Work, Work, Work and some more

Hello everyone! Hope everyone is doing well! 

So on Tuesday, I went on exchanges for the morning with Elder Tapia. Then we visited one of our investigators, Antonia, a single mother who's about 38 yrs old. We challenged her to be baptized and she accepted! We haven't put a baptismal date yet but it will probably be in December. Then we visited an investigator family, Fam. Lopez Madrid. They're also really special! They're really receptive and they have no problems with the lessons. I gave the family a Book of Mormon and we challenged them to read the Introduction together as a family. During both of these visits, I definitely felt the Holy Ghost with us and I hope our investigators did too, even though they might not know what it was.Wednesday, we visited Alfredo. He's in an alcoholic rehab center and we can only visit him on Wednesday mornings but he's awesome too! We taught him about Lehi's vision and we checked up on his reading in the BoM. Then we visited Antonia again to show her the Restoration DVD to help her visualize Lesson 1. We had the Spirit again! We also visited Angel and Helen and they have strong desires to attend church but they have no family in the Church and no one to take them so we're having some issues there. Thursday we visited the Fam. Guerrero Gaxiola and Elder Lugo and I bore our testimonies to Alejandra and Diego. It was pretty powerful. Diego has a baptismal date for 11/20 but Alejandra doesn't have a date set so that's our plan for this week. I prayed about it and I feel like Alejandra and the mom need to be baptized with their brother. Thursday evening we had a ward activity, put on by the Primary program. Each organization was to put together a sketch and act it out in front of the ward. So the missionaries (and me) created a scene where E. Lugo was at a barbershop, and then the barber is telling him all about how God doesn't exist because there's wars, poverty, diseases, etc. Then E. Lugo went searching in the audience for someone who's proof that God exists (me). I was dressed up in a costume which looked exactly like our ward mission leader so that's where one joke was. Elder Peralta then got in front of everyone and gave a very powerful spiritual thought. Everyone got dead silent, even the kids who were running around screaming. He bore a testimony of God's existence and how members of the Church need to be member missionaries in their lives and defend our faith. So Friday we were walking down our neighborhood when an elderly sister from our ward came up to us and said "Elders, I need a blessing. I'm not feeling good." So we walked with her back to her house which was the next street over, and then Elder Lugo volunteered me to give the blessing. I was really nervous because it's like one of my first ones and it's in a language that I'm not fluent in. I was nervous that I wasn't going to say the right words. But I gave the blessing, having faith that the Lord was going to help me in this moment. Although the blessing was short and simple, the elderly sister thanked us a lot for blessing her in her time of need. Later that evening, we had to walk to church which is a few miles away for a ward mission meeting. And then we had another appointment which is farther than the church is from our house. Then we had to walk back to our house in the dark, about 4 miles. Every other time we would make this walk, we would tire easily because there's lots of hills, we have our bags with us, and the terrain isn't smooth. It's rocky and sandy. But this night was not the case. We did not tire at all during the long walk back to the house and I believe that Heavenly Father blessed me and my companion with the energy and strength to walk back home at about 9-9:30pm. Saturday we had a zone meeting and I went on splits with Elder Cortes for a full day. I spent the night at their house. The funny thing is that Elder Cortes is a zone leader and since I was his companion, I became a zone leader for 24 hours haha. Since it was Halloween we had to be in our houses by 8pm. E. Cortes and I bought pie and coke and we chilled in the house. Yesterday was Sunday! Also Fast and Testimony meeting. I fasted for breakfast and lunch for my investigators and I felt prompted to bear my testimony too! So I did, in Spanish of course. It was short and simple again, but I believe it had some impact on our recent converts and less actives so that they could see me with my own challenges (learning Spanish) and that the Lord's servants are humbled too. We aren't out of reach of trials and challenges in life either. Last night we visited the Fam. Lopez Madrid and we discussed the Restoration pamphlet. Elder Lugo had to take a call and report the weekly numbers so I was left to answer all of their questions about the Restoration and what words meant, etc. The Spirit definitely helped me with the words that I needed to say in the right moment. This morning I washed my clothes by hand again, I'm starting to become a pro haha. Then we went to get some lunch when we ran into another zone walking through our area so we joined them for sushi. It was a huge group of missionaries, about 15-20 in all. 

Spiritual thought for the week:

1 Nephi 3:7. It's common but it applied to me this week. With the challenges of being a missionary and learning a new language, I know that the Lord will not abandon His servants nor His children. He knows all of our needs and issues and challenges and trials and he will provide a way for us to overcome our problems so that we can learn to grow and improve. Nothing is impossible with the Lord.

I believe that's all I have to report on this week. Talk to you all next week!