This Gospel changes lives. Our faith can change lives too!

Hello again! I hope everyone is doing great!! This week... started off hard. But through hours and hours of prayer the Lord helped me and gave me the strength and faith that I needed. And He really blessed us with an AMAZING week!! We just decided that we were going to work as hard as we could to baptize ALL of Manvel. We are getting there ;) 

So we seriously see so many miracles in this area every single day. And this week it was like miracle after miracle after miracle all day long every day. The Lord is truly hastening His work here in Manvel! We were able to see less actives that we havent seen in a long time and investigators hearts were softened and opened and changed. Slowly, but its happening. As we focused on prayer and just really asking the Lord to guide us to His children He had prepared, we could see Him guiding us to just the right place at just the right time. Like one day we decided to go try a less active/returning family and they werent home. Luckily we had our bikes on the back and we decided to just go bike around. We went to try some formers and potentials and then as we were coming back to the car I had a feeling to go down a certain road. We did and the first person we passed, he yelled out, "Hey! are yall the Mormons?!" YEP. We turned right around and went to talk to him! He was visiting his inactive sister and actually lives in Houston but is willing to meet with missionaries! So cool!! Then we got to give out a Book of Mormon to another kid sitting outside! My testimony really has grown so much these past 16 months. It is so important to live worthy of the spirit and then follow those promptings of the spirit or else you wont get any more! The spirit can literally tell us what to do. Its AMAZING.

This week we had Zone Meeting and it was SO AWESOME. I have the best zone. Its really a zone full of missionaries with lots of faith and the desire to do what the Lord wants. My favorite part was when the Zone Leaders talked about prayer. One thing they said was:

Prayer = Form of worship

The way you live your life = form of worship

We should be constantly living in an attitude of prayer but the way we live our lives and always have a prayer in our hearts. Then after that discussion, we prayed as a Zone. It was the most powerful prayer. The spirit was SO strong! Sister Sellers led the prayer and everything she said was by the spirit. She prayed for all the investigators individually for every area and then prayed for all the missionaries individually and said things that she didnt even know were going on. I just felt the spirit hit me like a wall and I know that the Lord is mindful of each and every one of US, and each and every one of our INVESTIGATORS. He KNOWS. And He has prepared so many people in our area and we just have to find them!

After Zone Conference, we played soccer with the ward and TONS of less actives showed up! We had sooooo many people there playing! There was also a family there that werent members and we invited them to play with us and they did! We got their number and we will be calling them to invite them this friday :) Also, after Zone Meeting we decided to exercise our faith and go see Angelica. She stopped answering texts and stuff and we thought something we said kinda freaked her out. But we went and she let us in and we were able to establish our purpose and she read the intro and we think she is just going to her church for her husband! Miracles! We know she can be baptized soon and that she will know this church is true as she reads more of the Book of Mormon and comes to church!

Saturday, was a miracle day! We got to see Maria and Valerie and we really feel like they will be ready for baptism really soon! We are working so hard with them :) Then later that day we went to try Gabriel and his family who we OYM'd last week and then we taught Gabriel earlier this week. We went to our appointment and Gabriel wasnt there but his wife Andrea was! SHE IS AWESOME! The minute she opened the door I just felt so much love for her. And her boys? Oh my gosh. Cutest/smartest boys ever. She has TONS of questions. But she is so ready. So prepared! She is questioning her own church and all the answers we gave her she agreed with and we testified that all the answers to her questions she could find in the Book of Mormon. She is so open and we are so excited to teach that family! :) And then we went to see Ana, Francisco and Francisco's kids and they accepted baptismal dates! Well Ana is a member and her husband isnt. They just recently got married and now he can be baptized! They will be baptized on the 16th!! :) 

Sunday... KHIARA GOT BAPTIZED!!!! Khiara is the cutest 9 year old. She is so sweet. Kenia and Ashley who got baptized 3 weeks ago are her older sisters :) She wanted to get baptized with them but her mom told her to wait! But she showed up to church late yesterday (we were FREAKING out that she wasnt going to come) but she did and during the 3rd hour we taught her almost everything (because we hadnt been able to teach her all week!) and then she had her interview after church! After church she like came up and gave us the biggest hugs and she was so happy. It was the cutest thing ever. So she goes to get baptized, and Elder Tew had filled up the font too high!!! So she walks in and is basically SWIMMING in the font and is like basically already baptized because she already was covered with water except for her head. I was DYING laughing!!! BUt everything went so well. OH! And Slatenka spoke about the Holy Ghost! She has come so far. She is so very special to me. She spoke about how she doesnt know much about the church, but that she has faith and she knows she will keep learning. She started crying and just expressed how grateful she was that her mom kept telling her to come to church and for the examples of her family. That family is so special and we are taking them to the temple in a few weeks! I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY! And seeing the gospel change people :)

Well I am so sorry this email is kinda all over the place. SO much that happened! But I love you all so much. Thank you for all the love and support! Que tengan una buena semana!

