17 months - Thanksgiving Week

Here's a quick pic of our happy missionary.

He loves the work! I can't remember what he was talking about here, but I thought it was an awesome picture that captures how Joseph is doing. He is loving being a missionary. Just taking a breather sharing with us a fun story of missionary work

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  Subject:  Day of action of thanks    
So this week was a week of MILAGROS!!

Thanksgiving quite roll off the tongue in spanish and especially when you translate it from the spanish back to english but it's the same idea! Also they don't really celebrate it here but we will be having a thanksgiving lunch at the multizone on friday.

I have come to know for myself that what is says in Alma 26:22 to be true. That if we repent, exercise faith in Christ, produce good works and pray continually then if will be given us to bring thousands of souls to repentance. So we haven't quite gotten to the thousands part yet like in Acts 2:41 but we have definitely been seeing success and it because we are striving to do these things. I would invite you to study more about Grace this week. It is a very interesting subject and some things that Elder Bednar said, along with things that have come up in conversation with people and other things that have come across my studies this week have really illuminated me on that subject this week. I would encourage you to study a talk by Elder Dale G. Renlund talk from April 2019 called "Abound with Blessings" and talk about Grace and how we qualify for blessings by living the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Here is one of the quotes that really hit me.

"The principle of activating blessings that flow from God is eternal. Like those ancient Israelites, we too must act on our faith in Jesus Christ to be blessed. God has revealed that “there is a law, irrevocably decreed in heaven before the foundations of this world, upon which all blessings are predicated—and when we obtain any blessing from God, it is by obedience to that law upon which it is predicated” (Doctrine and Covenants 130:20-21). That being said, you do not earn a blessing—that notion is false—but you do have to qualify for it. Our salvation comes only through the merits and grace of Jesus Christ (see 2 Nephi 10:4; 25:23).

Some of the blessings that we have received this week are that Ely is really progressing! He keep commitments reading the Book of Mormon and came to church this week! He was even present when we ordained Orlando to be a priest in the Aaronic Priesthood. Please keep him in your prayers because he feels like getting baptized would be a change of 360 degrees. Wait a sec. In the lesson he said 360 degrees but I think he meant 180 degrees because if you do a 360 you turn around but end up exactly like you were before. Awkward. Point is that he feels like it would be really hard to because his family all go to a different church and he would feel pressure from them to not be baptized but he is praying for an answer and he are going to go with our ward mission leader who went through the same thing when he was Elys age. He is super great though and we feel strongly that he will receive his answer.

The Osorio family is doing well and we are trying to figure out a time to take them to the temple so they can do baptisms for the dead.

Also this guy we are teaching named Luis accepted a baptismal date in December! We have to work to help him come to church but we are excited for his progress.

Also this week Cristian and two of his cousins Nayeli and Alejandra came to church! They really liked it and have started progressing a lot! We started teaching them with Elder Riffo and it's great to see how people progress over time even if it is a little slower than we might hope.

Also a cool tender mercy was that yesterday we had to approve a new house for some missionaries and had correlation and so there wasn't as much working time as we expected and then the appointments we had set up fell through so we just started contacting people in the street and most people didn't want anything but then the last contact of the night before we had to book it home was this guy named Eduardo. He shared some super cool and personal experiences from his life like how he recently got cancer surgery and when he was diagnosed it gave him a paradigm shift and so he has really been trying to turn his life around but he still doesn't know what is God's purpose for him and he doesn't go to any church! We are visiting him on Saturday and are super excited.

And I would just like to end by thanking you all for your great examples to me to be more like Christ, our perfect example. He is the Son of God and He lives. He is risen. The tomb is empty. This is His Church and His work. I am above all grateful for that He atoned for my sins and yours and if we turn to Him we can live with Him again.

Les amo mucho!!

The picture is a pretty view from another house in the zone. I love the guatemalan mountains!

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16 months - Sopresa

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    Subject:  Sopresa                        

Hey Hey!!

This was a good week. Not an amazing week, but a good week. We were a little disappointed about our turnout for church this week but are really trying to help the people we are teaching resolve their concerns through the Book of Mormon and keep commitments. If you are sad, read the Book of Mormon. If you need answers, read the Book of Mormon. If you want to have a happier family, read the Book of Mormon. And don't just read it, but feast upon it and LIVE what you learn. I can give you a 100% guarantee that things will get better.

This week I got a big surprise! Galilea, who we were teaching in Santa Marta, got baptized this week! She was the girl who was already reading Saints and going to Institute and came to church and already knew that the Book of Mormon is true. But there were some complications and so she did not get baptized in my time there. Buuut she got baptized this past week aaaand I got to baptize her!! That never happens by the way. The area presidency has been very clear that missionaries cannot return to their old areas to visit people for baptisms. But this was a very special case that I could explain but don't really want to take the time to explain it but the point is I got to be there and it was super great!! Her parents are not members but are super great people and I know their time will come.

