Last Conference with President and Hermana Urrea and a Really Good Week!!

Hola Hola! This week was really good! but I’ll let you read on to find out more. Tuesday in our district meeting we got a surprise visit from the assistants which was super awesome because I know them well. They are Elders Avendaño, Loomis and Davis. Avendaño is cool but I love Loomis and Davis. They are two of my best friends here in the mission so it was super awesome to see them. 

In the meeting we were instructed about how we need to always try to teach people the doctrine of baptism. We talked about how we should try to contact families because it is good to teach and baptize one person but it would be even better to do it with a whole family! Later we were able to have a lesson with Joselin and finish teaching her about the Plan of Salvation. She has lots of questions so we were going to try to go back the next day or Thursday because we ran out of time and had to run back to the casa.

Wednesday we went to go visit the Hernandez family, the less active family we visited last week, to share a little message with them, and they made us breakfast too. Later we had an appointment with Francisco, one of our new investigators we found on Sunday, then right after that we had another cita with the Arreola family whose 10-year-old son isn’t baptized. Unfortunately neither were home. Francisco told us he is always home so we can go by basically whenever but for an older guy who is “always home” he’s pretty hard to find there :). With the Arreola family, we’ve been able to talk with them over the phone and they told us they would love to get their son Mateo baptized but it’s just a little hard because they’re so busy. We were able to pass by with Joselin and answer some of the questions she had about the Plan of Salvation then teach her about the Word of Wisdom and the Law of Chastity. She understood it all perfectly and said she is going to live/keep those commandments.

Thursday we didn’t have many appointments so we had more time to go contacting. It started raining crazy hard while we were knocking on doors. I had my umbrella when we left the casa but because it was sunny when we left, my companion didn’t think to take his, even though that’s how the weather has been this week. Hot and sunny in the afternoon then cold and rainy in the evening. My companion was getting wet, but thankfully we went by a members house and they gave him a small umbrella. We went to visit Francisco and were able to share half of the lesson of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Then we also passed by the Arreola family’s house and their son was Mateo home. We were able to invite him to be baptized. Por Fin! Even though it rained a lot we were still able to find some really good contacts, one of which is a really nice girl who sells bread and is really interested. She also gave us some bread for free!

Friday we had a special conference with the whole mission where we took pictures as a mission and then saw a video presentation of pictures that President and Hermana Urrea have taken during their time here in the mission. Then they gave each missionary a surprise gift that had a really sweet pin of the mission logo, a bookmark with our picture and favorite scripture on it, a card with “A counsel simple and pure for missionaries” with scriptures, and then a business card that has their information so we can stay in contact with them after the mission. They shared last words and testimonies then fed us pizza! We were all thinking the conference would be to get to know the new Mission President and his wife too but they aren’t here yet. After we got home we went to visit a contact we found last week named Claudia. We talked with her and then invited her to be baptized and she accepted! Yes! It was a really great day!

Saturday we went contacting for most of the day and were able to end the day with 10 new contacts. We had lots of rejections throughout the day but thankfully we were able to find the contacts that we did. We tried to invite our investigators and as many other people as we could to church as well.

Sunday was an awesome day! Jorge came to church like he said and Joselin also came too! Then after sacrament meeting some members told us of a girl who was there but who isn’t a member and she lives in our area. We found out she has been coming to church for a few weeks now with another member and she likes it a lot, so we invited her to be baptized and she accepted! Then after church we went to an appointment with a family we found on Thursday. Only their two youngest sons were home, they are Angel and Eduardo and they are super cool! We taught them about the restoration and they had lots of questions and doubts but it was a super great lesson and they also accepted our invitations to be baptized! We now have 8 investigators in total! I’m so very grateful to my Heavenly Father for putting these people in our path and helping us make them investigators. I know it’s because of Him and I know that he is blessing us for our efforts, especially from the past cambio where we had 4 or 5 weeks without finding anyone.  

Wow sounds like you guys had a crazy busy but fun week! Thank you for the quotes and for the email! I love you guys! Have a great week!

My name is in the scriptures :)

The awesome pin we got from President and Hermana Urrea

The cool bookmark they gave me

Cambios and an Awesome Temple Trip

Hola hola! To answer your questions, as far as cambios… we are staying the same again. Yeah we were surprised too, but I think it’s because of the new mission president. It’s okay though, there’s work to be done! With Victor and Antonia we weren’t able to meet with them last week because Victor is always busy. After p-day ended, we didn’t have any appointments but we were able to make 3 contacts calling former investigators so that was good.

Tuesday we had a district meeting where we talked about accountability and how we need to always give an account at the end of the day to our leaders and more importantly to God, and do it without being asked. We had quite a bit of time to go contacting and were able to contact 7 new people. We also found one less-active family who are super great so we arranged to visit them the next day to see what we can do to help them and minister to them.

Wednesday when we went to see the family, they were awesome and made us breakfast too! They told us of some problems they are having now and it stinks with some of the things they are going through but we are going to do our best to help them. For the rest of the day we were able to contact some new people also. And Elder Ortiz made a deal with us to try and motivate us and that is if we have at least one person in church on Sunday who has been invited to be baptized on a specific date and accepted it, he will buy us each a pizza. I really wanted for it to happen, mostly because it’s part of my purpose but the pizza is a bonus! :)

Thursday during the day didn’t go so great. Things are at the point now that we joke with ourselves that our appointments are going to fall through because people are always cancelling on us. It’s sad because it’s true… Even when people make appointments with us, they still fall through. Last week a girl came running after us because her boss wanted to interview someone who speaks English for a class she is taking. So we set an appointment to do the interview and were planning to try and contact her afterwards, but when we went she said she was busy and didn’t need our help. We ended the day with some good contacts hopefully so that was a good part.

