Six Weeks In and So Much Progress!

 Hello everyone! Another terrific week we had here in Cuauhtemoc.

Today there were transfers and let's just say there were too many problems here, so 7 out of the 12 people left the zone, so we have a fresh new start over here in Cuauhtemoc.

 

We did an awesome missionary activity as a ward where the members split up with other members and went to go visit the inactives. This was the first time that this branch had done an activity like that, so it was really nice to see! The inactive member we visited with one of the members came to church the next day and the rest of his family are members so we are going to jump all over the opportunity to help him and his family learn about the restoration of the fullness of the gospel and Church of Jesus Christ!

 

On Sunday we had a miracle. The neighbors of this member family were invited to church by the members and they came to church and they really enjoyed it and said they would be back next Sunday! Their names are Hermano Juan and Hermana Lupi. We are going to go visit them later this week to get to know them better and teach them.

We should be returning back to green light this week which is really good news because we have found it difficult to help the people we teach progress unless we are with them in person and they see our faces and feel that what we are teaching is really important in their lives.

Hermana Blanca has been reading the Book of Mormon and said she likes it so she is progressing well and we are just trying to get her to come to church, just like everyone else we are teaching.

We have seen massive progress in our area, even in the last six weeks that we have been here. We literally got here and there was no one being taught, no inactives being taught, no work being done with the members, and no one coming to church. But now we have all of those so we are stoked to see how much more service and progress we can render here in the next six weeks!

 

I finished the Book of Mormon again, along with the institute manual and I have got to say that out of all the times I have read the Book of Mormon, it was by far the most enjoyable and impactful experience. I have also started to read the New Testament with the institute manual and have already absolutely loved it. Right now I am in Matthew 26 and as I read and imagined all the suffering and criticism the Savior went through in his last day before he died, it expanded my understanding of the love that he has for us. I came across the following quote in the manual that I would like to share.

 

Gerald N. Lund, who later became a member of the Seventy, wrote about the Savior’s voluntary choice not to use His power to defend Himself from the abuses He experienced:

 

“Imagine the Being whose power, whose light, whose glory holds the universe in order, the Being who speaks and solar systems, galaxies, and stars come into existence—standing before wicked men and being judged by them as being of no worth or value!

 

“When we think of what he could have done to these men who took him to judgment, we have a new and different sense of his condescension. When Judas led the soldiers and the high priests to the Garden of Gethsemane and betrayed him with a kiss, Jesus could have spoken a single word and leveled the entire city of Jerusalem. When the servant of the high priest stepped forward and slapped his face, Jesus could have lifted a finger and sent that man back to his original elements. When another man stepped forward and spit in his face, Jesus had only to blink and our entire solar system could have been annihilated. But he stood there, he endured, he suffered, he condescended” (“Knowest Thou the Condescension of God?” in Bruce A. Van Orden and Brent L. Top, eds., Doctrines of the Book of Mormon: The 1991 Sperry Symposium [1992], 86).

 

Jesus Christ’s response when Peter cut off the ear of the high priest’s servant shows the compassion of the Son of God even toward those who wished to harm Him.

 

As Christmas season is approaching I invite all to read once again the life and ministry of Jesus Christ as recorded in the New Testament in Matthew - John you might as well pull out the institute manual while you are at it:) I know that as we do so, it helps us remember the purpose of why we celebrate Christmas and it brings the real meaning of the Christmas Season to life. 

Have a fabulous week everybody!

 

Elder Talbot

 

 

Plenty of Work to Do

 Hello again everybody this week has been a solid one 

Lets start off with some of the bad news. Unfortunately we are returning to the yellow light which means we can't teach insides homes or contact in the street or houses, but it is supposed to only last for 2 weeks!

Another thing that happened thus week was three police officers died about four minutes away from where we live. But no worries, we are safe!

Baptism

Okay so now here are the good news. One of the lesson active families that we had been working with had their 8 year old boy Baptized. Their family will be leaving to montana in a few momths but it has been a great experience working with them and teaching their boy!

Member Visits

●We visited la hermana zobaida, she spent about na hour telling us about her crazy experiences. She was going through a time when she wanted to get divorced, at the same time she had cancer, she was lookikg to find God, and so one night she literally prayed the whole night asking for help, then the next morning the missionaires came and knocked on her door! She eventually got divorced, then baptized, then helped her friend get baptized! Then we talked to her about la hermana Wendy from last week that we visited, they had the same cancer problem so she has been trying to help her.

Non-member lessons

●We had a great lesson with someone we are teaching named la hermana blanca we walked to her house and had a lesson with her and her 3 year old kid, we taught them about the restoration and invited them to read the book of Mormon and prayed, she received the lesson really well and has a lot of potencial!

