12/19/23: Tan Frio, Bien Chido

 Buenas dias Hermanos y Hermanas, espero que sus vidas estén bién chído. This week has been a good one. Unlike last week (if you read that email) we had some sweet success this week. This email is a day late cuz our p-day was moved to today because we had a zone conference/christmas thing yesterday and had 0 time for p-day things.

For starters I wanna announce that Juan Antonio has been baptized! Poor guy had to wait 2 weeks longer than he was ready for various planning reasons, but we got it done on friday. The cool part of it was we got to baptize another little boy named Yonotan on the same day! So we got 2 in one for that day! Yonotan asked me to baptize him, and it was truly an honor to perform his baptism and help him and his family see the fruits of coming closer to God through covenants. A man who's a member of our branch, and a good friend of the family of Juan Antonio baptized him.

More on baptism and success... we got 2 more wonderful sisters on date for baptism this week! One is 17 and the other is 21, they are sisters and their mother has been inactive for years. How we found their family is a miracle of a story. We were just walking along the road one day a few weeks back, when a woman (this mother of the sisters) pulled up next to us in her car and asled us where the chapel was, she'd been living in Arriaga for years, but hadn't gone to church here since she moved here from Tuxtla. She'd explained how she'd been missing the church community and the spirit in her life and wanted to come back. We shared with her where the chapel was and invited her to come the next sunday. She did and she brought her daughters! It was fast and testimony meeting and she bore her testimony, it was a strong one, the spirit had been reintroduced in her life. I was super inspired by her faith to bear her testimony to a bunch of strangers on her first sunday back! Fast forward a week or so, and she introduces her daughters to us as some people who would like to learn more. And now this week they have accepted the invitation! 

We have a few others like those sisters that we are teaching who are looking strong in their faith and moving quickly towards God's goal of baptism for them. We also have many others moving a little slower and hesitantly. One thing that is huge in missionary work is learning the Lord's timing. Some people are suited for moving quickly onto the straight and narrow, others need a little more time and patience. The important thing is that we do everything we can to help them love Christ as often as possible, even if it's just a small thing. I have learned how to have a lot of patience here on the mission, with myself and others. The most important thing being that you cannot force your will ahead of God's, ESPECIALLY in doing his divine work. And sometimes God's will takes much more time than yours. But His was is ALWAYS better in the end than our own. I bear strong testimony of this.

Scripture of the week is D&C 4:5-7;

5 And faith, hope, charity and love, with an eye single to the glory of God, qualify him for the work. 

6 Remember faith, virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, brotherly (and sisterly) kindness, godliness, charity, humility, diligence. 

7 Ask, and ye shall receive; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. Amen.

Anyway, there have been a million things this week I could write about from this week, from Fiestas de Navidad to nearly eating myself to death multiple times, but those are the important things of the week I wanna write about. Disfrutan, tengan una buena semana y ¡tengan un felíz Navidad! ¡Adios!

Side note for the title: Tan Frio (so cold!) because It was freezing this week! Temps hit in the low 70s with the wind chill!! The locals had to break out their coats and blankets!! The town was nearly in colapse! We really are in the winter season here... and Bien Chido just means "really cool" cuz it was a cool week.

Photos: 

(1-3) ¡Bautismo! 

4. Enchiladas Matahualenses, Elder Garcia's favorite from his town in North Central Mexico, we helped a sister in the branch make these for comida and I had 2 fatty plates of them and almost died (never ask for seconds in Mexico...)

5. Custom Zona La Costa Fútbol jersey we got for Zone Conferences!

6. Most spacious combi ride in Chiapas

7. Zone conference feast table