April 21, 2014

Hey Fam!

 

How goes it everybody? Sounds like things are just going great at home! I miss those Easter Sunday church meetings. Here, Easter like isn't really a holiday. Like, kind of but not really. In Mexico they recognize Semana Santa, or, Holy Week. Its a huge Catholic thing and like a big week-long celebration that is capped off on Sunday. Ha even a bunch of the members here get caught up in all the stuff going on. It's kinda funny. But things are going good here! My new companion is Elder Martinez from Nayarit, Mexico. He's a stud. We get along great and are working really well together. And he speaks English, which is a plus. But kinda weird, because he's my first companion in the mission that has spoken English. Haha so basically now I'm trying to get used to speaking English with him. Our investigators are doin well... Mayte and Matilde didn't come to church yesterday. Matilde's baby got super sick so she couldn't go, and we havn't been able to find Mayte at all this week. We had a couple other investigators show up though, Oralia and Victor. Oralia is the wife of a less active member. She and her husband, Tirzo, are just awesome. They love us. And after 4 years of not going to church, we got them to come back! They're progressing super nicely. Victor is the boyfriend of a member here and he's just a super stud. Ready to be baptized, but he lacks going to church. That's his problem. He's always working choppin and haulin sugar cane. (The sugar cane is like the main product that they export from here. Right now we're in burn season, and the air is filled with ashes all the time from the cane fields.) But we've been finding new investigators too, so we've got high hopes for this transfer.

 

Mom I think I'm good on everthing. One thing maybe, might be some money to buy some new slacks. I traded my old comp suit coats because my suit was dying and his didn't fit him. But I need some new pants to go better with it. That's it. We do drink a bunch of soft drinks here, and bottled water. haha. Coke is literally EVERYWHERE. And ask anyone who has ever gone to Mexico, the Coke tastes better here. haha. Probably safe to say that I'll come home and have to fill a few cavities :) Also, tell me when Mother's Day is. Because here in Mexico Mother's Day is May 10th, so most of the Elders are gonna call that day but I can call on our Mother's Day if you want. Let me know when you want me to call you.

 

This week we had an awesome experience. We went to teach a reference that we had received a few weeks ago. We had already been a couple times to visit her but she's always been busy so we haven't been able to teach her. So we show up, and the same story, says shes too busy to talk to us right now but that we should come back another day. In my mind I'm thinkin, "Whatever, she doesn't want anything. Doubt we'll be coming back." So we left. We get about two blocks away and for some reason, that we aren't sure about, we both just turn around and start walking that way again. It's a good thing we did, because if we didn't, we wouldn't have seen a little boy waving us down, telling us to come back. So we did, we started to head back to the same house that we had just left. We get there, and the lady goes, "my daughter wants to talk to you guys." And so her daughter comes out, holding her bible and tells us to sit down. We sit down, and she starts telling us how she loves to read the bible and learn about Christ. And let me tell ya, you could feel this lady's sincerity about her love for Christ. And then she said, "I just.... I just want to know the truth about the Bible. I just want to know which church has the truth about the bible. I saw you guys come up and I felt like we should talk, because I've never talked with you guys before." We were stunned. haha literally didn't know what to say... We ended up answering a few questions and setting an appointment and we left because we didn't have too much time to teach and we both knew, as if we hadn't known it before, that God REALLY is preparing people to accept the Gospel. I know that, without a doubt in my heart. How amazing it is to be part of this great work.

 

Love you all, I think about you often. Have a great week! :)

 

Elder Webb

April 14, 2014

Family---

How's it goin everybody?? Sounds like things are super interesting back home ;) But glad to hear everyone is doing good!! Mom, yes I did receive the Easter package. It was great, I really enjoyed all the candy and everything that you sent, but mostly I enjoyed the little cards from everyone! That was awesome. haha. A lot of them made me laugh. Send my thanks to everyone who wrote a little bit to me.

We have a few investigators that are progressing. Well, I should say that we HAD a few that were progressing. The majority of our investigators have fallen through and stopped progressing. But, we have a couple who are doing quite nicely. One's name is Matilde, and the other is named Mayte. They're both super awesome and really prepared to receive the Gospel. I'ts just a matter of getting them to come to church. haha. As far as things that I need you to send me, I can't think of anything right now. My area is good, I really like it. We're now entering the heat months. Today, its 95 degrees hot. But, according to the people here, that's nothing. Only gonna get worse. CANT WAIT!!!

Life is good here. My companion, Elder Ocampo, just got transferred today and I am gonna be with an Elder Martinez. I haven't met him yet, I'm gonna go pick him up from the bus station in about an hour. But we have a lot of work to do. The area here has a lot of potential but we haven't been meeting that full potential. Like I said, most of our investigators that we were teaching have been falling through and so now we have to keep goin and look for new investigators. But, I'm not too worried. It'll probably be tough for the next week or so but we'll hang in there. I know there are people out here that we need to find. I'm seeing more and more that there are more people out here to be found. 

The other day, we had an appointment with one less active sister from the ward. We show up to her house, and she's not home. Her neighbor behind her house, who we had talked to one time before, came out and talked to us for a second. We asked if we could share something with her, and she said no. That she wasn't interested. But, I felt like we were there for some reason so I asked her if there was anyone else here in her little apartment complex where she lived that we could teach. She said, "No one is here." I still felt determined... so we stayed just chatting with her for about a minute when out from one of the other doors came a guy with a bike. I stopped him, we contacted him, and he accepted straight away and now we're gonna go back and visit him this week. 

