Things I've learned

OK, so I told you how my comp took off to see his dad. It was pretty bad. He found him in a coma state and couldn't even recognize him. They then spent the next two days running errands and trying to figure out what to do. The dad is in a very expensive hospital where their small insurance isn't covering them. They wanted to move him but in the current state impossible. In a couple days they will check him out and try to move him somewhere that there is a specialist to start therapy. Apparently it was bad... they have seen much improvement since my comp gave him a priesthood blessing. Last night they said he was trying to move and wake up. I was just following around other companionships for three days and feeling useless. (We couldn't hardly do anything in our area) and Mendoza came back Thursday night. He is doing fine. He’s strong and not really shaken up. He’s more worried about what happens next and fixing the things he can and not so much about the things that can’t be fixed.

A number of things were learned here 1) don't drive fast, it ain't worth it. If your gonna be late somewhere, wake up earlier. 2) This one I realized on Saturday during a lesson with a young brilliant couple. They need to get married to be baptized and be able to progress in this life but want a nice cushion of one year... we read the wonderful chapter of Alma 34 together. After finishing reading we usually start analyzing and sharing key point in the chapter, usually about what we want to get our point across. My comp started talking about the verses 31-36. He then told his conversion story. Him, his mom and his siblings accepted the church when the missionaries came but his dad didn’t. Shortly after his dad made some bad decisions and his parents separated. When he came to the mission his dad didn’t want him to but finally accepted it and took him to the MTC. About a year ago, he (my comp, Elder Mendoza) had the opportunity to see his whole family cuz he baptized his little sister when she turned 8. At that time his dad expressed a bit of interest in learning more but just said "when you get back I think things will start changing" well that opportunity to "change things" has been drastically prolonged if not eliminated. If the dad had known he was going to get in such a dramatic accident perhaps he would have started that change a little earlier and not waited until as Amulek puts it "its too late" the good thing is he is still here with us and perhaps will have that second chance for change. But none of us knows if we have tomorrow to change the day of our preparation and salvation is today. Now I know we all need to change and we all need to improve, but with frequency my heart is pricked by those of my own family or those close to me that have strayed from the path, that are living in darkness, living on daily pleasures. There may be justification or excuses but if you do not fix what you are doing and who you are being today, perhaps you will NEVER have that opportunity. I pray that you receive this letter and this story and that you receive my exhortation to change now. Don’t think that there is no way, that is a lie from the devil, there always is a way. Do not procrastinate the day of your repentance, because it may not come. Please I plea with you examine your life, find those things that you need to leave behind, don’t justify your actions, don’t look for excuses, and have the courage to do it. Sure change can hurt. Just like a lifesaving surgery may leave a scar. But if you don’t do it today, you wont be able tomorrow. I speak with that courage because I know the need of doing the necessary today, I speak with the authority of a representative of Jesus Christ, and with that same authority I promise you the peace, comfort, forgiveness, and divine love you will receive as you try and do what He would have you do. God will prepare the way, He always has.

Changes have come and I am leaving Molinito and returning to the zone of Linda Vista where I was born. It’s kind of ironic that I will "die" very close to the area where I was "born." I will be with Elder Cardenas, who I already know pretty good. I’m still gonna be zone leader, going on more than 10 months in that position which sometimes can be quite stressful but rewarding at the same time. Its crazy to me how quick time is flying by, I only have 12 weeks left, in fact I believe they will be giving us our flight plans next week... I hope in this last stretch I can continue giving it my all and continue being "an instrument in His hands" which has been my desire since the beginning. It is incredible letting go of personal interests and selfishness and just letting Him do what needs to be done. Wow, things happen you never think could.

I think I’ve babbled enough; yesterday I got pretty sick and was suffering. I feel a lot better today but still have a slight temperature. Pray so that my weak body can last 3 more months pls.

Love you all and you are in my prayers constantly.

