Bonus Photos from October 31, 2015 Our district at a baptism

Photos compliments of Elder Clifford (tallest)
These pictures are pictures of my district from some baptisms on Saturday.

Week Sixty-four: Hurricane Patricia

 Hurricane Patricia survivors:
Left to right: Ramon, Zurita, Myself and Gonzalez

So this week Thursday we decided to travel to the offices to help out Elder Zurita the next day and return to our area Friday.... no one decided to tell us that the biggest hurricane to ever hit the northern hemisphere in recorded history was going to hit Guadalajara the very next day. So we arrived at the offices, stayed the night and the next day started working in the offices.... we then found out about hurricane Patricia. all of a sudden our leaders started calling us and telling us that we needed to be in our houses by  4 pm that day and also needed to buy food to last 2-3 days. Then Elder Zurita told us that they had known about the storm since Monday or Tuesday!!! Apparently they had already been making plans as everything but no one informed us haha but its all good because we ended up staying with the secretaries in their house! On Friday we played chess, watched "Seventeen Miracles", and played around with the soccer ball to pass the time and were prepared to stay all day Saturday in the house. When we woke up Saturday, we were really confused because it was only sprinkling outside and wasnt windy at all. Then our leaders said that everyone could work as if it was a normal day. We were all safe and nothing happened, but to be honest we were a little let down. We were so ready to bunker down and have a man cave day, but then it ended up just being a few hours of light rain. 

Nothing was damaged, and no one was hurt and that's the most important.

Elder Wagner and Oscar

Saturday We returned to our area and went with our investigator Oscar to the temple!  It was a miracle that we were able to go. the entire ward was  going to go, but then everyone got scared from the hurricane and almost no one went, but we still went on the bus with Oscar. After seeing to temple from outside, we went into the chapel next door to teach Oscar, but when we went inside, we found a bunch of missionaries from the other mission and found out they were having a baptism! So we stayed for the baptism and it was a great experience for Oscar. Also, he went to church yesterday, so we are hoping that within the next 3 or 4 weeks we can get him ready for his own baptism!!

Elder Gonzalez and Elder Wagz

We also had a great experience with a family in our ward yesterday, we went to eat at their house and then we met with them about which of their friends would be ready to receive the gospel. It took us a while, but it was all worth it. They gave us the names and addresses of 13 families that they are going to visit this week and Sunday they are going to give us a report!!! They are both returned missionaries and it shows!!! They are named the Yañez family. The father asked me if I have any relatives around the age of 70 or 80 who served a mission in Mexico because his father was baptized by an Elder Wagner, so there's some homework for you dad!!

Mexico Guadalajara Temple

Scripture to ponderize: Moroni 7:48 Pray to be filled with love.

Challenge: Yesterday at church one of the lessons was a metaphor about different types of seeds and the dirt they are planted in and the results of how the plant grows. There were 3 types of dirt, the shallow earth, the thorns, and the good soil. Long story short, the seeds that are in the shallow soil grow a little, but when challenges come along, they dont have the roots (or a real testimony) to withstand the trials and they are destroyed. The seeds in the thorns are surrounded by trials and cannot grow well and it is hard for them to see the light (someone who is surrounded by trials and cannot progress well). and finally, the good soil is where we can grow, be nourished and be nurtured by the word of God. WHERE ARE YOU PLANTED? The challenge this week is to search for the good soil and plant yourself there! If you are in the shallow soil or in the thorns, get out and plant yourself where the Lord can nourish you!!!

I love you all so much! Thank you for all your prayers and support!

Con amor, Elder Wagner

Mexico Guadalajara Temple at night

Week Sixty-three: Visit from Elder Durrant with video and photos

Meeting Elder Durrant
 (who used to live in the same neighborhood as Elder Wagner's mom)

Elder Gonzalez, Oscar (investigator), Rogelio (Recent convert), and I

This week was going fine and normal until Wednesday night.. we had eaten really spicy food 2 days in a row. Disclaimer: the food was more spicy for my Mexican companion than it was for me. But then Wednesday night i felt really weird and felt the second round of spiciness in the bathroom before going to bed. then Thursday i woke up and felt really crappy and we went out and worked because i thought it was something small that i was going to get over in a few days. then it got better then worse, but the worst part was a raging headache and i didnt want to eat anything. we only went to our appointments and then went back to the house to rest until Saturday. Saturday morning we got up early and had a meeting with Elder Durrant which ill tell more about after this story. we got back from the meeting (during the meeting i felt fine and didnt have many symptoms of sickness) but when we got back i felt really bad and pretty much just went to sleep. Sunday morning i woke up and had a huuuge headache and couldnt even get out of bed to go to church, so later in the afternoon, the bishops sons took us to the hospital and they told me i had a stomach infection (big surprise) and they gave me an iv and medicine right there on the spot. yesterday i stiff felt sick so we didnt get to leave the house, but today i feel a lot better and we were able to get the necessities done and thats why im writing on Tuesday! Welcome to Mexico! the land of delicious food that you love and hate at the same time because it gets you sick!!!

Elder Del Toro and I. This was also my last time seeing Elder Del Toro (tear)

Elder Toala and I. This was the last time I"ll see Elder Toala
before we are both back from the mission.
He's going to play football for UW, so look out for him!

