Week Seventy-eight: Changes

Go Utes!

When Elder Guillen finished his service mission with his wife in the office.

I gave him this shirt to remember me and he loves it! 

This is a picture of him and Elder Peterson who is now serving in

 Brother Guillen's ward, in Morelia!!!

GO UTES!

This was a pretty crazy week. i know i say that almost every week, but im serious this time! So Tuesday, we had exchanges with Elder Luna and Elder Tempest, and the next day we went to a tiny town called Yahualica to do some baptismal interviews. In all my time in the mission i had never been on a bus trip outside of Guadalajara, but this week i did! the people there speak with a really funny accent and when we left i found myself talking like them hahaha. so we spent all Wednesday traveling and doing interviews. Thursday we did our weekly planning session and then after our food appointment,  at 2 we had a bunch of awesome lessons. We taught Pedro, Livier, and the grand-daughter of a less active sister and all the lessons were amazing!

Thursday morning we went to the offices to help out Elder and Sister Anderson in the offices and go to a meeting with all the ward and stake councils from the 3 stakes in Guadalajara that are in our mission. Elder De Hoyos presided and helped us know how to better work as members and missionaries to improve the work here. Elder De Hoyos is the Area President of Mexico, so it was kind of a big deal for us. Saturday morning we had a 3 zone conference with Elder De Hoyos, his wife, and President Egginton. His wife couldn't come because she is sick :( Please pray for her!! After the conference we had a leadership council with Elder De Hoyos, his wife and President Egginton that was really awesome and helped us a lot to realize the vision of the mission and missionary work in Mexico. 

Right after the leadership council, we went to the Temple with President Egginton and the Anderson's because Elder Martinez was finishing the mission and I got to go with him because only him and one other elder finished the mission this change. While in the temple I got to see a lot of members from my first area Patria because a young man was getting ready to serve a mission! it was amazing for me because the young man was completely inactive while i was there and didn't want anything to do with the church and now he is going on a mission!!! After the temple, we went out for tacos with the temple group and the secretaries.

Sunday we went to the Cruz Del Sur ward (the ward where I was in while in the offices) and I got to see a lot of familiar faces. After church we went to the mission home for Elder Martinez last interview and dinner. Elder Mathews, the other missionary finishing the mission, had his family come pick him up, so his brother, sister, and parents were in the dinner as well with the assistants and the Anderson's. After dinner we had a small devotional and then I went to stay with the secretaries and Elder Martinez stayed with the Assistants to go home this morning.

 All day today I have been arranging the transfers and now we have 2 new missionaries with us tagging along for the day before they get their trainers tomorrow. Its super funny to see them and remember my first day in the mission being super tired and confused hahaha. Also, today I received my new companion. his name is Elder Zuniga and he is from Honduras. I already kind of knew him before, but not very well. He has 13 months in the mission and seems pretty cool, so we'll see how everything goes!

During the meetings we had with President De Hoyos, we talked about the difference between baptizing a convert and baptizing a converted person. Elder De Hoyos shared a story with us that one of the Apostles had shared. He said that a man found a pearl of great price and sold all he had to buy it. After buying it, he wanted everyone to see its beauty. So he had a beautiful box made to present the pearl and put it on display outside his house.People every once and a while would stop to admire what the man had put out on display, and after a while the man realized that the people were only admiring the beauty of the box, so in his anger he took his pearl of great price in his house and never took it our again. In this example, the atonement of Jesus Christ is the pearl of great price and the church and its programs and organizations are the box.

CHALLENGE: Make sure you are admiring the pearl of great price and not the box!!!! The Atonement of Jesus Christ is the greatest gift that has ever been given and will ever be given. Discover its healing and strengthening power!!

I love you all!! thank you for all your love and support! Sorry only one picture this week :/

Elder Wagner