Week 14:Brownsville

Not very much happened this week. We dropped about 5 of our investigators because they weren't making an effort to do anything. So we kind of started over with the new transfer. We have found a couple of new people to teach. Hopefully they actually progress. On Tuesday we found a guy named David. He is a little different.  But he walked us around his neighborhood and told us all the people that we could go by. We started contacting all the peolple and found two mini miracles. 

The first mini miracle requires a little back story. The Conde's have brought their friend to church with them a couple of times and we have asked them multiple times for their address. They have not been able to find it though. But back to the mini miracle. As we were contacting one of the people David told us we could go by we found the Conde's friend's house! So we are going to try and teach the whole family. We haven't had a lesson with the family yet but we will for sure go back sometime this week and see if we can teach them. 

The second mini miracle is a man named Raul. We knocked on his door and he invited us in. To make a long story short he is 81, his wife passed away, he has multiple things wrong with his health and he said a couple of times he doesn't want to live anymore. So we taught him the plan of salvation and invited him to be baptized. He accepted a date! He wants to live with his wife again. I know that Raul needs our help and that with his baptism will come the baptism of his wife in the future and that the two will be able to live together forever. Another small miracle with Raul is I can almost understand everything he says because he speaks so slow! 

We had been encouraged to work more with our members by our district leader. So most of the end of this week was just working with members. On Friday we had a ward Halloween party with the English members so we went and tried to build relationships. Then on Saturday we went by all of our less active members. Most of them said that they were going to come to church. But they ended up not coming. We just have to keep working hard with the less active members. Most of the less active families are part member families as well. I think it is a little pattern that I am starting to notice. So we are going to be working a lot with the less actives and while we are at it see if we can teach the rest of the family. 

We've learned a lot this week. One thing that has stuck out to me is that missionary work his hard. We have a talk that we listened to the other day called missionary work and the atonement. It is by Elders Holland and Eyring. One thing that Elder Holland says is that of course missionary work isn't going to be easy; the price of salvation isn't easy. We have to work and work and work some more to recieve salvation. It's the same as missionary work. We have to work and work and keep working to help other people receive their salvation. So no matter how hard it gets we have to keep trudging along. 

Love, Elder Hurst

This is the exit we take every day.

This is Elder Curtis, George and I. George is a member in our area.

This is some food that we made because we didn't have very much food left.

This is the Conde boys playing basketball.

This is a picture of some of the Conde Children.

You know you're a missionary when you have a lifetime supply of tupperware.

Week 13: Brownsville

This week was the last week of the transfer! It was a pretty good week. Elder Curtis and I are both staying in Brownsville so nothing changes for at least another six weeks.

 

We had a blitz almost every day so we didn't do a lot of work in our area. But it was a good week. I learned a lot of things that can help us in our area. On Thursday we had exchanges with the Zone Leaders. I went with one of the ZL's named Elder Livingston in the ZL's area. Elder Livingston is a very energetic missionary and we worked very hard. He is a very good missionary and i learned a lot from him. He has a ton of animio and is super excited to be out on his mission. I learned two things from him on our exchange. One we need to love our mission, and two we have to work with the members or we won't  have success. During our exchange a few things happened. They had one investigator that was super close to baptism but was living with her boyfriend (who is a member). We were supposed to have a lesson with both of them at the church that night but it turns out that they broke up. So Elder Livingston turned this sad situation for her upside down. We went over the ladies house and talked with her. Luckily we had another member with us who was able to help her. But long story short the investigator was baptized the next day. It was all possible because of the member that we brought with us. Elder Livingston told me that it doesn't matter if we have 2 members of 500 members in our area it is all how we use them. We don't have very many members in our area and it's been hard for us to get their help but we are going to use them more and have more success because of it!

 

I also had another learning experience this week. On Saturday Elder Curtis and I were working in someone else's area and we found a man named Rafeil. Rafeil doesn't have legs so we decided to go and share the plan of salvation with him. But right away Rafeil didn't stop talking so we weren't able to give him a lesson. He told us his whole life story. He has diabetes, no legs, he's legally blind, he had a growth on his arm and he is on dialysis. He has every right to be super sad and depressed but he was the nicest most energetic person i have met in a while. He taught me a big lesson. I have it good. I have all my legs i can see. Lately i have been making a lot of excuses but after meeting Rafeil i decided that i don't have any more excuses.

