A Year of Miracles

Hi Everyone

Well.... I am now officially super old. I have a year in the mission (is that how you say it in English? Ya no recuerdo....) I´m having trouble coming to terms with that. This has to be the fastest year of my life. My consolation is that I still have 6 months to work my hardest here in Mexico.

This week was full of miracles!

First of all, I don´t know if any of you were able to find the talk "Open your Mouths" that I mentioned last week? Well, in it he talks about an approach he uses to invite people to learn about the gospel. He just asks two questions: 1) Do you like to read? and 2) If I sent you a book about the visit of Jesus Christ here to the Americas, would you read it? Now, I´m not really a fan of set methods of contacting, but this week we saw some miracles unfold as we invited people to read the book of Mormon in our contacts. 

For example, last Monday all our appointments fell through, but we saw a young couple putting up Christmas lights and started to help them. We started trying to talk to them about how families can last forever, which is usually quite effective, but they didn´t seem to respond. So we changed tactic and started talking about the Restoration of the Gospel through the prophet Joseph Smith, which Preach my Gospel encourages to do in every contact. Still, they weren´t too interested. In fact, the wife started telling us how they were very happy in their religion, how they go to study groups every other week to read the Bible, how they really don´t want to learn about any other religion... But then we mentioned the Book of Mormon: Another Testament of Jesus Christ. We read together 3 Nephi 11:1-12, which I have done many times in lessons but never in a street contact before. And this time we had their attention. We passed by yesterday to deliver their own copy of the Book of Mormon, and they are still very interested and want to read it, and we have another appointment to go and talk with them more :)

The biggest miracle was Saturday when Edith was baptized!!! I think I only mentioned her once before in my emails. Honestly, everything moved very fast with her, and we weren´t 100% sure that she was going to be able to be baptized this weekend, but she did! And she is so so happy. Edith was a kind of special case. 5 of the 6 missionaries in my district taught her at one point or another, so the entire district came to the baptism. Also, right before her interview on Thursday, she heard me playing one of the piano solos that Kellie sent me, "Nearer my God to Thee," and we showed her the lyrics and she really liked it, so I played it again as part of baptismal program. Considering the fact that I basically haven´t practiced in a year, it wasn´t too bad. 

Also, sorry for not sending pictures for so long, I might have lost the cord to my camera, so I´m borrowing my companion´s camera right now to send you all pictures. 

These are some pics from Edith´s baptism on Saturday. The last one is a 3 generation picture of my trainer, my trainee, and me. 

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. No one here celebrates it, but that day we ate with a member who is a professional baker, so I still ate a lot of really good food :)

I love you all! Hasta luego

-Hermana Herron

Very Grateful

Hi friends!

So guess what guess what guess what.... Bulmaro came to church yesterday!!!!!!!!!

You all remember Bulmaro? I talked about him in the first few weeks after I came to this area. he is blind and has only one leg. Every time he has wanted to come to church, something has happened. He`s gotten sick or fallen the night before. but yesterday he finally came! It made me so so so happy to see him there yesterday, in his big coat and his wheelchair. Yesterday just happened to be the primary program, and he really liked that. And he was still feeling good after Sacrament Meeting, so he came to Gospels Principles class too. It was soooo great! We have been praying and fasting that he would be able to come and he finally did!

Now we just have to baptize him :)

So, yes, anyways, we had a very nice week. 

I read a devotional by Elder Bednar this week that he gave at BYU about 10 years ago, called "Quick to Observe." And it might just change my life, it was that good. He talked about the spiritual gift of being quick to observe, both in our observance of the commandments of God as well as observing the needs of those around us, and how the gift of being quick to observe is a prerequisite of the divine spiritual gift of discernment. It really fortified my desire to seek these gifts of the Spirit. You can read it on the BYU speeches page. 

I also read a devotional by elder Harman Rector Jr. called "Open Your Mouths" this week, and I don`t have time to comment on it, but for all of you who are members of the church, I would like to invite you to read it and to take the challenge that he gives. I don`t know where you can find it on the internet, so, if you can`t find it either, let me know and I`ll give you at least the invitation next week. 

