week 12 otra vez

hello family

i miss you all. thank you for all the wonderful emails. i am so happy to hear that all is well at home. 

All is well here in Miraflores. I'm working hard and trying my best. It has been raining like crazy but no importa! The work continues. My umbrella doesn't work in the rain here; it's way too small. I need a new one, and my shoes get soaking wet the second I walk out of the house. I should've brought rainboots....and a raincoat. haha. it is fun, though. Such a classic mission experience, walking around in the rain looking for people to teach.

We had an investigator (A)in church on Sunday (!!!!) and she really enjoyed it. She said she is definitely coming back next week (for conference!) and that she is curious about going to institute! it was a good Sunday. 

Yesterday we also gave talks during sacrament meeting (me, my companion, and the two elders who are in our ward) we all talked about "la obra misional" (missionary work). I was so nervous, I had three pages of notes but only ended up reading about a page of it. I felt like while I was reading I was stumbling over my words and so half way through I just spoke from my heart and it was so much easier to speak. Everyone said that during my talk my accent was great and that it was amazing. haha. so i guess I'll trust them. For the intermediate him us missionaries sang the first verse of llamados a servir (called to serve) and then for the second and third all the return missionaries stood up and sang with us. It was cool.

I miss you all! please send me long detailed emails! oh, and packages/letters in the mail!

-Sam

heres a picture of me in our house. i just really like the outfit i wore that day haha. (I should start a missionary fashion blog because i have a picture of my outfits for almost everyday because we don't have a mirror so i just take a picture every morning to make sure i look decent haha)

My companion and Me

A picture of me awkwardly playing futbol this morning (Note: space camp shirt)

My Zone Leaders (Elder L and Elder R) and Me 

​

Week 11 (44?)

Hola Familia,

This past week went by really fast (relatively of course, because a week is a week).

My companion and I have been working hard in every way. On Monday we had a noche de hogar (family home evening) with a family in the ward. this husband is a retrun missionary and in the bishopric. he shared some mission experiences and helped us feel really encouraged to try our hardest. it was a great way to start out the week. 

On Friday we had interviews with the mission president and it was really good. I received a lot of guidance and support. I feel more confident in my ability to train, to work hard, and to be happy. Oh, also during the interview I found out that my release date in June 7, 2016 (if anyone was wondering exactly when I'll be going home. --- about 8 more months)

Weather update: It hasn't been tooo hot and it has been raining a little more than usual. :)

Spanish update: Improving. A lot of ups and a few downs. I am a lot more confident than I was two and a half months ago, though. =]

sept 14 - sept 20

this past week we worked a lot with members and tried/succeeded in finding a lot of new possible investigators. I feel good about all the effort we put into the work.

for my experience this week I want to share about a lesson we had with one investigator, A. First of all, I think it is important to say that A always reads the folletos (pamphlets?) and always has questions, which is a good sign that she will progress. So in our first lesson, we taught the Restoration and challenged her to read the Book of Mormon. Our second visit was on, I think, Thursday, and we started out by verifying that she read and prayed. We asked if she had received an answer about the Book of Mormon. In this crucial moment I was silently praying and anxious about the answer. There were a few quiet seconds and then she replied, "I do believe that there were prophets here in the Americas and that they prophesied of Jesus Christ." (AHHHHH). and then she explained that she did believe their wrote the book of Mormon and that it is true. Then during the lesson we were reading scriptures as we taught the plan of salvation and at one point we were going to read a scripture and she turned to the page and had already highlighted the verses (because she had read the pamphlet before the lesson and even looked up the scriptures!)

It was such a great moment. the spirit was so strong. I know that as a missionary, as i am obedient and Humble I will be guided and helped in knowing where to go, who to talk to, and what to say. We had walked by As house hundreds of times but one day we felt like we should knock on her door and because we followed the spirit we were able to find someone who was prepared to listen and accept the message we share. Honestly I feel humbled to know that the Lord has enough confidence in me to find those who are prepared and that we are all blessed as we follow the guidance of the spirit. 

Thank you for all the support and love! I really appreciate it!

love, Sam

I lost my Agenda so I had to make my own for a day.

I got a new bed (finally!!).