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Dorian

Prayer brings Faith, Faith brings Peace

"Behold, I am a disciple of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. I have been called‍ of him to declare his word among his people,that they might have everlasting life." 3 Nephi 5:13

 

I read this scripture this week and it hit me so hard. That is my purpose. And I will fulfill that purpose to the best of my ability! I am so grateful to be on a mission and for all that I have learned. One essential eternal truth that I have learned is the Atonement is REAL. Throughout my mission, I have just come to know for myself that the Atonement is so real. Its become more real to me that it ever has or ever could here on my mission. I know without a doubt that Christ has felt every single thing that we EVER have felt and ever will feel. He makes up for everything. Its through the Atonement that everything unfair in our lives, is made fair. How amazing is that? It gives me so much peace and comfort to know that. And to know that because of the Atonement, if we choose not to and we choose to have faith, we don't have to suffer as much as Christ did. He takes away the suffering. I know that from experience. We have such a loving Heavenly Father and we are all His special children who He loves so much! Trust in Him! :)

 

This week, we saw a lot of miracles. It was a very emotional week and I was a little all over the place. But it was a good week, now that I look back at it. I really am so grateful for all the trials that I go through in life. They make me so much stronger and I learn so much. I learned a lot from my trials this week. During the week we had a mini zone meeting and our zone leader challenged us to pray for 30 minutes every day and make the time for it. Man, I can testify that doing that really builds faith. If I hadn't done that, I wouldn't have the faith I have today. Its amazing. To just have a 30 minute conversation with your Heavenly Father. Truly such a cool experience! I challenge all of you to do that this week!! EACH DAY. You will see miracles and just feel a difference. Seriously my relationship with my Heavenly Father has grown immensly. 

So despite the hard times, we saw a lot of miracles this week! On Tuesday, we decided to go out on bikes for a little while and just explore a part of the area I had never explored. So we were biking on this road and I had no idea where we were but we went by this house and i felt like we should knock but we didnt. We rode by it again and I was like okay yeah we need to knock on that door. We knocked and this lady answered and was like, "Ohhh hola!!" and was super nice and let us right in! I was like alright this is sweet! So we went in and met Guadalupe and Hortencia. Hortencia is Guadalupes mother in law and Hortencia has tons of kids that are baptized in Mexico and a granddaughter that is on a mission! SO COOL. So they knew who we were! Hortencia has a problem with modern prophets but we are going to go back this week and help her understand :) So excited! A less active (her son) lives there so we are so happy we found that family! Blessings for biking. Then later that night we went and saw Elizabeth and she is awesome! We have really good discussions with her. We talked about faith and she was really happy because she said that was exactly what she needed. I love her :) She is slowly becoming more open to the gospel! 

Wednesday, we had a training all day with President Ashton for the newer missionaries and their companions! We had a training on the Atonement and I learned soooo many new things which was so cool! One thing i learned was that some times bad things dont happen when they should because it isnt pertinent to our salvation. Christ's grace and mercy covers that and takes those away so we dont have to suffer them. I love the Atonement. But that was really what I needed that day. 

Every friday night, we play futbol with the ward and the ward mission leader, Hermano Correa invites EVERYONE. So we went and I wasnt sure if we were going to have any investigators there but we got there and THERE WERE TONS. Francisco (recent convert) and ALL his family who arent members were there! Such a miracle! And then a reallllyyy inactive member went with his son! We are teaching his wife, Yvette and she doesnt want to get baptized until he can baptize her but its a miracle he is now participating in activities! :)

Saturday morning we went to go see Erica Hernandez. We hadnt seen her in a while but we finally got to go visit her. That morning during my personal study I felt so strongly that we needed to teach her the Atonement. So we did and the spirit was so so strong. She was smiling and answering questions and just was a lot more responsive that she usually is and she seemed a lot happier! Then we extended the 24th of August to her and she VERY SOFTLY accepted it!!! MIRACLE!! She neverrrr has accepted baptismal dates!! She also expressed her concern. That she doesnt understand the purpose if she might miss coming to church sometimes. She wants to know she will keep that promise. So now we know how to teach her! We are sooo excited :) We know she will be baptized! And then that night we went to a Mexican wedding of one of our investigators and active members. yesssss. i love hispanics and their weddings. 

