Eli was baptized! He is with his mom, Concepcion |
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Monday, June 24, 2013
Hello Family and Friends!
I hope that you all went to the
missionary work broadcast yesterday! It was amazing. The Lord is truly speeding
up his work and I am so grateful that I have the opportunity to serve a mission
during this historic period! This week has been amazing for Elder Lopez and I!
But before all of that...Impressions of Mexico! (And yes...I realized that I
just used a lot of exclamation points, but I am so happy!)Impressions of Mexico!
1) So in addition to the missionary work broadcast, this
week was also the long-awaited soccer match between Brazil and Mexico. The
moment the match started the pueblo literally shut down. The silence in the
streets was thick. The only thing you could hear was the same sound of the
commentaries about the soccer match from the windows of the houses as we passed
by. Soccer > Life in Mexico. I heard that even the government stopped
working to watch it.
2) We are now officially in the rainy season. And when it
rains. It rains. And also when it rains, it is more
than probable that Elder Nielsen and Elder Lopez are stranded on a hill,
drenched from head to foot, with nowhere to go. True story from this week.
3) Thankfully I still do not understand the nasty words in
Spanish. I do not want my companions to teach me them or even tell me when people
are saying them. The only thing they tell me is that little kids use them a lot
when they are talking to me...oh.
Well. The first big
announcement is that Eli was baptized this Saturday and confirmed on Sunday!
His mom, named Concepcion, was a less-active member that we helped to
reactivate. One day we went to teach her. She was not home but Eli was and he
invited us in to talk. We taught him the Restoration and he immediately
accepted a date to be baptized. Teaching him and seeing his faith grow has been
a very rewarding experience for me. He wants to be a better person and leave
his past mistakes behind. I had the opportunity to baptize him. The water was
Titanic-cold but after he was baptized (and also after he was confirmed) he
looked at me and told me that he felt so warm. That he felt different. He is
going to begin his journey now in the gospel! I am so excited for him!
It is such an exciting time to
be a missionary. I realize that I am about to complete a year in my missionary
service and I just keep thinking about how fast time has passed by. I have
truly learned so much and I felt my faith grow. I want people here in the
pueblo to accept our message so badly. Because I know what it will do for them.
It will change them. It will allow them to progress back towards their Heavenly
Father. But more than anything, I have realized lately that the message that
arrives closest to my heart, that I want everyone to know and understand is the
power of the Atonement to change a man's heart. Think about it. Change is
always possible. We can be better. We can be healed. We are understood and
known. We are listened to and loved. We have someone that gave everything so
that we could gain everything.
I know that I am known and
loved. I wish to be faithful and valient until the very end. When we are loyal
to God and the Savior, everything else just seems to work out. I know God
lives. Jesus is the Christ. Families can be eternal. The power of the
priesthood is real. The Church was restored through Joseph Smith. The Book of
Mormon is the word of God. It is through the Atonement that we can have hope in
gaining eternal life. This is my testimony. And I am so grateful that I have
another year to share it as an authorized representative of Jesus Christ!
I love you all so much.
Elder Nielsen
Monday, June 17, 2013
Hello Family and Friends!
Well, this week was difficult for Elder Lopez and I, but we
are pushing through it! The bitter always has to come with the sweet!
Impressions of Mexico!
1) If you want to start a business here in Mexico...sell
beef jerkey. Everyone here loves it. They ask me repeatedly to tell my parents
to send it to me so they can have some. Because honestly, it does not
exist.
2) T-shirts are commonly used here as mops, rags, and
towels.
I am grateful for weeks that are trying. They remind me
really of who is in control. We had to stop teaching a family of five this week
that we have been teaching for almost 3 months. They are wonderful and we love
them but they have just stopped progressing and have lost the desire to be
baptized. When we left their house, after telling them that we would not be
able to pass by very often, I truly got a little emotional. I feel love for
them and it hurt me to see them make the wrong choice. But we have to keep
moving forward right?
I think about those early pioneers and saints that crossed
the United States in order to make it to the Salt Lake Valley. Their faith and
determination amazes me. They were willing to leave everything behind and keep
pressing forward through every type of adversity imaginable because they knew
what was right and they knew what they wanted. They had a goal. They wanted to
reach Zion. And so they were willing and obedient. They sacrificed. They put
everything on the line for the Lord. Sometimes that it was what we have to do.
Keep walking forward, but with good cheer. This life is meant to try us to the
core and prepare us for something better but we have also been promised that in
those moments of trial, we are entitled to the peace of the Holy Ghost if we
are faithful to the commandments and to our Heavenly Father. We are also meant
to find joy and happiness and beauty on the trail.
My mission has caused me to reflect on how much I still have
to learn and how much growth I have yet to experience. It has been hard and
trying as it should be. But I can not deny the absolutely beautiful and
spiritual moments that my Father in Heaven has granted unto me. I would not
trade away this experience for anything. Because, if nothing else occurs, I can
say with a smile (and sometimes tears) that I know my Father in Heaven lives.
Jesus is the Christ. The Savior and Redeemer of my soul. It is through his
atoning sacrifice that I can be made whole again from the hurts and struggles
of this life. I will forever be grateful for the strength and healing I receive
through the grace of his Atonement. God loves us. And because he loves us, he
chastens us so that we may become stronger and more like him day by day. I hope
that we can all press forward. Peaceful and content with trusting in God and
his timing for us. And know that there is always a chance to change.
I love you all very much.
Elder Nielsen
Monday, June 10, 2013
Hello Family and Friends!
This week has been so good for Elder Lopez and I! New
investigators coming out of the woodwork, success with less-actives, and we
continue walking, and walking, and walking!
