Hola amigos!
Week 12 is down. It was actually probably my quickest week here. It was hot! I don't want to complain about the heat too much because I feel like I bring It up every email, but there was some natural phenomenon happening all week where there was some sort of invisible dome over México that was trapping the heat. So everyday was 110-120 throughout my mission. The coolest part honestly is the fact I'm able to withstand it so well, I'm actually quite proud.
I want to apologize before I say anything else about my typos and bad punctuation in my letters thus far. I type on a Spanish keyboard that autocorrects half of everything I say wrong and things that I assume will autocorrect to english, it doesn't because it's spanish. And then I'm doing it on a lagging phone so I cant catch all the mistakes as I go. And I'm always in such a rush I can't read through it again haha! One mistake was last week when I was talking about the spanish rhyming, I meant to say that my companions said, rhyming and poems in spanish is CHEATING and that made me laugh because everything rhymes. I know it changed to a different word and made my already not so funny joke make no sense.
Some things from this week:
I might have mentioned this, but I hate flan. I can not stomach it. And the members found out and now think it's funny to make it at every event they know I'll be at. My patience has never been so strained
You guys won't BELIEVE this but yesterday when I was at church, I was helping clean up and i went into the kitchen to see if anyone needed help and I came across the elders quorum president putting away the sacrament stuff. I didn't think much of it until I taried a little and watched him before I left, come to find out this man was wiping out all of the used sacrament cups... and putting them BACK IN THE BAG TO USE FOR NEXT WEEK. I almost threw up, it was good I didn't know spanish enough to chew him out. When he left I chucked the cups in the trash can and went to go get more. The members acted as though they were so disgusted but in my head I was like, give me a break because I have not eaten anything sanitary in 7 weeks haha. I don't want to know how long that was going on.
I realized that I can understand Spanish now basically, and that my holdup has been understanding the accent within my little Pueblo I serve in. Because nobody leaves, everybody grows up within city limits and everyone is family and friends, they all have almost their own dialect of speed talking and word slurring. I thought this was how everyone spoke until I had a Day with a Spanish comp without an accent and I was able to speak to him perfectly all day.
I have learned a big lesson in humble prayer. Never in my life have I prayed so intently, earnestly and unselfishly. I'm embarrassed to admit the before here, prayers much of the time were I vain, times of need, and for my own benefit. I had heard the term humble prayer before, heard it explained as well. But never felt it applied to me and the thought to change never came to mind. But wow is it beautiful, to talk to your father in heaven without any expectations, without asking for a miracle or your gain or in haste because you need something. To be on your knees and truly talk to your father with nothing more than the desire to grow and to grow closer to him. I would challenge all of you to truly pray. Humbly pray to grow, soften your heart and truly repent and try to feel the spirit, and try to do so expressing your love for Heavenly Father. It has been a peaceful realization for me on how our relationships with the lord ought to be.
Last thing, we had a baptism this week. Hermana Clara was amazing and was another golden investigator, and she made a comment the night before that she got baptized that blew me away. She has really bad eyesight, and she said because of this she has been stuck in cansahcab, if this wasn't the case she would have moved years ago but she really has no choice. She told us that she had come to the realization, if she didn't have her terrible eyesight, she would have moved out of the city without meeting us and becoming baptized. And how it was a blessing that she was borderline blind. I am such a baby, but I began to cry. So much faith, from someone so new to the gospel. Often times we get complacent, we can't see our immense blessings from the lord, and even sometimes when we don't have enough faith to get through our trials, we don't see why we had them in the first place and how we could have grown and what the lord wanted for us. And here is clara, finding blessings from the lord where most wouldn't.
I love this gospel and this church. I know it's true. That's my testimony and I can't wait to keep sharing it. I miss you all and I'll touch base next week.
-eb