-ELDER SOLOMON

P.S. CHANGE=REPENT

peronal revelations

Ok, well it’s nearly 7:30 pm of a pretty crazy day; we had a zone activity starting at 9 am with our district meetings and then cooked up some burgers and played some football and soccer. That was pretty fun except my shins are hurting from these wanna be professionals here who go all out and hit me in the leg instead of the ball… We played tackle football on a tiny patch of grass just big enough for 4 on 4 with 4 downs. Good thing we are all out of shape and softies, No one got hurt, just some strawberries. Well, during this all at about 10 the mission president called me and wanted to talk to my comp. They talked for about 5 minutes and then my comp gave me the phone. The president told me that my comp’s dad had got in a serious accident and was hospitalized in Queretaro, a nearby state, and was in really bad condition and that I would need to support my comp a lot during this time. It was quite a shock. While we were playing he went with another elder to a nearby member’s house and called his mom. Apparently his dad has about a day to live and if he lives he will be in really bad shape. Tough stuff. As I was cleaning up the huge hamburger mess he told me he might go to the hospital, (in a different mission) to make a long story short I put him on a bus headed towards his house (about an hour from here) and I’m with another companionship. I dropped of the clothes with one sister so she can wash them and here I am!

Who knows what happens. He’s supposed to return tomorrow afternoon but well see.

This last week I had a few “personal revelations” to call them that way. They were more of the type of revelations the Brother of Jared received when he forgot to pray and the Lord chewed him out for 3 hours. It wasn’t so long and intense but the same kind of deal. Lately we have been a bit down, me and my comp, not having the spirit as I have enjoyed during the majority of my mission. I was pretty sure that it had something to do with me. (I’m starting to find out other stuff about the person I teach with, but they can’t be said here, its just he needs a one on one) but we were walking along and I realized that I have been doing things “my” way. The way I normally do things here in the mission, they've worked before, I realized that my prayers had become monotonous and I wasn’t really asking Him for help, nor for his advice since we had stopped planning to a certain degree. I realized we had to include the Lord much more than we had been doing and let the Holy Ghost be the senior companion as it should be. Well, we planned really well that night and did some repenting. But the next day I didn’t feel much better to tell the truth. Until the night we were walking again and I realized I had been heading downhill ever since New Years. I had my goal to read the Bom before the end of the year which I did but hadn’t started again, I figured I could dive in a little more with the Bible and stuff like that, but in that night I realized the importance of reading the Book of Mormon in my personal life and confirmed the fact that I have to always be praying and reading the Book of Mormon in order to be ok. These last few days that I have done it have been sweet and I feel much better.

Ok, well hopefully we can have a good week and recuperate a bit from the last 2 weeks that have been down in the dumps as far as numbers go. I’m excited and ready to roll. It may be my last week here in this area so I’ve got to give it all and leave it ready for the next one who comes.

I love you all, study and pray hard, and be good.

-ELDER SOLOMON

Buckets

view from my roof top

view of mujera dormida on a not so smoggy day

Guadallupe's baptism

Martin's baptism

Howdy everyone. It’s windy today, and I finally have some stuff to write about. I'll start with the baptism. OK so this lady's name is Guadalupe, we’ve known her for some time, her son lives in the North mission and sent the reference for Guadalupe's other son Juan Carlos. Well she has wanted to get baptized for some time but wanted to get baptized with her son. Well, we got to their house one day and he declared, “ I'm not getting baptized”, so I just said, “Whatever”. In the lesson Guadalupe said, “I'm getting baptized on Sunday”, kind of like just letting us know. Hahaha! Anyway on Sunday I started filling the font, after about an hour I checked it and it looked like someone dumped a quarter ton of Swiss Miss in the font. It was brown. I emptied it and we got on the roof to look at the tanks and they were dirty too. Crap. We called the elders in another chapel about 20 minutes away and they started filling their font.

