Weekly Letter: May 19-24

Para todos uds.:

So another week has gone! This week was a little different. It´s funny, we had a whole lot less time to tract and have appointments this week, but somehow our numbers didn´t indicate it. This last Monday was, of course P-day, (as it always is) and then Tuesday was the missionary changes, which took up about all of the day all the way until the comida at 3:00pm, and we also had a Zone-district meeting on Thursday morning for two hours(we usually have those on Mondays, but this week was different with the changes) So we had a lot less time actually teaching and contacting people.

That being said, our numbers for this week are close to double what they were last week. I didn´t even realize how much work we were doing until Saturday night I realized how many lessons we had taught and how many people we had invited to church. I attribute all the improvement to our Zone´s renewed focus on reading the Book of Mormon in one transfer.

Yeah, this is going to be intense, but basically every companion in personal study, after we´ve planned and gotten ready for bed...in short every spare moment in the day(of which there isn´t much) we´re reading in the Book of Mormon. This time, our District leader decided that we´re going to read it chronologically, which means we are to have Ether and 1 Nephi done by today....and when I talked to my District leader, Elder Steed(who also went to Alta), he told me that pretty much all the District and the Zone is in good shape, and that all the numbers and the success have measurably increased.

It is crazy how many times the Lord sees fit to guide you in certain paths. Out of what may seem pure circumstance, we encountered a great help in the ward....named Manuel Piña. He´s a relatively recent convert(about three years or so) who is of missionary age. On account of some mix-up in paperwork, he wasn´t able to go on a mission when he wanted to, and now he is in school. But he had been going out and helping the Missionaries for about 6 months(sometimes basically living as a missionary without a call), but then went inactive after the trouble with the paperwork, and had been inactive for about three months.

That´s when we entered the scene, opening the area up after one and a half transfers without missionaries, and starting literally from scratch. We basically relied on the Area book and found a former investigator that lived down the street in an apartment complex. The investigator wasn´t there, but as we were getting ready to leave, I saw a picture of Jesus on the door of one of the apartments upstairs(only this was an LDS publication, so I recognized it right away). There we found the Piña family, and to make a long story short, we have now acquired his help at least once or twice every week to find former investigators, recent converts, and inactives. In short, his help has been invaluable. It´s truly interesting to see how the Lord truly knows his children and guides us to where we need to be, even without knowing it.

Unfortunately, this week, we kind of ended on a bad note. We invited tons to the chapel on Sunday, but had a very poor showing (that being 0 investigators, and 4 inactives). It was a little discouraging to see all that work that we did in what really was about half a week go to waste. But, we´re still working hard with the members, especially the references that we received last week, and we´re going to work hard to get more references this week. I just hope that we can get more people to the chapel.

Hermana Ábrego, still has problems with work on Sundays, but she is still going at it strong. We had a dinner appointment with her and her sister(who is also having us over for the lessons), and we had left her a Book of Mormon about two weeks ago and asked her to read a certain chapter, which she had completed by the time we talked to her last week. We then encouraged her to read from the introduction, and if she felt good about it, to keep going....well she must have felt pretty good about it, because when we talked to her last Tuesday, she was already half-way through 1 Nephi, already reading all of introductions, witnesses, testimonies, all of that. And, she understands and loves it. She talked about how beautiful Lehi´s vision was, and how powerful it was for her when she read about Nephi seeing Christ's condescension to come to the earth and complete his mission on the earth.

Wow! What an experience! Anyway, this week was great week, and I´m hoping for an even better following week. I don´t have really anytime right now because I´ve got to go to the District Meeting in about 20minutes, which is in another area. So I will talk to all of you next week. Take care you guys!

Con Amor,

Elder Thomas Blackham

Weekly Letter: May 4-10, 2010

Para todos uds:

Another week in Mexico. Wow! I thought time in the MTC was weird, but it seems to be a weird thing during the entire mission. At times, it felt like the day was lasting forever, but this week really flew by! What they told me in the MTC still rings true here, ¨the days feel like weeks and the weeks feel like days.¨ My companion also says that the months feel like days too, but I have yet to experience that in the field. Speaking of my companion, it´s kind of weird, even though we haven´t been together an entire transfer, I think this is the longest amount of time so far in my mission that I've been in the same companionship. It´s pretty wild.

Things in this area are....coming. As of yet, we're still working on finding investigators. Right now we really only have three families that I would consider consistent investigators, and maybe only one of the three as progressing as of yet. So right now we are finding lots of people, trying to find/contact them, often without consistent success. It's kind of weird that you can be teaching a person for three times, be setting an appointment and still not be sure if they'll be there at the time you set. We have been visiting many members of the ward here, many of which are inactive. We have been giving them copies of the Book of Mormon and a ¿reference card? (pass-along card) We then challenge them to pray to know which person they know that they can share this book with. They have received the challenge pretty well, a few of them are understandably shy, but in the end they agreed to do it. We´re going to make rounds again with the same members during this next week and hopefully we´ll have some references.

