The lord is workly strongly here in Arquitectura. I´m truly amazed everyday as I see time and time again the Lord working in the lives of these people as they draw more close to him and in the lives of me and my companion. I´m truly grateful to be here down in Mexico called of the lord to bring to pass his work. Every day has been a new personal challenge, but its been significantly rewarding as long as I accept my weaknesses and trust in the strength of the Lord.
This last week was zone conferance and as usual, president Wagner taught very powerfully as we learned more about our role as missionaries. We had the assignment to memorize the lesson plans from lessons 1-3 in PMG and were tested during the conferance. The first moments of memorizing the lessons were painfully slow and taking up all the precios study time. A Little frustrated I continued to memorize. During the process I was learning that the spirit in lessons was guiding us to say line for line what was written in those lesson plans. Which brought the spirit more powerfully and I recognized it as a cool tool that was fun to use at times. But the president made me realize that its much more than that. We need to base all the lessons off of those lesson plans. Everything thats there is pure doctrine that is needed to be understanded. Its written in the same book that we need to teach from these, which was written by the prophet. In any time throughout the world, if the people didnt listen to the prophets they were destroyed. For those of us who know the truth of the góspel of christ know that his second coming is nigh on hand. The time is now to prepare our oil, and to reach out and prepare our brothers and sisters. The doctrine thats written in preach my góspel is what we should be teaching to others, especially in our families.
That being said its absolutely essential that we follow the guidance of the spirit in sharing these doctrines. It will help us apply directly to those we teach and guide. And not all will accept what is said, but that warning voice needs to be raised.
As brothers and sisters we need to reach out and help those who are lost and havent found their way.
We have two baptisms coming up very soon. They were two investigators from the other missionaries when we took up this área as our own. The both of them were very far in the lessons but very far in their testimonies for baptism. But by the hand of the Lord I´ve seen the miracles of the spirit touching hearts. Erika is incredibly strong. At first was very timid and took 20 seconds to respond to a question, she now responds boldly to what she knows to be true. Knowing seis going to be baptized, only she fears rejection of her family. Today shes gone to talk to them to let them know she´ll be baptised.
The other is Pedro. He´s been keeping everysingle commitment since the beginning but hasn´t had that testimony. We´ve been helping him to grow that testimony, but still he hasnt felt like he was prepared and has been struggling a lot in his marriage. By accident we ended up late to one of our appointments with him and his wife and for the first time found his kids carlos and yameli. we started to teach them and learned that Carlos is agnostic. So since then we´ve been helping Carlos to understand that their is a God and he loves each of us unconditionally. Which in turn has greatly strengthened their family bond. Leading them together as a family to make these eternal covenants with our father in heaven.
One of our investigators died this past week. We found out the day of and went to the catholic church to pay our respects. When we arrived I felt sad that my brother had past through this life without the chance to know more of the savior, which sadness was increased significantly as his wife and daughters arrived. WAiling a cry of sadness like I´ve never experienced. With the thought that they would never see him again, which is the most sad thought I have ever experienced. Everyone in tears I said a silent prayer to hopefully ease their pain, I asked to please open their knowledge to that of our savior to help ease that deep pain. Immediately an enormous feeling of peace entered my heart and I knew then and there that the lord would take care of things.
The day before we visited them to see if we could help in anything. The father had been in extreme pain for the past couple months that just increased with time. So we sang a hymn to them and normally we asked in the prayers that he could recover, but this time I felt I should ask if they could enjoy these last moments together with peace as a family. After which he looked to be in peace and gave us a smile and thumbs up as if all would be well. He then passed the next morning.
After we left the viewing that day I felt so spiritually and physically exhausted. The lord has something incredible planned for that family and I´m so grateful the lord lou}ves us enough to provide us with a way to conquer death to live as families for all the eternities.
This really is the most rewarding experience that I can be a part of right now in my life. Reminds me of D&C 18:15-16
Love you all tons and talk to you later!
Elder Thompson
P.S. Erika has a pet Wolf named Rasha... yes Wolf! awesome!
