Jon's Missionary Letters

  Bueno Bueno! This week has been truly a wild one, I say that every week I feel like, but this one was for sure the most eventful. First off I wanna share a wild story. EL MILAGRO (miracle): So there's this guy named Joaquin who called us over one night from his porch amd he wanted to talk. He said he'd talked to missionaries like us years ago, but hasn't had the opportunity/lost the opportunity to speak with us again. So we was glad to see us. He'd mentioned how he has a hard time walking and has had growing pain in his legs for a while. After a like an hour of him giving us a rundown of his life, we finally got going. Anyway, that's how we met him. Fast forward a few days to Tuesday. I was on exchanges with my LD, Elder Price, and we walked by his house again, and, sure enough, there he was, in the exact same spot and clothes as 2 days before lol. He tells us he would like us to pray for him and his legs because he could barely stand up and let alone move. But in...

  Bueno bueno, ¿qué paso? This week was cool. Our hermanito, Juan Antonio, came to church with his mom (their family is very inactive) this week and last, so his baptism is on for saturday! He's excited and his mom is doing an awesome job of supporting him and us in helping him come closer to God through this covenant. We've done good work in Arriaga. The area was proclaimed "dead" bey the last missionaries, but we've done our best to prove them wrong! We came into a desert and planted some seeds, and we're starting to see some fruit after a good amount of watering. It's crazy how much God blesses us for doing the one thing he asks us to do after everything he's already given us (read Mosiah 4)  And that thing is of course to Love and serve Him by gathering his sheep and loving one another. Anyway, the title this week is a spanish tongue twister a few of you out there might be familiar with. My companion introduced it to me when I wanted help on speaki...

 Hey all, ¿qué paso? This week was slow, fast, boring and exciting all at the same time. We a lot of contacting and finding this week. Here in Arriaga there are a lot of inactive members of the church. Roughly 650 in total (although we're not sure how acurate some of the records are). Either way, there's a lot. Compare that with the maybe 40-50 active in both branches in the city, and it's a bit of a problem. So us as missionaries have been working hard to find those who have fallen away, because there are a lot. Much of this work has to do with getting the members to have relationships with eachother as well, because we can't stay and help keep people active. That's the members job's. Hence a lot of finding and inviting to church.  However, we are still focusing on helping others come unto Christ who haven't yet been baptized. We are super close with our little friend Juan Antonio who wants to be baptized. We came up with some games to help him remeber cert...

  Bueno Bueno. Another week in Arriaga, Chiapas passes. For those of you who are wondering, Sabiduría means wisdom. I titled this week's email that because I had a somewhat intense drunk man exclaim that word to me about 7 times with a firm tap on my chest with each syllable. I guess it's important to note, so I figured I'd share his "sabiduría" with you guys. There are a lot of interesting responses people have down here (and everywhere) to 2 teenage boys walking around in white shirts and nametags. Especially when one is white and in Mexico. We were in line for an ATM with a couple of immigrants (there are tons down here, mostly from Senegal, Benin and other parts of Northern Africa, along with a lot of Haitians and Venezuelans too) when one lady looked me up and down and boldly exclaimed to me in English, "I like you, I wanna marry you". Flattered, though somewhat shocked, I replied, "oh thank you, but I'm sorry, I'm a missionary and have...

  Jonathan Allen   < jrallen@missionary.org > Mon, Nov 6, 2023, 12:38 PM to  ? ,  Ally ,  Ashton ,  Aubrey ,  Aunt ,  Aunt ,  Aunt ,  Ben ,  Brother ,  Brother ,  Buddy ,  Christoph ,  Cody ,  David ,  andrew.carter ,  Eden ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Luke ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Elder ,  Emi ,  Erik ,  Ethan ,  Gabe ,  Gabriella ,  Grammy ,  Grammy ,  Grandpa ,  Hayden ,  Hermano ,  Hyrum ,  Jackson ,  Jason ,  Joe ,  Kacie ,  Kate ,  Kayla ,  Kelly ,  Levi ,  Lucas ,  Madelynn ,  me ,  Matthew ,  Maya ,  Megan ,  Megan ,  Michele ,  Parley ,  Phoebe/Paul ,  R...

  Hey kids!! Loved hearing about your Halloween! It brought back a lot of memories of Halloweens in elementary, middle and high school for me.  Dan: Obi Wan is an awesome costume! I was obi wan one year for Halloween, probably when I was about your age if not a little younger. We'll definitely have to do that when I get back, airsofting is the best! Also, did you know my mission is famous for having Jaguars in it? I haven't seen any, and I probably won't ever, but out in the jungles in "Los altos", a different area than mine, a bunch are roaming around. Where I am in the coast theres just a lot of Iguanas and loud blackbirds. Ems: That sounds like a blast! Trick or Treating with friends always is a good time. And yes, I have eaten some of the food we tried with Brother Guest. I had pig head tacos yesterday, which were pretty good, but took some getting used to (it was really fatty). I also had some of the best fish I've ever eaten, called Mojarro, it's fri...

  ¡Hola mi amigos! It's been a wild week, that's for sure. I left the MTC, came to Mexico and have begun the real deal. For starters, our flight got changed last minute. We ended up having a red eye flight into Atlanta and from there to Mexico City, and finally, into Tuxtla Gutierrez. It was a good time, not crazy eventful though, i was way tired after the fact tho. In Tuxtla we met our trainers! My companions name is Elder Garcia and he's from North Central Mexico and doesn't speak english, so that's been fun. Like legit, it's been super fun trying to communicate with each other in what little bit we know of each other's languages. Let's just say Google translate is our best friend (other than Jesus of course), siri always has my back. I'll have to put in a lot of work to learn Spanish if I want to survive out here haha. Hence the title, no nesecitamos Ingles.  My zone I got put in with my comp is La Zona de Costa, the costal zone. The city I'm ...