Secret to Being Happy

Hi Everyone!

So, every night we call our district leader to report on our efforts for that day. On Saturday, I was talking with my district leader, and he asked me, "So what´s the secret Hermana Herron? You´ve been super happy all week, why is that?" His question surprised me because Saturday was a particularly difficult day. We had a lot of appointments fall through, three families told us that they didn´t want us to pass by anymore, and I was honestly feeling a little sad about that. It was the end of what had been a very difficult week. But my district leader made me realize that I had in fact been very happy all week somehow. Which is weird, it was a very difficult and tiring week. Well, what I told him was that this past week may have been the week in which I have worked the hardest in my entire mission. And somehow, that made very happy, despite the disappointments. 

The gospel sometimes doesn´t make sense according to the world. But that doesn't change the fact that it´s true.

So, just some other news, they have been changing everything down here, and last week we were told that we now have permission to knock on doors. So, for the first time in my mission, almost 17 months in, I tried proselyting by knocking on doors. Due to the nature of our area, it´s pretty hard here, because most of our area is closed buildings and closed streets with security guards who only let the missionaries pass if they have the name and direction of who they´re going to visit. But there is one part that´s a little more open, so we tried it there, and we had a little success. We found at least one new family that way. 

Well, I know that this work that I´m in is God´s work. I know that we are His children, I know that He loves us with all His heart, might, mind, and strength. That´s why my all will never be enough to repay Him, but I´ll keep giving it :)

I love and miss you all!

-Hermana Herron

Happy Easter!

Hi Everyone!

I hope you all have had a wonderful Easter!

Just really quick, I have a new companion! Hermana Jimenez, she´s my third companion from Oaxaca, México, and she is great. We both arrived here in the mission at the same time, and we started in the same district, so I´ve known her for a while already. 

So Easter! Easter in Mexico is very different from Easter in the United States. The people here in Mexico have many traditions and celebrations all throughout the "Holy Week." They have processions that represent the suffering and crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Sometimes the reenact it. Some people walk on their knees to a certain place to show their devotion to Christ. I really don´t know that much about all their traditions, but it really is moving how these people show their devotion to the Lord by remembering His suffering for us. 

But something that I was thinking yesterday is that if we focus only on Christ´s suffering for us, we, well, suffer. But Christ didn´t just come to suffer, He also came to overcome that suffering, so that we don´t have to suffer like he did. 

"For behold, I, God, have suffered these things for all, that they might not suffer if they would repent;" -D&C 19:16

That is the real miracle of the Atonement, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ, that because he suffered for us, we don´t have to.

And the real real miracle is that Christ no longer suffers. He is no longer dead. He lives!

The focus of Easter shouldn´t be in His death, rather, in His resurrection and life!

I had the wonderful opportunity yesterday to reread "The Living Christ," I´ll put a link here so that all of you can read it. This document is the testimony of current day prophets and apostles that Jesus is the Christ, the Savior of the world, and that He still lives. 

http://jesuschrist.lds.org/testimonies-of-him/articles/the-living-christ-the-testimony-of-the-apostles-of-the-church-of-jesus-christ-of-latter-day-saints?lang=eng&_r=1 

With the prophets and apostles of all ages, and as one of His representatives, I also testify that Jesus Christ lives. He overcame death, He overcame sin, He overcame suffering, and He doesn´t ask us to suffer and sacrifice anymore, He only asks that we offer Him our heart and soul and faith and love, a broken heart and a contrite spirit. 

I promise you all that if you turn to Him, you will feel of His peace, as I have felt it. 

I love you all!

-Hermana Herron

A Special Baptism

Hi Everybody!

So guess what.... Manuel got baptized this week! Yay! It was a really nice baptism, a lot of ward members came. Arcos is a really really great ward for fellowshipping. 

