Week 52

Amor de un Rato

The work is still going!  Not much to report.  We havent had a ton of time to work because our zone leaders are a little crazy and we have to work in other peoples areas so we lost two working days of this week, but its all goood!

This week i saw the difference between working with references, and working alone.  One day this week we contacted 40 people straight, and out of all of them, none are going to progress,  then the following day we went with a member of ours and asked him to help us out.  We contacted a less active who has non member kids, and he actually talked to us and let us in, while before he didnt want to even see us, then after that same member introduced us to a family that wants to learn more about the church.  All in the span of 30 minutes.  It really shows the difference between us working alone, or us working with members.  We are basically useless if the wards dont help us out.

 

On another note our ward is trying a lot harder, and working well with us!  So that makes me happy.  Its hard to get members that really want to work, but everyone here has had desires to work with us, and we have a decent amount of recent missionaries! So we are gonna work realllly hard with the ward.

 

Alls well.  Included picture explains title.

 

Love you all!

Elder Hodson

 

 

Week 51

GUEROOOOOOOS

So the wait is over haha, i am in indepencia 2 in martinez de la torre!!  I am with elder Murphy from california!  He was training, but his son had to go home to fix a few things, so i got pulled down here!  And i am excited!  Ive never had a white companion, and we are in a normal companionship, so we literally have all of the time in the world to work!  We have a decent ward, and im really stoked to be working here.  We had 4 in church on sunday, but we are gonna start killing it this week. Its basically a whitewash (two people who dont know the area)  So we are just gonna have some miracles.  Our bishop is also very open to suggestions, so its gonna be a fun time.  We are gonna fix this area back up to being a power house!

Its really fun to have a companion that wants to work.  Ive seen that with my last few companions that satan really works the hardest and his best when we left ourselves get letdown or desanimo (dont know that word in english) and when we start to let him take our excitement.  It makes every aspect of being a missionary harder, and i fell in that cycle in my last area a little bit, and when things didnt go right i would get upset, but here its exciting, because we both have desires to work!

Its also funny to be with another white kid, because everywhere you go, people yell at you and say "hey guerooossss" and then we scream back "heeeey morenoooos!"  (brown people but in a not bad sounding way.)

 

Didnt take pics this week, but here is a few funny pics from the only people i was able to say goodbye to haha.

 

Love you all!

 

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Week 50

Crazy Weeeeeek

So this week was a little hectic.  But before we go on apparantly im getting changed to another area.  My president called me in the morning at like 10 o clock and said "Elder Hodson, theres 1 or two missionaries that we will be losing, and im going to need you in another area;"  so that was how that went, but he hasnt told me when or where im going, so im kind of in limbo right now. But my entire day has been packing, and washing clothes!  So not much time.

Besides that i got really sick on thursday and couldnt walk because i was so dizzy, and i think i got a stomach flu, but i took some medicine, and drank some salt water and by sunday i was more or less ok.  We also had a service project on friday in the farthest part of our area with our whole zone!  I didnt help at all because i was dying, but it worked out for us, because we had people in church on sunday, and they were those we helped out with. 

 

A couple other fun things happened out there but, not much time to write,  I guess Ill let you all know where i end up in a week haha!

 

Elder Hodson

Week 49

Dads

So this week was alright.  A little bit stressful, but luckily its all over.  on thursday we had a zone activity and we all went to the sister missionaries areas to work for 2 hours, and of course right as we start, it starts pouring rain! so we all worked soaking for 2 hours, and it was kind of fun, but were pretty sure that the rain was acidic because all of our white shirts are ruined from that day.  It was fun though.

We also had changes this week and basically there was no changes, im staying here, with my same comp, and my whole district stayed the same.  So that was a little lame, but ill hit one year in this area!

Ive been thinking a lot about worthy fathers again this week, because its something that this area lacks.  We as men have a huge responsibilty as priesthoood holders to keep ourselves worthy and ready to use our priesthood.  Ive seen here that the women are the stronghold of this little branch, and the men just dont exist.  It just is always a nice friendly reminder for me to search out the worthy and ready men to teach and prepare for baptism, and to recieve the priesthood.  

alls well! 

Love you all!

Week 48

"Sometimes its hard to think about Jesus"

This week was a little long, but good.  The 8 am church is still something that gives us troubles sometimes, but we just keep on pushing on.

On a working news we have a few families right now, but none of them are very certain, its just getting them to church is the hard part, but we are going to study super hard the sabbath day to get some work going here.

 

My new companion by the way is Elder Canto! Hes from merida yucatan, and hes been out for 17 months now.  I get along a lot better with him than i did with my other companion.  

Our branch president had a car accident before church yesterday which was crazy!  it was raining like crazy and he got hit on the freeway, luckily hes ok, but we had some fun times getting church started.  Luckily our stake president had to be at church with us that day, so he took over, and we got carlos confirmed!  We ended up having to give the 5th sunday class as well without any preparation!  oh how fun it is to be a missionary in a branch haha.

 

My quote is from the last general conference, i was listening to it over again last night before i fell asleep and that little quote called my attention.  Sometimes its hard to think about jesus.  We as members sometimes forget to think about jesus, or even "what jesus would do" if he were in our situation.  If we can keep our mind focused on him, turning down temptations and keeping true to our baptismal covenants will be so much easier.  So my invintation this week is to try harder to think about jesus this week.

 

On a random note i got stung by a wasp the other day.  My companion pointed at a bush and said "do you see that?" but i didnt see anything, and without warning he smacked the bush, and before i knew it, i got stung in the head by a wasp.  Needless to say there was an angry elder Hodson in that moment.  

 

But thats about it, the work keeps on keeping on!

 

Love you all!

Elder Hodson

Week 47

Baptism and Special Changes

So this week was filled with ups and downs, but all is well that ends well!

on saturday i had the opportunity to baptize carlos!  Hes the cousin of one of the 3 active families in the branch haha! It went well, and almost the whole branch came to the baptism!  We sang a childs prayer as well, but i think my companion has the video, but he didnt bring his camera, ill have to send it next week!

 

Special changes as well!  Aparrantly there was a ton of special changes this week, my companion is leaving me and going to another zone as district leader!  My new companion is Elder Canto, not sure who he is, but im staying the same as district leader!  So thatll be a fun change for the last two weeks of the change hahaha.  

Besides that the week was uneventful,  the family is on the edge right now, sadly they didnt go to church yesterday, so were gonna go find out what happens!

Love you all!

Elder Hodson