Well, thats all i have for you! I love you all and I hope yall have an amazing week. Remember, the Atonement covers EVERYTHING. :) 

Con amor,

Hermana Dorian

MARIA ARREDONDO GOT BAPTIZED

HELLO everyone!! I hope yall had an amazing week this week! This week was hard, fun, exciting, and great all at the same time! An ongoing thing I have running through my head is just FAITH. I study faith every morning and when I start to get discouraged, I just think about faith and how much faith I had last week, and that of course I can have that faith ALL the time! I just have to pray for it!! This morning I read in 3 Nephi chapter 18 and Christ right before He blesses all their children, tells them that because of their faith, He was full of joy. I had never thought of faith that way! I never thought that when I have faith, the Lord is happy and full of joy. So why would I not strive to have faith all the time?! If I want to please the Lord, I have to have faith. So that is why faith is so important. And we see miracles through faith!

 

So to start off, on Tuesday we had to go see everyone so that Hermana Duncan could say goodbye! It was so sad. I hate goodbyes, and I wasnt even the one saying them! But we got to see a lot of awesome people. Maria and Valerie made us cupcakes. RED VELVET. They know me allllllllll too well and how much I love red velvet. We also got to see Yvette! We talked to her about eternal families and the temple and she wants to so bad! She is just waiting on her husband to get active again so that he can baptize her! They said they were going to come to church yesterday but they didnt :( BUT we are not losing faith and we are going to visit them a lot more! They will be an eternal family!! :)

 

Wednesday was transfer day!! We showed up to the mission office a little late... oops. Everyone was already sitting down and President Ashton was about to announce all the companionships. I had NO IDEA who I was going to train!! But all the girls were so cute and looked so fun! So President Ashton went through all the english sisters first then to spanish... And I am training HERMANA TAYLOR! She is awesome!!! She is from Hurrican, Utah! I was praying soooo hard that I would train a sister that was ready to work hard and be exactly obedient. And that is her in a sentence. We get along so well and we are having a lot of fun! We are alot alike and have similar personalities. She is also a combination of like 3 of my friends. So.. its GREAT! I am really happy to train her and that she will probably be my last companion :) The Lord knows EXACTLY what we need. That is confirmed to me every single day. That night, we went RIGHT to work too. We got back and went strait to an appointment with the Familia Espitia. THey are amazing. We are trying so hard to get them to come back to church. I know they will. But then Hermana Taylor got to meet Dora and Rosalinda. Super awesome people :)

 

Okay that was like the big exciting day today and now I am just going to tell yall the main things that happened this week:

1. We contacted a referral this week. The couples names are Renee and Angelica. They are from Puerto Rico and have been here in Texas for a year. Renee works with an active member in our ward and thats where we got the referral. So we decided to contact them and they immediately let us in. We talked and talked and taught Angelica about church and what we do. The coolest thing though was when we mentioned the temple, we told her that families can be together forever through covenants we make in the temple. Immediately her eyes got soooo big and she was like "Hey!!! Like that family that just got killed in Spring!!!" I was reaaaaalllllyyyy confused because i had no idea what she was talking about. I mean come on... I'm a missionary. I dont know whats going on in the world. Anyways, she continues to tell us that she saw on the news that there is a mormon family that was living in Spring, Texas by the temple and they were all killed except for the 13 year old daughter. The 13 year old was interviewed on the news and she was in peace. Because she knew that since they were sealed, that they were going to be together forever and she was going to see them again. Angelica was sooo impressed by that girl!! I was like.. man! The temple is AWESOME. Then she fed us a Puerto Rican snack. Chedder cheese with guava paste! It was delicious!! :) We are excited to go back and see them!

2. Friday we went on an exchange with Sister Sellers! I stayed in the area and then Sister Taylor went to hers. It was such a fun exchange!! And we saw some miracles! We were FINALLY able to see Eunice!! She was really sad and going through a really hard time... and so we just listened and shared some scriptures with her and just told her that we loved her and that her Father in Heaven loves her. We also got in with the Familia De Hoyos and did a fun activity with the kids and taught about prophets! Okay but I think before that, I felt like we needed to go see Xavier. I was TERRIFIED to go back there and talk to him. His mom had told us not to go back until he called but he hadnt. So we waited a few weeks and I felt like we needed to go. So we did! He wasnt there, but his wife Heidi was and she told us we could come back on Saturday! So we went back on Saturday and we were praying sooo hard that Xaviers mom would be open and let us in. AND SHE DID!! SHe talked to us for a little bit and then she said she had to go do something so we set up an appointment for next weekend! YAY! Prayers work and were answered!!! And then that night, we went to soccer night and we had lots of investigators there! We are going to actually play this week :) Good thing Hermana Taylor plays soccer!

