March 28, 2011

Hola Hola Hola Famila!!! How are you all?!?!?!!?

I was so excited to get on today and see emails from both Mom and Dad
:) Just one question, is AJ alive? Hahah, just kidding, but seriously,
I thought I had a little brother too.
I am glad to hear everything is going great!!! Thanks for the picture
Mom :) I started laughing seeing the pictures of the girls... Molly is
HUGE, oh my gosh. I miss those dogs. Everytime I think of Molly, I
laugh. She's a goof. She needs to learn some manners from Jenny.
Anyway, I'm glad to see everyone is well. I hope Mom had a great
birthday yesterday too :)

As I have said before, time goes by fast. I can remember my last pday
like it was yesterday. But then it feels like the week has lasted
forever. Mission time is just weird. I've been here for almost 3
weeks. In 3 more weeks is the next transfer and who knows where I
will be going next?

The quick update... Carlos didn't get baptized on Saturday. Super
devastating I know.... From what I understand, it's this back and
forth desire to be baptized. It changes every day. At this moment,
he wants more time, which I am fine with. He needs more time to gain
a testimony and to really change his life. All these "backing out of"
baptisms is making me sad. We've had to move or cancel 5 baptisms
since I've been here and it's making me sad. But I know it's all in
the Lord's time and there is nothing I can do about people's agency.

Ok, now here is the day to day update from this week.

Monday the 21st:
After I sent my email, Hermana Parrales and I went to the casa de
Famila Herrera. We ate lunch with them and then headed out to
Malecon. We had a lot of fun! It wasn't very sunny, but super humid. I was uncomfortably sweating, but I had a great time. The day FLEW
by though.

Tuesday the 22nd:
We had our district meeting in the morning (unfortunately there was no
mail for anybody that day). We set a goal as a district to have a
total of 34 people attend sacrament meeting. If we reach our goal,
we'll have cake our next district meeting (and if we don't, we'll
still have cake for my birthday haha).

The rest of the day was so-so. We taught this man named Luis who was
super Catholic and all he wanted to do was talk talk talk, we didn't
really teach him anything. We taught Ninosca in the afternoon. She
doesn't want to be baptized because she doesn't want to change her
religion. She said she's feels the spirit in both the Catholic and
Mormon church and doesn't see a need to change. She came to the
Family Home Evening activity with us which was really fun. We watched
one of those old cartoon Book of Mormon movies, ate/drink popcorn and
Coke, and played a game. Ninosca had a good time.

Wednesday the 23rd:
In the morning, I was feeling sad about our investigators. That they
weren't progressing and I didn't know how I could help because I can't
really communicate. During my personal study, I was reading in Preach
My Gospel and was reading Chapter 1, My Purpose. I was led to the
scripture in Alma 17:2-3¨about the sons of Mosiah when they were
teaching the gospel. It says "and they waxed strong in knowledge of
the truth...they had searched the scriptures diligently, that they
might know the work of God... But this is not all, they had given
themselves to much fasting and prayer. Therefore, they had the spirit
of prophecy and the spirit of revelation. And when they taught, they
taught with power and authority of God" This was a reminder that I
need to do my part, study the scriptures, pray a lot, and fast and
then I can teach with power and authority, even if I can't speak
perfect Spanish.

This day then became what I called the day of miracles. In the
morning we went contacting in an area where we don't have any
investigators. Here we knocked on a door of a 15-year-old boy named
Bryan. His parents are divorced and he is living here with his mom
and aunt. When he was living with his dad, he was being taught by the
missionaries, but then he moved with his mom. We retaught him Lesson
3, which is the Gospel of Jesus Christ (we can be clean from our sins,
faith in Christ, repentance, baptism, the gift of the Holy Ghost, and
enduring to the end). He said he wants to be baptized and his baptism
date is the 9th of April.

In the afternoon we stopped by the house of a girl named Diana. She
is 15 and is an old investigator. She wanted to be baptized, but her
mom give her permission to be baptized. However, Diana said her mom
has become more supportive and believes her mom will sign the
permission slip. She is just waiting for the right moment to ask.

THEN,we stopped by the house of Sandra and Javier Lamota. Hermana
Sandra told us that Javier was officially divorced from his previous
wife, and now they are waiting for Javier to receieve permission to
leave work so they can go get married.

Awwww, I was on cloud 9 this day!!!!!!!!! So many great things are happening.