Tigre, the cat of a family in the ward.

Today watching the zone play volleyball.
​

Week 10 (Week 43?) Sept 7 - Sept 13 2015

Hola.
Como estan todos?

Esta Semana pasada fue muy interesante. trabajabamos mucho, y también descansabamos mucho. me enferme en miercoles, jueves, y viernes, entonces fue un poco dificil a trabajar con un fiebre alto. pero estoy bien ahora. Pero tuvimos la ayuda del senor bastante, porque tenemos muchas nuevas investigadores, y tambien tenemos 4 investigadores con fetcha bautismales. espero que vamos a tener muchas bautismos en el mes de octubre.

I love you all very much. I think about home and about my family all the time. This past week my companion and I worked very hard to improve our teaching and finding methods. We talked to a lot of people on the street and challenged a lot of people to be baptized. As a result, we have a lot of new investigators, future investigators, and we have four investigators with baptism dates. I hope that those who are preparing for baptism continue to feel the importance of the gospel and the church and that they are able to meet the requirements of baptism. 

This week I was sick with a fever for three days. We did everything we could to lower it, showers, sitting in front of the fan, staying hydrated, fever reducing medicine, but i was just so exhausted and feverish. We weren't able to work as hard as normal, and for one day we were in the house all day. I am now much better and able to work like normal.

weather update: hot as ever here in teguc. it rained on and off yesterday. which was really nice. i forgot to use sunscreen for about a week but i have started using it again. 

This past week we were in a lesson with an Investigator, M, teaching The Plan of Salvation. The spirit was so strong and we asked her if she had read the assignment we had left in the Book of Mormon. She said she had. Then, we asked her if she had prayed about it and she said she did. First of all, the fact that we have gotten to this point where an investigator has read and prayed without constant reminders and help is a blessing on its own. She said that she didn't think she received an answer so we asked her how she expects to receive her answer. She told us that she wasn't quite she but that she expected it in the form of a dream. We taught her about the the holy ghost speaks to us and that there are many different ways we can feel an answer, but for most people it is through feels of peace, warmth, happiness, etc. She said that now that she knows what to look for in an answer she will pray again. She then asked us how WE had come to realized the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. So my companion and I both shared our stories of reading and praying about the Book of Mormon. I don't know how to explain how we felt in this lesson. I truly know and have a testimony of teaching by the spirit. I was able to understand and ask inspired questions that were able to help M think about the importance of prayer, the book of Mormon, and the plan of salvation and how each were relevant to her own life. I know that I cannot do this work without faith or without the help of the lord. I know that as I teach by the spirit the words I need to say are not entirely my own, that I am being guided and helped in order to help others who are truly trying to become closer to heavenly father. I also know that in order to receive this help I need to be faithful and obedient.

Thanks for the constant support as I am here serving in Honduras. I really do appreciate it!

Love you, 

Sam

Favorite scripture of the week: 2 Nefi 25:26

TURTLE

This picture was taken when I had a fever of 38.5 C and was sitting in our apartment trying not to be miserable.

The only picture I took today. This morning watching the others play basketball.
​

Semana 9 (Otra Vez) / Semana 42?)

This past week was very interesting. A lot of normal missionary stuff happened and a few un-normal stuff happened too.

On tuesday morning around 2AM I woke up with a sharp pain in my right knee. I couldn't move my leg at all because of the pain. The pain didn't go away all morning and we left to work as normal but I only made it to lunch before I had to call the mission nurse. I spent most the the day in the house resting. Two days later we went to the doctor and she said I have tendonitis. So right now I am taking medicine for it and it it still hurts by this saturday I will have to go back to the doctor. 

So for the rest of the past week we have been trying to do work close together (appointments closer together) so that I don't have to walk as far or as fast. It has been pretty good but a few days were a little bit hard.

Spanish update: good. slowly but surely I am still progressing. I understand more every day and am able to say a little bit more every day as well. 

Weather update: hot. it rained a few days ago and my companion and I didn't have umbrellas or anything. one member made us ponchos out of garbage bags so we wouldn't get too wet. haha. 

