They grow up so fast :'(

Elder Pe

  So basically this week was completely uneventful, due to the fact that the doctor told me to take it veryyy veryyy easy for a few days. And so we only taught a few lessons. Butttt the big news is that my companion, and trainee Elder Pe is going to leaveeeee tomorrow to go onto bigger and better companions who will teach him all the things i never could :'( Its all fairly melancholy haha nah im kidding, its alright, but it was a pretty good 12 weeks together, and i have realized something that i think i can apply to my life fairly easily. I have learned....that I really do NOT like changes haha I was thinking about how this life is just one constant state of changes and changes. And well, it kinda helped me! haha I dont know about you guys, but i have always freeked out about how eternity is just gonna be...well eternity. I mean, thats a longggg time in my book. But hey, the good news is, we probably wont be going through sooo many changes at that point! But anyway, im gonna put a picture in here of Elder Pe and I or at least sometthing that can accurately describe our companionship....and isnt terribly offensive haha but in conclusion, Elder Pe is the companion that anyoneee could get along with. We never faught once in 12 weeks, and thats saying something cause you know me pretty well haha He was a hard worker, could speak both spanish and understand English really well, AND we had a ton of good time. ---End of Obituary--- ;)

       Sooo the only other news from this week would be that we set a baptismal date with an investigator that we have who is awesomeeee and totally has sincere desires to hear our message and to change. He actually has a job that requires him to work on Sunday and we were worried about how we were going to bring it up with him. But we brought it up in our lesson and before we could invite him to pray about it, he told us that he had already thought about how he should talk to his boss and change his schedule, and if that wouldnt work, he was gonna quit. Needless to say, this man is chosen haha hopefully we can keep him progressing.

The MICROWAVE!!!

       OHHHHHH But the biggest news from the week would be that we got......FRIKIN MICROWAVES!!!! AHHHHHH!!!! So stoked for that haha this is a big developement in the mission and I really dont know how many different possiblities were just opened up to me haha but one thing is sure...there will be microwaving going on in our house shortly.

       So spirtual thought from this week comes from 2 Nephi 31. I was reading about how Nephi saw Christ get baptized, and Ive always loved the verse (and we use it a lot on the mission) where Nephi tells how if Christ HIMSELF needed to be baptized, then how much MORE do we need it! But I always put such emphasis on that part, that i have totally overlooked the next few verses where Nephi explains WHY Christ was baptized. In verse 6 it starts and says: "6 And now, I would ask of you, my beloved brethren,wherein the Lamb of God did fulfil all righterousness in being baptized by water? 7 Know ye not that he was holy? But notwithstanding he being holy, he showeth unto the children of men that, according to the flesh he humbleth himself before the Father, and witnesseth unto the Father that he would be obedient unto him in keeping his commandments." And then in verse 9 it concludes: "9 And again, it showeth unto the children of men, the straitness of the path, and the narowness of the gate, by which they should enter, he having set the example before them." What I was able to take away from these scriptures was that Christ "descended" down to Earth, and became a fallen being in a human state. He came and suffered for us, so that we could return to live with God and so that we could have the EXAMPLE that he set for us. In these scriptures, Nephi tells us that the flesh is weak, but thats not an excuse. We have to humble ourselves before God like Christ did and keep his commandments if we want to recieve eternal life. The path is straight, the gate is narrow, but it is not only possible, it is worth it.

HEY FAM! Thanks for all the prayers and that good stuff. It sounds like things are good for EVERYBODY at home! Keep being awesome and try not to have too much fun while im gone!

Love,

Elder Josh Hamm

A HUGE Moth!

