OVERVIEW
So this week was AWESOME. It was like literally what dreams are made of! It's funny, I was anticipating the worst week of my life after all of our rejection experiences in the Mexico City airport, but everybody is so nice here and even if they reject us they are really really nice about it so it basically doesn't hurt at all. And, honestly, we don't experience that very much because we have so many good new investigators, and 3 really good progressing investigators. I can't tell you about everybody, though I love them lots-- so I'll let you know about the progressing ones.
1stly, M: He is having a really hard time right now. He is trying to stop smoking and drinking, and that is pretty difficult for him-- especially since him and his grandmother are having tons of disagreements these days, and she kicked him out of his house so now he sleeps outside of one of his neighbor's houses in their backyard with their permission. SO SAD. Anyways, he also doesn't have a job right now so we are trying to help him find both a job and a house and are praying that he can because we know that it will be less tempting to drink and smoke if he has a more stable lifestyle-- because he basically uses drinking and smoking as a way to escape the bad things in his life. However, he pinky promised (haha) that he would keep the Word of Wisdom last week and thus far he hasn't had problems yet! He is definitely our most difficult progressing investigator, but I love a challenge so I have really and truly enjoyed working with him.
2nd, G: Ok, so G is AWESOME. She has come to church twice now and she keeps her reading commitment and she is praying to understand everything and know for sure that it is true. She has agreed to prepare to be baptized on the 30th of this month so we are really excited about that and yesterday was her birthday and so when she came to church we brought her cookies and a card. I thought it was awesome that she came to church even though it was her birthday. She was catholic before/her whole family is catholic. Catholicism is really super prevalent here. Basically everyone is catholic, so that is probably are biggest obstacle most of the time...However I really do believe she will be getting baptized soon which is AWESOME!!! oh and she was the first person I asked the baptismal question in spanish too!!!
3rd, E: He is a nephew of one of the Hermanos in our ward and they took him to church yesterday. At first he didn't want to talk to us at all, but thanks to Hermana gate's AWESOME follow up, we got an appointment with him after church and he said he liked it alot. It is amazing how much his mind was changed in only a few hours!!! He has agreed to prepare for the 30th as a baptismal date to prepare for as well and he said he was really going to "focus" on preparing for it which I thought was awesome!!! He is really intelligent and had tons of questions. He is super fun to work with! Can't wait to see him again on Tuesday!
Ok other than that, everybody feeds us tons of spanish food. So much so that I need to work out like A TON. We've been doing these crazy push up- sit up- squats- repeat things and I hope that will combat all the rice I am eating. OH MAN BUT THE FOOD IS SO GOOD!!! And all the people are SO NICE!!! They all give us huge hugs all the time (only the women of course, though I had a close call with somebody's grandpa the other day) and they're super friendly. I love our ward, it's the best. Haha so there are also some sketchy parts of our area, mainly one, that we try to stay out of at night. My favorite/funniest moment of the mission thus far was when Hermana Gates warned me as we were walking up to a part member house in that area at night this way she said "you gotta hurry to the door cause otherwise the dogs will get you" and on cue about nine little ferocious watch guard dogs came running towards us and unfortunately I wasn't quite fast enough and one of them scratched me so I have a funny looking s shaped scratch on my right hand that will probably be gone by next week (I hope haha :P). So yeah, we pray for safety when we go to find/visit people there. hahah :P
SPIRITUAL LIGHTBULB
I don't know if this quite counts as a spiritual lightbulb, but I've made some progress on HOW to study the scriptures this week. Hmn Gates and I listened to this talk by Hank Smith called "Scripture Power" recommended to us by the english sister missionaries in our ward. It was so cool, I recommend it to everybody. He talked about how we need to read looking for a principle and then we need to think about how we could apply that principle. To give you guys an idea of what kind of principles he is talking about, I'll give you some examples from my study of 1 Nephi 17 and 18 this morning (nephi builds a boat and then they travel to the promised land). I came up with about 5, here they are:
1. God will help us to build big things-- no matter what others may have to say about it
2. If we do our part, the Lord keeps his promises
3. All things are possible with God's help-- NOTHING he asks us to do is impossible
4. Sometimes following the spirit requires us to hand over the steering wheel
and lastly 5. If our faith is unshaken, we will not complain about our difficulties to God-- no matter how hard our life may get.