Impressions of Mexico!
1) Okay. So, the Relief Society President here in Lomas del
Real truly is our best friend, but she is also a little crazy. Every time we
eat with her, something horrible happens.
Meal 1) She gave me a seat that had a broken leg. I
collapsed during the middle of the meal.
Meal 2) She left little pebbles in the middle of the beans.
And I bit into them.
Meal 3) She made cucumber water but did not put sugar in it
or anything. It was the most bitter thing I have ever tasted but she made us
drink it.
She also tells us on a regular basis that the moment her son
returns from his mission in Guatemala that she is going to go inactive in the
church, or, as she puts it, "I am going on vacation." And also that
if we drink Coke that we cannot participate in the Sacrament the following
Sunday.
2) Smiling in pictures is still a problem here in Mexico.
Literally I have to force them to smile in the pictures that I take, because,
if I did not, they would never smile. Weddings, birthdays, holidays, the
occasion does not matter, everyone in the picture looks like someones has just
died.
3) Everytime it rains on a Sunday here in the mission field,
the number of people that attend sacrament
meeting goes down at least by half. Well, yesterday it was raining all day and
our branch mission leader got up to give a talk. He said something that I
thought was funny and true. That everytime it rains, the Lord is cleaning his flock.
4) In English it is hahahahaha. In Spanish it is
jajajajajaja.
Well, Elder Lopez and I
continue to teach and reactivate. And we have truly seen miracles in our area.
We had been teaching a less-active sister named Betty and her husband Elías for
quite some time now, but she had said that she was not going to return to
church until her husband got baptized and Elías, well, he told us plainly that
he had no desire to change. So we invited him to pray and had stopped visiting
him regularly. On Saturday night, the thought popped into my mind that we
should go and visit them. So we went to the their house and Hermana Betty
answered the door. She had been coloring her hair but was so excited and
grinning from ear to ear. She said, "Guess what Elders, yesterday, during
dinner, Elías told me that he had prayed and that he wants to be baptized. And
we are all ready to go to church tomorrow!" *Cue Elder Nielsen jaw-drop/shocked
face.
I feel humbled right now. I am
so grateful for the love of my Father in Heaven. He continues to teach and
tutor me every day. I know he lives because I have felt his love. And it is so
gratifying to be able to try to express that love towards others each and every
day. The message that I have to share is one of hope, love, and peace. It is so
perfect to me, the gospel. And the more I apply it and live it, the more
perfect it becomes. Every day I am more willing to be humble and submissive to
what my Father wants. Every day I am learning and growing. Every day I see
miracles, big and small.
I am so grateful for the chance
my Father in Heaven has given me to serve him and be one of his missionaries.
To have the opportunity to teach and testify, to serve and bless, and grow
personally, it is just amazing and wonderful. God lives. Jesus is the Christ.
It is through his Atonement that healing comes to my soul and to the souls of
so many that have been battered and bruised by the trials and harships of this
life. I know that he knows me. And that I can change. There is hope. And there
is so much light, life, peace, hope, and truth to be found in his restored
gospel. I love you all so very much and I love the people I serve.Elder Nielsen
Monday, June 3, 2013
Hello Family and Friends!
This week Elder Lopez and I
walked. And we walked. And we walked. And...oh...we walked some more. Maybe I
do not have feeling in my legs and feet right now but that is okay because we
are happy, healthy, and working hard here in Yautepec!Impression(s) of Mexico!
1) My favorite thing to see and hear happens every time we go to a sketchy apartment complex in our area called La Gema. Here in La Gema you will find gangsters. Sitting in their cars. Blasting American rap music. And slowly bobbing their heads up and down. The funniest part for me is that I know that they have no idea what the rapper is saying.
My companion and I had a very
special experience yesterday. We went to visit a less-active sister in the
branch named Virginia. Virginia is a single-mother with three children, and, in
addition to working, cares for her aging mother that is now bed-ridden. Her
oldest daughter Cindy has a physical-handicap and Virginia told us plainly that
Cindy had no interest in the church. Yesterday, Cindy sat in on our lesson
about the Gospel of Christ. As we were talking about baptism, the impression
came into my mind to invite Cindy to be baptized. Then, as it always does,
immediately after the doubts came into my mind. But the Spirit kept telling me
to invite her, and so we did. And she accepted! As we were telling her about
the blessings that would come into her life by accepting this gospel, she began
to cry. The Spirit was so strong.
I feel my faith growing. I
realized a few months ago that I needed to allow my faith to grow. I needed to
believe more deeply in the power that God has to save his children. So I have
been letting go of what I want and putting my life in the hands of the Lord.
This week during one of my prayers, I told him that I just wanted him to use me
as a tool in his hands. My talents, my experiences, who I am, I just wanted to
be useful in helping less-actives to return and inviting others to unite
themselves to the gospel of Christ. And I have seen his hand in my life. New
Investigators. New less-actives that we have begun to teach. More powerful
lessons. When we exercise faith in God he answers us.
I know that my Savior Jesus
Christ lives. I know that this is his gospel and his church. I know that
through trials and problems, I am made stronger. We have to be refined. We have
to pass through what seems to be
insurmountable hurtles in order to truly become what God would have us become.
But, the moment, and literally the moment that we are willing to let him in and
begin to help us, we will see the changes. We will see our growth. And we will
feel, see, hear, and know of the love of our Father.
I know what it means to feel
loved by a Father in Heaven, that with mercy, charity, and patience, lets me
know on a day by day basis that I am his, and that one day, if I am faithful, I
will be with him forever.
I love you all.Elder Nielsen
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