On Weds, one of our best investigators decided to go to her old church, I'm not sure why. There, the pastor told her to never talk to us again, or even look at us. So she just told us to go away one day, and later her son explained about the pastor. So that was rough. Two days later, a different investigator, said that getting to church was too hard, so she stopped attending. Then she said that God wanted sacrifice from her, so she started going to her old church again! So it's been rough as far as that goes. They both had baptism dates, and the second one, Osiris, had her date in 4 days! She was ready and everything. Just gave up. The other lady is called Maria. So we're kinda bummed about that. We have also been teaching a family of 7. The mom and dad are Jose and Nolvia, and the kids are Julissa, Jorlin, Cindy, Emery, and Iver. The parents aren't married, so it will be hard to baptize them, but they're interested, so that's good enough for me. The son, Jorlin, is like 14, but asks the best questions of all time. Like, how can I make my prayers more meaningful? And how can I prepare myself for baptism? He's great, super receptive. The rest of the family is too, but he understands everything so well. The biggest problem with them, is that they are super poor. The dad works like 70 hours a week, but his boss is just refusing to pay him. I'm not sure how that's legal, but ok. So getting them to church is very difficult, but this Sunday, Cindy, Iver, and Emer went to church. The others all had stuff to do, but I hope this means that the others will start.
This Friday, we had a multi-zone conference. I wasn't super excited at first, because it was with Progresso Sur, and I don't know anybody from there, but I met a bunch of cool people.
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| Top left: Elder Carver from my district Top right: Elder Frost from Hawaii Bottom left: Hermana Alvarez, the leader sister trainer. Or something like that. Bottom right: Elder Carballo from Mexico. Also has good English. He's a great
missionary, and really cool. He came like 2 changes after me.
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| Top left: Elder Ruelas, one of the secretarys from Texas Top right: Elder Aldrich, secretary of finances--super cool Bottom left: Elder Solis, one of the AP's Bottom right: Elder Victor, He's got pretty good English and is super fun |
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| Top: Elders Magdelei and Martinez Botton: Queme and Gozart |
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| Elder Hepworth (from Idaho) and Elders Magedlei, Gozart, and Martinez |
The topic was revelation through the Book of Mormon, prayer, and church attendance. I loved it! The president always goes over talking and such, but I love it sooo much. He can explain things so well. He taught us about 2 lines. In one line, is God, Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, and an individual. In the other line is the missionaries, scriptures, prophets, even angels. All of them can help, but they can never replace the surety of the first line. That's why revelation is soooo essential.
I've been focusing a lot on personal revelation, before and after the conference. It's so incredible the chances we get from God to know stuff! Pres told us that every person receives several revelations a day, if they're paying attention. That hit me pretty hard. If we are capable, God is willing to give us soooooo much.
This last Sunday we ate lunch with a lady from the ward. She's the coolest person ever! She was explaining her whole conversion story to us--about walking like 6 miles to church, and that she brought real branches to a mutual activity because they were building their family "trees." Haha! She's super funny and interesting. It turns out she's the longest time member in the whole stake--and stakes are huge here! Then she told us how she got into family history, and I told her I was a consultant before the mission. Then we started talking about that. She actually owns one of the old fashioned indexing machines, because she indexed sooo much that the church gave her one. She still uses it. Then she started telling us about all the blessings of her life, and I almost cried. Her testimony is soooo strong and full. I wish I could have recorded that time. I felt the Spirit so much.
A funny side point: everyone thinks I am 25-30 years old. No idea why, but it's weird.
My comp is super funny. And crazy. But soooo fun. He's just full of great ideas. And he's so fearless with the people. He will go contact a house, ask to go inside, and then ask for a glass of water, and the people here are always so willing. Or he will chase down a car, waving his arms and going crazy, until they stop. Then just say, "Oh thank goodness (panting), I really wanted to give you this pamphlet!" So we're having a great time. I don't remember if I told you he's also from Bolivia. That worried me at first, but no, he's probably my fave comp. We just get along sooooooooooo easily.
