Hi Mom!
This week was kinda slow, we were all quarantined. However, it was quite the revelatory lockdown. So I think I’m gonna write a few of them for yall. *My pictures may or may not have anything to do with this post.
January 28th, 2022
HAPPY BIRTHDAY AVERY!!!
Today was a pretty good “missionary grind” kind of day. My comp went to sleep from 2:00 – 3:30 because he prolly has covid. So I read a book and waited for lunch to show up. Then we hit the member grind. Let me just say it is so much easier to ask for references here in México than in North Carolina. We are rolling with a 100% return rate. The next few weeks are going to be lit! We saw a couple of miracles tonight too. The first one came from a member family. We taught about how great Christ is and how we need to feed his sheep (John 21). We had them pray and then think about a few names they could reach out to and share the gospel with. They had a lot of good ones. The Hermano had a really spiritual experience last week with one of his supervisors and has been trying to give them a book of mormon since. After that we had a super spiritual Plan of Salvation lesson with a guy so that was fun. Anyways I’m tired now so goodnight 😁.
January 29, 2022 (smol plates)
I do not have the words to accurately the spirit that I am feeling. The miracles I have seen can only be described as absolutely awesome. Let me try my best. I know God blesses us for our diligent effort to be obedient. Even though it is ridiculously hard and has been over the top the last few weeks. I have been blessed with a fresh new companion who has an unquenchable desire to be obey. For it is by his example that I have seen a change. Thank you God for that. Because I am seeing the fruits of diligence and they are beautiful. Lets start by turning our hearts to God and allowing God into our lives. This is what happened with our friend Fernando. Last week we had a make or break lesson with him, because he has been a bit noncommittal. So we challenged him to pray and seek an answer from God for himself. Today was the fruit of that labor. God literally gifted him with a miracle at work. Now he, Fernando, wants to take the lessons more seriously and he is going to attend church tomorrow!! I am so excited!! Then we have our two miracle baptisms. Vero, she is awesome. So faithful and so ready. Her baptism is 1 week from today! Then we have Jose Antonio Flores. He is awesome. He is only 18 and has a powerful desire. His baptism is in 2 weeks and we have big plans for him until then. Today we did a mock interview because he asked us what the “rules” were for being baptised. He had a lot of good questions and we even had a nice diezmo lesson. So ya, god is good! I just know its because we have been pushing ourselves to do our best. We have started praying more for love, especially for our friends and oh boy can I feel that love now. That chapter 1 corinthians 13, is so true. Without charity we are nothing! Backed uo with Moroni 7:47 that says that charity is the pure love of Christ! Its what makes the work GO! It is what softens hearts and changes souls. It is why I am here as a missionary. God is love, God is good, if yiu want to know for yourself start by asking him and be willing to act! I hope I never forget this feeling and I hope I accurately spewed this spiritual overflow in a good enough way to be understood in the future. If not pray really hard and the spirit will smack ya for me! (God knows a think or two because he has seen a thing or two. *farmers market lol)
ALSO IF YOU GET THE CHANCE READ MY BIG PLATES (personal journal) THERE IS MORE FROM THIS NIGHT THAT I DIDN’T WANT TO ADD!!
January 30, 2022
I must have unlocked some kind of spiritual font because because these last few days have been awesome! I got to meet with the coolest family. The Ortega family were active and in active on and off throughout their lives but recently have decided to be 100% in it to win it. Anyways, now for the spirit filled awesomeness. So it really is funny to freak my super obedient companion out. Only to have it all work out because my mustard seed of faith can move mountains. Anyways! This family, when we were planning our lesson I felt strongly that we needed to teach them about patriarchal blessings. (Using Luke 19) my companion laughed and blew it off saying “Don’t you think that’s not a good lesson for them, plus its your first time going over there.” The old me would have just rolled over and probably blow off a spiritual impression. But nope! I knew God told me that patriarchal blessings is what we needed to do. Being as kind as possible I let my comp tell me his plan and I made sure to “compromise” were we were gonna still teach Luke 19 but with a less powerful focus on patriarchal blessings. So we got into the lesson and had a great time asking about their favorite word in the bible and how we have obstacles and how we need to do certain things to “climb a tree” to “see Jesus” etc etc. Then I felt the spirit take over. We made it to the big question (what I know God wanted us to ask) Which was “If you were Zaqueo in this story, what would your favorite word be?” The dad piped up and nearly in tears said the golden words “his name”. Now usually when we teach this people say Jesus as the first answer. So the fact that this was the first answer proved to me we were on the right track. I could feel the spirit and the love of God fall upon the room. Then God told me to ask the father, Benito, to reread the verse but replace Zaqueo with his own name. Whew, when i tell you the spirit was thick it was thick! Gift of tongues was in overdrive, love was high. Tears were in his eyes. The spirit guided my words into the most masterfully worded testimony and lesson on the patriarchal blessing. Which opened the door to another perfectly perfect testimony session from this member and his sister who was present with us. So awesome, I loved it so much. I don’t intend to be mean and I will most definitely need to repent about this later but, it completely shut my comp up. It was so interesting to see how it all played out. What honestly was my favorite part of this whole interaction was it was a sunday night. We finished our lesson at around 8:03 and we had a ward correlation meeting at 8:00. My comp (who may or may not had been full from lunch earlier that day) almost turned down a generous offer for the members to feed us. Because he wanted to walk home in the dark with our phones out… in Mexico. You could just tell the member really wanted to give us a meal. So in a split second before my comp could respond I said we could eat with them if we could do the call in their home. They wholeheartedly agreed and even let us use their internet. Our meeting lasted 30 minutes while the members labored to make us hotdogs. Miracles: (1) this was the shortest council and the most effective council we have had since I have been here in San Juan (2) second is that we had a beautiful dinner with this family (3) third the hermano and his wife offered to drive us home so we didn’t have to walk home in the dark. (4) fourth we got home on time (well 9:05) satisfying the need to get home for curfew. (5) Though I was actually pretty full from lunch this afternoon. I showed my love to this family and ended up getting a second helping of Hotdogs and a drink and was 100% fine. Moral of the story… DO NOT take an impression from a companion for granted! Especially from a more seasoned missionary… second moral, i am fully aware how un humble this is so BE HUMBLE AND CHOOSE YOUR BATTLES.
January 31, 2022
P-Day, but really it was a work day! Started with the uber to the church. I drove with the ZLs and we ended up getting the ubers number. Then a half an hour later I left with Elder Huffaker, Barrera and Ortega to get hair cuts (btw don’t let those names fool you we are all Americans and english is our first language) The first two get their hair cuts and leave us. So I get mine and the next thing I know I’m teaching the first 5 lessons and 2 hours later we get his number and hand him off to the missionaries in his area. That was a good time haha. Definitely should have kept it short but this kid we talked too was powerful! His testimony and willingness to learn despite it conflicting with what he knew growing up was everything a missionary wishes for.
So ya, twas a good week
Till next time
Elder Service
