Baptism!!

Well, from the title you know we had a good week.  Yesterday I had the opportunity to pull out the white pants and tie waiting on that top shelf. 13 year old, Joel was able to fulfill one of his greatest purposes in his life yesterday.  We had a really good baptismal ceremony, combined with an 8 year old girl as the newest church member of her family join us.  We had his baptismal interview on Saturday, he did great.  His mom, who is a member, was able to make it to the baptism.  I saw that his baptism made her remember a lot of the time when she was first baptized.  At first we were a little nervous cause the baptimal font hadn't been turned on in a while and the water smelled like a sewer but we got it all straightened out.  The Mission Leader asked me to sing a hymn in English at the end of the ceremony. I was searching for a song to sing in Sacrament and was debating between "Nearer my God to thee" or hymn 338, America the Beautiful. I went with the first one :).

 

We had appointments everyday with a family we found a few weeks ago.  It is a single mother with five kids. The mom is a little out of it but the kids are receptive and progressing.  We did activities with them in teaching them the points.  One of the pictures attached is of a string that we tied outside to the gate representing eternity before this life.  It extended to the furthest wall of the house representing eternity of after this life.  It breaks off into 3 sections at the end, representing the 3 kingdoms of glory.  They all drew pictures of the steps of this life and put them on the string. It was a fun activity.

 

We had another 10 year old, the cousin of Joel that was going to get baptised yesterday.  When we first started teaching Joel, he always joined us and loved it.  He always asked his mom (very Catholic) if he could get baptised but always told us that he has to wait till he was 18.  On Wed. morning, the district leader, Elder Combe and I went and talked with his mom for the first time, leaving with the permition of his baptism from the combination of the Book of Mormon and the Spirit.  Unfortunately, yesterday he had to go home after Sacrament meeting, telling us that he would come back at 1:00 for his baptism.  We went to bring him back and his neighbor told us that they left in taxi a few hours ago.  We havent been able to find him yet but well see what this week brings.

 

The last picture is of a cake we bought for the birthday of the girl in the family were teaching. Oh yea, and my companion got hit by a car while I was with the district leader.  The car had a beautiful body dent but my companion is fine with a few scratches from shattering the window with his arm.  So he's fine, we got out to work the next day.  I'm just worried no one is going to want to be my companion after this because they are all getting hit by cars.

I hope all is well, have an awesome week! - Elder Warner

 

 

Dad I appreciate your email.  These get me through more than you know. Mission work is some of the most dissapointing, but exciting work.  Not a week goes by that I don't experience the best of both.   Some days are harder than others, a majority of the days I feel overwhelmed.  I have a list of goals that I nothing short of expect to complete before my mission.  One of them right now is knowledge. I lack greatly alot of bible knowlege, the ability to remember where scriptures are, ect. it makes it harder to teach. But I am seeing literal miracles from the smallest of sacrifice that the Lord expects me to make.  Miracles that with surety will change who I am the rest of my life. I am but only starting to recognize how the Spirit works, how to call upon it.   There are so many things for me to learn, and each month I see pass makes me realize there is so little time to learn it.  I am always accepting to your advice because its obvious to see what the mission made you.  Thanks for your support.  It helps me in each day of this.....

- Elder Warner

Hey!  How are you all?  We had a better week this week. We were able to find 3 families in which the dad and his son of one of the families were able to come to church with us.  We have a firm baptism date for a joven that we found in a contact.  His mom is from Utah in where she was baptised in our church there but hasn't been back since she moved here 15 years ago.  This week a lot of our schedule was filled with lessons, which was nice.  In district meeting, we made a goal to quit the words that take the spirit away (flip, crap, fetch etc..) and as far as we know, the goal helped with more of a successfull week. 

One of the things I have seen here in Mexico is that if the ward has a party, and they make food for it, what ever is left over is what the missionaries are fed on for the following week. I dont know if that was the case but this week but we had this food called MOLÉ.  Yes, in English that sounds a little unappetizing.  But it's like this chicken in a chocolate sauce. Mmm!  It's different, but fun, right!  We made a statistic about 2 nights ago, that as far as we analyze correctly, the average Mexico family spends just over 800 dollars on coca-cola each year.

Well, this week (the 14th) we started the canicula.  It's about 40 days of what I would say, living in an oven. 