●We had a really nice, smoke and distraction free lesson with la hermana Josefina. She is the mom of three kids that got baptized but never were active. We taught her about the restoration of the gospel and we are excited to see her start reading the Book of mormon and progressing!

●Then we visited this other inactive family and it's another interesting situation. The wife of one of the inactive families sons got baptized about 2 years ago, but never came back and got confirmed so we started teaching them.

Less active visits

●Then we had a visit with a less active family and it was interesting. The mom is la Hermana Bustillos, and let me say she is very crazy. She is still honestly convinced that covid doesn't exist because she has never got it. On the way out, she showed us her Marijuana plant...we thought she was kidding and didn't believe her until we decided to smell it, but uhhh yup she wasn't kidding. Then her daughter la Hermana azul kept calling me some name that I didn't understand because it was one of the thousands of slang words they use down her. But apparently she was trying to tell me that I was a guy that had a lot of girlfriends back at home...okaaaayy

●We gave a bible an inactive dad that we are going going start working with

The food

●A member made us super good discada this week - Sausage, ham, salchicha, weenie, cow meat, potatoes, tortillas, cheese, salsa

I want to finish with a quote I enjoyed from my studies from the prophets about prayer, agency, and action.

As parents and leaders, we must remember that ‘it is not meet that [the Lord] should command in all things’ [D&C 58:26]. Like the brother of Jared, we must carefully consider the needs of our family members, make a plan to meet those needs, and then take our plan to the Lord in prayer. This will require faith and effort on our part, but He will help us as we seek His assistance and do His will” (in Conference Report, Apr. 2003, 15; or Ensign, May 2003, 16).

"The Lord wants us to grow and learn as we make our own decisions. He also wants us to take our conclusions to Him frequently for His confirmation. When the brother of Jared asked the Lord about the matter of light for the vessels, the Lord answered with a question of His own: “What will ye that I should do that ye may have light in your vessels?” (Ether 2:23). According to President Harold B. Lee (1899–1973), the Lord’s question was similar to saying the following:

                                “‘Well, have you any good ideas? What would you suggest that we should do in order to have light?’ …

                                “Then the Lord went away and left him alone. It was as though the Lord were saying to him, ‘Look, I gave you a mind to think with, and I gave you agency to use it. Now you do all you can to help yourself with this problem; and then, after you’ve done all you can, I’ll step in to help you.’”

                                After considering the possibilities, the brother of Jared demonstrated his great faith by asking the Lord to touch 16 stones and supply light. The Lord answered this plea and not only provided light for the vessels but gave this faithful man a vision unlike any other.

                                President Lee concluded: “This is the principle in action. If you want the blessing, don’t just kneel down and pray about it. Prepare yourselves in every conceivable way you can in order to make yourselves worthy to receive the blessing you seek”

Pictures

1. Baptism

2. Discada

3. Food

4. A cute chihuahua en chihuahua:)

Week Three in Cuatehemoc

 This week has been exceptional. We had two people show up to church on sunday. One of them was the sister of one of the members we had been working with- Hermano Noe - hes a convert to the church of about 3 years. Apparently the entire rest of his family are non members so there's a lot of work to do there.

The other non member that had been showing up to church and we hadn't even realized was the niece of an active member, named Mauricio. So we are going to start working and helping these two people.

For our fast Sunday meal, the members fed us some soup which had chicken on the bone. We all had a good time eating and then feeding the stray dogs the bones. It reminded me of the first time I was in Mexico when I would I always feed all the mean dogs, then those dogs would always start to like me

We had a very neat experience on Sunday evening. On Friday we got a call that we to see if we could go visit a very sick lady that lived in Anahuac. So we called our Mission President and we received permission to go. This place was previously closed because of some dangerous things that happened. So the members came and picked us up and we traveled to her house. We said a prayer and then we went inside to meet the her. Her name is Wendy, she probably has 35 years old. She has 2 little precious girls - five and three years old. We talked to her and she explained everything that had been happening to her. Since November of 2020, she has had cancer, and she has tumors in her legs. She has already had three operations /surgeries. She then told us that she will have another visit with the doctors, but te last time she went, they told her that there is no remedy. And so she was left to think that she will die soon and leave her two little ones behind. After everything we explained the priesthood and asked her if she would like for us to give her a blessing. We then proceeded to give her a priesthood blessing through the prayer of faith since we weren't allowed to touch her. It was a great reminder that the power of God has no limits. Jesus Christ healed so many people without ever touching them. The spirit was strong and afterwards we offered to come back and teach her the plan of salvation.

