Week 3 (Otra Vez)

Hello!

This past week went by so fast! I hope that all the weeks go by as fast as this one.

Andrea, our investigator was baptized on saturday. We have been teaching her ever since I arrived in the mission (she had one lesson before I came to this area). She has been the perfect investigator, always reading, asking questions, and praying. We had a lesson with a member present and he testified about the Gospel of Jesus Christ and the spirit was so strong that she started to cry and told us that she was ready to be baptized. She already had a baptism date but it was a very spiritual experience for us all. I am so happy that I was able to be part of her journey.

I'm starting my fourth week this week and I hope that I can continue to grow and progress as a missionary. I feel like I am learning a lot about what it means to be the best missionary I can. This week I realized that a part of that means being more humble. As I humble myself I will be able to love others more and be more receptive to the feelings and needs of those we are teaching. 

My Spanish is progressing little by little. I think it definitely helps that I am with a companion who does not speak English. Which means I am constantly improving my grammar in every way from the moment I wake up to the moment I go to bed. No dreams in Spanish yet, though. I feel like I'm in a transition period where I am stumbling with Espanol but also feels weird to speak in English. 

I am looking forward to receiving mail from all of you soon (haha)!

Love, Sam

Week 29 (July 21th- July 27th)

Week 23 in Honduras

Hello!

For P-Day on monday we went and played Futbol with our zone in Choluteca at the stake center and it was really fun. It can be kind of frustrating playing with all the Elders because they are SO competitive (even though as missionaries, we aren't supposed to play competitively or keep score), but a few Elders and my companion, me, and two other hermanas from our zone played a side game that was much more relaxed and it was really fun! After we were all done, we realized the power was out and someone had closed the gate (which is electric to open if you don't have the key) and no we did not have the key so we were trapped inside! So we climbed the wall! haha

We also had divisions this week. I went to the other area in Yusguare with the sister trainer and one of the hermanas from that area. it was great to experience a new area and new people. and I had a lot of fun. divisions is something that I actually really enjoy. Their area is pretty similar to our area but it gave me an opportunity to get to know the members from the ward who live over there since we never go over there. Since their area is part of the same ward as ours, I knew pretty much all the members who we stopped by. That evening we had a Noche de Hogar at a member family's house and watched the Story of John Tanner movie and everyone there seemed to really love it. 

This week we had one baptism! The baptism was for our investigator, Marbin (pronounced like 'Marvin'. Marbin's wife is a member and all of her family are members and he has met with many many many missionaries in the past, but finally felt like he was ready to be baptized! And he really had a desire. 

The day of the baptism there was no power and when we did finally have power we filled up the font as much as we could but it wasn't very much water at all... just to about the knees. and Marbin is really tall so we didn't know what we were going to do. about 30 minutes before the baptism everyone started showing up and we were just like, "uhhhh theres pretty much no water" (and the water pump wasn't working again). So Marbin, the bishop, and Alan (his brother in law) started filling up the font bucket by bucket from an unknown water source (I think there is a well or something inside the shed they have at the back of the church haha). It was really amazing to see Marbin filling up the font for his own baptism, and you could truly tell that he wanted the baptism to happen and was making sure it would happen. it was great. 

The baptism was amazing and the spirit was so strong. All of Marbin's wife's family was there and he was baptized by the Bishop and he has such a strong support system in the church already. I know that his testimony and his faith is only going to grow in the future. 

And today... we are writing from the house of the Bishop. She wrote first (and I read Jesus the Christ) and then I wrote for about 5 minutes and then the power went out! we waited an hour and then went home. and right as we walked into our door, the power came back. haha. So we walked back to the Bishop's house so I can finish writing!

Anyway, miss you guys so much!

climbing the wall, the coolest tie, making baleadas during divisions, and me

Marbin and his family and us

The power went out again that night

k00l

Week 28 in Honduras (July 14th- July 20th)

Week 22 in Honduras

Hello!

This past week was super busy... lots and lots of traveling! 

On last monday I spent my P-Day traveling to and from Tegucigalpa, where i submitted my esidency information. Hna Alvarado (another hmn from our zone who came at the same time as I did) and I traveled together and spent the entire day sitting in the immigration office. but it was exciting. (But I think I posted about that last week!)

On tuesday my companion and I worked hard and taught a lot of our investigators and it was a very nice normal day. Sometimes I love normal days. 

On wednesday our new mission president, Presidente Bowler and his wife, Hna. Bowler, visited our zone and we had get-to-know-you interviews with each of them. They are from Colorado and are super nice and have the strongest testimonies ever. 

On thursday we went to the temple! it was super great and fun. We left at 3 am and got back to our our zone at like 9:30pm. But it was fun. I am glad I had motion sick medicine this time. 

Friday was a normal day and we got a lot of work done and met with a lot of people and got ready for Ana's baptism!

On sadurday Ana was baptized! The baptism was amazing. We spent all morning filling the pila bautismal because there were technical problems and water problems but things worked out great in the end. The spirit was so strong and Ana's mom and dad were there and it was great. 