Well, out of time. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving. I really am grateful for this gospel. I am very grateful for my Savior Jesus Crist, for His atonement, and for the great opportunity I have to go tell everyone about it. I am grateful for the chance I have had this week to see the Atonement working in the lives of people here in Mexico. I am grateful for the privilege I have to talk to my Heavenly Father through prayer, and I am so grateful that He always takes the time to listen to me and to answer.

I love this gospel!

And I love you all too!

-Hermana Herron

Farewell to the Titensors

Hi Everyone

Hope you are all having a very nice November. I´m trying very very hard to ignore the fact that I´m old and that I´ve been out here for almost a year already.

So just two quick things from this week:

First of all, President and Hermana Titensor have been officially and honorably released. President Titensor came back on Friday and got to see us and talk to us one last time. As part of that, all of the missionaries here in the Cuautitlan and Tepalcapa Zones sang I am a Child of God for him, (in English!), and I played the piano. Mexicans aren´t exactly known for having the best voices in the world, but it was actually really really beautiful. I think we were all crying a little bit, President Titensor most of all.

I love President and Hermana Titensor a lot. They have taught me so so so much, by their words and their example, and the mission just doesn´t feel the same without them. They live in Orem Utah, too, so hopefully I´ll be able to visit them again after my mission when I´m back at BYU. 

President Garcia will be presiding over the mission until next July when the new president comes. We had a zone conference on Wednesday so we got to meet him and Hermana Garcia there. Of course all of us are still kinda in shock and still adjusting to the change, but they seem very nice. President Garcia is very wise and strict, and has a lot of experience, but at the same time he is... I don´t remember the word, but he seems to do things and make decisions on the fly a lot. 

The zone conference was interesting too, because for the last hour, the stake and ward leaders were invited for a small part about working together with the missionaries. And because Barrio Joyas is the best, they asked us to hold a quick, real Ward council there in front of everyone! It was the second ward council ever of Hermana Morillon. But it went well. It was the most productive 20 minutes any ward council has ever had I´m sure :) But my ward here really is the best, so it wasn´t any different than normal. 

Ok, the other quick thing is that we had a regional conference yesterday. It was broadcast from Salt Lake to all of Mexico, and it was really good. Sister Carol F. McConkie, Elder Benjamin de Hollos, Elder Robert D. Hales, and President Nelson all spoke. Elder de Hollos is from Mexico, so he conducted and spoke in perfect Spanish, but I was surprised when both Sister McConkie and President Nelson also delivered their talks in Spanish! They both have a very strong gringo accent, stronger than mine ;) but it was really good. And I think it shows a lot of love and respect for Mexico and the members here and their language that they went to the trouble to speak in Spanish. I loved it.

If your prayers lately have been getting a little repetitive or lazy, I invite you all to evaluate your prayers and really start again to pray with your heart. Prayer works, I can promise you all that. 

Sé que Jesucristo es mi salvador y que vive. Y esta es Su iglesia.

Les amo muchísimo, que tengan una semana muy linda.

-Hermana Herron

Day of the Dead

Hi everyone!

So we celebrated day of the dead in our house last Tuesday, but it was fun. We bought some chocolate skulls and special day of the dead pan, and we decorated a little bit. 

This week was a good week. We found some really promising investigators. And a lot of people came to church yesterday! Also, Edith is progressing a lot. I can`t remember if I`ve already written about her. Edith was listening to the missionaries a while ago in another ward with her boyfriend. He got baptized, but she still wasn`t convinced, and then she moved here. One day she was feeling bad so she just got up and went to the Cuautitlan chapel. The sister missionaries there sent us the referral, and now we are teaching her. And she is super golden. She has attended church every week for the past 5 weeks either in Cuautitlan or here. She downloaded the Gospel library and has been watching all the videos :) Also, she has already finished 1 and 2 Nephi in the Book of Mormon. Golden.

So, last week my Mission president and his wife returned to the United States to receive treatment because they have detected cancer in my mission president`s wife. We don`t know how long they will be there or if they will be able to return. For now, we have a substitute mission president and wife, the Garcias. They seem very nice.

Ok, love you all, I know this church is true and that Jesus is the Christ, I`ll send pictures next week :)

-Hermana Herron