Faith Precedes The Miracle

Hey hey hey!

What a great week it has been here in Mexico! Lots of success, lots of failure, but all throughout, lots of happiness.

Last Tuesday Elder Valdovinos and I knocked for the most part of the day and had a good time. We also found out that our investigator Monica and her daughters moved away so we were very disappointed with that.

On Wednesday, we had a very full day of appointments because of the tremendous amount of knocking we did the day before. We met with part of a family who we are really excited for. We talked with the mom, Rosa, and her two daughters, Eli and Anateli. They are super ready to listen to the message that we have to share. The daughter Anateli is a great example of faith to me and so I want to share her story real quick with you. Anateli is 21 years old. In July of the year, she and her family were involved in a car crash. The others came away fine, but she was left paralyzed from below the shoulders. The doctors told her that it would be a long time before she would be able to move her body again. To their surprise, she proved them wrong. She has movement in her arms now and is working day by day to regain all movement. I feel she is such a great example of faith and we can all learn from her. She has never in her head questioned why this happened to her, but has only relied even more on her Father in Heaven and her Savior, Jesus Christ. Sometimes, this happens to us in a different sense. We get paralyzed by the challenges of life and the hardships that we must face. We get paralyzed by the worldliness all around us and lose our sense of who we are. But, no matter the struggles we have, we can always be healed. Both spiritually and physically. We must turn to our Lord with full purpose of heart, which means that we must rely on Him and give Him our total trust and follow what He wants for us instead of what we think we want. By using the principle of faith, which means we have a belief in God and His ability to help and heal us and that we also ACT according to what He wants, we come to find that we are free from what paralyzes us and can move forward with Him. So, what we must do is use our faith by praying for help, reading His council to us in the scriptures, and do His will and act how He would have us act. Then, and only then, can we truly come to know God and Jesus Christ more in our lives and feel of their love for us.

Well, on Thursday we met with one new investigator, Iris, and had a great lesson with her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. She felt the Spirit as we taught about the cleansing effect of a baptism and she committed to be baptized! Yeah! 

Friday, we talked with a big family about the Restoration and the Plan of Salvation. We have great hopes for some of them to accept a baptismal invitation. Cool story: one of the uncles (his name is Manuel) in the family is great friends with Jonathan. They run a puesto (like a little restaurant) of huaraches (words can´t describe it. it is delicious! look it up) as a family and he told us to stop by and eat one. So, we stopped by in the night and were surprised when he said that it was all free for us! Whoa! So we ate and were happily filled with Mexican goodness. Now here comes the cool part. They also told us that we can stop by once a day and eat another free huarache!! One for each! Can you say benefits?

Saturday was crazy. All our appointments fell through so we turned to plan B. Knocking! We got a few lessons and some return appointments out of it so it was pretty good. Later in the night, our ward had a talent show. So we went and had a good time with the members and some investigators who came also. Funny story: while they were trying to get the sound to work, I was just chillin like a villain with strawberry fillin when all of a sudden everybody got up and started going outside. I was confused for a little bit, as I thought they were doing some sort of game or something. I again relaxed and leaned against the wall only to feel it move like a wave. Not good. So, I thought to myself: Hmm, people are leaving, the wall feels like a wave, so, I must be in an earthquake. So, I followed everyone outside. Come to find out, it was a 6.5 earthquake but the epicenter was somewhere south of the city, so it felt pretty weak over here. Cool stuff. Later, some members challenged us to basketball. So what did we do? Accepted and beat them of course! Good stuff. 

Sunday was really good and there was a great Spirit there. Felipe and Jimena came to church and enjoyed it so we are excited to see them tomorrow. Later Sunday night, we met with a cool investigator, Hector, and had a great talk with him. He even accepted to be baptized! Woohoo!

Today was p-day again and we played soccer in the morning and now here I am writing my e-mail.

Good stuff happening here in good ol Mexico City!  I love you all!  Do great in all you do!

¡Ten fe y se obediente!

Todo mi amor,

Elder San Diego