Meeting with Elder Durrant: They told us about a week ago i think, or maybe two that we were going to be meeting with him so we were pretty excited. my first thought when he walked into the room; holy cow this guy is huge!!! he is seriously like 6,8 or something like that. hes enormous!!! and he speaks Spanish! it surprises me to see how many leaders in the church speak Spanish. He is the first counselor in the presidency of Sunday school for the church, so he did a lot of activities with us to help us learn how we can teach better and be better missionaries and i liked it a lot. he helped me realize that i need to get to know the New Testament better hehe. 

Thanks for all your prayers and love!!! I love you guys!!!

Con cariño, Elder Wagner

Elder Wagner with his buddies Elder Del Torres and Elder Clifford
at the Leadership Conference 

(Left Elder Gonzalez) Elder Wagner and Clifford with their "sons".
(Missionaries whom they are training)

Elder's Gonzalez, Tzub with their "dads" Elder Wagner and Clifford
Wagner and Clifford were in the same district in the MTC

Below is a video clip of the leadership conference that Elder Durrant taught in. 

Elder Wagner can been seen in it at 1:10 and 4:54

Below are random photo's from Hermana Egginton that she posted on Facebook:

Week Sixty-two: Still haven't found a forest here...

my daily breakfast (moms gonna be so proud!)

I'm still really confused as to why this place is called forest. after lots of searching i still havnt found a forest.

Everything is great! the ward is really willing to help us and we actually received over 100 names of references from the members this week! the bishop had us give out slips of paper to everyone at church and before starting the testimony part of the meeting he spoke a little about missionary work asked that everyone wrote all the names of all their relatives, friends, and neighbors on the piece of paper! now all we have to do is visit all the members who gave us names and go visit these people and share the gospel with them!!! we are really excited for this upcoming week!!! 

Elder Gonzalez sleeping on the bus (it was a long second week on the mission)

Oscar is our only investigator with a high possibility of progressing right now. he is about 25 and has a christian background. he likes listening to us and learning more, but he has troubles getting up and going to church because its at 9 and thats early for him (to be honest, it would be hard for me too if i wasnt a missionary hahaha). 

We visited a lot of members this week to get to know the ward leaders and were able to help a family paint their house! i was really scared i wasnt going to do it well and they would thank us for our help and then start re-painting what we did the second we left the house hahaha. but it turned out good and they said they didnt have to put on a second coat! hahaha i had no idea i knew how to paint! or maybe they just lied to us to make us feel good lol. oh and my companion painted the ceiling, but i think he got more paint on his face than on the ceiling hahaha.

a few days ago we went to a big supermarket kind of like walmart named chedraui to use the bathroom and this is what i found. ive never seen a step pedal next the the toilet to flush it hahaha. welcome to mexico elder wagner! youve been in the offices too long!

Challenge: think of someone who needs the gospel in their life and go with the missionaries to visit that person. i think this has been the challenge like 5 times already, but i can tell you with 100% certainty that helping others gain a testimony of the restored gospel is one of very few things in this life that will bring you real, everlasting joy!

Scripture to memorize and ponder: last week i chose D&C 121:44-46 because the mission has a goal to memorize verses 34-46 before the next zone meetings and those are the only two i have left. I did it!!! this week i chose alma 26:30. what scripture will you choose?!?!

I love you all!!!!!! thank you for all your love and support!!!

Elder Wagner

Week Sixty-one: Week one in Bosques

giant bread that i found here. it wasnt too good to be honest :( but it was big!

Week one in Bosques: Well, it was a week of a lot of walking and calling the other missionaries in our ward for directions. Neither one of us knows the area very well, so we got lost almost every day trying to get the the food appointments. Example: Wednesday we went to eat with the garcia family and they told us to talk a certain bus. i asked the sister if we needed to take the bus going up the hill or down the hill and she told me going down and i asked her about 3 times to be sure and she responded the same each time. so when we took the bus we noticed that we left our area and entered the zone leaders area which wasnt too alarming because i we had to do it once before to get to a food appointment. After about 15 minutes in the bus we called the sister to make sure we were going the right way. we explained where we were at and she had no clue where we were. so we got off and she had us talk to her husband. after talking for a little bit we realized we had taken the bus going to wrong way! the sister had told me to take the bus going down because in this area there are two neighborhoods named "Altamira" and she thought we were in the other one!!! so that sums up pretty well how well weve been able to get around the area this week, but we have already improved a lot!

welcome to my new area! its called bosque (forrest)
 but theres no forrest here hahaha

After 9 months of being in a nice comfy chair all day i get a little bit tired at the end of the day... or maybe at about 4 pm hahaha but im getting my legs back and were hittin the pavement! we had a great meeting yesterday with the ward mission leader and the bishop, so we are really exited to work hard this week!

I hope you all enjoyed general conference and received the answers you were looking for! 

Challenge #1: Find a talk that you like and study it deeply. its always good to listen to talks just once and get the general message, but when we deeply study the words of the living prophets, we can find more answers than we ever thought was possible!

Challenge #2: Take Brother Durant´s challenge the choose a scripture every week and ponder its message daily. write it on a piece of paper and put it in a place you will see it every day. our mission has taken the challenge, so join us!!

Thank you for all your support and love! i love you all!

Elder Wagner

Elder Rojo and I several months ago
(He has finished his mission, and recently tagged Zach in this photo on FB)