Hola todas personas! So this week has been super long! To start off, 3 of my really good friends left for the field this week. Elder John just left for Honduras. Elder Favila just left for Oregon. Elder Sanchéz is serving here in Mexico. It´s weird without them here. They were way cool! (I was going to show you guys what they looked like. But they have this new thing that wont let my camera download pictures onto the computer... So you´ll have to wait until I can figure that out! lol
So sorry this email is coming late. We left the CCM this morning for our temple trip, and I couldn´t get on until now. I also have pictures of the temple trip. And of what Mexico City looks like close up. Our bus driver almost killed like 4 people on the way to the templo. It´s really scary driving here. I wouldn´t be able to do it. haha Also! You know how we have panic circles? Well today at the templo, we discovered that they have panic squares! We were so excited!! Hurray for safety! haha. (Shelly, tell Stewart to just get a rug and paint arrows going different directions. Then you can have your own panic square y circle in your living room. lol)
Sunday was extremely spiritually edifying! Lesson after lesson and devotional after devotional were outstanding and filled with the spirit. Everyone was crying all day... That´s why no one took pictures this time. haha We watched 2 movies. I don´t remember the names... but they were way amazing! 1 was about how the Kirtland Temple was funded and built. The 2nd was about the atonement. So good!
HJ and I taught Abraham on Monday again. Our second visit with him. He´s still looking forward to Baptism and is keeping up with everything else he needs to be doing. He´s amazing! An investigador everyone wants! Everyone else is having issues with him. They can´t get him to commit to anything. (One of our other investigadors is super difficult. His name is Eduardo.) Anyways, after our lesson with Abraham, Hermano Vera gave us feedback about how he was feeling as an investigador. And he shared something with me... he said ¨Hermana Dodge, I feel like you are the most advanced in the district with spanish and your teaching style.¨ When I stared blankly back at him, he said... did I say that right? (He´s still learning english. lol) I just kind of looked at him and said: you mean the worst... right? haha Then he started laughing and said it again. He meant what he said... It just blows my mind that he thinks that. Because all the other teachers love my teaching style... they use me in english teaching examples... but when it comes to language, they go to everyone but me. (Hermano Vera is our night teacher) I guess I´m just better at spanish at night porqué I´ve been speaking it alllll day. lol)
Our second investigador is Adrián. He´s way cool. We´ve only met with him once. But he accepted the challenge to read and pray about the book of Mormon. And to pray about our message y José Smith y if the priesthood is truly on the earth today. He said that if he got the answer that he would be baptised. So we´ll see how it went tomorrow morning. :) Keep your fingers crossed!
Our 3rd investigador is Eduardo. Man he´s a tough cookie. He´s stubborn headed and doesn´t want to hear anything. The first time we met with him, he wouldn´t let us say anything. But he wanted his question answered about his family and why they´re happy when they go to church. But he wouldn´t let us answer his question. The second time we went, we got him to accept everything! Yay! Then the third time we met with him. He forgot what baptism was... We were planing on teaching him the 3rd lesson. The Doctrine of Christ. But when we went in there, he asked a question that prompted us to teach lesson 2. The plan of Salvation. Which is moy defeciet if you aren´t prepared for it. He seemed enthused when we taught it though. Then this last visit, we taught lesson 3. He loved it and accepted to be baptized again. haha This time it seemed genuine though. We´re finally making progress with him! Yay!! haha
Yesterday we had TRC. I think I told you about that last time. (it´s where we go fake tracting.) Well last time we didn´t have any volunteers. At the beginning of this time, we didn´t again. But luckily we ended up having 5! 1 for each companionship! We were so excited... but so flipping nervous. Since they´re real people who volunteered to come to the CCM to learn something. Luckily, we got a less active member of the church. Her name was Hermana Lopéz. She has to be like 80 yrs old. Sweetest lady ever! But spoke spanish moy rapido!! My comp didn´t understand a thing that she was saying. Luckily, the spirit helped me to understand what the heck she was saying. Then I told HJ and she was able to deliver a great testimoney. She stopped going to church because she stopped receiving answers to her prayers. I explained that she needed to increase her faith and ask Padre Celestial for help and guidance. And to strengthen her faith. And to ask for the guidance from El espíritu Santo. She said we helped her a lot. I asked her to say the closing prayer. I swear, that´s the longest prayer I´ve ever heard in Spanish. I understood like half of it. haha It was amazing. The spirit was so strong! And the prayer lasted for about 4 minutes. No lie. That´s a long prayer when you´re speaking spanish like an auctioneer. haha But it was way amazing! We were both on a spiritual high for the rest of the night. It´s amazing how quickly we came to love her. :) She´s an amazing lady. And She gave us a really good review to our teacher. I have the note she left him! :)
