The Great Christmas Honk

This week was full of really great as well interesting experiences. Monday, I had a really neat opportunity to talk to this Barber guy who was cutting my companions hair. He had lived in Arizona for 27 years, illegally and so his English was perfect. I was able to share our beliefs and clear up all the misinformation about our church that he had, all in english so that was very very nice haha. As well as testify of the power of the Book of Mormon, and I gave him a copy and he was excited to read it. On Wednesday December 11 at 6 pm, about 800 trucks passed by the main street, all of them honking their horns non stop, and they all had a picture of Mary on the front of their trucks. And so tons of people gather on the sides of the street to watch. This is a Catholic tradition to celebrate the virgin Mary. But, the tradition with the trucks passing by is apparently only celebrated in Parral. We had a few Christmas/Light the World Activities this week. All the missionaries in Parral gathered in central, and for the first activity, we set up a table filled with Light the World calendars, Book of Mormons, and treats to entice all the kids to get their family to come over haha and it worked. We invited the people to accept the calendar, and to do the small act of service that was listed for the day. We also went out and contacted the people in the Plaza area to bring them over and it was a success! The next activity was 2 days later, and it was similar as the last one. But this time we had more tables, and more candy haha. And we also invited the people to write letters to the kids in the hospital, that we would then go and deliver the cards to these kids. On Sunday, we had an amazing experience with this family that we found. So a few days earlier, we were contacting and we contacted this house and a guy came out and we talked to him and asked him how he felt his relationship with God was. And his response was "Pues bien, gracias a Dios" which means "Well good, thanks to God." However, this is also the exact same response you will get to just about any question regarding how they are doing haha so I don't think he fully understood the question. And so on Sunday, we came back and contacted his house, and he wasn't there, but there were people that were shouting at us asking who we were. Eventually, they came out and they asked us if we wanted to come inside and have homemade tortillas with them. And so we accepted the invitation and went inside and got to know them. Living in this house, is a mom-Rose, of 2 boys, 2 girls and a grandma-Selena. And the mom told us that she Selena needed council, and so we talk to her and find out that her brother was the guy that was just recently killed just the other week. And so we had an amazing lesson with her and taught her the Plan of salvation. And when we explained to her where her brother is right now and that she will be able to live with him again, she was in tears. And so the lesson that I was able to learn here was that, part of Gods plan for some people, might be experiencing something devastating, such as the loss of your brother in a murder, that will then prepare that person to receive the Gospel of Jesus Christ. This experience in particular really opened my eyes to see how God works in different ways to accomplish his work for his children here on the Earth. Church on Sunday was very very different. For one, we had a homeless guy walked in ,before sacrament meeting was about to start, and started asking the congregation for money. That Sunday was also the presentation of the primary, and so we had over 40 people at church! But, there wasn't enough kids to sing all by themselves, so everyone just sang for every song haha. Then afterwards, they served al the kids cake, coke, and sandwiches, and they enjoyed that. Later that night was when we had our experience with Rosa and Selena. But after them, we went to go visit Sotero and Vicky However, before we got there, this other homeless guy stopped us and he said a bunch of crazy stuff, like he had a pistol in his bag and that he had killed a lot of people. He also asks for our number and for pamphlets, and so I hand him a pamphlet. However, I accidentally handed him one in English, and so I try and take the other one back in exchange for a Spanish one, but he wouldn't give it back haha. Then, he says that he's going to leave and he goes to shake our hand and grabs my hand forcefully and does the Catholic cross thing using my hand on himself, finishing by kissing my hand and doing the same to my companion. So that was wierd haha. So yea that was my week, I hope yall had a good week! Take care everyone!

Elder Talbot