Familia,
Well this week was pretty short... each day seemed to go on forever... but the week went by super fast.
We started the week with an activity of the zone and it just happened to be the day befor the national holiday Dia de Los Reyes. This holiday is a holiday to remember the 3 wisemen that gave the 3 gifts to Jesus Christ (okay really we have no idea how many wise men there were but society has made the image that their were only 3 of them due to the 3 gifts given to Jesus Christ). It's kind of a fun holiday down here... they still remember Jesus Christ on this day but it's not as big as Christmas. Another fun culture fact is that many of the children here don't recieve gifts from Santa Claus on the 25th of December, but receive gifts from the 3 Reyes Magos on the 6th of January. Another fun thing that they do is they make a bread called Rosca de Reyes which is sold everywhere the 5th and 6th of January. Hidden within the bread there are little plastic babies (which represent the baby Jesus). The game they play is that the person who has the plastic baby in his bread has to make tamales for everyone, everyone that participated in eating a slice of the Rosca, on the 2nd of February for another holiday named Día de la Candelaria. It's pretty fun eating the bread and seeing who recieves the little plastic baby. Well Elder Vazquez and I have eaten from two Roscas and Elder Vazquez had the little plastic piece twice... later we went to the store on the corner and Elder Vazquez only bought one piece of the Rosca and he also found a little plastic baby in the piece he selected. It was hilarious! It looks like Elder Vazquez will be making a lot of tamales on the 2nd of February. ¡Que lastima! :)
Well this week was pretty short... each day seemed to go on forever... but the week went by super fast.
We started the week with an activity of the zone and it just happened to be the day befor the national holiday Dia de Los Reyes. This holiday is a holiday to remember the 3 wisemen that gave the 3 gifts to Jesus Christ (okay really we have no idea how many wise men there were but society has made the image that their were only 3 of them due to the 3 gifts given to Jesus Christ). It's kind of a fun holiday down here... they still remember Jesus Christ on this day but it's not as big as Christmas. Another fun culture fact is that many of the children here don't recieve gifts from Santa Claus on the 25th of December, but receive gifts from the 3 Reyes Magos on the 6th of January. Another fun thing that they do is they make a bread called Rosca de Reyes which is sold everywhere the 5th and 6th of January. Hidden within the bread there are little plastic babies (which represent the baby Jesus). The game they play is that the person who has the plastic baby in his bread has to make tamales for everyone, everyone that participated in eating a slice of the Rosca, on the 2nd of February for another holiday named Día de la Candelaria. It's pretty fun eating the bread and seeing who recieves the little plastic baby. Well Elder Vazquez and I have eaten from two Roscas and Elder Vazquez had the little plastic piece twice... later we went to the store on the corner and Elder Vazquez only bought one piece of the Rosca and he also found a little plastic baby in the piece he selected. It was hilarious! It looks like Elder Vazquez will be making a lot of tamales on the 2nd of February. ¡Que lastima! :)
I went to the hospital this week to talk to my awesome Korean doctor and he checked on my foot and just told me that I need to throw away my brace because my body was healed properly. Wahoo! What a blessing right? Its been tough process having my sprained ankle... but its such a blessing that I am back on my two feet preaching again. My doctor is awesome... we finished the doctor apointment but then talked for another hour about his life, my life, and religion. He is from South Korea, moved to Guadalajara when he was little, studied in the United states, and now lives in Guadalajara. It was fun talking to someone who is well educated in medicine as well as in doctrine and history. He mentioned that it was really dumb of me to want to go home and study, work, get married, and start a family right off the bat. I just reasured him that I understand the plan that God has for us. Invited him to investigate more about the Church and was going to leave a book of mormon but to my surprise he already had one in is office but never has read it. I have faith that Doctor Agustin Chan Lee will accept the restored gospel one of these days.
