Week Ninety-nine: "No te mueras" PLUS: Photos found on Facebook from Sis. Egginton

This week our zone had interviews with President Egginton. I was super excited to get my last interview in before my exit interview that he will give me my last weekend here... But President told us that he wasnt going to interview Elder Clifford or me. these are his words "ill be seeing you guys in a few weeks". Dang! So he didnt interview me :( Its all good though. After he finished interviewing everyone in the zone he talked to Elder Ojeda and I and before finishing the meeting he grabbed my shoulder and said, "Elder Wagner, NO TE MUERAS!" (Which means "DONT DIE!". I feel like that is that everyone has been telling me these past few weeks haha.

 

This week was super busy. We had our zone conference, interviews with President Egginton, and our stake conference. All of this was done from Friday to Sunday, so we were busy planning everything during the first half of the week and then the second half we were busy doing it all. Elder Ojeda and I were asked to give small talks at the stake conference and it was pretty nerve racking. Now that I think about it, im pretty sure there were more people at my farewell talk than there were in the Saturday night session of this stake conference, but im pretty sure I was more nervous this time haha. Everything turned out great though!

During the stake conference, Elder Reyes, an area seventy, spoke a lot about keeping the Sabbath day holy. I looked back on how i had treated Sundays before the mission and realized that when i get back ill have to make some changes on my Sunday behavior! He reminded us of some amazing blessings that we can receive if we keep the Sabbath day holy and keep our covenants.

Challenge: This week is to find a way to change your Sunday behavior and make it more spiritual!

This week i am going to ponderize the scripture Alma 39:14 "Seek not after riches nor the vain things of this world; for behold, you cannot carry them with you."

I forgot to take pictures this week, but ill try to do better this week!

Where's Elder Wagz?

Week Ninety-eight: Just one month left

I found this photo of Zach on his "myLDSmail" profile,
since he didn't send photos this week,
 I'm sharing it, even though it is low res. 

Time just keeps on flying by. We keep having really busy weeks and I feel like the time just keeps going by faster and faster every day!

Elder Ojeda and I had a lot of big plans and goals for this week and were expecting to have big results, but we had a lot of complications. In stead of working in our area, finding new investigators and so forth, we realized it was a lot more important to get together with the stake leaders and for that reason we were very busy in our area but saw very little progress in our area which was tough, but we feel like the work will now go forth better in the stake now that we have been working more with the stake leaders.

These photos are compliments of a Google search for scenery in
Lazaro Cardenas, the city Elder Wagner is serving in.

We went on divisions this week with Elder Clifford and Elder Herrmann. We went over to Zihuatanejo Thursday night and had a few meetings and then worked with them all day friday. I got to be with Elder Herrmann and got to know him really well. Hes from Utah... and to be honest i dont remember what part haha.. but hes really awesome and is learning and growing a lot.

CHALLENGE: This week we did a lot of preparation for our zone conference which will be this Friday. All the zone is going to read the talk named "To the rescue we can do it" from one of the past general conferences. So that is going to be the challenge this week and next week ill share what we learned as a zone!

My scripture to ponderize this week is Romans 8:6
"For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace."

Have a great week everyone!

Elder Wagner

Week Ninety-seven: First week with Elder Ojeda

This week Elder Ojeda and I worked a lot with the members to build the relationship between the members and the missionaries and so he could get to know them. As a result of this, we went to the ward activity to clean the chapel on Saturday. The members were trimming a tree and asked us to grab some brooms to poke the tree and get out all the dead leaves and dirt. There was a lot of dirt! Lets just say that when they started cutting the tree some bats came out hahahaha. So we were poking the tree and i got pretty into it... maybe a little bit too into it... you decide. I attached a picture of how I ended up after we finished.

Elder Ojeda is amazing! He helps keep me motivated and is learning the area really quick! Here in the mission when a missionary is close to finishing the mission they are called "Muertos" which means "Dead people".. kind of haha. So since I have very little time left on the mission people jokingly say that im "dead". My companion told me the other day "Elder, youre the most alive dead missionary I have met" haha so thats the kind of positive, uplifting companion I have. I am blessed!

This week I will be ponderizing Alma 37:37

"Counsel with the Lord in all thy doings, and he will direct thee for good; yea, when though liest down at night lie down unto the Lord, that he may watch over you in your sleep; and when thou risest in the morning let thy heart be full of thanks unto God; and if ye do these things, ye shall be lifted up at the last day."

Challenge: As a mission we have learned a lot about the importance of having a vision or knowing where you want to go so you can plan on how to get there. It has really helped me in the mission and it has also helped me set some long term life goals. So the challenge this week is to look at your life and see where you want to go so you can set goals to achieve that vision. You wont regret doing it!

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Week Ninety-six: The beginning of the last transfer

Heres a picture of a small Iguana
 that ran into our house when we opened the back door

Today I said goodbye to my last american companion Elder Hogge ;( He is actually going to the exact same area I was in before this one! I will receive today around 5pm Elder Ojeda my new companion! I got to see him start the mission and I have actually been on divisions with him and now he is going to be my companion! I dont know a lot about him, but I know that he is from Vera Cruz Mexico and is a great missionary! Ill attach a picture of us that we took last week with a good friend of mine who finished the mission last week.

Elder Ojeda is the one on the far left

Before Elder Hogge left we got our last hurrah in!  

The sister missionaries in our ward (Urieta and Powley) had made matching skirts and then we decided to have some matching ties made from the same fabric.

Elder Hogge and I even wore them to the leadership council and President and Sister Egginton LOVED it hahaha.To top it all off we all wore our matching stuff to church yesterday and sang a special number for Elder Hogge and Sister Urieta´s farewell because they both got transferred. 

Consejo de Liderazgo Junio 2016

This week we traveled to Pantla again for another baptismal interview and I had a super awesome experience with the baptismal candidate (Now recent convert). He has had his life completely changed through the gospel. He was extremely exited to tell me all about in in the interview. Im pretty sure the interview lasted 1.5 hours and i spoke about 15 minutes haha. he said something that really impacted me. He said that a while back he was just an unhappy person and that he felt empty, but now that he has found the church he feels like "a little kid with a new bike and he cant wait to wake up the next morning to go ride it again" those are his words. While I thinking about what he said, I was brought to a scripture in Alma 5:26. "And now behold, I say unto you, my brethren, if ye have experienced a change of heart, and if ye have felt to sing the song of redeeming love, I would ask, can ye feel so now?" I know that all of us have felt that "new bike" feeling and that is amazing. Now the question is, can we feel it now? I like to reflect on this scripture a lot to try and get closer to my Heavenly Father and repent every day. 

Challenge: Ask yourself Can i feel that same feeling now? if not, make the necessary changes. If yes, great job! Keep doing what you're doing. I think I already left this as a challenge, but I really like it and i think it goes along great with the baptismal experience.

Thank you for all your love, support and prayers! I love you all and hope you have a great week! Just six little weeks left! I cant believe how fast its gone! Ive only got 6 more weeks to give it my all with Elder Ojeda, so ill keep you posted!

The following photos were emailed to Pam

 from Yaitza Sagnite Yañez Sandoval,

 as per Elder Wagner's request :)

And this from Hermana Elizabeth Powley's camera: