Dog Bites & The Police

Dear Family and Friends,

Wow, that is awesome about the pavement in the backyard and to hear about everyone going to the temple and the adventures at East elementary!

These past two weeks we had some crazy adventures.

This past week, we had to wake up at 4 in the morning 3 times to go to the airport to help the Elders and Sisters get off to their new areas. We were soooooo tired. If you don't get 8 hours of sleep you can't function as a missionary!

Anyway, here in Bolivia there is a taxi service called Radio Movil. It is a 24 hour service. I wasn’t too confident that we could find a taxi so early in the morning so I started looking through our contacts and I found a number that said ´´Radio Patrullas 110´´ and it was in the phone twice so I thought it must be a really good taxi service because the previous elders put it in there twice. So I called it.

A very concerned women answered the phone and said, ´´Sir what is your emergency?´´

I thought, “Wow, this a great taxi service; they really take their job seriously.´´

So I told her that we needed to get to the airport, and she asked why we needed to get there and I told her, “Well this a radio movil right?” And then she very seriously said, “Señor este numero es 110.” Then I got the hint, I had called the police. OOPS! So I told her I was sorry and quickly hung up.

Short story short, if you call 110 it is the police in Tarija! But the Lord blessed us and no one came to our house to arrest us and we found a taxi to get to the airport!

Now for the dog bites!

There is a great family that is a little less active that lives by our house and so we went to help pick their oranges. They have 5 dogs - 4 tiny Hope dogs and a big dog. As we started picking the oranges, the 4 small Hope dogs started barking at us. But we kept going, and then one of them got really brave and scratched and bit my leg.

Well we washed it, and the members felt so bad they bought me some nice cleaning medicine and they didn't have any band aids but the gave me a pink strip of cloth!


We called the mission doctor and reported that I got bit by a dog and that it didn't have its rabies vaccinations. And so he told me to send him a picture of the bite and what type of dog so that we could start doing the vaccinations immediately. I hate shots, so I was getting a little scared but..... After seeing how tiny the bite was the doctor told me just to watch the dog for 10 days and if does not die I don't have rabies!! I am happy to report the small Hope dog is still alive, so I´m rabies free!

Picking oranges and their parrot

​I bought some chapaco clothes! The men here wear these fancy shirts to dance and play music!


​Early morning airport adventures for transfers.

But some miracles that we had this week is that Marilin, Joselin, and Claudia all went to our stake conference! Elder De Pozo of the 70 came and spoke. He is from La Paz, Bolivia and has family in Spanish Fork!

He spoke of many things but invited all the members to give one reference to the missionaries! He promised that as we work together this year we can bring 300 souls to the waters of baptism!

To see Elder De Pozo strengthened my testimony that this is the Lord´s church, and He guides us through modern day profets who know and love him!

Also, Friday, there was a special devotional for all investigadores and new converts with Elder De Pozo, the Stake Presidency, and President Rodriguez. And Marilin went!!

It was incredible. All 5 of these amazing lideres were converts. The stake presidency shared their testimonies and conversion of how they felt when they were baptized. President explain the restauracion in such a beautiful way. He testified how God loves us and because he loves us, He created the earth for us. He sent his beloved, perfect, and most obedient son to suffer and die for us. His beloved son was suffering unbearable pain and asked that our Heavenly Father would love all of his other children so much that he would permit His begotten son to suffer and die for us. Both He and our Savior, Jesus Christ did this because they love us.

After the death of the apostoles and the persecution of the church, the world fell into spiritual darkness and apostasy as unauthorized changes were made to the doctrine and structure of Christ's church.

But because God loves all of His Children, He called a latter day profet, Joseph Smith, and through this prophet restored His true Church!

Because God loves His Children, He brought to life another testament of Jesus Christ, which is the Book of Mormon. The Book of Mormon contains the fullness of the gospel and is convincing evidence of God's love for us and that truly He restored His church on the earth!

I am so grateful that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ love us! I know that this is His church and that the days when we make foolish mistakes or we feel rejected or humiliated that the Lord loves us! How the gospel leads to the tree of life or in other words, God's pure love and happiness!

Marilin is progressing so well! Now we want to teach her husband more and baptize them both. Please pray for us that he can feel the truthfulness of our message and he too can be baptized.

This week, Claudia is going to be baptized. Pray for her please and that she can have the faith to make this covenant with God!

Love,

Elder Matheson

P.S. Elder De Pozo invited us to tell our parents how much we love them and give them a big hug. Mom and Dad, I love you and I am so grateful that you taught me the gospel and that you love me! Thank you for always writing and for you encouragement! I love you both so much! And I am sending a big virtual hug your way and a back scratch for dad!