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Saturday, January 9, 2016

Time to Learn


Oliver is the cutest!

Sleepover!


Hey family,

It sounds like you all had a great Thanksgiving. I loved all the pictures I got. I even got some from Jodi and Grandma and Grandpa, they had quite the house full. I'm glad Ryan got to go. Speaking of Ryan, in your email Mom, the first time I read it I read it as Ryan opened his mission call and I almost had a panic attack. I freaked out
for a second. But it's ok, because now I can mentally prepare myself for when it really happens.

This week has been full of learning experiences for me and Hna Warmbier. On Wednesday, we had a lesson with Hermano Benjamin, whom I've talked about before. We had had a pretty successful day, we taught two really good lesson and committed one person to be baptized (I'll talk about her in a second) and one to fast to know if she should be baptized(I'll talk about her in a second too). We got to Hno Benjamin's at like 6:30 and taught a good lesson, read from the scriptures, and then he started telling us his Casanova stories from when he was in Mexico. We ended up staying until like 8:30 and it was basically time to go home. Bad missionary moment. We felt multiple times that we should just leave, but our other appointment had cancelled so we weren't really in a hurry to go back out in the cold. So bad. It's funny because anyone that is really disobedient would laugh at us, but we felt AWFUL. There are worse rules to break than staying at a less-active's for too long, but we felt terrible. I don't think I've ever felt so guilty than when we knelt to pray that night. It doesn't sound like a big deal, but missionary time is God's time, we are representatives of Jesus Christ, we don't have excuses. What made it even worse is that morning we had a district meeting where we talked about why we are on a mission, what we want to gain from it, how important it is to be diligent. And we messed up. We resolved to never EVER do anything like that again. Every single second since Wednesday night we have been doing everything we can to talk to
everyone and use our time as fully as possible. We have come home absolutely exhausted every day since then. We are learning that the more the work, and the more effort we put in, the happier and more motivated we are. Hna Warmbier and I are committed to never wasting a second ever again. Our poor future companions are going to be run ragged. We have seen the blessings of working hard  the last few days, more than half of the people we've contacted have invited us back. We'll never go back! We set monthly goals on Friday, which was good
and bad because we were/are running on a motivation high, and so our goals are achievable, but borderline crazy. We are terrified of being separated in transfers next week. So lesson number one: always always
always be diligent.

Another experience we had was with our weekly goals. We only needed 1 other lesson to fill that goal, and we had the opportunity and blew it. We met a really nice guy named Victor, and we taught him a  full lesson on his doorstep, and he invited us back, and we invited him to read the Book of Mormon, aaaand neither of us acted on the impression to pray with him, and so it didn't count as a lesson. Lesson two: Follow promptings, even when it's awkward or scary.

We have learned so much together this transfer, we are excited to start applying it. The work in our area is really starting to pick up. We started teaching Christina, she's 20 and just moved here from California, one of her friends goes to church with us, but she is by far the most prepared person I've taught. Last lesson we gave her a Book of Mormon, and by the next week she had already read 4 chapters (HUGE deal!!!) and had sticky notes for questions, verses she found relatable etc. Coolest thing ever. She excepted our invitation to be baptized on December 19th, so we are really excited to help her work towards that date.

Erika is doing well, literally the only thing holding her back is that she doesn't go to church. She didn't come again yesterday, but she wants to be baptized, and she has committed to fasting on Sunday to know if/when she should be baptized. It makes me happy to hear about Jeff. Seriously the youth and young adults are the best to teach.

Thanksgiving here was good, we were invited to a member's house, the Vega family. We spent the whole morning relaxing in our apartment. We made cookies, cleaned a bit, drew pictures, cut out snowflakes, just relaxed. Dinner was obviously less traditional than I'm used to, but we basically ate for four hours straight haha. We just couldn't stop snacking the stuff that was left out. They made turkey, puree de papas, gravy, veggies, all classic, but then there were tamales dulces and strawberries and bananas con crema. And no pie. But it was good:) We really enjoyed the time we spent there. We hadn't really met them before Thursday, but they were incredibly welcoming and nice because they speak mostly English in their house. Jailene, the daughter, is 17 and planning on going on a mission. She came joint teaching with us last week. She's awesome. We really enjoyed talking to their family.
Thursday night we were out again working.

Sunday was fifth Sunday, so Obispo Volz gave he lesson the third hour. He shared that there are almost 400 people on the ward list, about 108 of them have received their endowments, and only 20 or so attend the
temple regularly. He shared about the three basic things that is stopping people from getting/using their recommends. I bet you could guess. 1. Tithing. 2. Law of Chastity. 3.Word of Wisdom. Classic. Bishop is really good at being straight-forward but also relaxed and funny. He is firm and gets his point across, but also makes us laugh. It takes a special personality to help a Hispanic ward. Last night we had a sleepover! All the sister missionaries in our zone met at the mission home and we had a devotional and stayed the night and then had breakfast together this morning. We had a lot of fun. The devotional was all about how we could find joy in missionary work. And they (the STLs) shared from Jacob 5:72,75 about walking with Savior and being diligent. It was really fun.

Also this weekend, the Christmas video came out!! Yayy!! Hna Warmbier and I have already shown it to like 5 people. We love it.
https://www.mormon.org/christmas#discover
These videos are so inspired. And it's such an easy way to share. That's basically all I've got for this week, it's been a lot of learning and growing, which I think is the best kind. I hope all is well, keep me updated!  I am super excited to go to the temple this week for the first time in forever. And really excited that we get to Skype approximately 25 days from now.
I love you!

Emily

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