying to her and telling her that I didn't know why. That I don't know why certain people have different trials that are harder than others but I do know that Christ knows. That He is the only person that knows exactly what you are going through. And that all they have to do is go to Him and He can help them be whole again. During this lesson, we preceded to explain the Plan of Salvation and that Alma, their baby daughter, wasn't gone and that she is in Heaven and that she is with our Heavenly Father. They have to do their part if they want to see her again. This was actually our first lesson. And I remember that we were talking about the temple with them already. We told them that they had to go to the temple and be sealed to her. From this moment, a change started in their life. I wouldn't say that they just believed everything we taught right away but you could see that they had learned. If there was a chance that they were going to see their daughter again, they wanted to take it. And they started reading the Book of Mormon everyday. They started praying everyday. They just started progressing super, super fast. Actually Luciano was smoking about 40 cigarettes a day at the time. And in two weeks he quit everything, then about three or four weeks later he got baptized. He was really set on making his baptismal goal on July 7th because July 7th was the date that Alma was suppose to be born. So he quit smoking super fast and got baptized. Seeing them change and seeing them use the Atonement, not just the Atonement of the aspect of repentance but Atonement where Christ really just knows what we are going through because he suffered for us. That was a really big testimony builder for me. So when my parents came to pick me up and we headed up to Buenos Aries that Friday night, it was so that Luciano and Romina could go to the temple to be sealed together and to their daughter, Alma, on Saturday morning. My parents helped fly them up to the temple and it was their first plane flight ever. Romina's mom was able to stand in for Alma and I was able to be a witness for the sealing. That was such an incredible experience to be able to witness and the peace and the Spirit felt that day is something I will never forget. So one of the biggest things that I learned is that the Atonement can help anybody. It doesn't matter what the situation is.
So another thing that I really learned on my mission, is to love the scriptures. I love reading the Book of Mormon and reading the scriptures. I can't go a day without reading the Book of Mormon. Recently, since I have gotten back and have a phone now, it has been kind of nice to listen to it in Spanish so I can practice and keep my Spanish up. The Book of Mormon never fails to bring me peace and joy in my life. I remember when I had about 8 months in the mission and I went from being junior companion to a trainer. Before this, I didn't have any Latino companions, so all my companions were Gringo so I didn't really speak Spanish that well because I was always talking in English with them. And then I just became a trainer, I didn't really know what I was doing, and my companion was a Latino so I didn't know how to communicate with him that well. So I remember I was super stressed out. I was really.., I don't even know. I wasn't going to cry because I didn't want to scare the kid, but I was really stressed. So I remember one night, I was just laying in bed and just remember opening up the Book of Mormon and I just started reading. I don't even remember what I read. I just remember that when I started reading the Book of Mormon, all those feelings of anxiety and stress just went away. I know that the Book of Mormon never fails to bring me peace in my life and I am so grateful for that. One of my favorite scriptures is in D&C 19:23 and it says "Learn of me, and listen to my words; walk in the meekness of my Spirit, and you shall have peace in me." And I just love that. It is so short and sweet and just explains everything perfectly. That is all we have to do. We have to learn of Him and listen to His words. When I think of that I think of reading the scriptures, praying, listening to the words of the prophet, and going to the temple. We have to learn of Him and listen to His words. "Walk in in the meekness of my Sprit." We have to follow Him. And if we do these things, we will have peace. It doesn't matter what is happening in our lives. It doesn't matter how big your trial is. He can always heal us and He can help us find that peace.
Another thing that I learned on my mission is to rely on the Spirit in everything that I do and just trust in the Spirit. When I was younger I didn't really have the Spirit with me that much. I didn't really read my scriptures that much, I didn't pray that much. So I didn't really know what it was like to be able to have the Spirit with me at all times and the things I had to do to keep it with me. So on the mission I learned how to be more sensitive to the Spirit. I learned that I had to do certain things every day if I wanted to keep the spirit. It is definitely a big game changer and big difference in the mission when you have the Spirit and when you don't. I remember one time I was with my companion and we were walking to a lesson. I don't even remember what we were arguing about but we were in an argument and we show up to the doorstep and we both just did not have the Spirit at all. So we walk in and tried to teach this guy but literally nothing came out of our mouths. We like literally did not even know how to talk. It was crazy. So we both kind of realized that we both did not have the Spirit with us and we were not going to be able to teach him in this moment so we told him that we had to go and we left him with a chapter to read in the Book of Mormon and told him we would come back another time because we didn't want to mess up this lesson with him. So we left and made up, I don't even remember what we were arguing about but it was something dumb I'm sure. But we made up and went back later and he actually accepted a baptism invitation. I left the area shortly after but I know that when we teach with the Spirit, it makes a lot bigger of a difference. Doctrine and Covenants 42:14 talks a little bit about that. It says, "And the Spirit shall be given unto you by the prayer of faith; and if ye receive not the Spirit ye shall not teach." And I testify of that. If you don't have the Spirt then you are not going to teach and you are definitely not going to teach the words that God wants you to say.