The people are out there, it just requires a little bit of diligence. Just a little bit more than what you've already given. Just a little bit further than where you've gone before. It's that little bit that makes all the difference.

I love you all suuuuuuuppper suuuuuuuuppppper much. Thanks for everything. Hope everyone has a great week! :)

Elder Webb

April 7, 2014

FAAAAAAAAMILY

Wow.... Conference was amazing!!! Conference weekend as a missionary is seriously better than Christmas. (If we were allowed to call home, then it would literally be the best thing in the world). Something about being a missionary makes watching Conference just that much better. It's hard to explain it. But I learned a ton from Conference. One of my favorite talks was Elder Uchtdorf's about being grateful. I loved what he said when he told us to "put down the bottle of bitterness and lift up the goblet of gratitude." I think it's so true, that a grateful heart is the key to all the greatest blessings we can receive. 

Everything about conference is just so special. We watched conference in the stake center in our area. All the missionaries from our zone came to our area to watch it. And yes, I did get to watch it all in English :) with all the other "gringo" missionaries. That's what the photo is at the bottom, all of us Americans watching Conference. On Sunday after the first session me and my comp left for a little while to go to our lunch appointment. We left, and noticed that right across the street was gathered another church congregation. There were a bunch of people in this meeting, listening to the pastor or preacher shouting at them, almost angrily, about who knows what. What a difference between their meeting and our conference. We're so blessed to know about these restored truths. And in my mind, we're lucky that we don't have a pastor shouting at us and reciting prayers that no one can understand. How blessed we are to be able to listen to God's REAL servants here on earth.

This week was crazy for us... tons of running around. On Wednesday night we took a three hour trip out to Tampico for a training meeting for my comp. That was a lot of fun, but we returned Thursday night and were only able to work Friday before General Conference. The work here in our area is progressing... We're struggling to find new people to teach but we're working hard. The investigators that we do have right now are progressing..... kind of..... struggling to get them to come to church. haha. but things are rolling along. 

Here are a few pictures... like I said, these are some of the guys watching General Conference, and this morning, we took a little trip to the outskirts of town to a member's ranch and did a little bit of fishin! :) It was terrible trying to fish with a stick, about 6 feet of line, and tortillas as bait, but hey we had fun :) and it was beautiful there. Lovin the mission :) Miss you guys a ton. Love you so much.

Elder Webb

March 31, 2014

FaMiLiA

I'm getting a lot better at the piano, believe it or not. Pretty sure the Lord is helping me out. haha. But cherish the organ that you guys have back home because it's a ton worse to have a 19 year old kid who had almost forgotten how to read music playing the right hand melody of the hymns every Sunday. But I'm getting a lot better :) And the goal of baptizing one person every week? ha....... we're workin on it :) it's not too easy. But who said missionary work would be easy, am I right?

Wow... sounds like everyone had quite the week back home! And Mom, thanks for all the pics! From what I've seen and heard this week, everyone is receiving many blessings. I'm not kidding... I open my mail, read letters from Cam, Dad, Mom, other friends, Aunt Ann... And the blessings just abound. I can see that the blessings have even reached Cam and Lindsey! Cam seems to have a little less acne and Lindsey looks like she's dropped a few pounds! (hahaha you knew I couldn't miss the chance to embarrass Cam and Lindsey right?) No but seriously. Its honestly amazing to me how many blessings we ALL are receiving. It truly is. Hold on to them. Cherish them. And always remember the scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 78:19, "And he who receiveth all things with thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this earth shall be added unto him, even an hundredfold, yea, more."

This week wasn't too bad for us... we had what I felt was a lot of success in teaching this week. The only problem was none of our investigators showed up to church. Which is tough, because obviously if they don't show up to church they can't get baptized. But, we're staying optimistic. We've been blessed to have found quite a few new people to teach, new people with desires to get baptized and follow the gospel, but just can't get them to come to church that's all!! ha.... frustrating. The mission will work your patience let me tell ya.

We're super pumped for General Conference this weekend. At least I am. Mostly because I get to watch it in English. The language of the Restoration! Spanish is sweet... and it's cool to know another language... but.... I like English better. haha. I'm gonna be praying this week and thinking of questions to take to conference, so that I can be inspired. I invite you all to do the same! It's like, 2 times a year we have a chance to refresh, start over again, relearn the gospel as taught through the mouths of the prophets, and be inspired to know what we need to do in our lives. Conference is for US. It's not just for the prophets and apostles to practice the talk-giving and speaking skills... What they say is direct inspiration for all of us. Let's take advantage.

By way of spiritual thought, I have a quote that I really like from President Monson. One thing that I love about the mission is that in every house, there are like a million old Liahona's and Ensigns. And with a bunch of extra time at night, it's fun to read all of them. This week I found a quote from President Monson in the August 2012 issue of the Ensign where he says, "May we ever remember that the mantle of membership in the church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is not a cloak of comfort but a robe of responsibility." Being a member of the His true and living church isn't a luxury, it's a responsibility. We all share that same responsibility. Love you all.

Elder Webb