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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