Now, regarding our investigators. Hermana Ábrego attended church for the third time this week, and brought her daughter with her. She really enjoyed the service, which was fast and testimony meeting (It got moved back one week because last week was Stake conference) and we challenged her to be baptized. She said she didn't feel ready, so we left her something to read, and we´re going to contact her during this week. (We don't know when she can be baptized, because she works the following Sundays, and we have no clue when she'll have another descanso on Sunday) Still, I feel like the message of the gospel has really helped her. She´s been having some hard times with her family, but she seems to be progressively happier every week, which, of course, is the gospel working in her life. She really enjoys the lessons, the people in the ward, and everything. She even signed up in Relief Society to have us over for dinner next week! I just hope that she recognizes this happiness for what it is and decides to get baptized.

The other investigators....still welcome us to their houses, and are really receptive to the messages, but one isn't willing to fulfill commitments consistently and the other gets caught up in his own beliefs (which are pretty close to the truth), and doesn't see the need to attend our meetings on Sunday. He says that his religion is his personal relationship with God. We've been really working hard with both of them, for them to make connections that if the Book of Mormon is true and if Joseph Smith was a true prophet, that this church is true. However, you cannot force anyone to believe anything, it´s all done by the spirit.

So that´s more or less this last week. Sunday, by far, was the best day of the week, so going into this week, things are looking up! Thank you all for your love and support.

Con Amor,

Elder Blackham

Weekly Letter: April 21-27

Para todos uds:

As promised, I sent some pics with this email. Most of them are from the MTC, but I did send a few from the field. I´ll send more next week.

Life in Mexico is....different. The people are awesome and really friendly, sometimes too much so. Whenever we contact anyone and we make an appointment with them, we have to take it with a grain of salt, because pretty everyone you talk to is going to look like their interested and will want to make another appointment, but will never be there when you pass by. I´m not sure that being rejected hard straight-up would be worse than getting your hopes up only to find that the investigators went ¨chafa¨ on you.

That being said, reopening an area is pretty difficult at the start, because you starting from scratch...which means your walking....a lot. However, things have started looking up lately. We´ve got several new investigators now, including two families that we've taught at least twice, both of them are reading and doing their commitments. They both have doubts, but that´s to be expected at first. One member of one of these families, Hermana Ábrego, came to church yesterday! Her daughter and husband were not able to, but she did! She´s been have hard times lately, so I hope she felt loved by the members.

The other family is very spiritual and really like to talk, but that´s good thing....when you don´t have another appointment directly after them. We learned after the first lesson to set aside a good two hours after the appointment before setting another!

Other aspects of life here in Mexico: the food is great!....just different, so your body has to make certain adjustments,(I won´t go too far in detail about these adjustments, but I just hope I´m almost done). They like stuff really spicy. I thought I liked spicy before my mission (my family can attest to the fact that I basically drank salsa), but, man, my mouth was not made to handle this kind of spice. Maybe that´s why they talk so fast down here, they've got stronger mouths than us gringos. Also they like lime, my companion especially. I like lime too, so that isn't a bad thing, it´s only that he puts it on EVERYTHING he eats! Whatever he eats, he either puts lime or honey on it....and sometimes both.....it´s a little weird, but I´m getting used to it.

Of course, he´s probably writing home right now about how his Gringo companion basically has a love affair with leche. This also shouldn't be a surprise to my family. I love milk, and I've really had to tone it down here in Mexico because milk is a lot more expensive down here than it is in the U.S.(of course, everything else is a lot cheaper to buy here. For example: we bought 3 avocados for about $5.60 Pesos....or the equivalent of about 43 U.S. cents)



Don´t worry all of you, I haven´t drank the water yet. What I didn't realize is that the people here in Mexico don´t really drink it either. They usually boil it and then add fruit juice and sugar (usually lime). So I should be okay during my mission, because everyone here seems to be aware that the water here isn't good to drink. Last week, after playing soccer non-stop for about an hour-and-a-half as a district, I wanted more than anything to drink the water from the kitchen sink in the chapel, but my companion told me that that was not a good idea. He told me he was thirsty too, but that we would wait until after the district meeting to buy refrescos.

Speaking of soccer, it´s funny, at every chapel, there is an outdoor cement field for soccer. So churchball here is basically football. Every friday night, the Plateros and the Puerta Grande wards meet at the chapel to play soccer. It´s actually a way cool tool to meet people and invite investigators to come to the chapel and do the same.

Anyway, time is short, I better get off soon. Thanks for all your prayers and support. I hear that my brother posted my pouch mail info on the blog, go ahead and use it, it´s very reliable because it´s sponsored by the church. There´s about a week delay, but it will get to me.

Con Amor,

Elder Blackham