Oh my dearest family...sorry we are crazy pressed for time today
because we're having to rent a new apartment and a bunch of crazy stuff. I'm
going to shoot off this family letter and respond to your individual emails
next week! No pics this week -- Sorry! We're at a different internet cafe and I don't have my cable!
Huge moment of the week: I bought a watch totally on my own! Talked
to the guy, told him which one, all that jazz. Super simple conversation but
it's something that I can say I did on my own!
Also! I got Rach's card this week! I absolutely loved it! We live
right by the mission office and one of the secretaries was nice and gave me my
mail for the day! Technically we're only supposed to get it once a month. Haha
and no, I didn't ask or offer bribes! It reminded me how fun it is to get real mail .. You should feel free to keep doing that!!
This week we had a lesson with two investigators, a mother and
daughter, named Maria and Melissa. Maria is a grandma and Melissa has these 3
beautiful kids! We taught about Joseph Smith and the Restauracion and it was
super special. They agreed to be baptized! Melissa's son Eric is 6 and he is so great. He loves to listen to the missionaries and he's so reverent. I just
think of Christ's love when I see him. I KNOW that kids are so important to our
Heavenly Father. Her youngest Evaline, is about 3. She hugged and kissed me
after the lesson...my heart melted. This family is so special and I know that
we can help them follow through with their baptism!
This week we were out with Iliana Contreras, the daughter of Carlos,
and she told us he doesn't want to read. He is so distanced from their family. Hermana Valdez told me that before I got here he told the missionaries he
didn't feel like he needed to repent of some pretty serious stuff too. Gahh, my
heart is breaking! I feel like I'm here for him. Every time we talk about him
or plan lessons for him, I feel the strongest spirit, but I also can't make
decisions for him. Hermana Valdez suggested leaving him and ahhh, I don't know.
We're going to have a lesson with him tonight and then decide. I feel like the
strongest spirit that we really need to be bold and law down the way, and then
after just rush in with love and the spirit and hope for change. I 'm a little
nervous actually but I know I can follow the Spirit! Ahh, the mission is a
tricky thing. I know there's good in him, and I also know that he's truly
unhappy. I love him so much. I have never been this emotionally exhausted
before. I honestly don't know how our Savior experienced all of it. It amazes
me...I'm exhausted after feeling utterly joyful and then heartbroken for three
or four families, but he literally experienced all of the emotions of every
single one of us. These people are Heavenly Father's kids and I need His help. It´s kind of crazy feeling so much for things barely I don't understand completely. I´m so grateful my Heavenly Father lets me feel this love, even if it exhausts
me!
So...moment of truth, parts of this week were a little rough. Every day is
just so up and down! Usually it comes back to me and what I see I my weaknesses
as. I want to be feeling a perfect love for everyone, and communicating like
crazy, and being a real support to my companion in lessons, and I'm really
actually progressing, but my brain is just a dangerous place. Anywho, I was
asked to give a talk in sacrament meeting this week. As I was thinking about
what to say Sunday morning, I realized that I felt alone this week. This was
the thought that kept sticking in my head like this was what I needed to share
and relate it to the Atonement and the comfort we can find. I wasn't really
enjoying the idea of sharing that from the pulpit, but the thought stuck with
me all morning...
Entonces, guess what I gave my talk on! Whoa...the words just flew
out of my mouth, and I'm me so of course there were tears. I shared Mosiah
14:4-5 and also 1 Nephi 21:15-16. Oh and the children's hymn "I Feel My Savior's
Love." I sure felt my Savior´s love. I have a strong testimony that He is always
with me and we are never truly alone. I need to learn how to more fully lean on
Him, to turn to Him more fully. I want to be a perfect missionary now, but I
need to learn to rely on His Atonement as I grow.
After church, I just felt an outpouring of love. So many people
thanked me for my testimony, complemented my Spanish, and or told me not to
feel alone. I received some of the tightest hugs today. One of the Young Women, I don't know her,
gave me the biggest hug and just told me she loved my talk. Some
of these members are really starting to feel like family. The Contreras family,
Flor, Lupe, Iliana, Mayra, ahhh I love them. I feel at home in their house. The
Arreola family is incredible too. Oh and the Infante family, and Hermana Rosa
Elia. I love these people so much and I'm definitely being taken care of. Also,
I had a ton of spiritual moments this week when I felt better. However, it
wasn't until I took the sacrament, until I spent time at Church that I was
truly lifted. We can read scriptures, we can pray, but we HAVE TO take the
sacrament every week. There's something about being completely clean and
feeling the fullness of the Spirit.
However, I have a pride problem. I don't like when people talk to me
in English. I'm so stubborn that I can speak and understand Spanish and even
when people talk to me in English I respond in Spanish. Also, I really don't
like looking weak, and it was hard for me to announce my weaknesses from the pulpit. I bore my testimony fervently, but my pride kicks in when people are giving me
advice and telling me not to feel alone and cosas asi, because then I start
thinking -- "Hey I'm back on track! I'm good to do! I already understand!" Haha, I know I'm a brat! But in all seriousness, the Spirit strongly directed my words during my talk. Maybe somebody needed to hear it, or maybe I needed to seem weak, who knows. What I do know is that we have weaknesses for a reason, and that reason is
purely to learn how to come unto Christ. We have to learn how to rely on Him in
all things. We have to learn how to be humble, how to feel uncomfortable, so
that we can be better disciples and also so that we can learn to never make
other people feel that way. Lessons of humility are great!
I want every single one of us to realize how
completely blessed we are. There is a 15-year old named Geraldi in my ward. She
is less active, married, with a baby, and her husband is drinking and has
started hitting her. She crazy stubborn like me, and her mom, Hermana RosaElia
told us this was going on. She said Geraldi would never admit it and she's
currently living with her mom. This breaks my heart...my life at 15 was nothing
even close to this. Sometimes we forget just how good we have it, just how much
we have to offer, and just how much we can truly reach out to other people in
love. Be strong Young Women!
Two things: Mom, big time thank you for my laminated Plan of Salvation card! I
use it probably once a day in lessons! Also, everyone here struggles here with my name big time. Half the time I'm the --¨Hermana from Tejas¨-- Haha I love it!
I just want to leave you all with a hymn that was especially helpful
to me this week!
Abide with me, 'tis eventide. The day is past and gone;
The shadows of the evening fall; the night is coming on.
Within my heart a welcome guest, Within my home abide.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
Abide with me; 'tis eventide. Thy walk today with me
Has made my heart within me burn, As I communed with thee.
Thy earnest words have filled my soul and kept me near thy
side.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
Abide with me; 'tis eventide, and lone will be the night
If I cannot commune with thee, Nor find in thee my light.
The darkness of the world, I fear, Would in my home abide.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
O Savior stay this night with me; behold 'tis eventide.
I love you all to the moon and back and I feel your love every
single day.
Be missionaries! Be bright! Smile! Spread joy!
I´ll do the same.
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE, YOU!!!
No comments:
Post a Comment