I don´t know if I ever explained this, but Manuel has had several.... I don´t actually know what they are. In Spanish they´re called infartos cerebrales, which literally translates to brain heart attacks. But because of this, he struggles to control is movements. That´s why he´s in a wheel chair, he can technically walk, but it is very difficult and very dangerous for him, because he falls a lot. That´s also why he can´t read and why he talks in a very slow, very deliberate way. In the baptism we had a chair in the baptismal font, but it was still very hard for him to get baptized. Either a hand or a foot or a knee would slip up without him wanting to. And even worse, his hands didn´t really have strength to keep his nose plugged and his mouth closed, so yeah, it was an uncomfortable experience for him. But after 4 tries, he got it! And Manuel is so great, he never complained and he never gave up, he knew that he wanted to get baptized, so that´s what he did, no important how difficult it was. After the fourth time finally worked, he came up out of the font and said, "They finally got my horns out!" It was pretty funny. He´s always been golden, and I know he´ll be a faithful saint. 

I love what he said in his baptismal interview too, our district leader shared it with us later that night. The two of them entered the room for the interview, and then Manuel started by saying, "Hermano, with your permission, I would like to be baptized this Saturday."

We really have been blessed here in Arcos, and we have been seeing a lot of miracles. Just one more that I really wanted to share with you all. This past week we had a lot of meetings, studies with other sister missionaries, consejo, the baptism, and basically a lot going on. So even though we had a high goal for new investigators, but Saturday, we had 0. After the baptism we only had a couple of hours to work, and it was full of appointments. One of the appointments fell, so we decided to look for some of our future investigators to hopefully teach one or two of them and convert them into new investigators. We went looking for one named Damaris (it´s actually an interesting story of how we met her and contacted her too, but that´s a story for another day). We knocked on the door and her sister answered and invited us in. Then Damaris came down, then their parents, and suddenly we had a family of 4 new investigators! But much more important than the numbers are the people. This family needs a lot of help. The mother, Lupita, has had major back pain for over 10 years, and she shared with us about all her trials that she has had. This family has basically every problem you can imagine. And  Lupita was considering suicide when we showed up. She told us that she knows that the Lord sent us there to help her and her family, and I know it too. I know that the Lord sent us to that family not to find new investigators, but to save. I just hope and pray that they accept this gospel, because I know it is exactly what they need to save their family and their lives.

That is real missionary work. That is the Lord´s work. The Lord doesn´t call us to bring people into the church. He calls us to serve and to save. That´s why Manuel kept trying until he could finally be baptized, because he knew that he wasn´t just joining a church, he was becoming clean of his sins, making a sacred covenant with God, and preparing to return to His presence someday. And that´s why the Lord guided us to this family, not to convince them of our religion, but to give them the opportunity to be healed through the power of Jesus Christ. 

And speaking of healing through Jesus Christ, enjoy Easter everyone! It´s the day that we remember the most important even that ever happened in the whole history of the world! The resurrection of our Savior Jesus Christ.

Well, love you all, keep reading the Book of Mormon every day!

-Hermana Herron   

Nayeli

Hi Everyone!

Sorry for not writing last week, I kind of ran out of time.

Quick news, I whistled for the first time in my life this week! It really wasn´t that impressive, but it was better than any whistle I´ve ever done before. 

This week was wonderful, because we had GENERAL CONFERENCE!!!!!!!!!!!!  I love conference so much. I was particularly moved by President Monson´s simple testimony of the Book of Mormon. And his prophetic council is to study the Book of Mormon every day. I know that the Book of Mormon has a great power to it, I´ve felt it in my life and most especially in my mission. So, if you aren´t reading the Book of Mormon every day, follow the prophet and do it. 

I was also impressed by how many times they talked about "The Living Christ" and encouraged us to study it as well. 

I don´t know if I´ve told you about Nayeli yet. Nayeli was a former investigator who just kinda disappeared for a few months. She wouldn´t answer her phone and she was never home when we passed. Hermana Brady seemed to know her pretty well, but I didn´t meet her until two weeks ago when she showed up at church. She has really, um, recobrado ánimo, she´s really poniendo las pilas, um, well, she´s pretty excited now, she wants to be baptized, and she has a baptismal date for the end of the month. She also has a 7-year-old son and she wants him to serve a mission someday :) He´s adorable, he did an activity with us where we had to draw a picture, and then everyone else had to guess what it was. I drew the temple first, and everyone guessed that right, so then I drew a French horn, and no one guessed that. 