3. On Saturday, MARIA ARREDONDO FINALLY GOT BAPTIZED!! It was sooooo special! She is AMAZING and holds a very very special place in my heart. I was able to attend the baptism and she started crying when she was telling me how happy she was to be getting baptized. She has so much faith. After she got baptized, Hermana Villarreal and I went to the bathroom door to help her and wait for her and she was having trouble getting the jumper off so we had to help her! PRICELESS. So many memories. So special. OH and we were waiting outside the bathroom and we heard Maria talking and she was saying a prayer. SO CUTE. It does not get cuter than that. I LOVE my job!! :)

 

Well... thats all I have for yall this week! I love you all so much! Thank you so much for all your prayers and love and support! This church is TRUE! Have a great week!!

 

Con mucho amor, Hermana Dorian

Not 1, not 2, not 3, but 4 PEOPLE made covenants with their Heavenly Father

My email today will be all about the results of a lot of FAITH. 

Here are the beautiful 4 girls that got baptized yesterday!! I love them all so much. Ashley, Kenia, Nilzza, and Slatenka!! Ashley and Kenia are sisters, Nilzza and Slatenka are sisters. They are all cousins. Seriously this was the greatest miracle I have seen on my mission so far! Okay let me start from the beginning.

A month ago, President Ashton received revelation that our zone could baptize 10 people on the 12th of july. Or the weekend of the 12th of July. When our district leader told us that, I felt the spirit really strongly that we would be able to participate in that amazing miracle. I immediately thought of Maria and Valerie who had started to progress more. Then a few days later we extended the date to Alan and Slatenka. Throughout the next couple of weeks, we realized that Maria and Valerie just werent ready yet. But Slatenka and Alan had accepted and we were working with them a lot more. Then Xavier had a date for the 12th. Then he dropped us. We were devastated! But we werent going to lose hope or faith! Alan and Slatenka still had dates for the 12th!! Well.... last monday comes around and up until then we had just kept inviting them to prepare for baptism. Then we had to remind them about their date for the following weekend! (probably should have done it sooner... dont learn from that example). Anyways! So on Wednesday we called Dora (Slatenka's mom and recent convert) and asked her if Slatenka was home so we could catch her before she went to work. She said she was getting ready but that yes she was there. We were on the other side of the area and BOOKED it to their house! We show up and Dora's other daughter was there too with all her 7 kids who had all gone to church before :) So we taught them and then asked Slatenka about baptism that weekend. She said she wasnt ready and wanted to be more prepared. So we respected that and invited her to pray about a date. Later that night, we go to their house again to talk to Alan. He wasnt there when we got there, but as we were talking to Dora, he walked in!! That was a miracle!! So we taught him and talked to him about baptism and he just so easily said yes! He has a looooootttt of faith. So we were like okay awesome! Alan is still getting baptized. He became soooooo busy the next 3 days and we werent able to see him. Friday he texted us and told us that his mom was coming in to visit him in August and he wanted her to be there. So we were like okay. No baptism. But i KNEW we could baptize! I just knew it! That night, Elder Dennis (zone leader) called Alan and promised him that if he was baptized that his mom would follow his example! 

Skip to Saturday. I decided to start a new paragraph so i dont bore you! hahaha okay anyways soooo Saturday we couldnt get a hold of him. Around 5, the Zone Leaders called and said they were in our area and ready to go see Alan with us. I knew he would still be at work, but we just decided to take a huge leap of faith. We have been talking ALOT about taking huge leaps of faith!! So we did. Alan wasnt there, but Slatenka was. The elders decided to talk to her! We did a combined lesson and the spirit was SO STRONG. We extended baptism and she said she still wasnt prepared. Elder Clark then said, "I will tell you what. If you pass an interview with Elder Dennis right now, you are prepared!" So they went and did the interview and SHE PASSED AND SAID YES!!!!!!!!! SUCH A MIRACLE! 