Just a few other highlights of this week

We received the list of all the members, made a map with all their names and directions and we started searching for them. We have had so much success so far and we are excited to continue!

We were able to found and start teaching eight new people this week. 

Keep these people in your prayers - Hermana Wendy - Sister with cancer, Laisa, Miguel, Gabriel, Jorge Calderon, Blanca and Octaviano, Alejandra and Ernesto, Josefina and Ornorio, and Jose

We had zone conference this week we woke up 5:30. We had interviews with president and got my new temple recommend,  

We had a zone inventory because there was a lot of problems within this zone  

Also I finished my BYU application  

 

The interesting lesson this week...

We had a lesson with Josefina and Ornorio, but he was drunk so he was super distractive...hopefully we catch a bit more perky next time

Something to Share - The infinite accessibility and power of prayer

President James E. Faust bore testimony of the gift and privilege we each have of access to our Heavenly Father through prayer: “Access to our Creator through our Savior is surely one of the great privileges and blessings of our lives. … No earthly authority can separate us from direct access to our Creator. There can never be a mechanical or electronic failure when we pray. There is no limit on the number of times or how long we can pray each day. There is no quota of how many needs we wish to pray for in each prayer. We do not need to go through secretaries or make an appointment to reach the throne of grace. He is reachable at any time and any place”

Elder Talbot

ZL in Cuauhtemoc with Elder Toledo

“Freedom” is now Drew described his transfer out of the office. He is glad that his 12 weeks there came to an end so he could get back out and work. He has a terrific companion, elder Toledo, from Mexico. They are the zone leaders and are both new to the area of Cuauhtemoc. Drew’s excited to have a companion who’s just as ready as he is to work hard, pray hard, do the Lord’s work, and teach the people of Cuauhtemoc about Jesus Christ. 

 

Mexican Independence Day

 

Anna Alicia came to the Mexican Independence Day celebration. 

Tough Times in the Office

Drew hasn’t written a letter for a while, but we’ve been able to visit with him each week, so I thought I’d include an update. He is with a companion that has a different definition of “work” than Drew has. Drew lives with five other missionaries. The AP’s work hard, but Drew’s companion and the other set of office elders don’t work after 5pm. They’re supposed to proselytize from 5-9pm. Drew has tried a variety of ways to coax and encourage his companion to get out and make visits but to no avail. He wrote his mission President a letter yesterday explaining his frustration and his desire to work. He feels like he’s wasting the Lord’s time, which is super frustrating. He’s been with this companion for 7 weeks, meaning he has at least 5 more together.

He says that his morning workouts and his peanut butter milkshake are some of the highlights of his day. We’re keeping him in our prayers. 

 

Office work

 There really isn't anything exciting to write about. Literally all I have been doing is working on completing uncompleted baptismal forms. For example, almost all of them are missing signatures from the bishop or the person that got baptized,  because they never signed it and so now I have to go track them down. I really don't know what else to write about because I don't want to bore the people that read these letters. We have been calling all the people in our area book and I talked to someone named gabrielle, I told him some questions aback out jesus christ, then I asked him if he knew of any other books besides the bible that talks, and testifies of jesus christ and he said no. So I told him about the book of mormon and he was interested enough to drive by our office to come talk to us and pick up the book. So we will be meeting with him and his wife here again on Monday

That's everything worth noting about my week

Tacos al pastor hit different 

Elder Talbot

Jose’s Baptism

 This week started off pretty bad, but greatfully it didnt end that way

So I think it was on Tuesday when I woke up and I after I went to the bathroom, I realized I was sick. I felt like I was back in the CCM all over again. And if you know my experience that I had in the Mexico MTC, well lets just say then you already know what I'm talking about and I don't need to say any more haha. So I've been back to eating my bananas and toast. I lost all my energy and my stomach wasnt feeling too great, so I went back to bed and rested, pretty much the whole rest of the day.

After the next day I was pretty much all better.

We found out from asking our mission president that we are allowed to knock on less active and inactive family homes to see if they actually live there, that includes part member families, so now we don't have to wait for the members! I wish I knee that 6 weeks ago when I got here

We have also started to go out and hand out pamphlets to people doors, so that was a nice change for sure

Best part of the week was

The baptism of Jose Alvarado! It was amazing to see his progression through every one of the lessons that we had together. We were grateful to get to attend his baptism, even after we found out he actually wasnt in our area. Him and his while family were very happy and it was a great experience

Today was the end of the transfer, and I have been called to go to the offices, so that's where my new assignment is. My new companion is...

Elder Guerrrero

Until Next Week!

