Always. Check. The. Water.

May 20, 2013

This is me with the Hulk - NBD

            Sooo this week has been one and the SAME! So there isn't much to tell. But the least i could do is explain the title later - haha. We pretty much worked hard all week and we are seeing progress with a lot of our investigators. We are really lucky with this area because there are sooo many awesome members here in the area! We really do have the best ward. The members care about us, and they help us a tonnn with the work. We pretty much only operate off of references! There were two exciting things that happened this week. 

            The first exciting thing about this week would be the fact that we got to go help set up a wedding for the bishops daughter! She got married on Thursday and apparently here, even if you are a member and everything, the country requires you to be married civily first and then you can go to the temple. Temples here aren't permitted to marry people...don't know if that's a church rule or state.... So anyway we helped set up this huge reception which included a lot of "tall people jobs", a lot of "wow a woman would be a lottt better at this job", nailing things into cement walls....that was fun, cleaning up our faces from the blood caused by cement chips and flying nails haha, and even setting up tables and chairs. It was a good service project, but it was definitely hard work in that Mexico heat.

             The second exciting thing this week is that we found a GOLDEN family a while back called Family Rivera and then we taught them twice before we found out they were in the other ward's area -__- killjoyyyyy. So we had to give them over to the other missionaries even though we had already set baptismal dates with them and everything. But that's okay cause this week we got to go and watch them be baptized at the service. It was really cool and we got to bring 2 investigator families with us! The funniest part was that apparently these Elders didnt check the water (BIG mistake haha and a rookie one at that) and so they just turned on the boiler and left...apparently it wasn't working and the water was FREEZINGGG!!! haha everyone who touched it was gasping and whining hahaha but then something really cool happened. The mom told us afterwards that she got  in and it was SUPER cold and she was freezing...but the moment the Elder started to say the Baptismal prayer, she felt a warmth start to grow from her feet up to her head slowly. Then when the prayer was over he dunked her and she said it didnt feel cold at all. SOOO COOL!! We told her the Elders would explain more about the feelings she had...for those of you playing along at home, that's the spirit ;)  But also really quickly i would like to encourage everyone reading to attend the baptisms of the missionaries in your ward. Those people who are getting baptized can feel such a love and such a sense of belonging when we go and support them in what is a HUGE decision for them in their lives. Sometimes they are coming from broken homes where their decision to be baptized is not received well, or maybe they are nervous about leaving their old life to start a new. Either way, your attendence will show that you care!

              But that's about it for the week. Except for the fact that I ate Mole and for the first time WASNT throwing up everywhere!! haha it was funny too cause we were eating with a RM and his mom and he totally read me like a book. He's like hey you don't have to eat it if you don't like it. I was like oh no it's delicious, trying to be polite. And he was like no seriously we have more spaghetti. But i didn't want to hurt the mom's feelings so i just said no it's great and kept eating...but he kept punching me in the leg whenever i'd be trying to choke it down hahaha he was like dude just leave it!! hahahaha it was funny.

               So i guess this is the part where i end with a spiritual thoughttt!! Sooo stilll in first Nephi over here haha buttt I was reading in chapter 15 and Nephi is talking to his brothers who are ticked cause they can't understand the dream of their dad. But here's the thing. We know that Nephi didn't understand the dream either...but then he asked God to help him understand and suddenly we have the ENTIRE interpretation of Lehi's dream (thank you Nephi haha). So his brothers are like ohhh this dream is so hard to understand. And Nephi is like uhh....duhhh haha and he says in verse 8): "And i said unto them: Have ye inquired of the Lord? 9)  And they said unto me: "We have not; for the Lord maketh no such things known unto us." What i took away from this is very simple. Ask. God. For. Help. Seriously, i think that sometimes we overlook this very, veryyyy simple solution for our problems. We sometimes think that our problems are small and unimportant, or that we can handle it ourselves, or that we dont think God wants to help us. But we are his children. He wants the best for us, and he is stuck doing nothing when we do not seek his help. Inquire of the Lord, and have faith that he will make "All things known unto you." Because that is his promise, that is his job, and THAT is his love.

Love,

Elder Hamm

Josh