 

On Sunday we were going to have a Baptism for Janet. But she didnt' show up to Church. That was very sad. I was so excited for Janet to be baptized. We still haven't heard from her so we don't know what is going on with her. But she will be baptized this sunday! It just comes down to using members. We need to help her have some friends in the church. That is one thing we have negletcted. We need her to love church!!

 

Well that was my week in a nut shell. I hope that you guys are all doing amazing!

 

Love, Elder Hurst

Week 12: Brownsville

So last P-day while we were emailing we got a text that for the next Tuesday we all needed to be in McAllen at 9 in the morning. They didn't tell us what was going to happen in McAllen just to be there. So we showed up to McAllen the next day and had no idea what was going to happen. But we got to watch Meet the Mormons! We got to watch it three days before it came out in one of the chapels. It was a very good movie and I think that it will help the growth of the church a ton!

This week was pretty slow. We almost didn't have any energy and it defiantly showed in our work. It doesn't help that half of our Zone is sick or has been sick. I luckily have not gotten sick yet. Elder Curtis however was sick on Saturday and we couldn't leave the apartment. So I had a lot of time of just studying which was actually pretty good.

Things with Janet didn't work out. She was unable to make it to church on Sunday so she couldn't be baptized. Pretty much every possible thing that could happen to her happened to her last week. It's really sad. But we are hoping that she can be baptized in this Sunday. It would be a perfect way to end the transfer. 

Basically that is all that has happened. It's been a pretty uneventful week. By the next P-day we will know if one of us is getting transferred. This week has definately been a test of my testimony. It would have been very easy to just give up and not try but we did the best we could. We obviously could do so much better. Our goal for the last week of the transfer is to make the most of it and go super hard. So that is our plan! I hope you guys are all doing good!

Love Elder Hurst

 This also is what happens when I cut my own hair!

We made a cake the other day. It was very delicious!

A huge piñata at a members house.

This about 4500 dollars worth of ties that we found on Monday on my arms. and that's not even all that we found that day!

 The rest of the ties.

This is some Mango Ice Cream with Chile on top! It actually wasn't that bad.

Week 11:Brownsville

This week was a really good week. President Maluenda decided that we are going to start doing ten hours of role plays every week. That is a lot. So five days a week we have started going to the church to have role plays. We basically just practice teaching to other missionaries. We also do random situations that can happen. One other thing it is all in Spanish. This is amazing practice for me. Not only does it help me improve my teaching but my Spanish as well.

Really other than the role plays nothing much has changed. The weeks are flying by here. I feel like I just barely got to the mission field yesterday. It's crazy how fast time flies here.

Conference was really good. This was the first time that I have ever watched all 5 sessions right in a row. I was also to get a lot out of conference. We were able to get one investigator to church!

We had a couple of lessons with Janet during the week. After one lesson we invited her to pray and ask if the church is true. She said the prayer and the spirit was very strong. And then on top of that a song came on the radio and said "IT IS TRUE" I know that this was not a coincidence and I think it gave Janet the push she needed. She has plans to be baptized next Sunday!

We also had a pretty strong lesson with one of our other investigators that we had been teaching. They are doing super good and hopefully will be baptized at the end of the month.

But back to the topic of conference. It was amazing to hear the prophets voice. The whole time I was watching it the only thing I could think of is that these words are direct inspiration from God and they are exactly what need to be said. Elder Bednar had such an amazing talk! We will probably have all of our investigators watch or listen to it!

Things are going really well here in Villa Nueva. Our area is packed with potentials. We just have to go find them. I know that we will find people who have been seeking our voice. I don't know when this will happen but I know it will sometime. We just need to be where the Lord wants us to be.

The Church is true and it breaks my heart when people reject the message we try to share. I can't even imagine how our Savior feels. I read somewhere that serving a mission is the closest we will ever come to knowing what Christ went through. In reality we proably don't even excperince a fraction of what he went through but it is still hard. But it's worth it. I hope you all are doing well!

Love, Elder Hurst

This is Elder Curtis and I doing some servce for the Conde Family. 

This is ELder Latanzio and Hancock. They have been spending a lot of time with us.