Don't Freak Out

Our 2 assistants that are leaving this change :/

Minute 5 in the hospital

       Okay, so i realize it is 6:45 on a Monday which means we should be back to work, but before you run and tell your stake president, let me explain. So i guess you could say it started yesterday at the food appointment. We had some delicious chicken and rice and beans. It was pretty good. Butttt the problem was that the food didnt really like me back....well it wasnt exactly the food, but we'll get to all that in a minute. So I woke up at 12 oclock last night and well....it wasnt the best time. But it was just getting started. I woke up at 2am in extreme amounts of pain, and then didnt sleep again. I was pretty much getting out of bed every 20 minutes to let my body do awful things to me. Butttt then the best part came when I finally decided that this called for a phone call to President Reeves....at 4:30 in the morning. Asked forgivness for the hour, and then told him what was going on, to which he replied, okay....go to the hospital in Puebla (this would be the part where you dont freak out). So we ask our member neighbor if he can take me in his car at 5 in the morning to the Puebla Hospital, and he agrees! So we pick up the other Elders completing with instructions from President, and we all go to Puebla Hospital....Longest car ride Ever. - and it was only 20 minutes too. 

Minute 20 in the hospital

So Im not fully coherent at this point, and they put me on a bed and start pumping stuff into my blood stream as i try to explain what is going on haha luckily Elder G was there to help tell them....and take rediculous photos of the action (reminded me of Dad on High Adventure). So then I finally allow myself to drift to sleep even though i was still soooo nauseous. But then when I woke up, I felt soooo much betterrrr. Then the doctor came in and started pushing on places on my stomach that kinda hurt, and told me there was a chance I had apendicitis...which helped me feel soooo much worse. Buttt long story short, I stayed in the hosptial pretty much all day so they could make sure it wasnt apendicitis, and in the end it turned out I have a parasite in my stomach along with a stomach infection. But the good news is, they gave me medicine that is going to kill EVERYTHING inside of me, I got to sing some spanish songs to the nurses, and Im already feeling a TON better, which i guess really isnt too hard after going through all that, but yah know looking on the bright side and all that Jazz.

Hour 6 in the Hospital

       So compared to the Hospital story, the rest of the week is going to sound boring, and honestly there wasnt much that happened. Sooo Ill attach some photos of the rest of the week and the Hospital adventure and we'll call it a day with a spiritual thought.

       So we got to have interviews with President this week which was AWESOME as always, and he always asks us if we have any questions for him, and he always has a great answer. So this week, him and I were talking about the good and bad forces in the world pulling people in different directions, and he enlightened me to something that I hadn't thought of before. He talked about how Satan, was punished by God and cast out of Heaven, and so he came to Earth to pervert the ways of the Lord and make us turn our backs on Eternal truths in the name of fitting in, feeling good, etc. So I had kinda already heard that, but then he said, that while Satan is tempting us, and God is allowing him to do that, that there is a power that he brings. And that power tempting us to do bad is sooo powerful!....but second to the even more powerful force that is enticing us to do that which is good! I had never really thought of that! We always focus on temptations of Satan and how strong they can be at times....but God is sending the exact opposite force to help us! He is sending infinitely more strong impulsions which invite us to continue on the path. So idk, i just thought that was something cool for me to think about. And it made me wanna look for those opposing good forces when it seems that im only surrounded by wicked influences! So anyways I hope that helps you this week!

Hey fam! Dont worry about me, Im super good right now, and although God kinda left me out to dry for a while last night, he came through in the end! haha Love you all a ton!

Love,

Elder Josh Hamm

Just some of the yummy food we have gotten to eat
here in Huejotzingo!

The Love of God

Heres a path we walk down a lottt, and a double rainbow!

 Sooo, dont know if you all like repetitiveness or not, but i feel bad every time i say the same thing....so instead of saying "well, nothing really happened this week", Im gonna say..."Dude! This week was so uneventful it was almost like being home again!"...but you will all understand what i mean.

       Only question from Dad is about the food appointments. Well, we have them for lunch like i said, but no, unfortunately the husbands dont come home from work, which is kinda wierd considering it is the big meal here. They stay at work and have lunch there i guess, and because of that, there are a ton of times when we cant enter a house cause there isnt a man present and then the hermanas get mad at us cause theyve prepared food, but its a rule so we cant break it, and...yah, just all around fun times. But usually the husbands get home around 7 or 8, although a lot of people here have 24 hour jobs. So they work from 10 at night until 10 the next night and then have a break from 10 at night until 10 the next night...at which time they start over again haha kinda rough, but thats the life to provide for your family.