The area we have contacted this week is on the border, where this photo was taken. It's actually kinda pretty, there is a lot (more) of green.  I noticed that Texas has a beautiful golf course right on the river just to tempt the Mexican heritage.   I hope you had an awesome week! 
Love you all,
Elder Warner

Hey how is everyone! Well, we had a good week. Not a lot turned out but I'll try to put that aside. Monday, the 3 Elders that I live with and I got on the roof and watched the fire works from Texas.  That was a lot of fun.  Also, this week we had the opportunity to have interviews with the Mission President. His wife did house checks so we got to bed late Wed. night trying to put the house in order. Interviews went really well, I really love and respect President Romney. Well, to be honest this week was more....difficult.  We found out we won't be seeing the family with 5 boys again, their dad let us know. I really like the story of what I have written in my journal about the lady we brought to church last week: 


"We have witnessed the miracles of putting an hour aside for the Lord.  We visited the lady we found on Sunday in her refuge home.  She didn't hesitate to tell us the blessings she received after walking out of those church doors.  Before we met her, she hadn't sold any of her bolis.  Within five blocks of leaving the church, she had sold every last one.  As a result of this, she wanted to buy her little girl a new shirt.  As she went to buy it with the money she had, the lady told her she wouldn't accept the money and handed her a box full of clothes for this little girl.  She told us last night, a woman she knew had plans to cross the border on a secure path.  The woman tried to convince her that her 6-month old baby in her stomach could have much better of a life, as well as her little girl.  As our investigator went to get black clothing to cross the border, she ran into a man that had a little cinder block side home that she could live in for free.  After we taught her, we moved all that she possessed, containing a few backpacks and the box of clothes into this new home, and filled out her baptism papers."


Unfortunately, we met with her yesterday and found out that she doesn't have an interest in progressing. It was hard seeing that, but I was very blessed to have seen the miracles that she had seen.  We have been trying to find areas that other missionaries haven't contacted to find new people.  Right now, we're working near the church to see if we can have people more willing to leave their homes for a few hours.  The pictures are of me and my companion. He bought a purple bike so we have been lookin pretty good in the streets.  The other is a Mexican band we contacted on the street.  It was too classic so I had to snap a photo.  We look forward to another week and hope all is well at home! 
p.s. its free slurpee day so take advantage of the 7-11´s
-Elder Warner

Transfer 5, Week 2

Happy 4th of July! I hope your all celebrating the independance of our country. As for now, I'm hoping I make it to the end of the day alive - Mexico isn't happy with this holiday. Alright, so I thought of a few stories throughout the week that I could share.  You asked me to send some journal entries through email so I figure just sending a picture could be faster. The entry below (7-2-11) is about the mother of the 5 boys I was telling you about.  It was a day in where we had an appointment with her and before we arrived her kids went to the market so the house was a little more peaceful. The entry says the rest.

Journal Entry 07-02-11:  We had a lesson with the mother with five boys today.  As we asked if she had read the pamphlet, she pulled it out of the desk and opened it to a certain page.  She told us how much she liked what it said about repentance.  She started reading from the part she liked and tears filled her eyes.  She tried hidiing her emotions, but the Spirit was stronger than she could contain.  Her husband doesn't want her going to church, which is very difficult for her because her heart knows it is true.  i told her to share what she knows to her husband and promised her if she has a desire and sincerely prays, the Lord will soften her husband's heart.  (Please pray for this family).

Journal Entry 07-03-11:  The investigator we went to pick up wasn't home, so we got to church 10 minutes early.  I decided we should go outside and invite everybody we saw to the church.  A few minutes before it started, we saw a lady and her daughter selling 'bolis' in the street.  She accepted our invitation and loved the meeting.  We explained a little afterwards and asked if we could pass by her house this week and explain more.  She told us she doesn't have a house and lives in a refuge home with her little girl while her husband is in prison for crossing the border.  She has accepted to meet us at the church on Wed.

(7-3-11) was before church started yesterday. I wrote about a bolis - which are like Mexican otter pops that this mother and daughter sell in the street for 50 cents. Some more spects about this lady is that during the Sacrament meeting she and her daughter were very reverent and they were singing the hyms.  We had talked to her for about 30 miniutes before church started so I had to explain to her the Sacrament and everything during the meeting. It was testimony meeting and she asked me what a testimony was.

Do you remember our last convert (Bety)?  I dont think she has even missed one mutual. She is very active.  But our ward didn't have a "Principles of the Gospel" class for new converts so we started one yesterday, that I am the teacher in.

So what we do for food is the ward has a calander of the month that the members sign their name on - the date to eat with missionaries.  The past 2 Sundays no one signed up so what they have done is they give us money. (I find it funny that they give us money to eat on Sunday).  There is a part in keeping the Sabbath day holy, that doesn't apply much here, so we eat the cereal we have at home and use it to buy lunch on p-day.  So I guess it works out.

This week my companion told me in the morning that I started introducing myself and teaching a little in my dreams the previous night. I've definately been a missionary for 8 months!  That's my week, thanks for the prayers. We have seen the miracles that have a given result from them.  Elder Warner

   

This is a bumper sticker that I found on a truck from Texas.

Well, I threw on this picture of my feet even though its gross, cause I thought it was way legit that I have walked off half of my toe nails on both feet. 

And the 'house of the week' says - warni(n)g they kill for free here.  I thought that was kinda funny.  Don't be scared, they were just kidding.

Journal entries this week