Friday we went to the temple and it was super amazing!!! I just love the temple so much. After we got back to our area my companion and I were talking about how it was super nice and reassuring to be able to go to the House of God and get away from the crazy beliefs of some people. It was a great reminder of the pureness and trueness of the church. Plus I got to see a bunch of my friends and old companions so it was super awesome and uplifting.

Saturday was interesting… When we were contacting, we talked to a man who said he was Jesus and God. He said he was Jesus, my Savior who died for me and was resurrected and also my Heavenly Father, our all-powerful God who created the Earth. We said he was mistaken but he just wanted to argue so we left. Thankfully Elder’s Ortiz and Hidalgo invited us to a baptismal service for 2 of their investigators. It was a nice spiritual service so that was good -- especially after our encounter with the man earlier.

Sunday was an incredible day! In the morning we tried to invite people to church but we couldn’t find anyone, so we went to church feeling awful. But right before sacrament meeting started, a woman and man came up to us and told us that she is a member but he isn’t. He is interested in learning about the church and would like it if the missionaries could passby and teach him. We asked where he lived and he lives in a colony in our area! So we asked if we could talk with him for a minute in a separate room to get to know him and then invited him to be baptized to which he accepted! After 4 weeks without any investigators God blessed us by this man, Gorge, coming to church. During the day we passed to visit another contact and were able to find him home so we talked with him and invited him to be baptized and he accepted too! Yes! Thank you Heavenly Father! I know he blessed us to be able to have 2 new investigators. I am so very grateful to Him!

Thanks so much for the thoughts! I love you guys, and dad I hope you had a great Father’s Day! Have a great week this week!

Words of Support and Counsel from Presidente and Hermana Urrea, and Spraining my Ankle

Hola Hola! Thanks so much for the email! I am doing good. After p-day ended we were supposed to have a lesson with Victor and Antonia where we were going to talk to them about Eternal Marriage, families and the Law of Chastity to help them understand why it’s so very important that they get married so they can be baptized, but it didn’t happen. They had to go somewhere far away for medicine for Antonia so we rescheduled for another day. So we went to an FHE with an old bishop and his family who are really cool! They gave us gorditas and candy then we had a lesson about obedience. The Bishop was trying to get his 13-year-old daughter to be better, she is in a rebellious stage, so we helped give a lesson on obedience and it went pretty great!

Tuesday we had interviews with President and Hermana Urrea, rather it really ended up being final words of support and counsel that really helped me a lot. I’m going to do my best to apply what President told us. We ended late with them but we were still able to go contacting and find a few contacts. We also had a lesson with Joselin about the Plan of Salvation. She had lots of questions, so we explained things very clearly to help her understand and it went really great! Now she just needs to come to church…

Wednesday in the afternoon/evening we went with one of the Bishop’s Counselors, Nefi, to have a lesson with a contact we found last week whose family is all members but the wife. We had a great lesson and tried to invite her to baptism but she thinks because she was baptized in the catholic church, even though she doesn’t go, that’s good enough. We are still going to try to visit and invite her one more time. On the way back to the casa we were running to make it back on time and took a short cut down a muddy hill, it had been raining a lot. Unfortunately, I slipped and fell and felt a pop in my left ankle followed by a lot of pain. I didn’t want to get home late, so I did my best to walk and we made it home on time. It hurt a lot though. There was no swelling or bruising so I think I just sprained it, and it’s feeling better now so that’s good. Oh we also found a couple really awesome contacts!

Thursday my ankle hurt quite a bit and it was hard to walk around but I did it. It was swollen a bit but still no bruising, so I was just careful as we walked around. Our appointments fell through or people canceled but on the bright side, we were able to find 10 new contacts. Again there’s a couple really solid ones we found that we hope good things will happen from.

Friday my ankle was a little more swollen than Thursday so I called the mission doctor and he told me some medicines to buy and other things to do to help me recover as quickly as possible. I also had a good teaching moment that day with my companion about how you can tell when someone isn’t interested in what you are saying. We were able to find 10 contacts again too.

Saturday was a really frustrating day. We were supposed to have a lesson with a super awesome woman who was one of our awesome contacts, but her husband wasn’t home and we couldn’t find anybody to come with us to visit her so we had to cancel and wait until sometime this week to passby again. After that one by one our appointments fell through. :(

Sunday, well we verified with Joselin all week that she was going to come to church, she said yes every time, but she didn’t come. We even called her in the morning and she said she would be there but she never showed up and we couldn’t get a hold of her after. So we are just going to stop going by… Church was really good though! The bishopric spoke about technology and the importance of paying attention during sacrament meeting and using technology to our advantage instead of using it for things of less importance and about paying tithing. Then we explored a colony of our area where we’ve never been and were able to visit a less-active family and go contacting where we found some really good contacts in a short about of time. We ended the day by visiting Jorge Cruz (our recent convert) and his family. We talked with them about the Plan of Salvation because Jorge’s mom recently passed away. They are an awesome family, I just love them!

Well I gotta go but I'll talk to you soon. I love you guys! Have a great week!

With Presidente and Hermana Urrea

This is part of my area. On the other side of the hill
in the background is the CCM (MTC).

An altar of the saint death that people worship????

Cool shirt that I saw in the Tianguis!