       Soo seriously, like nothinggg happened this week. Excepttt for the fact that on Sunday, we had an investigator come to church. But it was a biggg deal. She is the wife of a less active in our ward who hasnt been to church in foreverr. We have taught thema few times but we went to teach them this last time on Friday night and she told us she would never go to chruch cause she didnt feel comfortable and her husband is a return missionary and he wouldnt share his testimony with her....but expecting nothing, we showed up to church, and 10 minutes in, she came in....ALONE. And sat down with us....and then followed her 2 kids (also never been to church) (one is 10 and the other 7).....and they brought a friend who lives across the street who isnt a member! I still dont know whyyy they decided to come to church, but miracles exist. 

       So spiritual thought for this week comes from the book Jesus The Christ written by James E. Talmage (one of the few books we are allowed to read as missionaries). If you havent read this book, you need to. It is sooo good, and full of insights and depth that I havent found in any book, not that im an expert, as my parents will attest, I have NOT read a significant amount of books. But this week i was having a really hard time with something that Ive been working on for a long time now. And, as i thought about it, I became angry with God. I felt like he wasnt helping me as much as he should, and that if that was the case, then maybe he thought that I wasnt worth the help....or at least in that area of my life, as i have failed him several times before. But in chapter 3 of this book, i was reading, and it began talking about the infinite and perfect love that God has for his children. It talks about how God has a perfect knowledge of his children, their struggles, and what they would do in given circumstances. And then it says the following which i quote: "Let not ignorance and thoughtlessness lead us into the error of assuming that the Father's foreknowledge as to what would be, under given conditions, determined that such must be. It was not His design that the souls of mankind be lost; on the contrary it was and is His work and glory, "to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man." Nevertheless He saw the evil into which His children would assuredly fall; and with infinite love and mercy did He ordain means of averting the dire effect, provided the transgressor would elect to avail himself thereof." I dont know why, but that just hit me so hard in that moment, and I just started crying. Cause I knew that God loved me, that even when i struggle, even when i fall, he loves me SO much, and Soo much more than I love him. He doesnt care if Im a sinner, or if Im perfect. All he wants, is for me to return to him and be with him forever. I know god loves you and I know it with all my heart. He is watching over you, he worries for you, he is concerned for your eternal welfare, and for your personal happiness. So instead of turning against God, always, ALWAYS remember that he loves you, and THAT will NEVER change.

Hey fam! I love you guys a ton! And i know that God loves you too! Always remember that! I hope you guys are having awesome lives! Stay strong! Have finn!

Love, 

Elder Josh Hamm

Parrish, Me, and Iñesta at Papa Johns. Ignore the sock on the table...i seriously dont know.

The FEAST we had cause an Hermana gave us money to eat.
Look at me gettin all cute with the pic-stitch

D&C 89 and Soup

This is a Rose we have on our gorgeous rose bush out front.

All of Puebla at night. P.S - The ladder we
climbed to get up there was sketchy as anything haha

  Okay, QUESTIONS from Dad. We do have daylight savings time here!....but it was last week haha pretty crazy. I didnt realize until we saw it on the calender that bammer made, that Mexico does daylight savings time a week before the US does. Wierd stuff. My language skills?....well....haha I can understand anything someone says, so thats a big improvement from the beginning of the mission. I can pretty much say whatever I want, but every once in a while, its frustrating cause i wanna quote something I know in English, or I wanna say something in a specific way, and i cant find the words. But its not too terrible. I definietly need to study more, thats for sure. For the sacrament, it depends. Sometimes they use regular bread, but a lot of the time they use bread from a "Panadería" (which is a bakery) and its delicious fluffy, homemade type bread haha its really good. For the sacrament, they prepare it from water that has a filter on it, so yah, we are allowed to drink it. However...there are some places where they might not use filtered water, and you drink it anyway haha but if you drink a lottt of the water you get really sick....just a little bit and you might have some diarreah or something. So its not a huge deal. And, no. Sadly they dont really have any special candies or chips or cereals or anything like that for the seasons. So i looked for Boo-Berry cereal at the store and they didnt have it :( bummer. But they do have this special type of bread called "Pan de Muerto" that they put out for Dia de los Muertos. Its pretty good....but its not Boo-Berry cereal. And they dont really celebrate Halloween down here. Just a few people going around...but ill talk about that in a bit haha

       Okay, so this week has been pretty good! Monday we got to have a family home evening with a less active family that is now VERY active! It was soo fun! Then Tuesday we had a lesson with some investigators and it was well.....kinda like bible bashing. Or at least thats how i felt. But in the end it was good and I told them, look, all these doubts you have that we have answered and all the things you are asking...you can learn if you only read and pray about the Book of Mormon. And they all agreed that they would do it. So not terrible. 