Sunday was great too. We had three investigators at church and Ana was confirmed! Marbin showed up two minutes before the sacrament which was so lucky and such a blessing because if he didn't arrive for the sacrament he was going to have to push back his baptism by two weeks. But he was there and he is going to be baptized this upcoming saturday! There was no power all day and we forgot to buy food for dinner, but one member ended up inviting us to eat dinner at her house and it was another blessing! 

so over all the week was great and i had a lot of good things happen. 

love you! 

-sam

Starting our journey to the temple in the madrugada

Almost Sunrise

My Companion and Me

Tegucigalpa Honduras Temple

Me, Ana, Ana's Mom, and My Companion

Ana and Me!

Week 24 (June 16-22, 2014)

Week 18 in Honduras

This week was full of walking back and forth all over town.
I have two fun stories of things I really enjoyed this week.

First: we went to contact someone who went to church with a family member last Sunday. She was visiting her grandma who lives really far away but still in our area and so we went to go find them and we had never been to that part of our area before, it took about 30 minutes by bus so we had our lesson with them and were there for a long time because there was this really old man there who just wanted us to convince us that we needed to force his granddaughter to get baptized. The granddaughter liked our message but said she really did not want to get baptized. After about one and a half hours we left. We wait for a bus we saw a wooden bridge that was really high above river/rocks, the bus never came so we walked like two hours back to town. Without water. So that was interesting.

Second: yesterday the power went out at 8AM, we needed the power at the church so we could get water in to the building because we had a baptism scheduled for 4 pm. We couldn’t fill the font because there was no water. Everyone around town was telling us the power was going to come back at a certain time, each person we talked with said something different.

We needed to have the baptisms that day because it had been really hard to get permission from parents and to find a time where the parents would not be working and would actually be willing to see the baptism, also because Nicol and Noe did not want to reschedule for another day. We were trying to figure out what to do the whole time during church. in the end we were either going to have their baptism in a river (10 minutes away) or wait around and hope the water came before too late. If we had it at the river the parents would not be willing to go so we decided to wait. So we waited. And finally it came on at 6 pm but the faucet was not working. We filled the baptismal font up bucket by bucket.

And then it started to storm very hard. We needed to pick people up for the baptism and it was dark and raining. So we ran all the way across town trying to find at least two witnesses for the baptism. We ran from house to house to house of members in our neighborhood but everyone said no except the bishop so we just hoped someone else would show up. So we ran some more to pick up the people who were giving the talks, and then to pick up the families. Everyone was soaking wet by the time we got to the church which was around 8 pm. Right after we showed up, the other Hermanas from our zone showed up with a, investigating, family and so we had enough people to have the baptism, witnesses, and confirmations. The baptism was amazing.

Nicol and Noe were baptized and Nicol's grandma was there. Alex, who was baptized in March, gave a talk about baptism and Estiven a kid from an inactive family who is friends with Nicol and Noe gave a talk on el Espiritu Santo. Even though they are both kids, the talks were amazing and their testimonies were powerful. Then my companion sang “Hazme andar en la luz” (Teach me to walk in the light) for Noe and Nicol. Half way through the song nicol, just sitting in her chair looking at her feet, started to sing along with Hermana Saldate. It was so cute. The spirit was so strong during the baptism, Nicol and Noe weren't discouraged that the rest of their families or friends couldn’t make it. The power was flickering and there was a huge storm outside with HUGE loud thunder but everyone was just glad to be there.

Those are the two big stories that happened this week. There were a lot more but I have no time to write them all.
I hope you guys all had a great week too!

Love, Sam
sent june 23

Adventure to el corpus

Baptism of Lizzie:

Baptism of Nicol y Noe:

Week 17 (May 5, 2014)

Week 11 in Honduras

Hola!

On Monday, before we returned from Tegucigalpa, we helped out at one of the ward buildings. American dentists were there to do dental work for future missionaries around this area of the country! and since we were already there and just waiting around (our ward was there getting work done and they were our ride home) we helped translate. Translating from Spanish to English was easier for me than translating from English to Spanish, it was great practice though. Of all the doctors, doctor AJ really helped me a lot by having me translate for him...even though he already knew how to speak Spanish. Dr AJ I was a new missionary and wanted to help me out by throwing me in the deep end haha. Also, he loves Hawaii and wanted to talk about Hawaii the whole time ha-ha.

