Monday, April 29, 2013 - Miracles Happen Once In A While When You Believe...

Hola Mi Familia! Well, Thankfully this week seemed to go by a lot faster than the first and it is hard to believe that it is Monday already. I am super thrilled that you all will be having a missionary lesson at the house this week! That makes me so happy that my family is participating in missionary work! Keep it up! Make friends with them, be a support system for them, help them feel comfortable, and share your testimonies! Well, like I said, this week has gone by a ton quicker than the last and thank Heavens! Looks like we are really starting to pick up work which is really nice. It is fantastic to pull out the agenda and look at this week and see various appointments already made with people. The sun has not been my friend lately....Although Agua Prieta is higher up and "cooler" than Hermosillo, just the fact that it is higher up in altitude is a killer, so we are closer to the sun. It is cooler, but the UV rays are SO STRONG! It is basically almost impossible to not get burned if you don't put on sun block. Even if you are out in the sun for only like 3 minutes, you can burn the rays are so bad. I found that out with my head the first day we arrived. I got burned pretty badly! So it is cooler, but also more suffering for the rays. The boyfriend of a member is progressing well! But he sort have had a big family problem come his way this week. We had a really nice lesson with some members Wednesday and talked about the Plan Of Salvation and it was nice to hear the testimonies of the member! When we went for our lesson Friday we arrived with him and he was quite upset. He was crying a lot and excused himself from the room. His girlfriend's mom said that he had told his mom that he was going to be baptized and the mom apparently got really mad and upset and is quite an explosive person, so that didn't end well. He says that he will continue with the baptism because he is 18 and doesn't have to have his parent's permission, but it still tore him apart how unaccepting his mom was. We just have basically a week and a half left till his baptism so we need to get moving to get him well prepared. The other member’s boyfriend is still going... we were talking with the family about him as well and they were saying that his family is quite strict and quite catholic and so they may not accept the thought of him being baptized. However, they told us that he has a birthday in June and will turn 18, so we may just have to wait until then to really put a date and progress too much further. But he is really loving our lessons and is a great guy and will get baptized one day I think. We also found a few new investigators this week. A guy who is 19 years old and is from the south but is here trying to get into the army. We taught him only once, but he seems pretty positive. This week we also had a little miracle. Friday before leaving the house we said a prayer asking God to put us in the path of someone that day so we could find more people to teach. Well we went and were going to our 6PM appointment that night, but it fell through and so we went to look for our back up plan, but that also fell through. We were thinking of who else we could visit and so we planned to go contact a reference that we received. We were walking down the street and this older lady in her 50s, flagged us down and asked what time the church services were. We began talking to her and apparently she lived in Hermosillo before and had a really close friend who was a member of the church and she would always go with this friend to church and go to the Family Home Evenings and such, but she never got baptized. She also said that when her father was older he got baptized and she also went with him to church. She knew a lot about the Church, but never got baptized. She told us that she was going to a church here, but doesn't really like how they have bands and "praise music" in their church and she decided not to go. We offered to share a message with her and we taught her the Restoration. She loved the message and accepted to read The Book Of Mormon and get baptized. We didn't put a date because she has a difficult work schedule, but I know that in the near future we can. This was really an answer to our prayer. I feel like those 2 appointments we and fell through for a reason and God put us in the path of someone who needed to hear our message. Just another little testimony that God hears and answers prayers. This week I also had 2 sweet experiences with families. We went to a baptism of a little girl in the branch that turned 8. Before she was baptized, her whole family got up and sang a special musical number. It was sweet because the little girl and her dad were dressed in white and her brothers had on their white Sunday shirts and also the mom had a while blouse and so all were dressed in white. It was quite a tender moment to see this family dressed in white singing together. It made me think of the temple and a family being in the celestial kingdom together. I also thought of my own family and how I can't wait for the day when we can all be in the temple together, dressed in white in the celestial room, getting a glimpse of what heaven will be like. We also taught this family who only has a year or so in the church about temple and the importance or temples and how their goal is to go and get sealed. It was really a sweet lesson and the spirit was there quite strong. Another little moment about families and temples! I LOVE the temple! Well, yesterday we didn't go to church. They called us early and said that we had to go to Hermosillo to get my Visa renewed. So we traveled all day Sunday and arrived in Hermosillo in the evening. This morning we went to the immigration office and got everything squared away so that I am legal and can stay another 9 months. Afterwards, I had the lovely opportunity of getting together with those who are in Hermosillo who will be apart of our small choir or octet for the Apostle that is coming in a few weeks. We found out it will be Elder Christofferson. How neat will that be! The octet is coming along really nicely and it should be quite a powerful little number! We then returned for a 5 hour bus ride back to AP and here I am. That is why I am writing so late! Sorry! :( Well, here is to another week! I am stoked because we are having a multi-zone conference with Nogales and so we will be going to Nogales! I have always wanted to go there so we will see what it is like! Hope you all have a fantastic week! Love and miss you all tons! ¡Yo sé que vive mi Señor! Con Mucho Amor, Elder Joyner