Mexico Pachuca - Week 67 - February 23, 2015

(Excerpts from his email)

hey sounds like a crazy but a good week. this week was a little crazy for me too. crazy but good. we had a great day yesterday. we had 7 investigators in church and 6 of them have baptismal dates for march. so we are really excited for march. The seven investigators we had were Blanca and Alberto who are normals. Rosa and her son Fernando. Joseline is 9 and her family is getting active in the church again. Joseline and her family are great. the dad was a little hesitant at first but now he is super excited again. haha he asked his daughter when she wants to get baptized and she was like right now haha. he was like no i need a little more time to prepare myself but yes soon. it’s awesome. Alberto also is amazing. he has diabetes and his body is just shutting down. he’s not super old but he just has had a hard life and doesn’t have what he needs to take care of himself the way he should. he could barely get out of his chair. he couldn’t breathe well cause he fell on his chest but he said i am going to church today. i want to be there and i will go. its was amazing to me. how when we are healthy and good we find every excuse to not do the things we need to do simple things like go to church. and then there are people who literally its a struggle to get up and walk and they are there in church. 

M: It's when life is good that we tend to slack, the BOM cycle! It's easy to remember the Lord when we are struggling and need help.  We know we are getting closer to being Christ-like when we remember the Lord during the good times as well as the bad.  People like Alberto are examples of how we need to be all the time.  I think the other thing you have learned on your mission is that we truly have a lot, we are not rich, but we have so much more than so many people around the world and we need to be more grateful than we are sometimes.  And we need to serve with all our heart, might, mind and strength because we are so blessed.  I think each time you tell me a story of one of your investigators and you tell me that they have had a hard life, it reminds me again to be grateful and how good the Lord is to us.

EP: that’s something an investigator said yesterday. i have seen people a thousand times worse than you economically but they are a million times happier than you right now. its so true. we don’t need material things to be happy. yes they are great and important but not the most important. yes we are really blessed and i am really blessed. its what i have noticed not just with the people here but with other missionaries and everything.  

M: What do you mean about the other missionaries?

EP: just the lives they have are so different from all that i have. a lot of them really have some hard stuff. when i see them its like what do i have to complain about. being on a mission without support from home is crazy. i don’t know how they can do it.

M: Yeah, sometimes I look at what other people are going through and I think to myself, how is it that I can complain about anything.  We are happy to support you on your mission and we assume because we are all members of this church, we are all the same and have equal support and love and that is just not true.  Sometimes it is not emotional support they lack but the physical things, or the monetary things, so much that makes our lives easy that we pass off as normal.  So we need to be aware and help where we can.

So tell me a story from this week.

EP: o haha ok i got one. so it was like 8 at night and we just went to the house we were gonna visit and they weren’t there. and i was just like no way they told us yesterday they were gonna be here and nothing but whatever, it happens. so we go walking to another house. same thing no one. we went and visited like literally 5 people and none of them were home or they didn’t answer us when we knocked. i was just like o man what are we gonna do. i am super tired we have been walking in circles for like half an hour and there is no one home. we cant go home yet cause its not time. so we end up in the same street where we started and were just like ok there’s no one else let’s go visit this family of less actives. we go and they answer and we go in and the mom just tells us. elders i have been praying for the last couple days that you guys would come here. i need a blessing. i am going to the hospital this Thursday because i have pain in my stomach and the doctors don’t know what it is. its super sore i can barely walk and i need a blessing and now you’re here. i was just like ok ya the Lord definitely knows where we need to be and when. it was humbling. i was a little frustrated and tired and everything and then it was just like ok i understand. it was Saturday night and we offered them a ride to church and came to church yesterday to take the sacrament before she had to go to the hospital.

M: Great story, the Lord sometimes tests us by putting road blocks and then sees if we are willing to listen when the odds are against it. You were an answer to her prayers and for some reason you needed to walk around a bit before you could go see her.   I'm glad they came to church and the price, a little frustrated and fatigue, a small price to pay for a family to come back to church. Awesome how the Lord works and humbles us to understand His ways.

You good son? You sound good.

EP: ya I’m good, excited for march. should be a great month for us. this week if everything goes good Blanca and Alberto are gonna get baptized. we just gotta double check. well i gotta go but i will talk to you guys in a week. love you guys. have a great week.

Love,
Elder Park