In my journal I wrote down these principles and the verses that inspired me to write them, but I will leave those out of this entry and invite you all to read those chapters and try to find where I got them from. Next week, I will provide you with the answers! haha :P But really, I will. To sort of describe how to apply a principle, I will take the 2nd one and apply it to M. M is trying to stay faithful to the promises he has made to God (and to us) about not smoking and not drinking, even though he doesn't have a home or a job, and his grandmother won't even talk to him. On surface, this looks like a practically impossible thing to accomplish. But if we think of the fact that with God nothing is impossible (see Luke 1:37), then we can help M to understand that if he trusts in the Lord and relies on the enabling power of his Atonement he will be able to do ALL THINGS with God's help. I'm praying that he starts to really understand that. I am hoping that the effort we have decided to put in by sending him a verse and reminding him to keep his commitments everyday in the morning before our meeting with him or after will help. Also we have a lesson with him like every single day, so that should help him I HOPE. Pray for M guys, cause we really want him to be able to overcome his addictions, enter in the pathway to eternal life and with God's help (and ours)-- find a job and a housing situation that will work for him!!!
Ok lastly, TOP TEN. It is hard to pick because I have had so many good things happen this week but here goes...
1. FINDING A $4 BLANKET. It is way too comfortable for how cheap it was. But it is the most beautiful thing. And yes as the title to this email suggests, I really have started to dream in spanish. Like, almost every night. And we are always knocking on doors in my dreams. GOOD TO KNOW I AM FOCUSED ON THE WORK hahaha :P
2. finding R. She is a new investigator with breast cancer. She is AMAZING.
3. Also we found this really great family in the sketchy area. I don't know all their names but the people that are most interested are named Placida and Jennifer. We are going to see them again this week and I will let you know how it goes!
4. one lesson of M's this week we brought this awesome kid from church named Mo. It was the best idea EVER cause they clicked so well. Member present lessons are always awesome (try to go when the missionaries ask you! <3) but this one was just MAGICAL.
5. haha ok so I have been getting a lot of compliment's on my spanish but the other night my companion told me it literally sounded like I had already been out here five months...that made me SO HAPPY ah she is the sweetest....I still can't even conjugate like 3 or 4 tenses and I mess up my tenses all the time but everybody is really nice about it haha
6. ONE OF THE OTHER SPANISH SISTERS IN MY AREA PLAYS VIOLIN ONCE WE BOTH FIND INSTRUMENTS WE'RE GONNA PLAY A DUET I AM PSYCHED
7. We went over to this sweet girl named Liz's house yesterday and we got to talk to her a little bit about missionary work and we're excited cause we think she is going to give a copy of the Book of Mormon to one of her co-workers. YES! :)
8. We visited a reference named V this week and had some really great lessons with her. She ultimately decided that she didn't want to have any more meetings with us, but we left her with our phone number and after feeling prompted to give her the family: a proclamation to the world I left it...and it was just sweet, because though we were parting I knew that someday she would talk to some other missionaries again cause we hadn't been too pushy or anything like that, but we had tried our best. Ending on a good note is always exceptional if it can be managed!
9. We gave M a journal to write in this week and wrote him little letters in it to help him out. I loved being able to tell how writing in a journal changed my life, and I can't wait to see how it will change his! This was after reading the PMG section on addiction recovery during my personal study in which I realized that if he was going to overcome this then we REALLY NEEDED TO HELP HIM MORE!!! So I am glad that we did, and that we have been and that we will be even more!!!
10. Ok so lastly, my companion and I bond on so many levels. Last night after everything was done we just chatted and ate popcorn and receeses peanut butter cups on our little sofas and I just felt again how much God has blessed me with perfect matches. It was AWESOME. We have so much fun all the time, but that was nice, because for once we could truly relax since Pday was on its way over....
All right guys, that's it for this week. Just know that I am being way blessed here and having tons of success and that if all goes as planned we will have 3 baptisms on the 30th of this month!!!
I LOVE YOU GUYS!!!!
BE GOOD AND HAVE FUN!
xoxoxoxo
Hermana Lindsey