So that was the highlight of the week!

We are also still working with Ely (who's first name is Elder) and he is doing great! He has a lot of great questions and came again to play soccer with us. He understands really well and has lots of great questions. Keep him in your prayers.

Also the Osorio family is doing great and we are still working with them, and are planning a temple trip soon! This week after the face to face we helped them get started on family history work and found a cool miracle where it suggested a record asking Nicodemo if it was his grandpa and it was! And because of that record he found out who his great grandparents were and it was so cool! Makes me excited to do some family history work in the future. We also started teaching Dinas sister Rosa and her family! But we found them separately and so Dina doesn't know that we are teaching her sister yet but they are very similar.

I'd just like to end with my testimony that this is Christ's Church and that He will direct and guide us in our lives, helping us to be truly happy, if we do what he asks of us. It is my deep conviction that He has called us to help gather Israel, which is the most important work on the whole earth. I challenge you to go and open your mouth to share the gospel with someone! If you do so without fear, the Lord will help you and guide your words so that the Spirit brings it unto the heart of the person, so that they can choose to accept the restored Gospel.

Con mucho amor

Elder Wride

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16 months - Una Buena Semana

I was helping Sophia practice and totally missed Joseph. I got on in time to see him wrapping up his headphones and wave before turning off the webcam. So doh, note to self, don't practice violin right after school on Wednesdays. (Although it would be nice if he called earlier in the day!! And not when I'm in the after school rush?) Oh well. I'm sending him his Christmas package this Saturday, so I guess no last minute things for him. I still need to get the things he asked for two weeks ago. He looked great though, big smile as always, I know he's happy and loving serving the Lord as a missionary.
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   Subject:   Una Buena Semana         

This week was really good!!

We had Elder Bednar come to the mission! And it was SOOO cool! He taught us a lot of stuff and really words cannot describe what was felt and learned. You had to be there.

Elder McGraw and I didn't have changes but they did add another area to our ward! So the area is split in half but it's in the part that we didn't really work much so that is awesome that they will be focusing there now!

And also really great news is that Orlando got baptized!!

It was a day to remember.

I exhort you will all the energy of my heart to feast upon the Book of Mormon every day. Don't just read it but feast upon it. People that don't do that end up falling away but its little by little. Feast doesn't mean just read. It means eat like its a banquet. And we normally do that as a family, so what we learn here is that family scripture is also very important.

I haven't even written the hundredth part but I don't have time. LOVE YOU ALL

Christ lives and This is His Church.

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16 months - Ooooohhhh

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    Subject:   Ooooohhhh         

Hey hey!!

So when there is a place really far away here and you ask someone how far away it is or how long to get there, like for example if I asked how long it would take to get to Jutiapa from Chimaltenango, before saying how long it would take a typical Guatemalan (or missionary here with some time on his belt) would say "Oooooohh". Part of the zone is this pueblo called San Martin Jilotepeque and its about a 45 minute bus ride and costs 7 Quetzales. In the Pueblos there are also these things called Tuk Tuks which are super fun but here in Chimal they are pricey. And so we only take them when we are running late and need to get there fast and there is no bus route to get exactly where we need to go. So the other day jokingly I asked Elder McGraw how much it would cost to take a Tuk Tuk to San Martin and he said "Oooohhh" becuase a Tuk Tuk to San Martín would be crazy expensive and to be honest they wouldn't even be willing to go. But we also have put it to test with a couple native Guatemalans and most of them had the same answer when we asked him how much a Tuk to San Martin would be. It was super funny. I didn't explain it super well and its kind of hard to if you aren't in Guatemala so if you didn't think it was very funny then you had to be here hahah.

But this week was super good!! I actually was in divisions in San Martin yesterday! It's such a pretty drive there! Guatemala has some very scenic drives up and down the mountains here.

Last week after pday ended we found this guy named Cesar and he is SO awesome!! We were walking past him and he said something in English so we started talking to him and he actually had a lot of questions! Also the other cool thing is that he was with a kid named Erick and that is when we figured out that Erick, and his dad Erico, are some recent converts that moved at the same time they stopped coming to church and so we literally lost contact with them. They were baptized like 4 or 5 months ago. So it was a double 2 for 1 miracle because we found those recent converts AND Cesar is very very receptive! He just gets it. He is reading the Book of Mormon now and loves what he is reading and is just such a great guy. We are going to visit him tomorrow and will keep you updated on him!

Also Ely is also progressing a lot! He is in 1 Nephi 17 now and came to church for the second time on Sunday! He is Evangelical and feels like it would be really hard to switch churches if he comes to know that the Book of Mormon is true but he loves what he is learning and feels great about it! He even came to play soccer with us this morning and went out to eat with us. He is super awesome.

Also Nicodemo, from the Osorio family, also had a big trial of faith on Sunday but I dont have time to tell all of it so remind me next week! He is so awesome and has great faith.

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