Wednesday, March 13, 2013

Week 29 - Loving Every Minute Of It!


Mi querida familia, 
 
Hi!  Its a great day to be alive.  Welp, it turns out that there weren´t transfers this week so I´ll be sticking around here in Reforma with Elder Martínez a bit longer.  The week was pretty great.  We had a stake conference, but it was done from Salt Lake by Satellite for the Southern Mexico area.  We got to listen to Élder Bednar and Elder Scott (who gave his talk in Spanish.  It was weird to hear him speak Spanish - the exact same voice, just different words).  They gave some killer talks. And Elder Bednar gave a shoutout to TXG and said he had fond memories of being here!  :) 

After the conference we had two baptisms, a mother named Yolanda and her son Jorge Eduardo.  It was totally awesome (despite the fact that they are both very afraid of water and it took a solid 10 times between the two of them before they got completely immersed haha).  It was for sure a memorable Sunday.


 
Well I´ll get on to answering your emails :)
 
Dad - I´m sure glad to hear you had a good Sunday too!  I haven´t heard about the new version of the scriptures - ah man!  now I´ll be all out of touch with things when I get home haha.

1.  What is your normal interaction with the youth of the Ward? Are there any young men nearing missionary age?  Can you help them along?
- Our ward doesn´t have a ton of youth, but the ones we have are awesome! They are all converts, at least all of the young men are.  We work with them sometimes (aka they come out with us) and we use them to invite people to church and stuff like that.  They are probably our most reliable source of support in the work.  We have a couple of converts (Roberto and Luis) that are preparing for the mission.
2.  How much direction do you get from the Ward Bishop?´
- The bishop is great. He usually asks us to visit a couple of families each week.
3.  How do you rate your Spanish Skills now?  Speaking? Comprehending?  Reading?
- They´re pretty good.  I haven´t been able to fool anybody into thinking I´m from Spain but I feel that day is coming.  What I lack most now is vocabulary. I never realized how many words there are haha.  Recently I´ve learned axle, crowbar, and saw haha.  Eje, palanca, and sierra.
4. I was surprised by your answer from last week, that the Spanish speaking missionaries are relatively uninterested in learning English. I would have thought it would be seen as a big benefit and something they would be motivated to do.  We're you surprised? 
- No... its so hard to learn without being submerged in it.  My companion is pretty good about actually studying it though.  The pronunciation gets him down sometimes though.
5.  Tell me of a Spiritual experience from last week. 
- One thing that blows me away every time is the changes people make in their lives without us even telling them to do it. For example we baptized a youth named Sandra a few weeks ago.  She has completely changed her wardrobe to be modest, and all we did was teach the principle of respecting our body.  There is so much power in the word (Alma 31:5  And now, as the preaching of the word had a great tendency to lead the people to do that which was just—yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them—therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God.).  Also I had a very spiritual experience teaching her sister the doctrine of repentance and the reality that after repentance we are 100% purified.  She carries around a lot of guilt, and I sure hope she´ll do whats necessary to throw it away.
6.  How is the district doing in baptisms, in terms of goals? 
- In our district we set goals for each month. Our goal for baptisms in March is 6, Las águilas has a goal of 7 and Chiapa de Corso, 4.
 
 I love you! Have a great week!
 
Roy - My Cougars! Well at least we have the prestigious NIT to look forward to haha.  Its totally awesome that you and Andee are working in the temple! That's definitely something I want to do when I get back in the land of Zion :) Rock on bro!  I love you!
 
 Mom - I´m glad you had a great week in happy valley.  I love that place!  
I´m also glad you at least got to meet Lauren, she´s a hoot.  haha.  There are indeed few things funnier than watching Roy trying to bowl.  I hope he did the classic ¨try to get the ball to hit the pins on the fly¨.  You can always count on that to earn a visit from the manager haha.  Have another great week in Utah! I love you!!!
 
Andee - How could nothing funny happen!!  You are married to the worlds largest delk!!  (It turns out that in the separation after birth, Roy kept a slightly larger part of the delk, but I´m content with second place) :)  Also the thought of Adam Hoynackis being a father is pretty funny haha. :)  Love you Andee!  Keep on slaying it!
 
Mikele - AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!  In like not very many hours you´ll be a missionary!!!!!!!!!  Your email was great!  (You might have made be shed a little tearlet haha)  You´re going to be the best missionary of all time and I´m so proud of you.  I don´t think I´ll send my letters to the MTC because I´m afraid they won´t get them on time, but you will get a few early on in your time in the field :)  Kill it girl!  I promise you´ll love being a missionary more than anything else you´ve ever done before.  For me, there was a bit of a price to pay early on, but now I´m truly happier than ever!  I miss you too! But its a pleasure to be here serving the Lord in Mexico and you are going to love Chile!  Make everyday a great day and work like crazy!  I´ll see you next year!  I love you Mikele :).
 
Well time is running short.  Have the best week of your life this week, and do your best to share the gospel!  I love you all and you are in my prayers. Thanks for keeping me in yours!
 
Till next time,
 
Elder Clark Roth
 
Love you all! Bye!

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