Elder Talbot

Father’s Day

 Summary - here you go, there's not a lot but that's how it goes sometimes

 *   I was asked to speak in church.  I spoke for about 10 minutes.  Wrote my talk out in Spanish which was helpful.
 *   We had multiple lessons with Jose Alvarado.  My companion said we should talk about the word of wisdom. Then before we start the lesson he tells us he likes a song about the word of wisdom and he doesn't have any problems with it so that nice. He accepted the invitation to obey all the commandment and so is progressing very well. He also said that he prayed about his baptismal date.  Then that very night he had a dream that he was in a war on a boat and he got shot, but he said that through his faith in Christ he would be okay.  He was okay and he left the water okay, also that the water was red. Coming out of the water - baptism- red -cleansed through blood of Christ. So he took that as an answer from God so that was a really cool experience for him. Sadly, we later, we found out Jose isn't in our area so we won't teaching and baptizing him anymore. However, we will still be there at his baptism hopefully this sunday!
 *   I was able to call my dad and family on Father’s Day.  That was nice to talk to them. 

Did He Really See Him?

 Hey everybody, we had an interesting week. We had zone conference at the beginning of the week.

-Jose Alvarado came to church again and also these 2 new guys walked into church and so we talked and sat by them, and they'll be back next week, they are both in other elders' areas though so we won't be teaching them. We also got a new guy at church named Dominic, he speaks creole, he's from Haiti. We finally managed to get a member's friend who spoke creole to act as a translator to help us understand him, so we could understand his situation. He needs help with immigration, but he too said he will be back at church next Sunday!

-we had 2 great lessons with Jose Alvarado about the restoration, and about the Book of Mormon, the holy ghost, and our life here on the earth. He wants to be baptized June 26!

Interesting story

-A few days ago, one of our friends, Jesus Ruiz called us 6 times at 11pm, but we were asleep so we missed all the calls because I had put the phone on silent. Then the next night, we got 2 calls at 1 AM from him. We missed the first one, but the second one my companion got up and took the call in our room, and our friend told us "I hope I'm not disrupting your sleep" and I'm thinking to myself while I'm in bed, oh yea no worries it's only 1 AM, what can we do for you haha

Anyways, he then went on to tell us that he had "an act of presence" is what he said, where he saw Jesus Christ, we are not too sure what to think about that, about that was the first time I've had an experience like that before

-we also went to a tehnghis- which is a sale where streets are full of people to buy random stuff people are saying. I bought a $2.5 hat, and then also saw someone that served in our ward over 6 years ago I guess when my mom was RSP, I did not even know that

- we finally got Our air cooler in the house to work now

Have a great week!

Elder Talbot

Pictures 

Pizza, homemade hamburgers, tenghis, and hats

Lots of teaching

This week we got Jose Alvarado and Ian Martinez at church! His wife is a member but he is not. He is classic awesome good guy and he wants to get baptized, he is just waiting on his answer, we are trying to help him recognize that. We also gave him his bom that has all the questions of the soul answers marked in the book.

-Ian Martinez is a little 10 year old boy that comes from a member family that is now inactive, but we got him and his 8 year old sister to come with their uncle

-In 2 hour they all talked about the new member missionary work plan!

- I did a baptism interview for Kevin and Estefani, 2 kids being baptized from other missionaries  in the district, they are awesome

-We Watched the baptism for Kevin and estafania

-Our bishop bought us pizza for fast Sunday, don't tell anybody that

-We started teaching 8 new people this week!

3 new people found on Facebook that aren't in our area. But Yolanda and Ester were 2 of those that are in our area and Yolanda was super emotional because she was so glad to be able to talk to someone about God again:)

-We finally Had our ward council by zoom

-I got to meet Roger, a convert who my zone leader back in 2020, helped baptize so that was cool. He has a daughter that's not a member that we are meeting with tonight.

-A funny thing this Roger guy said-He said that if you have the covid shot then you can have metal, stick to that part of your arm. But its gotta be exactly on the part where you got the shot. He showed us videos of metal spoons apparently sticking to people's arms, so you all should go try it out....

-wWe started teaching Ernesto Orozco and his son this week as well. They were driving past the church when we were doing the primary activity, and his son wanted cotton candy so they came, and that's when we talked to him and set up a lesson. We had that lesson this week and it went really well, he said that he has knows about the LDS church for 47 years, and that he wants to get closer to god, but he doesn't know where to start, so we helped him out with that:)

-That's it for this week, oh yea also I strained my lower back playing soccer somehow...so there will be no exercising for me for the next 2 weeks probably:/

Hasta la Próxima!

Tortas, hamberguesas, and montados:)