Thank you for all of your emails! It´s great to hear how you´re all doing! Thank you Grammy for the recipie! And thank you for all of the helpful motivational things you´ve been sending this way! Oh! Also! The first half of yesterday was pretty difficult so I finally gave in and opened my Spanish 101 package that you guys sent me. Senór Rodreguz´s sombrero is the best! And I love his little mustache! Although the thought of what was inside made me laugh. Because who doesn´t love trying to figure out what the heck all these notes say in español when you´re stressed out about the language. haha I thought it would be.. oh I don´t know... maybe some comforting things in english. But no. Everything was in Spanish. haha So my roomates and I all tried to read and understand what they were saying... sadly our dictionaries don´t have the majority of those words in there. We know one said My Dear Tacobell. And Another mentioned something about a dinosaur... That´s all we got. hahaha How sad right? lol But thank you for the package. It made me happy!
Remember that Heavenly Father loves each and everyone of you. And that he knows you personally. I know some of you are struggling right now... but when life gets you down you know what you gotta do? Just keep swimming! And remember that Jesus Christ knows exactly how you feel. So pray often and fervently. The Elder´s in our district´s knees on their pants are worn out. And the Hermana´s and I all have calluses on our knees from how often we pray. I challenge you to get some as well. Oración y fe es moy importante to recibir ayudanos para nuestro Padre Celestial. I love you all. Keep on keeping on!
Con Amor
-Hermana Dodge. :)
So sorry this email is coming late. We left the CCM this morning for our temple trip, and I couldn´t get on until now. I also have pictures of the temple trip. And of what Mexico City looks like close up. Our bus driver almost killed like 4 people on the way to the templo. It´s really scary driving here. I wouldn´t be able to do it. haha Also! You know how we have panic circles? Well today at the templo, we discovered that they have panic squares! We were so excited!! Hurray for safety! haha. (Shelly, tell Stewart to just get a rug and paint arrows going different directions. Then you can have your own panic square y circle in your living room. lol)
Sunday was extremely spiritually edifying! Lesson after lesson and devotional after devotional were outstanding and filled with the spirit. Everyone was crying all day... That´s why no one took pictures this time. haha We watched 2 movies. I don´t remember the names... but they were way amazing! 1 was about how the Kirtland Temple was funded and built. The 2nd was about the atonement. So good!
HJ and I taught Abraham on Monday again. Our second visit with him. He´s still looking forward to Baptism and is keeping up with everything else he needs to be doing. He´s amazing! An investigador everyone wants! Everyone else is having issues with him. They can´t get him to commit to anything. (One of our other investigadors is super difficult. His name is Eduardo.) Anyways, after our lesson with Abraham, Hermano Vera gave us feedback about how he was feeling as an investigador. And he shared something with me... he said ¨Hermana Dodge, I feel like you are the most advanced in the district with spanish and your teaching style.¨ When I stared blankly back at him, he said... did I say that right? (He´s still learning english. lol) I just kind of looked at him and said: you mean the worst... right? haha Then he started laughing and said it again. He meant what he said... It just blows my mind that he thinks that. Because all the other teachers love my teaching style... they use me in english teaching examples... but when it comes to language, they go to everyone but me. (Hermano Vera is our night teacher) I guess I´m just better at spanish at night porqué I´ve been speaking it alllll day. lol)
Our second investigador is Adrián. He´s way cool. We´ve only met with him once. But he accepted the challenge to read and pray about the book of Mormon. And to pray about our message y José Smith y if the priesthood is truly on the earth today. He said that if he got the answer that he would be baptised. So we´ll see how it went tomorrow morning. :) Keep your fingers crossed!