Well, if you didn´t see conference, please watch it here www.lds.org.

If you did see conference, review your notes, pray, and set some specific goals and plans (see Elder Ballard´s talk) to apply conference in your life.

I love you all!

-Hermana Herron 

I Love Being a Missionary

Hi Everyone!
I just want you all to know that I love being in Mexico. Even though I´ve been here for almost 16 months, there are still times when I´m walking in the street and I look around and see the people selling tamales and the signs in Spanish and the graffiti and the pollution and I think to myself. "I love Mexico."

And I also want you to know that I absolutely love being a missionary. I love everything about it. I love that we spend all day everyday out and about in the work of the Lord. I love that I have the opportunity and the authority to testify to every single person I see that I am a representative of Jesus Christ. I love that I get to see so many miracles as the Lord brings about his work here among these people I love so much. And maybe I´m going slightly crazy, but I even love when people reject us, because it is exactly when someone challenges us or rejects us that I most feel the Spirit testify that our message is true. And later on, when someone accepts the gospel, it´s just the sweetest thing in the world.

I love walking through the streets. singing hymns with my companion and getting weird looks from people because we sing so loud. I love praying and knowing that my prayers are heard. I love sitting in an intense lesson with an investigator who needs the gospel much and promising them with all my heart and all my soul that this is exactly what they need. I love serving, and I pray that I can serve with even more of my heart, might, mind, and strength while I´m still here.

My friends, this gospel is true. It´s all true. God lives. Jesus Christ is the Savior and Creator of the world. The Book of Mormon and the Bible are the word of God. And our Heavenly Father hears and answers prayers.

Also, I hope you all know that I love you all!

-Hermana Herron

New Investigators

Hi Everyone!

So I promised I would tell you about some of the families we have been finding recently. 

My time here in Arcos has been very interesting, because our investigator pool has been completely transformed in my time here. We have had to drop or have lost almost all of the investigators that we had when I got here about 2 months ago (have I really already been here for 2 months?!) and so we have really been exercising our faith to find new investigators, especially new families. And the Lord has been blessing us a lot. 

One family we have found is the Lopez family. We contacted the father in the street, and he invited us to visit his family. When we went to the first cita, he wasn´t there but his wife was, so we started talking with her. They have 2 adorable children, Diego and Kenya. And every member of the family has a different personality and a different level of openness. The father is very thoughtful and more than anything, wants to change. The mother is open but also very skeptical and wants to be completely convinced before committing to anything. And Diego is adorable, he is the most open of everyone. During the first lesson he didn´t really make any comments or ask any questions or anything, but at the end when we invited them to come to church, he was the first to say, "I want to go!" And when we were arranging a day to come again, he told us, "Don´t come on Tuesday, because I won´t be here on Tuesday." I love this family!

Also, Manuel now has come to church 3 weeks in a row, and he is getting very very excited to be baptized in April!

Well, to end I just want to share with you my scripture of the week:

"33 Wherefore, be not weary in welldoing, for ye are laying the foundation of a great work. And out of small things proceedeth that which is great.

 34 Behold, the Lord requireth the heart and a willing mind; and the willing and obedient shall eat the good of the land of Zion in these last days." -D&C 64:33-34

There is so much I could say about this scripture and how it has helped me, but I don´t have time, so I´ll just settle by saying that I know that this is the work of the Lord, truly a great work. And I really do know that it is the small things, the every-day diligence, the small acts of faith, that bring about the great miracles.

I love you all! Have a wonderful week!

Pictures from Arcos

Hello everyone, I have no time today, literally. But next week I promise to tell you about some of the amazing families we have been finding lately.

I know this work is the work of the Lord, and I love being a part of it!

I love you all, have a wonderful week, you´re all in my prayers.

-Hermana Herron