Now to Sunday. We fasted. We HAD to. Because that baptism had to happen. They came to church and everything and it was just so awesome! We spent most of church trying to get everything ready for the baptism. During church, Elder Dennis came and asked why Nilzza wasnt getting baptized. It was because she hadnt shown much desire. He went and pulled her out of class and asked her if she wanted to be baptized with her sister. She said YES!!!!!! I was FREAKING out!!!! So we are almost ready to start the baptism, and Dora's other daughter showed up. Her daughters saw that Nilzza was getting baptized too and said, alright we want to be baptized too! WHAT IN THE WORLD?!?!?!?!?!?!?! I was in shock!!!!! The Zone leaders were both there, interviewed them, and they were ready to go!! THEY ALL 4 GOT BAPTIZED! It was such an awesome miracle. 

This week I have been praying a lot for faith. Even when I felt like I had a lot of faith. I prayed for even more faith. I know that through much fasting, prayer, and hard work/diligence, we can see MIRACLES. Miracles that we dont even expect or know could happen! We went from 2 baptisms, to 1, to 0, to 1, then to 4! INCREDIBLE. This church is so true and the Lord is guiding this work!! It's all up to Him. If we just trust in Him and have faith and do all that we can do, then leave the rest to Him, sooo many awesome things happen!! 

I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!!!!! :) Hope yall have an awesome week!! OH yeah! I forgot. I am TRAINING AGAIN!!! Super excited to get my new missionary on wednesday!! :)

​All of us working together to make it happen!! That's Dora in the brown suit. She is the cutest :)

Love you all!!! thanks for all your love and support! Thank you for all the prayers as well! 

Con Amor, Hermana Dorian

Heart Attacking and lots of faith WORKS!

Where do I begin?! I have started writing down on a sticky note in my planner everything that happens during the week so that I dont forget. Too many things happened this week! They dont fit one sticky note!! This week was PACKED FULL of miracles and stuff. we were sooo busy. I have my ongoing study of faith and this week i changed my prayers. I started just praying for the gift of faith and let me tell you, Heavenly Father heard those prayers!! Because of our faith and hard work this week, we saw SO many miracles. Like miracle after miracle after miracle after miracle. Okay I will stop talking about it and start telling you about them!! 

To start off, Monday we had Zone Activity. haha definitely did Hunger Games... where one companionship had to find another copmanionship. We did it in a legit forest. SO COOL. Anyways so we were driving back and we got back into our area right at 6 and we were hungry. We wanted to get food but we decided not to because we needed to get to our appointments. That night, we got to see some investigators that we havent seen in a while!! We saw Yvette and she is still preparing for and thinking of baptism!! Then we saw Francis who apparently was going to get baptized before. She is really busy though and we finally found her at home. Then she gave us pizza. BLESSINGS for being obedient!! :) 

On Tuesday, we went to see Dora and Slatenka and Slatenka had stopped drinking coffee on her own to prepare for her baptism!! She didnt come to church yesterday because she is so busy but we arent losing faith!! She can still get baptized!! But we taught the Word of Wisdom and then got talking about the temples! I showed her a temple brochure of the Fort Lauderdale temple that I had in my scriptures and she LOVED it! She said she wants to go there so bad. So does Dora! So we are working really hard with them so that Dora can go and do baptisms and Slatenka as well after she gets baptized. P.S. Dora has a pet DEER!! Its name is bambi. in a cage on the side of her house. Pictures coming soon. hilarious!!! Okay so then that day it rained SO HARD! Thunder and lightning for hours!! Later that night we went to go see the Familia Aquino and their drive way is all dirt. That night it was all mud. They thought it was HILARIOUS that we walked through the mud to get to their door. Hey, gotta do what ya gotta do. There is still mud on my shoes. It was fun! 

Wednesday we went to see a part member family. Actually we just went to go see the wife who isnt a member. She is so closed off though and doesnt talk much or show any desire in knowing that the church is true. Our ward mission leader knows we can help her though and says we are the only ones that can. So we are working sooo hard with her!!! Please pray for her!! We got to see lots of awesome people that day though!! Funniest thing ever was when we were having dinner with Brother and Sister Ramos, Brother Ramos was telling us about his best friend that has a house in Utah and has been there for a while. He was trying to remember what it was called. He said his friend described it as "not a nice place, just a normal place." so then i asked more questions and we figured out that his friend has a house in HEBER CITY. hahahahahahahaha i was dying. I love my Heber City :) 