       Sooo Wednesday was pretty slow and so we are gonna combined it with Thursday haha but this is where we get to talk about Halloween here. So basically they go trick or treating...WHATEVER night they want as long as its within 3 days before Halloween haha or at least thats what it looked like. So on wednesday AND thursday (and even a few on Tuesday) the little kids dress up in costumes and go from the little stores and businesses that line the streets here and ask for candy. So where my comp is from they say "Dulce o travesura" which roughly translates to "Candy or something that makes you wanna punch me in the face". But here in Puebla they say "¿Coopera para mi calaverita?" which lamely translates to "cooporate for my skelleton?"....yah i dont get it either. But its pretty cool here to see them having Halloween and all the little kids trick or treating. It reminded me of going out and having your feet hurt soo much, but you gotta get more candyyy haha good times. And there isnt really anything Note-worthy that happened on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. Surprisingly, there arent really parties for Dia de los Muertos, just bread, and everyone puts flower petals in the shape of a cross in front of their doors.

       So, I need anyone reading this blog to let me know if there has been new revelation in the church that the members are no longer allowed to eat soup or something....because I think there are forces at hand, trying to prevent me from eating soup. So you know we drink water from a "Garrafon" which has 5 gallons of water (aka heavy mug), well Monday night i was gonna make some soup and I tried to pour the garafon and it slipped off the counter and my hands were wet from washing the pot, and it slipped out of my hands, hit the floor and pretty much shattered, which i have never seen haha and water went everywhereeee and we dont have a mop so we had to squiggy it all the way to the door and out. Not fun. Then the next night Im like okay, we buy a new garrafon, got the soup. Lets do this. So i plug in the stove, turn it on...and its not heating things up. Okay well I'll just use the other side then. Turn it on, and BAMMMMM. Sparks flying, sounds like someone is welding, my comp and i are screaming like little girls, we run out of the kitchen and then the stove explodes. Like literally it catches fire and like breaks in half. Dude, i dont even know what to tell you. Point is, we aint got no stove, and soup is either now, or very shortly will be, against the word of wisdom.

       Okay, spiritual thought for this week comes from my brain. Basically I was laying in bed the other night after a tough day (for me personally) and I was thinking about whyyy the mission, as good as it is, is the hardest thing I have ever done. I thought about how life, and sometimes, this gospel is so hard! Why is it that I have suchhh a hard time some days?! Why did our Mission President tell us to be greatful when the mission is hard, and why do the apostles tell us to pray and be greatful for trials? Well, I came to the following conclusion. When you reach the age of about 13 or 14, you start growing like a weed (please refer to my Mother for pictures of Nathan and Tyler) and when you start growing like that, you have what are called "growing pains". These pains, often strong, are associated with the fact that you are growing, developing, and changing, and as painful as they might be, you know that they are the result of progress. This is life. We are developing, changing, progressing, and....Growing. Now, in reference to the mission, I believe that some peoples missions are harder than others, because some people need to grow more than others. I personally have a lot of room to grow because maybe I didnt grow the way, or at the pace, I should have before the mission. In life we learn to tame our physical apetites, to control our minds, and to come closer to Christ, which are all really hard...but all really good in the long run. So when you are having a tough time in your life or with the gospel, just know that these are growing pains. They are temporary, they are refining, and they are worth it. 

Haha, this always makes me laugh

This is one of the smaller spiders
we have found in our house.
Not cool.  How are you gonna
 tell me that they arent baby Tarantulas!?

This is a close up of another one we found.
 I risked life and limb to take this photo.