We had intercambios this week and
although I'm sad that my sister training leaders were changed, I was
very excited about being about to take a shower. I know, it's sad but seriously that
shower is amazing! It's like standing under a wonderful warm waterfall.
Sigh. Anyway, my new sister training leaders are great and I left my
area...of course... and the sister that stayed with my companion took
very good care of her. =)
We had a lesson with
Marisol and with her entire family...finally. Her husband was in Los
Cabos (in the north of Mexico) and returned two weeks ago. Although
they have no religion, they have a wonderful collection of Bibles.
During our lesson we talked about how God is our loving Heavenly Father
and read from Genesis 1:26-27, as we read, every member of the family
had a different version of the bible (catholic, christian, King James,
de las promesas, etc). When their son read the scripture, looks of
confusion appeared on every face as the verse being read from the
Catholic Bible did not agree with the version that each member of the
family had. It ended up being quite funny to me because although as
missionaries we are used to the other bibles not agreeing with the King
James version, I have never been in a lesson with so many bibles not
agreeing with each other and every person with the room recognizing it.
We ended giving a little lesson about the Great Apostacy to clear up the
confusion.
We have a new investigator named
Emmanuel. He's 18 years old and has a ton of desire to find the truth.
He has a TON of questions about EVERYTHING. We've been working with him
for about a week, even though his mom didn't even want him to let us
into the house, and he attended Sacrament Meeting with us yesterday.
It's a little frustrating sometimes because he has trouble understanding
me because "I talk funny" but I have trouble understanding him because
"He mumbles" so I guess it's okay. =P He has accepted a baptism date for
the 29th of November and seems to be excited.
The
other day we were in a member's taco shop because that's where we teach
Martin. It was later in the evening and as I was talking to one of the
family members, Hermana Arellano called me over talk to someone that was
standing in the taco shop. She told me that she needed me to speak
English. She led me to a Chinese man and we began to talk. He spoke
broken English but nothing of Spanish. He's a Christian of 22 years and
travels a lot for his work which keeps him away from his family a lot so
it's a little hard for him. He has the bible on his phone in both
English and Chinese. He asked me about our church and said that he had
recognized the Jesucristo on Hermana Arellano's name tag. I invited him
to listen to our missionaries and gave him a pass along card with the
church site and explained how it worked. It was really cool to have a
conversation in English about the gospel with someone who's actually
interested in it.
Saturday night we had to make
a decision if we were going to visit our investigator that lives on the
other side of our area from where we were or someone that lived closer
to our house. Considering how late it was and after praying and
listening for the direction we needed, we decided to visit an
investigator that lived closer to our house. We hadn't been about to get
a hold of her and hoped that the impression to visit her meant that we
would find her in her house. When we found that she wasn't home, I began
to question if we had actually followed the prompting of the Spirit and
if so why in the world did Heavenly Father lead us here when she wasn't
even home? We then decided to try our luck and visit a couple of old
investigators we hadn't seen in a few months. That was when we found out
why we had been led to that part of our area. They ended up being home
and received us with open arms. They had been passing through a really difficult time with a false accusation in the school where one is a
principal and with their daughter being seriously ill. They were very
grateful for our visit and took it as a reminder that their Lord is
always mindful of them.
The funny thing that happened was that
I was watching the clock on their wall and not my watch. When I started
thinking that it was time to go, our district leader called to check on
us. It was then that we realized that although their clock said 9:20 it was actually 9:35.
We worked the fastest that we could to leave and then started running
home. (We tend to do that a lot) As we ran across a busy street, I saw a
family walking along the sidewalk...the next thing I saw was the street
rising up to say hello. I totally biffed it in the middle of the street
and got a double hit from the ground and my backpack. I sat for a minute
thinking about what in the world had just happened and my companion and
the father of the family helped me back up. I ended up meeting the
entire family. I thanked them so much for their help and their concern
and wished them a goodnight. Although my skirt began to get wet around
my left knee, my companion and I began to book it home. I got a pretty
nice road rash and on my knee but most importantly a grateful heart
because I didn't fall on glass which is everywhere in the street and a repentant heart because I didn't contact that family.
To
close, I learned a very interesting lesson yesterday in the combi which
is, "Don't compliment people on the their anything here in Mexico. It
is very likely that they will gift that very thing to you." I was
talking to a Señora about how short the combi and laughing with her
about how I really don't fit. I complimented her on the scarf, telling
her that it was very pretty. She looked down at it and then took it off
and handed to me. I tried many many times to tell her that I couldn't
take it and that it wasn't right but she just told me that it was clean,
wasn't very expensive anyway and that it came from the heart. I would
have continued to try and give it back but our stop came up and we had
to get off. i thanked her the best that I could and got off. A member
who say what happened, told me to not feel bad, that some people are
just like that and can give things away as easily as a birthday present.
Lesson learned.
I still feel that my Heavenly
Father continues to bless us here even though we're not perfect and I'm
beginning to feel that it's because His love for each of His children is
so grand that He is willing to use imperfect servants to help His
children to one day become perfect and return to live with Him again.
I
love you all, you are all amazing! Thank you so much for the birthday
wishes, prayers, and love. I hope you all of an amazing week. =)
Carlie explained In Puebla (not sure how the traditions change depending on which city you are from) the Day of the Dead starts on Oct 28th until Nov 2nd. Apparently
each day you make an offering depending on who they were and how they
died.
Day 1- for people that died in accidents
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