The rest of the week, we focused our teachings on temples! Because as a zone, we took all of our investigators to visit the temple! we had activities and lessons prepared for our trip to help them feel the spirit and learn more about the temples and about the gospel. The trip was great, and a success for all the people who went. Our zone had three yellow school busses, full of people! At the temple we had four lessons and rotated in groups around the four sides of the temple for each lesson. Our Mission President, President Hernandez, came and gave a talk and helped motivate all the people who were there.  Overall, I really enjoyed the trip and I know our investigators could feel the strong Spirit and love de nuestro padre celestial on the temple grounds. 5/2

The next day, Saturday 5/3, one of our investigators, Luis, called us early in the morning and said that he wanted to get baptized on Sunday after church. We have been teaching Luis for a long time trying to prepare him to be baptized. He has had a lot of challenges in life and changing his lifestyle has been a long journey for him. But I know he has a strong Spirit and a testimony of the Gospel. We were so happy that he finally felt ready and willing to be baptized. The Baptism went really great! We had it after church yesterday. I gave a talk about the Holy Ghost. I wrote it all out but I didn’t even end up looking at it while giving my talk. Cool. After he was baptized, Luis looked so happy walking out of the water. He bore his testimony afterward and everyone could feel how genuine his testimony was. I am grateful to have had the opportunity to help him progress and learn about the gospel of Jesus Christ. This week was really good.

It rained for the first time on Tuesday! and almost every day afterward. The night we got back from the temple it was raining so hard while we were walking to drop people off at their houses and to our house, by the time we got home we were soaked. Even though it was storming it was hotter than ever. Haha.

I love you guys, and I think of you always! Thanks for always being so supportive and loving!

Love, Sam

Temple with Investigators:

Luis' Baptism:

Haircut this morning:

so ready for this

oops

realizing i made a horrible mistake

I GOT MAIL:

the happiest sam in all the land

Week 12 (March 31, 2014)

Week 6 in Honduras

Transfers are this week, but my companion and I did not get a call or were not told about changes, looks like we are together again for another six weeks! I expected it since I am still in training.

This week was good and full. We had citas every day which was crazy. the funny thing is that some people are very particular and wait for us to get there and some people don’t remember at all, and some people make up a time different than what we said ha-ha. It’s all good.

Fun things that happened:
-we taught a lesson on the steps of the catholic church in our town
-we ate a giant lizard. It tasted like a mix between chicken and fish; it was slimy and was cooked, of course.
-I think I reached my breaking point and don’t know if I can eat anymore bananas. Especially fried bananas, they are eaten at every meal here. Ha-ha.

On Saturday Christian, the son of a less active member of the ward, was baptized. We have been teaching him the gospel for a few weeks and he is so adorable. He is 11 and is always enthusiastic about learning and always has his own input during our lessons. The spirit was so strong during his baptism and it was really great. Afterward, he bore his testimony. It was so sincere and so special and you can really tell he got baptized for his own reasons and not his parents. He has a strong testimony of heavenly father, Jesus Christ, and the importance of living the gospel. It was really great.

There are so many stories and stuff that happens every week but it is so hard to remember when I am here writing. Ha-ha, trust me, fun stuff happened, hard stuff happened, and there were a lot of serious moments.

I am so grateful that I grew up in the U.S. and for my family. I am so grateful for the experiences and privileges I have had. I am Grateful that I can experience the lifestyle and culture here in Honduras. It is a great experience to be able to teach others about the gospel of Jesus Christ and to just be there for them when they need us is something so special and so unique. I am learning to love it more and more each day.

Have a good week!
Sam

Christian and his uncle Ronny

Christian's sister and their cousin

Week 8 (March 3, 2014)

(2nd Week in Honduras)

This week has been so busy! My companion, Hermana Saldate, is so nice and her Spanish is amazing she is really helpful and patient, which is good because I ALWAYS need help. Siempre. Pero, I think that everything is good. Everyone says that their first few months were rough with the language so I am not too discouraged. Our days are long and we do so much but the time passes very quickly.

It’s hard to find people who agree to come to church because they work on Sunday! We have visited one family two times this week who say they aren’t interested in going to church with us because they belong to a different church. In Kansas City! But they agree to listen to us talk...so we have been teaching them ha-ha. They seem to enjoy listening to our messages. This is really good! They speak English and the daughter, Jennifer grew up in Kansas City so she is fluent in English. It’s nice to be able to bear my testimony in English ha-ha.

I am so happy that you guys have gotten my mail! It’s harder to send mail from here so I don’t know when I will get to send another letter, maybe later this week or next.

Things here, in Honduras, are so different than home but one thing that is the same is the church. And that is truly a comfort. It is nice to be sitting in church and be doing all the same things and learning the same things and singing the same songs. Even though I may not know the lyrics in Spanish, hearing the familiar tune is comforting.

We finally got a fan and a microwave and a new stove and some dishes for our house! This is exciting because now we can eat foods that can be microwaved and not just beans and eggs ha-ha.

This past Thursday we had zone conference with all the zones here in the south and it was very fun. The mission president came and we met for pretty much the whole day. It was super nice. There were a lot of talks and helpful lessons. And the chapel we were in had AIR CONDITIONING; me gusta. Also I got to see Hermana Young!!!!! She is serving in a different zone here in the south about 40 minutes away. It was so nice to see her and talk to her even though it had only been a week since we saw each other ha-ha.

I love you guys so much and I am so grateful to have family and friends who are so supportive of me and I am so happy to be here in Honduras, even when I feel tired and hot. Ha-ha.

I love you!

me and my companion!