In the evening, we got a phone call from our zone leader that we
received permission for our district to fast for our goals. We would
start our fast after lunch the next day and fast for 24 hours.

Thursday the 24th:
We taught recent converts in the morning, had a big lunch, and then
started our fast. I was fine at first. We went to Bryan's house and
we met his mom. She is interested in the church too, but had a lot of
life changing things to do first before she can be baptized. However,
she signed the permission slip for Bryan to be baptized.

We taught Ninosca after. This lesson was filled with a little bit of
tension. She kinda got upset with us because she doesn't believe the
Book of Mormon is true. We shared scriptures in the Bible that helps
support the Book of Mormon, but she just wouldn't believe what we were
saying. We are trying to make a plan to help her believe.

In the evening, we had a lesson in the house of a recent convert named
Vincente. He brought 3 friends to this lesson and they said that
they'd come to church.

Fasting was so hard!!!!! I was so thirsty and in all the houses we
went in they all gave us my favorite drinks (Coke, Incacola, and apple
soda) and we had to practically beg for forgiveness that we couldn't
drink it. However, great things happened during our fast.

Friday the 25th:
Friday was a so-so day. We had our planning session in the morning
and then broke our fast for lunch. We received a reference from a
member and taught her. Her name is Graciela and she said she'd attend
church on Sunday. Hermana Parralas and I were so happy because at
this point we had 10 investigators say they were going to come to
church on Sunday. The rest of the day we just had lessons with recent
converts.

Saturday the 26th:
In the afternoon, we finally got to teach Julio (the older man from
the last email). He wanted us to come back and teach him, but every
time we stopped by his house he wasn't there or was asleep. He makes
me laugh, because he is very receptive, but asks tons of questions
just to make sure he understands. I can't really explain in. We set
a goal for him to be baptized on the 9th, he was a little hestiant at
first, but then said he would be baptized if he receieve the answer
that the church is true. We had a member from the ward with us at
this lesson who said he'd stop by Julio's house in the morning to
accompany him to church.

Sunday the 27th: (HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY)
Hmmm... Sunday, oh Sunday. We have church at 8 in the morning, super
early right? Long story short, we only had 2 of our investigators
come to church (Javier and Sandra, who come to church every Sunday
anyway). I was VERY frustrated and disappointed. I actually broke
down during Sacrament meeting, almost to the point where I would've
sobbed if I was alone. I was so confused. We had made all these
plans for people to come to church (members stopping by their houses
to get them, etc.) and they didn't come. I was upset because I didn't
know what else I could do. I thought "Man, if I could speak Spanish
fluently, I could know what to do to help these investigators"
However, I was comforted during the rest of sacrament meeting. The
topic was on missionary work and the members talked about how they
need to help the missionaries. We sang "I'll Go Where You Want Me to
Go" and I was reminded of the moment when I received that answer that
I was supposed to go on a mission. Then the closing song was "Called
to Serve". I know Heavenly Father was telling me in this sacrament
meeting "Taylor, don't give up, I've sent you to Ecuador for a
reason".

After chruch, we stopped by Bryan's house. He said he was all ready
to go to church in the morning, but the person who said they'd stop by
didn't come (which they actually did, they just didn't knock loud
enough). Long story short, so Bryan can be baptized on the 9th, he
needed to attend a sacrament meeting...so we went to a sacrament
meeting of another ward with him at 3 o'clock in the afternoon.

In the evening, we had a family home evening with Famila Lamota
(Sandra and Javier). We are all just tryng to be patient with Javier's
work to give him permission to take a day off.

Today the 28th:
Today has been pretty chill. We cleaned our apartment in the morning,
did our studying, and had some time to write letters and relax. We
headed to the mall to have lunch. Hermana Salmon (a sister from Mesa,
AZ) and her companion were at the mall too. So we ate with them and
it was so good for me to talk with Hermana Salmon. We were able to
vent and talk about our missions. It was a little tender mercy that I
needed.


Well, it's time for me to head off.

I can't believe my birthday is Wednesday. Am I really going to be 22?
I always want to be forever 21, haha. I am actually excited for my
birthday. We have our district meeting on Wednesday instead of
Tuesday because the zone leaders have a meeting. It should be a good
day...hopefully I have mail and the packages you sent mom!

I miss you guys. I pray for you every day. I hope all continues to
be well. Hugs and kisses!!

I LOVE YOU

-Hermana Smith