OKay I dont have much time so I am going to focus on the other amazing miracles we had this week. So for weeks and weeks we have been trying to get ahold of this less active family. WEEKS. They would never open the door and they dont come to church. Nothing. Everytime we went over though we would leave a nice note. Then we started heart attacking people. Then one sunday we were trying to contact them and happened to be there right as the Hermana was getting home. We set up an appointment for Thursday!! Thursday came and we had a member come out with us. We drove to their house, with doubts that they would even be there. We wait a few minutes. And a few more minutes. AND THEN THEY OPENED THE DOOR AND LET US IN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! whattt??? Such a miracle. We shared a scripture about the Atonement and then talked about reading the scriptures as a family. She said that it made her excited or gave her animos para hacerlo!! Yay!! man we were stoked. We told the WML about it on Sunday and he was stoked too!! So awesome. Then we went and had a lesson with Xavier and Heidi. I dont know if i have talked about them. oh yes i have! they were the referral. So we taught them the Plan of Salvation and it was the most amazing lesson. One of the most spiritual. At the end, Xavier said, "Thank you guys so much for coming over! Really there is a different feeling when you guys are here. Almost heavenly. It feels really nice!" AHHHH!!!! i couldnt stop smiling the entire lesson!! And then he offered to send the closing prayer!! He told us he was athiest the first time we talked to him and then he wanted to pray. SO AWESOME. He also accepted a date for the 12 of july!!! please pray for him!!! bad news is they werent able to go to church and we got a call from Xaviers mom telling us they didnt want to participate. Well his wife mostly. But we arent losing faith!!!! He can still be baptized!! It was just so awesome though. 

Friday we got to meet some investigators in the new area we took over from the elders and they are wanting to get baptized really bad!! yes!!! Then we had dinner with Mario, his dad Jose, and his wife Elizabeth. Jose and Elizabeth arent members, Mario is and he served a mission!! It was a really good dinner and Elizabeth was a lot more open!! we are really praying that she has a change of heart! she is going to another church right now so we are just going to show her we love her and continue to go by and share messages with them!! 

Saturday was way fun!! We started out by going to the bishops house to help the jovenes with family history!! i am getting a bit addicted!! haha its so fun! and hard too!! but awesome. Then we ran to Walmart to get cupcakes for Eunice because it was her birthday!! we surprised her and then taught her and she told us she wants to get baptized! She just has to get divorced and then married! She can totally do it and we are so excited for her! :) Then that night we went to see Maria and Valerie and Oswaldo. They were having a party for Oswaldo for his birthday. So we got to party with them! it was fun. Then we went and saw the Familia Morales. They are the BEST!!! They kept joking around about the Word of Wisdom. Kinda had to be there. Love that family though!

Sunday morning was CRAZY. We stopped by EVERYONE to get them to church!! and guess who finally came. MARIA AND VALERIE!!!! Finally!!! it was sooo great!! So did Erica Hernanadez. We also had tons of less actives show up. It was just a happy happy sunday :) It had some down sides but mostly upsides!! :) 

Basically it was just an amazing week and I dont think words can describe how I feel about it. I just love this work so much. Its hot here. And its a lot of work. But I love every single second of it. I thought for a second today about going home and it made me cry. This is my home. I love this so much and I wouldnt trade all the bad and good times for anything!! :) Thank you for all your prayers and love and support! Love you all!

Con amor, Hermana Dorian

Following Ammon's Example

I just want to start off with a scripture. James 5:20. 

 Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. 

We as missionaries are saving a multitude from sin as we first repent ourselves, and then invite EVERYONE to do something and to repent!! We are all imperfect and EVERYONE needs this gospel. I just love this scripture so much and it hit me really hard when I read it in personal study this week. 

Okay so this week was haaaarrrrrddddddd. But good as well!! Just like about every week. So on Monday night, we played futbol with the kids at a trailer park. It was SO fun!! I was soooo tired though afterwards. And we lost :( so sad. The kids are gonna help me practice though! But before that we were ready to go and help a recent convert cut the grass in her yard but we show up and it was already done!!!! So we asked her what happened and she said that another recent convert's boyfriend had come over and done it for her!! SO NICE. The people here are so great. They just help everyone out! 

The downside of having a car is that we only have a certain amount of miles. On a bike, we had "unlimited" miles. No stress. But in a car, its not that way. lammeee. haha so we were sooooo stressed about miles this week. So Tuesday we went out on bikes for a little bit. Its really hot and humid here. But I just kept reminding myself that I am not doing this for me. This is all for the Lord and these people. Well we bike to our appointment and she wasnt there. She forgot she was meeting with us..... So we just tried a less active close to that area that we have been trying for 2 weeks. SHE WAS HOME. MIRACLES. Man miracles truly do come from sacrifices. We invited her to church and talked about the sacrament. She says she cant wake up. Church starts at 2. ? We are going to work really hard to get her back to church! She still has a testimony!! We have to save that testimony. But anyways then we tried some other people that werent home and then had dinner with the Familia Garza. She was so sweet! And then we taught the english class. A nonmember was visiting a family in our ward and she came to the class. and we got to share a message with her :) saweet!!