Another time, I was contacting with my companion Elder Ramirez. We were in Santa Rosa, and I remember it was the morning time and we were on our way home for lunch and studies becasue we have our studies during lunch and the siesta because everyone just goes to bed so there isn't much work to do. So we were done contacting for the day and were actually running a little bit late for lunch and studies. But I remember we were walking on kinda of a busy street and there were a lot of people passing, but I remember that we both got the impression that we needed to contact this woman walking with her 8 year old daughter. We both got the impression that we needed to contact her and I didn't know why at the time. So we go up and talk to her. It was like a terribly contact. At the time I was like "why would the Spirit tell us to contact her? She didn't want anything." She ended up giving us her name and address but I didn't get it at the time. So we were going to pass by another day and we got a date to go back. I didn't really have much faith in it and was like "I don't think she really wants anything. Maybe it would be better use of our time to go and visit the people that are actually progressing." But my companion, he is awesome-he's a stud, was like "no, we gotta go." So I was like, "Alright, let's go." So we went back to the house and we knock on the house and a man answers the door. His name is Franco. He let us right in, he was super nice, and he let us teach him all of the restoration and we actually set a baptismal date with him. He is the husband of this woman, Brenda. And even though she never accepted the gospel and she never wanted anything from us, but I know that the Spirit led us to her to get to him and I am just hoping that he can get to her. That was a really big testimony changer for me. I actually had the chance to baptize Franco about two months later so that was awesome. So I know that for missionary work, we always have to have the Spirit with us when we teach and when we find people. They call it finding the escogido, or finding the chosen people. So I just love that in the mission I was able to be able to be more sensitive to the Spirit and know the things that I needed to be doing in order to have the Spirit with me.
The last thing that I learned, (well not the last thing but the last thing I want to talk about) is that I learned to be humble and more converted to the gospel. There is no way to be able to serve a mission without humbling yourself before God. Without God's help, it would literally be impossible. We are rejected every day, I didn't speak the language, it was a whole different culture, everything was just so different, and without His help, and without humbling myself before him and realized that I can't do it alone, I definitely would not have been able to serve a mission. I remember that my last month in the mission, I was kind of stressing out because I was like, "I am already finishing my mission and I thought that I was suppose to have the testimony of an apostle or something. I thought that I was suppose to have a perfect testimony and know everything-know the scriptures front to back. And I was like wow I think that I failed on my mission. I don't have all the scriptures memorized. But I remember I definitely learned a lot and my testimony definitely changed a lot. So I was kind of stressing out about this a little bit. And the last week of my mission, Elder Villar came. He is one of the members of the quorum of the seventy. And I remember and Elder asked a question. He said "How did you become so converted to the gospel?" and his answer in Spanish was "Estoy en eso" which means like "I am still in it," or "I am still trying to convert myself." And he is a general authority. He is a member of the quorum of the seventy and he explained to us that conversion is a life long process. It is not something that just happens. So I really like that. I have been thinking about how the mission shouldn't be the spiritual high of my life, it shouldn't be the most spiritual moment of my life. That after the mission I can keep progressing and keep coming to know my Savior more and learning my scriptures more, and so I love that it is more of just a spiritual springboard rather than just a spiritual high.
I know that this Church is true. I am so thankful for the chance that I had to serve a mission, to strengthen my testimony, become more converted, to know my Savior, to use His Atonement, and to see miracles. I am so thankful for these past two years that I have had. I loved absolutely every minute of it. I want to share my testimony with you in Spanish.
*Testimony in Spanish*
En el nombre de Jesucristo, Amén.
* a few pictures from after my talk
I will miss Argentina but it feels good to be home!
