9/24/2012

"La iglesia mormona es la unica iglesia que tiene permiso de bautizar y confirmar." - Padre Catolico. A catholic priest or "father" told one of our investigators that The "Mormon" church is the only one that has permission from God to baptize and confirm people. That was a pleasant surprise. He said this in a catholic baptism to a huge group of people (accorting to her). I thought that was cool. Everyone who really wants to find the truth will recognize it, even if they don't always decide to follow it. This week we did a lot of service for the ward, we've been focusing more on members to the point where we're not contacting much. This week we helped one family tear down two walls and take out all of the debris as one of our service projects. It was actually pretty fun for one afternoon. Turns out concrete bricks aren't quite as hard as they look. One thing i've loved about these past few weeks has been teh excitement of my companion. He got here new and full of excitement for the work, and it really makes the problems pass by faster, and the rest of the day a lot of fun. It's definitely taught me a lot. Sometimes it's easy to lose the excitement for the little things, or even for the big ones. Sometimes we just need to take a step back and see how great life and where we are really is, regardless of problems, homework, or just plain work. It also has been a lot of fun because he has a pretty good sense of humor and likes to laugh. Reminds me a bit of the song "make them laugh" from singing in the rain. Make 'em laugh. Life's more fun that way. This week we had an awesome experience in the church. We brought a couple for a tour, and by the end they were crying and kept telling us they felt a peace they hadn't had before. Especially with some traumatic (no idea how to spell that now... español...) experiences. They have a baptismal date, and are really excited. It was also cool to teach an inactive family, and as we've been teaching them see them become reconverted to the gospel. Having people who haven't come to church in years is something awesome to see. Like they get baptized again or something. And it's been really cool to see one of our converts become the most active member in church. She goes to all of the activities, is early to church every week, and already has a tone of responsibilities. It's been really cool. It's cool to come to church and see a lot of people there that weren't there before. Even in a short period of time. The gospel is true. It really makes people happy if they are converted to the gospel, and not just the motions of going to church etc. ¡les amo! Elder West

9/17/2012

¡Feliz cumpleaños México! This week was crazy. the 16th is the independence day of Mexico. No one celebrates 5 de mayo, but everyone goes nuts the 15th to start celebrating the 16th. We had to be in the house early to avoid problems (lots of drunk people celebrating independence doesn't always go well with foreigners). We ended up celebrating in our house on our own. It was great, chicken necks, tortillas, empanadas, and we made mexican rice and juice (peach flavored). We were practically mexican. Except that today we made hamburgers... We also had a lot of fun with a finger soccer game (thanks mom!). The day after the streets were carpeted with millions of fireworks (mostly bottle rocket like things). We also had a cool experience with Brenda, Yael, and Viridiana. We finally were able to talk to her husband, and for a while i thought he was going to get baptized too. But in the end, Brenda and Yael got baptized Sunday. Great way to end the independance day celebrations. We also had a really cool experience with a couple we took to the church to give a tour and teach the Sabbath day. We finished in front of the baptismal font, sang a hymn, and in the end they were crying, and almost couldn't pray. It was really cool, and we're hoping they can get baptized in a few weeks. They were really excited about the idea of having the gift of the Holy Ghost. ¡Les amo! Elder West

9/10/2012

THis week i don't have a lot of time, we are very behind, we had a meeting with the zone in the morning that killed most of our day, so we're running to get things done. My new companion is Elder Reyes. He is great. He's from Guatemala, came really prepared, and seems like a really nice guy with his head and more importantly his heart in the right place. We had a really great, and really crazy week. This week we had the baptism of Gloria!!!! We spent the week scrambling, running, and judge hopping to get them married, and finally we managed to track down all the papers that are legally required, and find a judge who doesn't charge us as much, and we finally managed to get her married in saturday. It was really hectic, but it was a great way to spend my birthday. Really mixed things up, which was nice. And what better way to celebrate a birthday than with a wedding? We ended up eating a lot of sweets that day too... Turns out people here haven't ever seen chocolate chip cookies, and most of them haven't seen brownies. But i think another american elder and i have made addicts out of our companions.... It's been a great week, and it's been kind of funny to see how having a "son" in the mission really makes you feel like he's your son sometimes. You really want to do the best for him, and make everything perfect. It was so great, i asked Gloria if he could baptize her, and she was excited for it, and so my companion was able to baptize someone his first week in the field. I was really excited, and he was almost skipping. It was great. But out of time, ¡les amo a todos! ¡Gracias por todo!