We talk about the new president and wife a ton. It's weird, remember when I thought it was so cool I was going to have 2 presidents? Well now, I wish I could have Pres. Klein the whole time. He's soooo great. But I'm assuming the new one will be great too.
We are emailing from an internet cafe. It's not bad, but a little complicated. For P Day we played sports like always. Then went to lunch, and then came here. Same as always, but it's great. Funny the tiny things I appreciate now. Like a breeze. Or sitting down. Or a bag of water. I'm very easily impressed nowdays.
And I got the package!! The ICCU bag was so hilarious! Even more so because even the gringos were confused by it. It really is so helpful to me to get stuff from you guys. No joke. Every time I pick up my mp3 player, I think of you guys and all your prayers and help. It's so amazing. I literally couldn't image serving without all the house support! And the mp3 player has been awesome, cuz I downloaded all the music from a bunch of different people and now I have a huge pile of awesomeness. I'll give it to Sam for his mission. We listen to music a ton, like an hour every night and more on P Days.
AND, that was actually such a miracle. First a miracle that she went to Honduras, and 2nd, a miracle that we pulled it off so well. [see below for the whole story on this package.] I've met both those elders, but only like twice. We don't see the Roatan elders a ton, but yeah, they're cool. I've actually built a bit of a reputation here. Nothing too exciting, but I came to this zone, and most of the people had already heard of me. All good things! :) One advantage of three areas in four changes I guess. :)
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| Catan at the secretaries and AP's house! Their house is sooo cool. It has A/C and hot water and a washing machine. And it's huge! |
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| It was super hot, so we drug our mattresses in the front room area, and surrounded ourselves with fans |
When Ben got his mission call a couple in our stake told us they were going on a cruise in February that stopped in Honduras. (This wonderful gal, Rebecca Bledsoe, is a lady I met through young women's. I don't actually know her super well, but she is also a photographer and she took Ben's senior pictures, his mission pictures, and our family pictures. It's the only time I've ever talked to her outside of stake YW meetings. She is lovely, but we don't go out to dinner or anything social.) As it got closer, she called me and asked if she could take anything to Ben for me. I didn't really know how that could possibly work. First of all, the cruise ships stop at an island, Roatan, off the coast of Honduras--not on the mainland. The island is part of Ben's mission, but it's fairly remote. She persisted. She said she could pass something on to some missionaries if she happened to run into any. I explained that there wouldn't be too many missionaries hanging out around the beach and the zip lines courses! Again, she persisted and asked if she could at least carry a letter just in case. Then, days before they left for their cruise, Ben emailed and mentioned his mp3 player had broken and he didn't know anywhere in Honduras he could buy a new one. Getting one to him successfully in the mail would have also been unlikely. So I called Rebecca. Who insisted that she would happily carry around a package and look for missionaries. Not just a tiny mp3 player, but a whole package filled with Nutella and pudding and nuts and his beloved sunflower seeds. We hastily threw it together, bought an mp3 player and loaded it with as much church music as we could and handed it off to them. Being concerned this was a tad crazy, I messaged Sister Klein and told her of our plan and asked if it was ok to attempt this long shot. She messaged back right away and said that not only was it ok, but gave me the missionaries on the island's phone number! She said the cruise ships dock very near an LDS church and they could call the missionaries, and they could meet them at the church. Not only that, BUT she and the president were going to visit the island that very weekend. She would bring it back with her...and with Ben's newest transfer just the week before, he was now in the same district as the office elders....who could deliver it to Ben the next day. Literally, he had it within days of it being in our hands. Truly a miracle.
And did I mention she was on this cruise with 3 other couples! She dragged her husband and 6 of their friends around an island in Honduras to deliver a package to some missionaries.
And claims it was one of the highlights of her trip. I love this woman.
Her pictures/texts to me from Honduras:
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