Our 3rd investigador is Eduardo. Man he´s a tough cookie. He´s stubborn headed and doesn´t want to hear anything. The first time we met with him, he wouldn´t let us say anything. But he wanted his question answered about his family and why they´re happy when they go to church. But he wouldn´t let us answer his question. The second time we went, we got him to accept everything! Yay! Then the third time we met with him. He forgot what baptism was... We were planing on teaching him the 3rd lesson. The Doctrine of Christ. But when we went in there, he asked a question that prompted us to teach lesson 2. The plan of Salvation. Which is moy defeciet if you aren´t prepared for it. He seemed enthused when we taught it though. Then this last visit, we taught lesson 3. He loved it and accepted to be baptized again. haha This time it seemed genuine though. We´re finally making progress with him! Yay!! haha
Yesterday we had TRC. I think I told you about that last time. (it´s where we go fake tracting.) Well last time we didn´t have any volunteers. At the beginning of this time, we didn´t again. But luckily we ended up having 5! 1 for each companionship! We were so excited... but so flipping nervous. Since they´re real people who volunteered to come to the CCM to learn something. Luckily, we got a less active member of the church. Her name was Hermana Lopéz. She has to be like 80 yrs old. Sweetest lady ever! But spoke spanish moy rapido!! My comp didn´t understand a thing that she was saying. Luckily, the spirit helped me to understand what the heck she was saying. Then I told HJ and she was able to deliver a great testimoney. She stopped going to church because she stopped receiving answers to her prayers. I explained that she needed to increase her faith and ask Padre Celestial for help and guidance. And to strengthen her faith. And to ask for the guidance from El espíritu Santo. She said we helped her a lot. I asked her to say the closing prayer. I swear, that´s the longest prayer I´ve ever heard in Spanish. I understood like half of it. haha It was amazing. The spirit was so strong! And the prayer lasted for about 4 minutes. No lie. That´s a long prayer when you´re speaking spanish like an auctioneer. haha But it was way amazing! We were both on a spiritual high for the rest of the night. It´s amazing how quickly we came to love her. :) She´s an amazing lady. And She gave us a really good review to our teacher. I have the note she left him! :)
Thank you for all of your emails! It´s great to hear how you´re all doing! Thank you Grammy for the recipie! And thank you for all of the helpful motivational things you´ve been sending this way! Oh! Also! The first half of yesterday was pretty difficult so I finally gave in and opened my Spanish 101 package that you guys sent me. Senór Rodreguz´s sombrero is the best! And I love his little mustache! Although the thought of what was inside made me laugh. Because who doesn´t love trying to figure out what the heck all these notes say in español when you´re stressed out about the language. haha I thought it would be.. oh I don´t know... maybe some comforting things in english. But no. Everything was in Spanish. haha So my roomates and I all tried to read and understand what they were saying... sadly our dictionaries don´t have the majority of those words in there. We know one said My Dear Tacobell. And Another mentioned something about a dinosaur... That´s all we got. hahaha How sad right? lol But thank you for the package. It made me happy!
Remember that Heavenly Father loves each and everyone of you. And that he knows you personally. I know some of you are struggling right now... but when life gets you down you know what you gotta do? Just keep swimming! And remember that Jesus Christ knows exactly how you feel. So pray often and fervently. The Elder´s in our district´s knees on their pants are worn out. And the Hermana´s and I all have calluses on our knees from how often we pray. I challenge you to get some as well. Oración y fe es moy importante to recibir ayudanos para nuestro Padre Celestial. I love you all. Keep on keeping on!
Con Amor
-Hermana Dodge. :)