Elder Spencer's Mexico Mexico City North Mission: Crazy first week in Jasso!

Buenas días mi familia. This week was really good. It was pretty crazy to start out with. On Tuesday when we had to leave, we went to the workshop of the familia Hernandez Velazquez, Victor came too, and we ate tacos before we left. I already told you but the whole morning on Tuesday I felt really bad, really terrible. Then when we got to the offices, Hermana Urrea said that President wanted to talk to me that’s when I knew that he was going to talk to me about grandma. It was good that we got to talk on the phone for a little bit.

After we talked, to get to my area we took a taxi to a bus station, then two buses to get to our area. That was pretty crazy with all the luggage that we had. I have three bags and my companion had two and a bunch of other stuff too. There is an elder here, Elder Correa, who is like a helper missionary, a service missionary. He helped us a lot this week with getting to know the area and showing us around. The members here have been very supportive as well.

On Tuesday when we got here we went to eat with the familia Hernando Cruz. We ate with them like 4 times last week, they are a super awesome family here. We also went and visited the patriarch who lives here and talked with him for a little bit then came back and visited another family who lives across the street from us. The family are not members, but they have a member son who is on a mission in Argentina. They are super awesome as well. Super friendly. Our casa is really small. It’s good for living temporarily but for the long term, it’s too small. We don’t have a washing machine so today, we are going to the family Hernando Cruz to wash our clothes.

Wednesday was a really crazy day. We had our district meeting in the morning. Our district leader is Elder Donkersgoed and he was my zone leader in Tepalcapa. He’s from Pleasant Grove. He’s super awesome, I love him. His companion is Elder Juarez. After the meeting we came back and visited with some other people. Later that night we were getting ready for bed and got a call from our neighbors across the street and they were like “Elders you need to evacuate right now!” They told us there was a gas leak, a pipe had burst. The smell was really strong here. A family invited us to go with them to another house that they have in our area that was out of the range of the smell, but we called our leaders and they told us we had to go to our district leader’s house. So our investigators took us to the district leader’s house. We were so quick to leave that we only grabbed our emergency kit, we didn’t grab any extra clothes. So in the morning, fortunately they had some extra clothes that we could borrow.

Thursday we were planning to just do intercambios with our district leaders, but we got a call from a member here in the ward who said we could come back to the area. So after we got back to our area and changed, we did divisions. My companion and Elder Correa went to another area to do some visits. A member, his name is Levney (sp?), and I went to another part of the area and visited some less active and inactive families. We also went and talked with the bishop so I could introduce myself and see if the ward has any needs. It was really good.

Friday and Saturday we walked a lot. It was really hot out, I was sweating a crap ton. It feels a lot more humid here than in Villa del Carbón. It’s not as deserty as I thought though. It’s actually pretty green here. There are buses and combis and taxis to travel around in the area that don’t cost a lot. Our area is pretty big. We do have a map of this area though (he never did get one in his last area).

Saturday was September 1^stand it’s crazy that it’s already September. Time is flying by so fast, it’s unbelievable. Sunday was really good. In the morning we had a meeting with our ward mission leader, then we went to ward council. It was really good to talk with them and see the things we need to do to progress in this ward. We had sacrament meeting and I went up and bore my testimony. I first introduced myself then bore my testimony about eternal families. It was really quick cause I started to get emotional and I didn’t want to cry so I just shared my testimony quick and went and sat down. There’s a really awesome promise in D&C 62: 1-5, but I think it’s verse 3 how if we bear our testimonies, we can be forgiven of our sins.

The last 20 minutes of Priesthood and Relief Society we talked about what we need to do if there is another gas leak. It’s not very common but we talked about what the ward needs to do if there is another emergency situation. This ward is really supportive, really united. In the evening we went to another part of our area and knocked on one door. A woman answered and as soon as we introduced ourselves as missionaries of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, she said, “come in, come in, let’s talk.” Her husband was watching a movie he didn’t really want to talk to us but we talked with her a bit. She’s a really nice lady. She wanted to know about being with her family after this life so we talked with her about the Plan of Salvation. It was a really awesome lesson! We invited her to be baptized at the end. She said she’s not interested in changing her religion but we could feel something different with her. She invited us to come back next Sunday. I feel like if we keep talking with them that we can baptize them.

We spent a crap ton of money today shopping for food. The elders who lived here before left us nothing. During the week last week, we went and bought some eggs and bread and milk but that only lasted us a few days. Now we have food for a few weeks so we should be good.

Things are going good here. I love you so much and hope you have a great week and I hope you guys are doing good.