We are still working hard and teaching and finding. my quest to become more humble continues. Although, it has slowed down a little bit. this is because as a mission, we are studying about ten topics in the guia para el estudio de las escrituras, which doesn't exist in the english book of mormon. We are studying a lot about family history and how to teach everyone about the gospel through talking about family history. it it really great and my testimony is growing a lot as i study the assigned topics. 

One experience from this week: We were having a small lesson with a member after we ate lunch at her house. My companion and I hadn't planned the lesson so we weren't sure what direction it would go in. After the prayer and introduction and all, I decided to ask the sister to recount a spiritual experience she'd had in her week. Her eyes lit up and she told us that since she had been praying for a few days that someone would come to her house and ask her about a spiritual experience she had had that past week. She said she wasn't sure who would come and answer her prayer but that she really needed someone to talk to.  She told us of her experience and about how her testimony in family history and temple work had grown. To me, my testimony of following the promptings of the spirit grew. I wasn't sure what I was going to say when we started the lesson. But because I followed the spirit, I was able to ask an inspired question. A question that this sister had been waiting for. I know that as I continue to have faith and as I am obedient and strong, I will always receive the help I need in order to help others. 

i love you all. 

write me letters. write me emails. all the time please. 

love, sam

(the night we walked around in trash bags because of the rain)

Watching the zone play soccer all morning  (I wrote you all letters so expect those in about a month)

(One hermana has this tiny little book of mormon and i would really love it if someone could buy me one and send it to me. i think they sell them on the lds store website)

we all ate pizza for lunch. i honestly dont know how much more little ceasers pizza i can eat.

Listening to one of our zone leaders tell jokes as we eat.

emailing!
​

week 8 otra vez

eight weeks wow

this past week was a very normal week. no exciting conferences or trips. we worked hard and have new investigators. i feel good about the work we did. 

One experience from this week:

We were walking down the street just trying to talk to people on the street because one of our appointments fell through. so i thought we should try a house that we'd already visited in the past with my former companion. so we walk over and there is someone sitting outside. two people actually. we introduce ourselves as misionaries and explain a little bit about what we would like to share with them. one of the women doesnt want anything to do with us and leaves the yard and drives away. we had been standing outside on the sidewalk outside of the gated yard but then the ramaining girl invites us in and we taught a whole lesson and the spirit was strong. \she invited us back to her house for two days later. so two days later we return and we teach all of the restoration. what was really great was that she read all of the folleto we had left with her and had questions about prophets, authority of priesthood, joseph smith, and the book of mormong. it was so inspiring to find someone who really was ready to accept our invitation to learn more and even accept the invitation to be baptized. she has a bptism date and we are working hard to help her feel ready for that date. the whole experience really strengthened my testimony of the importance of finding and teaching by the spirit. i know that as i am obedient i will recieve the help i need in order to find those read to be taught. 

honduras is hot as ever and im trying to be grateful for the weather even when it feels so hot i cant walk anymore. i was a bit deydrated this week so i have been trying to drink more water. i dont want a repeat of what happened last summer when i couldnt get out of bed for a whole week because of extreme dehydration.

i am happy to be here and to be working hard in la obra misional. right now my biggest challenge is being a good trainer and helping my companion understand the way the mission work and how to teach and plan. i think im doing a decent job at that. 

spanish update: someone comented today that i dont have an accent. HA. its a nice complement but i don't believe it. i';ve been working hard on improving my accent to not sound so gringa. Slowly I think it's improving; still struggling a lot though. But I study every day so don't worry. I think I have what you'd call a conversational vocabulary, which is good enough but I would like to improve to master the big grammatical stuff. [post-mission comment: I remember that around this same time I started getting a lot of random complements about my accent and my grammar, and I got super self-conscious and started to be very self critical and didn't want to admit I was actually nearly-fluent]

i love you all

love, sam

this morning watching the zone play dodgeball. im still dehydrated and didnt want to over exhert myself.

a view of tegucigalpa from a hill near our house

 

hna p. and me (you can see the top of the church building in the background between our heads)

i honestly dont know how to flip this around. but the street we live on.
​

week 7 otra vez (CAMBIOS)

Hello!

This has been a very busy week. A lot has happened. We had changes on wednesday and Hna C. finished her mission and went home, and I got a new companion. I am now training. My companion is new to the mission and just got here from the Guatemala CCM. 