Elder Piper (Area Seventy in México) came to our mission and talked to us about how we can become more succesful and talked a lot about finding the chosen people... the people that will edify the church. He talked about how we shouldn't worry about filling up our agendas... will will always be able to do that no matter what the circumstance is... but if we want to have more success we need to stop teaching the people who aren't doing their part in keeping their promises [commitments] (lo que quiero decir es las personas que no estan cumpliendo sus compromisos), and the people that won't help in the edification of the Church. I have been thinking a lot about it and have found that we have had a lot of investigadors that aren't really doing their part so I have been a little bit more firm with them and have made it clear that we will not be visiting some of them because they aren't doing anything and have been in the teaching for a long time. Elder Vazquez and I seem to have different points of view on this subject and he gets a little angry with me when I am direct with the investigadores and when I tell him that we need to stop teaching some families. He tells me that I don't know them well enough to stop teaching them... honestly what I think is that he is more like their friend instead of a missionary so it is hard for him to stop visiting them. I don't blame him... it's tough when people don't do their part... it's tough making the decision to drop investigadores... it takes a lot of faith... but it is worth it. I guess Elder Vazquez finaly oppened up with me and got a little frustrated with me telling me that I am super bossy and don't care for the people in our area... I took it in and thought, that maybe I am kind of bossy... but I am bossy because he doesn't take initiative. We had an awesome companionship inventory and things seem to be going a lot better now. I really like Elder Vazquez - he honestly is a great guy.
We had a great experience with finding a family thanks to the advice of Elder Piper. We finally stopped visiting a sister investigator that has been hearing our message for about 5 months but hasn't done her part... Elder Vazquez loves her and really desires her salvation... but he backed me up with the decision to stop teaching her. Well we then recieved a reference from the familia Carrillo (we never recieve referals) and this family of 4 (familia Aguilar) are now preparing for their baptism and went to church. It was a crazy faith builder and was amazing that what Elder Piper said came true.
I love you all and will talk to you next week.
Love,
Elder Summers
Elder Piper (Area Seventy in México) came to our mission and talked to us about how we can become more succesful and talked a lot about finding the chosen people... the people that will edify the church. He talked about how we shouldn't worry about filling up our agendas... will will always be able to do that no matter what the circumstance is... but if we want to have more success we need to stop teaching the people who aren't doing their part in keeping their promises [commitments] (lo que quiero decir es las personas que no estan cumpliendo sus compromisos), and the people that won't help in the edification of the Church. I have been thinking a lot about it and have found that we have had a lot of investigadors that aren't really doing their part so I have been a little bit more firm with them and have made it clear that we will not be visiting some of them because they aren't doing anything and have been in the teaching for a long time. Elder Vazquez and I seem to have different points of view on this subject and he gets a little angry with me when I am direct with the investigadores and when I tell him that we need to stop teaching some families. He tells me that I don't know them well enough to stop teaching them... honestly what I think is that he is more like their friend instead of a missionary so it is hard for him to stop visiting them. I don't blame him... it's tough when people don't do their part... it's tough making the decision to drop investigadores... it takes a lot of faith... but it is worth it. I guess Elder Vazquez finaly oppened up with me and got a little frustrated with me telling me that I am super bossy and don't care for the people in our area... I took it in and thought, that maybe I am kind of bossy... but I am bossy because he doesn't take initiative. We had an awesome companionship inventory and things seem to be going a lot better now. I really like Elder Vazquez - he honestly is a great guy.
We had a great experience with finding a family thanks to the advice of Elder Piper. We finally stopped visiting a sister investigator that has been hearing our message for about 5 months but hasn't done her part... Elder Vazquez loves her and really desires her salvation... but he backed me up with the decision to stop teaching her. Well we then recieved a reference from the familia Carrillo (we never recieve referals) and this family of 4 (familia Aguilar) are now preparing for their baptism and went to church. It was a crazy faith builder and was amazing that what Elder Piper said came true.
I love you all and will talk to you next week.
Love,
Elder Summers