So we started inviting everyone again and trying to get members to go. But if they wont stay for an extra 30 minutes in their chapel there is no way they are going to a different chapel. So we finally got to the other chapel at about 1 pm just to find out that the font was about a quarter full... so they all waited outside and us and the 2 elders from that chapel took of our coats, opened the cistern outside and started passing bucketfuls through the window and dumping them into the font. After 15 minutes and a good wetdown, we filled it up with relatively clean but freezing water. So we started getting the room ready and the family walked in and a member from the local ward started throwing a hug fit over that we hadn’t planned it out, I wasn’t in the mood and started saying that you cant plan for dirty water and that if he had any problem that he should talk with the ward mission leader who he doesn’t support and some other stuff. Luckily my comp was in that ward a while back and took him outside and talked it through.

I got dressed and we were waiting for the hermana to get dressed and her daughter walked out and said that the dress we bought her didn’t fit... geez laweez. By luck I found one of those overall suit deals and it fit her. We started and when I walking in the water. Freezing. She even said, “Oh my, this is really cold”, so I did the ordinance, (she was one of those flippers who when they go under have no idea which way is up and start kicking and flailing, so you have to just calmly raise them up and hold on till they get it figured out, it was tough cuz she’s a big lady). But some thing amazing happened. When they shut the doors she said "its not cold anymore, I feel warm" it was true; I wasn’t cold anymore either. Later, after we got all changed I commented what had happened, I said "I don’t know if sins heat up water or if it was just the Saviors love we felt". It was a special spiritual experience for me. I also told one brother that I can go home now; I have filled up a baptismal font with buckets.

Other than that until Friday it was raining like crazy, many parts near here are still flooded, luckily here we are in the hills and it cant flood, but it was a depressing few days, but the sun came out as it always does and now I'm back to the short sleeve, its unpredictable here, and not just the weather.

That’s about all I got this week, we are gonna go bowling right now, see if I've still got it, happy valentines day to you all, may the Lord bless you. 143

-ELDER SOLOMON

Couln't ask for more

London’s Run sounds like fun. As Elder Wirthlin says, learn to laugh. Sorry you had to do all that work and go through all that stress and still be criticized. It’s hard when someone judges something that they have no idea about isn’t it. But you do, everyone has been shooting daggers at me lately for the whole Haiti earthquake. The US always is the bad guy here, never mind the millions sent to the country, all they see here is the few children traffickers and that "the US is taking over Haiti cuz they wanna rule the world". Whatever. I just say, “Sorry if I offended you in any way for being in your presence. Can you forgive me?” That shuts them up.

Today we played volleyball with the ward in the morning and it started raining and it was coming down! But we kept playing and it was fun. Now I’m sitting here with my socks trying to let them dry.

The work moves on. We had another baptism this week. His name is Martin. His wife got baptized a couple of months ago but never wanted anything until he played soccer for a while with the Bishop and other brothers and recognized that were not really all that weird after all. So he got baptized in a very special service. Every one was crying. After that, to celebrate we went with him and the ward team to get our butts whipped 5-2 at a nearby field, but it was fun to run on some turf under the lights and even with a real referee.

The zone did awesome too. 7 of the 9 companionships baptized resulting in 9 baptisms over all which is a high point in my service as a zone leader, The Lord has been blessing me a lot in that calling as the zone has really begun to prosper. It used to be that I baptized for the zone but now we’ve repented.

What else can I talk about? Oh ya, it’s the first day of February, the month that has my birthday, (I turn 21 on the 27th for all you who have forgotten). I will be able to legally drink in the states. Here age doesn’t matter. All that does is your 20 pesos... And the 14th of this month is a very special day, not because its Valentines, it’s cuz I complete 21 months in the mission! Meaning there are only 3 left. But whose counting anyway! I’m happy where I’m at. I’m working and that makes a missionary happy. I couldn’t ask for more.

I can’t think of any sweet experience story tell from this week so I’ll just leave it like this. Love you all have a great week and study hard!

-ELDER SOLOMON