Training is so much more challenging that I every thought. It always looks so easy when other people are training. I have, now, so much respect for my old trainer Hna. S. Not only did she teach me how to be a missionary and how Honduras funcions, but she also taught me spanish in 12 weeks. My companion is from Honduras and I will be training her until she leaves from Mexico. She's staring her mission here until her Visa gets all sorted. She is very motivated and excited to work. I am trying to train her as best I can so that she can develop good skills right now. 

I am so grateful that I have recieved the opportunity to be a trainer because it means that the mission president, and the lord, trust me to be a leader and to be a good example. I know it will be a challege for me, but i also know that the lord will provide a way. (1 nephi 3:7)

I have officially completed 9 months in the mission field which means i have nine more. I am so grateful to have had the opportunity to serve the lord and to help spread the gospel. i am also greateful to have been able to return to finish serving and to have been able to return to the same mission where i started.

on saturday we had a missionary conference (all the honduras, tegucigalpa missionaries and all the honduras, comayaguala missionaries, and broadcasted for internet to all the central american missions) with elder russell m nelson of the quorum of the 12 apostles. i am so grateful to have had this opportunity. i learned so much about the expectations the lord has for me as a missionary and as a daughter of god. we learned so much about how important it is to testify of the plan of salvation and to take our investigators to see the temple in person. i really do think that his words will change the way we teach here in honduras. 

i love you all and hope that you have a great week. 

please email me and send me letters in the mail. if you dont know the address, ask my mom she should know.

love,

sam

the last picture with hna c. before changes

my former companion, also hna c. went home as well. she served her whole mission without being send to the south. que buena suerte.

my new companion! hna. p.

in our area of miraflores. i was thinking the other day about how i wanted to serve in a big city before i got my calling (thinking of tokyo, paris, new york) and here i am in a giant city. not quite what i had expected but its still the greatest.
​

Week 6 (Otra Vez)

Hello!

This week was good. Another full week of hard work and baleadas. 

Nothing super exciting happened this week. It was pretty ordinary. We taught and walked around and had meetings. 

There was one lesson that sticks out in my mind. We were teaching an investigator more about Jesus Christ and the atonement. And he brought up a video we had watched in church last Sunday about the Plan of Salvation. He talked about how he knows it is important to accept the Gospel in this life and to always perseverar hasta el fin. He said that he knows there are people waiting in the spirit world for their families to accept the gospel, be baptized, and do their family history work and go to the temple for them. The spirit was so strong. I really do hope that we can continue to help him prepare to be baptized and that he will find the strength to do all he needs to do in order to be baptized. 

This upcoming wednesday we have cambios. My companion has over 18 months in the mission, so she is going home. She is really happy to be going home to her family. I can't wait for that day to come as well (but for now I am enjoying missionary life). I am nervous to get a new companion and be the one to know our area because I am still getting to knoww the members and the location of house and all. I hope we don't get lost too much haha. I hope I get a companion who loves to work hard. I know that working hard and occupying my time with missionary work will help me be the best missionary I can be. 

This past week it was cloudy almost everyday! The weather was great. I can only hope it will be like that again this week. Pero, no creo porque hace calor y sol ahorita. =/

My journey of becoming more humble is coming along. I have discovered that humility is related to so many more aspects and that to be completely humble is hard. It involves being obedient, selfless, charitable, and so many more christlike aspects. Every night before bed I come up with one goal for the next day that will help me be a little more christlike and it has been really helpful. One of my favorite goals this past week was to "Smile all day" So the next day I smiled and greeted everyone on the streets and not only did I feel happier and stronger about missionary work, but my relationship with my companion, with members, and with investigators improved as well. It's a fun and helpful project, to make daily goals to be more Christlike (you should try it too!).

I love you all! Please watch a good movie for me! haha. 

love, sam

​We had a waterballoon fight today as a zone and I got soaked.

with one of my Zone leaders, Elder L.

I've used three cans of OFF all on my own since getting here six weeks ago.

Week 5 (Otra Vez)

Hola Familia!