Wednesday was fun. We drove to the trailer park where everyone lives and just tried everyone we know there! We walked by this guy getting stuff out of a van and he invited us in! His mom used to talk to missionaries and she loves her kids learning about the gospel. She says she just believes in her Bible though. haha so we talked to her and discussed with her why we have the Book of Mormon, who Joseph Smith is, and why he isnt in the Bible. We have gotten that question so much lately. "Why does it not mention Joseph Smith in the Bible?". I just wish i could sit down with people for 2 hours and just explain everything about the Restoration to them and how it makes so much sense. But we had a good discussion and were able to use scriptures from the Bible to support what we were saying! Said we could come back :) Then we ate dinner with the bishops wife and her kids and mom visiting from Mexico. As we were leaving, Sister Hironymous came outside with us and told us how she really wants us to come over and teach her mom and help her. She is a member but is not active in Mexico and doesnt go to church. But she goes every sunday when she is here. I LOVE her mom sooo much and so i am really excited to work with her and help her! We started on Family History with her this week and it was so fun to hear all her stories of when she joined the church. Then we went to see a less active family and I went to go to the bathroom and it smelled SO strong of smoke. It broke my heart. I dont even know them that well. But it just broke my heart. Soo... we taught the word of wisdom! Then their son didnt come to church on Sunday. So please pray for them!! 

I LOVE media referrals. Lately, our media referrals have truly been the prepared people. So this week we got a media referral for Heidi and Ester Estrada. We looked up their address on the GPS and it couldnt find it. So we were driving down the street it was on and I happened to look over and see the house number on a mailbox! So I pulled over fast to go find the house. Okay that was actually the day before. Fast forward to Thursday when we had an appointment with them. So we go and we had a lesson with Heidi and her husband Xavier. Xavier said that he is athiest. Anytime someone tells me that, it makes me sad. I'm just like.. "why??" There is SO much evidence that God exists!! He loves us so much. So we bore strong testimony of that with personal experiences in our lesson. We taught the whole Restoration and it was really powerful. I felt the spirit so strong and Xavier asked us some really good questions. He then asked us about repentance and the after life so we left him with Alma 34 and Alma 11 to read. He said he would read it and try to pray. And he was really excited to come to church!! Fast forward to saturday night, we went and just stopped by to remind them about church and he said he had read ALL of it AND PRAYED!!! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh! we feel SO good about them. They didnt come to church yesterday but we are going to find out why! I am not losing faith on them!!! This is going to bless their little family so much!! :) But then that night we played futbol again with the friends at the trailer park. It was a blast. The best part is that people come and stand around to watch us playing and having fun with the kids! :) And 2 of our investigators came to play with us! SO FUN!

FUNNY STORY: So we went to go find another referral and it happened to be where the english sisters live. So we knocked on the door and a black guy answered. I was like, "oh! Sorry we are looking for someone named Cesar and Tonia!" He was like, "upstairs." I was like oh okay! thank you! so we go up and we see a picture of Jesus Christ in the window. BAHA he thought we were looking for the sisters!! i was dying. i thought it was so funny. we are still in search of that referral! we will find them!! 

On Saturday, we went finding. We just went looking for all the former investigators in this one neighborhood! There were so many people being taught there. So we go looking for a man named Jose and he was actually outside watering his grass! So we start talking to him and he starts telling us he is catholic and all that stuff that we get all the time. So we testify of the Restoration and then he asks us, " if there is only one God, why are there sooo many churches?" Perfect question Jose. So I started testifying and teaching him why there are so many and then he started cutting me off and not letting me explain! I was getting really frustrated so I just was super bold with him and bore testimony of how things were changed after Christ was killed and His apostles but that we have ALL the same teachings of Christ in our church. NOTHING changed. He couldnt say anything after that. He was silent. And then accepted a Book of Mormon. I LOVE THIS WORK. 

