August 16, 2010

August 16, 2010

Hola familia, ojala que todo esté bien con uds. (Hopefully everything is good with you all) That’s good that you received the letters I sent, I never know if they are actually going to make it haha. Hopefully you all are enjoying your vacation as well. I figured that since my family is on vacation, I should take a break as well so this week I’m going down to Cancun... Ok maybe not haha. This week has been good for us here in Guanajuato. We found quite a few people who are really cool. One family we found lives in some really, really humble conditions, but they are ready to receive the gospel. They literally live on top of a mountain in a house made out of 4 4X4´s some 1X4's and a couple of tarps. I took some pictures but I forgot to bring my camera today so hopefully ill get them sent off next week. But this family is really receptive and is really grateful for us as well. They didn’t go to church this week because the dad had to work and I think the mom was a little bit scared to go to church without him. They said they would plan to come for sure this next Sunday though. As well, we found another really cool couple. They have had quite a few troubles in their lives and seem like they really want to change. We found them on Thursday and haven’t had time to teach them everything as we found out on Sunday when he came to church with a pretty strong hangover. Apparently it was the first time he had drunken in about 7 years but he was definitely regretting it. It’s amazing to see how the gospel works on people. A brother who was baptized about 3 months ago talked with the investigator and helped him out, because this recent convert had the same problem and was able to relate to his situation. The gospel really is a one glove fits all solution to problems. No matter what someone’s problems are, the atonement and the gospel will either resolve the problems or provide a way for the problem to be endured. I have been using a scripture Lance sent me quite a bit this week. It is in Mosiah 2:41 and basically says that if we keep the commandments, God will bless us in both temporal and spiritual things. Also, I’m pretty happy because I just talked to one of the Elders in my last area, Silao, and I guess 4 of the people we found got baptized. So that’s always good to hear that the people I taught are still progressing in the gospel. One random thing I was thinking about today was something that I find weird in Mexico. When someone wants to say "watch out" they say "aguas" which translated in English, means waters. I remember how confused I was when I first arrived and was crossing the street or something and a car was coming, the people would say aguas and I had no idea why people were saying waters. The other thing about Spanish, at least here in Mexico, is almost every word has another meaning that usually is not appropriate. So that’s always fun as well to try and figure out what people mean sometimes. Well, my real scripture for the week is in 1 Nephi 2:4. (And it came to pass that he departed into the wilderness. And he left his house, and the land of his inheritance, and his gold, and his silver, and his precious things, and took nothing with him, save it were his family, and provisions, and tents, and departed into the wilderness). The mission president challenged the whole mission to re-read the book of Mormon by December so I started over and as I read this verse which talks about how Lehi left Jerusalem and left everything with his family and the only thing he took, was his family. I was thinking that this scripture can be applied to us in our day as well. When it is all said and done, the only thing we can take with us when we die and leave our Jerusalem with all our precious things and go to our "promised land" a.k.a. heaven, we can only take with us our family. This is why the most important thing we can do is strengthen our ties with our family. But yeah that’s my thought for the week; hopefully it’s nice and sunny in Oregon.

Love you all!!!

Elder Price

P.S. after almost 6 months, the church is still true!! haha