How has your week been?! My week was pretty good. The Sun was SO STRONG this past week. I felt like most of the days it was so strong that it felt like i was being pricked by needles. (You'd be proud, Mom, I've been diligent about sunscreen)

This past Saturday I completed ONE MONTH of being back here in Honduras. Time is going by so quickly but slowly at the same time. I can't explain it haha. 

One of the things (other than spanish) that I struggle with here in the mission is talking to people on the street. I can talk to people just fine in lessons in their homes, and usually don't struggle with words or with feeling embarrassed about my language skills. But with talking to strangers on the street I do have a little bit of pena and my companion usually is the one to approach people. Anyway, yesterday estabamos abriendo la boca in la calle and we were walking down a street in our area and my companion was walking forward but I felt like I was being pushed/led to the side to a house. So i walked to the front gate of the house and I saw a woman sitting in the shade. I started talking to her and waved my companion over. My companion knows I struggle with talking to people in the street so I knew she was going to just let me talk. So i started talking to the lady about her religious background all. and then instead of just introducing her to the gospel and inviting her to church I started to teach a full lesson. Since we were just standing in front of her house I kept it short but I taught all of the Gospel of Jesus Christ in about five minutes, invited her to Church, to pray about the Priesthood, and invited her to be baptized. I didn't worry at all about the words I needed to say because somehow they just all came out naturally and it was amazing. We made an appointment to teach the hermana again later this week and I hope that she can progress and be receptive. It truely was a great spiritual moment and it has inspired me to follow the promptings of the spirit more often and to be not afraid of talking to people in the streets.

Spanish Update: A few people this week have mentioned how much my spanish has improved already and about how I am starting to open up more. I think they're both related. that I feel a little bit more comfortable talking because my spanish is getting better. I am trying hard to learn from what I hear and also to practice diligently every morning before we leave the house. 

Later this month, on the 22nd, our mission has the great opportunity to have conference with member of the 12 Apostles (we don't know who yet). I am really excited. Especially since this will be the 3rd time I've had the opportunity to hear a talk by an apostle in the past two years. I hope that I can find inspiration in the talk that will be given and that 

it will help me in my journey to be more humble as a missionary.

I love you all and hope that you're having a great week!

please send me letters/packages!

love, Sam

=]

my companion and me

we had baleadas for lunch and i ate half before remembering to take a picture. feat. coke.
​

​

More pictures from Week 4 P-Day

=]

shopping

i should've bought this headband =[
​

Semana 4 (Otra Vez)

Hola todos!

This week was really good. I feel like it was a little bit longer than the other weeks for some reason. But that is probably because it was fullll of stuff.

This past week we had divisions and I stayed in my area with the sister training leader Hna M. She was great and actually taught me a lot. Including a detailed descriptive lesson on the difference between the two different past tenses used in spanish. 

We also had Zone Conference with all the zones here in the city. It was great to hear encouraging words from Presidente Bowler. I learned a lot about obedience, which was great because obedience is one of the things I realized is important in humility. I also learned a lot about teaching by the spirit, especially in asking inspired questions. This is something I need some practice with. I hope that I can become great at teaching by the spirit. I know that the more humble I am the more I will be guided and helped while teaching. 

We talked to a lot of people on the streets with week and had the help of a few ward missionaries. It was nice to go out and work with people from the ward. 

We are working a lot with members here which is supposed to encourage them to take part in missionary work and give us people to contact. This helps us a lot with teaching more than finding. I hope that we can help members feel the spirit during our lessons with them and that they have more of a desire to do their part en la obra misional. 

Honduras is a hot as ever. I'm happy that this summer I am not in the south. what a blessing. haha. 

Spanish update: it's coming along. I'm praying a lot for the gift of tongues. Sometimes I feel like the words just come easily even when I don't understand how I'm saying them and I know that's a real blessing. But other times I'm stumbling all over trying to form my thoughts into words. 

Today (p-day) with our zone, we visited a town called Valle de Angeles and went hiking to a waterfall. It was really fun and reminded me of all those hikes we would go on in hawaii. Then we looked around the town in a few shops. It's a really big tourist destination apparently. I saw a few americans. o=

I hope everyone is having a great summmer!

Love, Sam

​