So Ammon was an AWESOME missionary. He first served people, won their hearts, and then they were open to hearing his message. So this week, we ahve been trying to do that! Anytime  a member or investigator isnt home, we heart attack their door!!! everyone has loved it so far!! :) And we play soccer with the kids and just go out of our comfort box. Instead of just throwing our message at them, we try to win their hearts. Its been so much fun. Because we have such a wonderful message and if their hearts are open to it, they will be more receptive!

Well I hope yall have a great week!!! Pray for our investigators please!! I love you all so much!!! :)

Con muchhhoooo amor,

Hermana Dorian!

This week was FULL of miracles!!! And we taught a TON! 31 lessons. INSANE. We are sooo busy but I am loving every single second of this work. I love my area so much! I love my companion, I love the people, I love this gospel, I love just everything about being on a mission. We have been trying to be so exactly obedient and we have seen tons of miracles from it. I think it would take me all day to write all the miracles we have seen this week. But first off... HAPPY BIRTHDAY SARIAH! I cant believe you are already 17! Stop growing up would ya?! :)

 

Okay so Tuesday we had a recently returned missionary from the English ward come out with us! She just got back from Bolivia and her Spanish is perfect!! So it was awesome having her come out with us. She always brought the spirit in so strong. Especially in our lesson with Maria and Valerie. Holy cow AWESOME lesson!! We taught part of the Plan of Salvation and we were teaching and then it all got quiet and Maria said, "oh man... I feel like im going to..cry." AH THATS THE SPIRIT! we pointed out the spirit to her and she just gets it!!! We are prayinngggg that she gets baptized soon!! Her son is going on a mission soonish so we hope that helps!! 

 

Wednesday we went to District Meeting and then we had interviews with President Ashton!! He had me teach him the Kingdoms of glory and I made him laugh. haha it was awesome! He asked me a question that I had never thought of before and I had no idea how to answer it... so I just told him that that was a great question and that I would study it for him! he was dying. So then the coolest thing happened later that day. We went to teach a potential named Stella and we asked her for referrals. She said that her neighbor might be interested but that she is deaf and doesn't speak. Hermana Duncan got super excited because she knows sign language!! So we had a lesson with her!! I had NO idea what was going on but I felt the spirit so strong!! Her name is Rosa and we are having a lesson with her this week with the sign language missionaries. She was really grateful and open and it was just the coolest experience. I felt so much love for her! Then that night we saw Yvette and she wants to get baptized really bad but she wants her husband to baptize her! Her husband is a less active and returned missionary.. so we are praying so hard that he has a change of heart!!! I love Yvette and she is so ready!

 

Friday we went on some adventures! Our area just got made bigger and so we went to explore the area that we took from the elders! Funny story. I put a wrong address in the GPS for an investigator we were trying to find but we ended up finding a superrr awesome family!!! The mom doesn't go to any church which is perfect!! And she accepted baptism! We are sooo excited to teach them :) Miracle!! Oh and we ate about 4 tamales that day. Good thing I love them :) OH!! so we do this thing... where we are driving in the car and if we wave at someone and they wave back, then we pull the car over and get out to talk to them. So we got out and talked to this lady named Elsie and she is the cutest. We told her there is a temple in El Salvador where she is from and her face LIT UP! She was so happy!! So we are going backtonight to teach her about temples and show her the video of the El Salvador Temple! YAY!! I have such a strong testimony of talking to everyone!

 

Saturday we taught a TON! And it was awesome!! Another miracle. So we are really trying to talk to EVERYONE. So the night before, we talked to this girl named Mariela. She was outside playing soccer! I started talking to her and we told her we wanted to play soccer with her but that we would come back the next day! So we went back ready with our soccer clothes and everything but they were just about to leave. We got to teach them for 5 minutes though and they are a BEAUTIFUL family. A mother with 5 kids. They are all sooooo darling. And so open! They loved having us over and I loved being there. We are seeing them again tonight and playing soccer this time and applying it to the Plan of Salvation! Should be fun!

 

Sunday was full of miracles too!! 3 less actives that haven't come to church in a while came!!! And we had 3 investigators at church!! They all LOVED church!!! Then we saw the Familia Hernandez. A part member family. The mom doesn't really want to get baptized but the father wants to be an eternal family. It broke my heart that the mother didn't want to do anything and seeing how bad the father wanted to be an eternal family. Pray for that family!! They are amazing! And gave us MORE TAMALES. Enough to feed an army. :)

 

Well I don't have any more time but I love you all so much. Thank you for your love and support and I hope yall have a great week! This is truly the Lords work and I am SO happy to be where I am right now. I don't want to be anywhere but here! :)

 

Con mucho amor,

Hermana Dorian