More Manzanillo

January 15, 2018

Man, how time flies.  I’ve also realized how busy people in leadership in the church can be.  I can’t even imagine what it would be like for President Clayton.  There isn’t any time to get it all done.  I think that in the past month, I’ve really learned to love to serve a lot.  I never want my mission to end honestly.  One thing that I am sure of is that I need to serve for the rest of my life.  I don’t know how I will do that, but I know that I want to serve more missions later on in life.

Manzanillo Zone

February 12, 2018

I have had so many experiences in the past few weeks and so many miracles, yet I have been to lazy/busy to write them dow.  That’s kind dumb.  All I know is that this work is true and that the Lord is directing it.  We have had our ups and downs for the past few weeks.  One good thing is that we had to get more chairs for the prayer house in La Huerta because so many people are coming.  

Today we had interviews with President Clayton.  and we talked about several aspects of the work here in Barra.  I need to be more humble and trust the Lord more.  I’ve been trying to convince the people too much I think.  I have also been trying to hard to teach the members how to be members when I should concentrate more on finding, teaching, and baptizing.  I need to focus more on missionary responsibilities and trust that the Lord will do his part, which is really everything.  Its very humbling to consider God’s love and patience towards us, being such imperfect people.  It still amazes me that He lets me be part of His work.  He truly does love his Children.  In interviews we talked a lot about goals, and how goals should reflect our desires of our hearts. And those desires really tell us what kind of people we are. So when we put goals, we shouldn’t make our goals the desires of our hearts, we should make our goals to be the necessary steps to reach our desires, it’s the how. Just a little detail I hadn’t thought of before. 

Every single day he blesses us with miracles, his tender mercies can be seen at every turn. I’ll try to mention just a few.  In La Huerta, we had a Christmas activity and some investigators that didn’t know showed up. We went to go and visit them later on and another one of their relatives decided to come to church too.  She is a young woman of about 15.  The first week that she came, she asked for a hymnal so that she could learn the hymns.  That’s incredible! 

We had another experience in teaching when my companion was supposed to speak in La Huerta and he was inspired to talk about tithing.  The very same Sunday, an inactive family that I have never seen before, came to church and paid their tithing. Last Saturday, we baptized another one of Irma’s grandchildren.  There is enough work for us to do in La Huerta that the President is letting us stay in the prayer house so that we can work more efficiently.  That is really going to help us, even though we have to sleep on the floor.  We had another great experience when we went to visit a family who lives about 10 kilometers away from town.  We got out of our earlier lesson a little late and so we had to wait for a bus.  We were in the middle of nowhere in the dark at a crossroad, waiting and waiting, without any luck.  Finally we saw a school bus approaching, heading in the right direction.  We waved him down and the driver stopped for us and gave us a ride!  That’s a pretty cool miracle for a missionary, but it got even better when I realized that I left my phone on the bench at the bus stop.  We told one of our other investigator’s about it and he went and looked at the bus stop for us and FOUND it!  He told me he would bring it to me in church…this is the greatest miracle because now our investigator will come to church with his family this Sunday. 

We have been working a lot harder at contacting people and I have been having a great experience.  I have seen so many miracles.  Just today, while waiting for President Clayton, we started contacting and found lots of really great people.  When we went outside to take a group missionary picture, two people called us over to ask us doubt meeting times and when they could come to church!  So we gave them a Book of Mormon to read and they said that they would stop by on Sunday.  The are lots more miracles happening in our whole zone.  I have decided that we really don’t have any time to waste.  I feel like we travel so much, that we cant afford to waste the precious minutes that we have doing missionary work.  In this whole transfer with Elder Schank, we have only had one official p-day.  This is both an awesome thing and a bad thing.  Personally, I want to work hard and so does my companion, so the sacrifice of clean clothes and food has been worth it.  Honestly, I don’t see it at much of a sacrifice at all. I gave this time to the Lord, so I’m going to give Him everything I’ve got.  

Brother José is super good! He decided to follow the example of

Jesus Christ after seeing the example of his brother and grandmother.

He has a desire to learn more about the gospel and to have the Priesthood.

He and his brother are being missionaries with their friends and they are

inviting them to learn more about Jesus Christ as well.

Elder Schank, Elder Colvin, Elder Sevilla, Elder Medina

Lots of stuff has happened here in Barra too.  The other day, an earthquake hit.  It wasn’t a tiny one either.  Our gas tank was rocking back and forth, and our whole house felt like we were on a boat rolling with the waves.  Fortunately, there were no tsunamis or significant damage.  One of the families that we are working with  started coming to church on a regular basis.  They are also reading, and doing everything that they need to do to prepare for baptism, but they haven’t accepted a date yet.  It will happen when the time is right.  Another investigator is also progressing and is getting along better with his wife since he has been taking the lessons.  

Things are going so well with the work here, that the President wanted us to be able to have more time in our own area.  He changed it so that we always have divisions in our own area unless we are on divisions with the assistants, then we go to their area.  So we have a lot more time to teach and work in our area now!  

This weekend, we are traveling to Guadalajara for a mission wide conference with Elder Anderson of the quorum of the 12.  Elder Oaks was supposed to come, but he was called to be in the First Presidency, so we get to hear from Elder Anderson.  

Lots of good stuff is happening here in our mission.  Elder Cluff was just called as the new assistant! He was in my group of missionaries!  It is really strange to be some of the oldest missionaries in the mission.  I honestly still feel like a newby and I feel like the more I learn, the more I realize how much I don’t know.  I need to continually remember that I can’t do anything without the Lord’s help.  It’s His work after all. 

February 14, 2018

Well the change flew by as always, but its been such a privilege to serve here in Barra de Navidad. Just in these past few days we have seen so many miracles. Just yesterday our appointments had fallen and we decided to go visit a less active, but as we passed by a park we had the impression to turn back and talk to some of the people there, The woman we  talked to told us that in 16 years of living there, the missionaries had never talked to here before, but in that very moment she needed our message, that she needed God in her life. All of her trials were just weighing down on her and she wants/needs peace. She asked us if there was something we could leave her to read to help her and we gave her a book of mormon and shared a few principles about how the gospel can bring us peace if we put in practice in our lives. She told us that she would do what was necessary to acercarse a Dios. Its just another testament to me that the Lord guides this work and without Him, we would be left in our own strength, and in turn, hopelessly lost in this work.