S.U.N.B.U.R.N.T.

Soooo Sunburned

Alright, so as always, I'm gonna go ahead and start with the questions from my father. #1) The thing im looking forward to most about General Conference, besides the fact that its like the greatest thing ever....would be my boy Jeffrey R. Holland. He ALWAYS throws down with a sick talk. And of course the planch that is of course coming from Bednar. Its all around awesome. #2) We do NOT have an oven in any of the missionary apartments...but we do have stoves....ish. We have what is not so unsimilar to a coleman grill haha 2 hot plates that you plug into the wall. its not bad most of the time....and then sometimes its awful and cant even bring water to a boil haha its the struggle #3) The farthest i have ever lived from my district leader....ummm like 25 minutes in a combi....but the zone leaders were 10 minutes away walking haha so pretty close most of the time to at least one leader. But there are some areas in the mission where you are like 30 min from the DL and like 3 hours from the ZLs. and #4) The biggest difference between being a district leader and not....id have to say just the added responsibility. Like, you have to be even more obedient cause youre an example, and if your sisters or elders have a problem they call you, and you have to give district meetings and do baptismal interviews. But apart from that its normal life haha

My Spoils.  NOM NOM NOM

IBC

       So this week was alright. It has been unbelievably hot. I know, i know, all you folks on the East Coast and Idaho and all other places unbelieveably cold are jealous....but trust me when i tell you that it has seriously sucked. Straight up. We were in a pueblo this week called Chilac and it was 105 degrees. Yes, ONE HUNDRED AND FIVE CURSED DEGREES. It was unbareable. And then today we had a zone activity and I usually dont need sunscreen....but due to the weather in Chilac and the sun today....I am sooo unbelievably sunburned. Pictures will be attatched but viewer discresion is advised. Lets see, tuesday....nothing. Wednesday....district meeting went well...and then we helped the zone leaders design a zone shirt. And after we went to help them pick out the food for the zone activity. We settled on hamburgers...BUT we were in Sams Club....and I found TREASURES OF DELICIOUSNESS, yea, even hidden treasures. Ladies and Gentlemen, we are talking of the top American Products you can find NOWHERE here. I....B....C...Cream soda. Yes. AND Black Cherry...so you know i bought that. And then i also found jelly beans and potato skins from TGI fridays. It was moneyy. Then thursday we were in Chilac, then Friday we were in Chilac again, and President came to give a talk to the youth of the ward about missions. It was awesome. Seriously it was sooo cool. Then Saturday we worked in 4 of our pueblos and helped the zone leaders with some service at a guys house, at one point we turned a cardboard tube into a bat....and a toilet floater into a ball....and i crushed it....and it landed on a metal roof about 10 houses over....we decided that it would be best to go inside after that haha Oh, and then we got to eat lunch with that sick family in our ward and they bought us pizza. Gotta love em. Then Sunday we had church services in Chilac and then that night the branch had a movie night and we watched The Testaments. I freeking love that movie. But I ALWAYS cry at the end. Its kinda obnoxious. But oh well.

       So the spiritual thought this week again comes from President. He said something that was freeking awesome and it made me think that maybe it would help people who are a little bit nervous about sharing the gospel with people. President was talking about missionary work and he said: "Before this life, we were instructed and taught about the Gospel of Jesus Christ. So when someone hears The Plan of Salvation for the first time...they are hearing it for the second time. And it only takes The Spirit to open their hearts and minds and testify of what they already knew but didnt realize." THAT BLEW MY MIND. So when we are talking with our neighbors about The Plan of Salvation or any other Gospel truth, we only need to bear our testimonies to them and in doing so, invite the spirit to enter into their hearts and help them know that they have heard this before. That this is something familiar to them, and that they know its true. Its THAT simple! But that all requires us to be engaged in a gospel centered conversation, having lived worthy of that spirit, and being willing to share our testimonies with the people around us. So take confidence. We arent starting a church, we are restoring it. We arent teaching something new, we are reinstituting lost truths. And THAT is something we can ALL do.

Love you FAM! Hope everything is going well for you guys! Enjoy March Madness!

Much Love,

Elder Josh Hamm

Oh, and in Chilac. Iguanas run wild everywhere. This one was in our
 house of prayer (that thing you have here when you don't have
 enough members for a real church building) and its totally normal.