Temple Blessings in Tegucigalpa

 Elder Lund's Zone

Another week here in the mission field. We had a lot of great lessons and memorable experiences this past week, but only one showed up at church. REALLY frustrating right now because we have a large group of investigators who have awesome potential, but no one is coming to church, entonces, no one is really progressing towards baptism this change.

We went to Santa Barbara to do divisions this past week. I went in a trio with Elder Martinez from Monterrey, Mexico and Elder Nelson from Arizona. We really had a great day. On the way there, a predicador got on the bus and started preaching. He was very enthusiastic and had that classic honduran preacher voice. At the end, he asked for ofrendas and many people gave him money. Moving on...we contacted a lot of people and found some really good nuevos as all the citas fell. We taught some really good lessons and the people were more receptive than usual. Near the end of the day, there were some riots in the streets and people with antorchas as they were protesting the government corruption that is going on. We avoided any trouble by letting the riot pass until we went to the next lesson.

We found a new family this week. Familia F-M. There are 5 potential baptisms and the oldest daughter was baptized when she was 11 but is less active. They are SUPER poor economically, spiritually, and have low enthusiasm in general. They really need the blessings of the gospel in their lives. We hope to see some progress because they are friends with M, A and I (recent converts) and they are going to help a lot.

Speaking of those recent converts, M (the baptism from last month) was able to go to the Temple in Tegucigalpa this past weekend and literally loved it. I am very confident that she will not go inactive. We are going to focus on temple attendance with new converts in the stake so there is better retention.

We went to a priesthood conference in the stake center in Chamelecón on Sunday. It was on awesome meeting and I left edificado. I learned a lot, felt the spirit, and received more animo to work more efficiently as a missionary.

We had a lesson that went downhill. Not going to explain it all here, but the investigator is named A and we are teaching him and his family. He has some serious learning and behavioural disablities, but he contacted us and said he wants to get baptized (missionaries taught him around 6 years ago but because of the same issues at age 9 they didn`t move forward) so we began teaching him. Basically, he got up "de la nada" and left for 2 minutes. "Where are you going A?"..."voy a hacer un mandado (I´m going to go run an errand)". It may not be funny for you guys, but in the moment it was super funny. Later on, one of the neighbors was present and we invited her to church and she said no and then A ´spilled the beans´ as he said "no va a ir, se lo juro por dios que va a jugar naipes con la mama (She´s not going to go, I promise you guys that she is going to go play cards with her mom (gamble))" Finally, near the end of the lesson, A was sitting on the edge of the pila and fell in with his legs and feet up in the air. I went running to the pila because you could easily drown, but he was able to get up on his own quickly. Que loca esta lección.

Well, we watched "El Monte del Señor" and played futbol and basketball as a partial zone today. Good stuff.

Well, that´s all I have. Oh ya, I hit the 18 month mark...yaaaa Cheque

-Elder Lund

Cofradía 1, Zona Cofradía 6/22/15 - 6/29/15

Divisions

Well, another week here in Cofradía. This was the last week of the change and it went well. I did divisions with Elder Chancay from Ecuador in my area on Tuesday. He is new in the mission, but progressing well. We had a good day teaching despite not everything going perfectly as planned.

We taught a lot of good lessons this week and found a lot of good prospects, but again we are not seeing the progress we would like to see with certain investigators with fecha. It is quite frustrating, but nevertheless, we still had 4 at church and a handful of menos activos even though they weren´t the ones we were intending to have. We just are instruments and the Lord touches hearts, simple as that...we don´t always choose who will come and who will not. For example, we had awesome spiritual lessons (some in the church) with M-A (with E to fellowship), M (with M to help fellowship), an awesome contact named P and D, C (with S to fellowship), A, and Leonel...but none of them came to church. Then, we had some "so-so" lessons with F. , M, and a new reference named Y (from F. ) but they all came to church.

Well, the Lord always provides, as we saw with K this Sunday. We haven´t really been teaching her. She is 15 or 16 years old and lives with her boyfriend´s family Luis Baquedano who is 18. The family Baquedano are active members, but L had some chastity issues, K got pregnant, and now they have a 9 month old daughter. She always comes to church and knows more or less the message of the Restoration, Plan of Salvation, etc because she lives with the family. After church, she told us she wants to get baptized and that she separated recently from her boyfriend until they can get married. Truly it came out of nowhere, but we´ll see what we can do. There are obviously some serious issues, but repentance is always available. 

Not going to tell the whole story for you guys, but just so I can remember, here are the trigger words. M during her noche de hermanamiento... "vacío" ... "es como si las puertas de mi corazón fueran cerradas"

Well, that´s all I have. Have a great week everyone!

-Elder Lund

Cofradía 1, Zona Cofradía 6/15/15 - 6/22/15

Words Like Thunder

¡BUENAS!

Well, another week here in Cofradía. We are already beginning the last week of this change...puchiga this change has gone by soooo fast. We are always working, always doing divisions, always having meetings, and always having fun. Life´s good. Hit the "6 months to go" mark (5 months and 25 days to be exact now) and I think President Uchtdorf put in a special picture just for me in this month´s Liahona (see attached fotos).

First things first, we had a baptism! Woohoohooo! M. She had received the missionaries earlier this year but stopped because she had church responsibilities in a different religous sect. The missionaries before I came, however, worked with the daughter and son-in-law and they got baptized and are super awesome converts which helped her out in the conversion process. When I got her, we started working more with her, she learned more, and took a leap of faith as she asked God if these things are true and started reading el Libro de Mormón. After having the faith necessary, she handed over her church group held in her house and her other church responsibilities. She bore a powerful testimony after her baptism. She has a tablet with the Gospel Library App and is literally a sponge right now as she absorbs everything we teach her and everything she reads. I had the privilege to baptize her. We wanted the son-in-law A to do it but she kept saying no. She said that what I had said one lesson impacted her. Basically, not knowing her very well, I said "M, we have come with a goal for your baptism, and we believe a great day for your servicio baptismal will be the 13th of June. Will you prepare yourself to be baptized that day." To me it felt like just another compromiso, but it impacted her and she began to think and ponder more and more, began to read more and more, etc. Sometimes we say things that really influence other people without knowing. Jeffrey R. Holland once said that we as missionaries have to be like the angel who called out Alma hijo to repentance, or in other words, we have to astonish people as if our words were like thunder. He added, "it may not be thunder to you, but it will be thunder to them" ... I agree with this statement.

With that said, sometimes we can have the spirit and have an awesome lesson but people still have their agency. Last Saturday, we contacted a L and taught a quick Como Comezar Enseñar and talked about the Restoration. We came back this Saturday to teach his family. He has family members in San Jorge who are members and told us he has had contact with the Elders in the past. He and his wife M are firmly active in another church and said in both lessons "ya me bauticé" noting that they had no intentions to change. This Saturday we taught one of the top 10 lesson 1´s I have had in the mission. The spirit was present, there were no distractions, and they understood the doctrinal layout of our message. We asked the Luis if he could sum up what we taught and he clearly understood what we wanted, but was not interested in changing or even asking God if the things were true. The wife had again said "ya me bauticé" and started saying that every one of us is our own church and how she wanted to be a prophet. It´s as if a flip had been switched and she forgot the principles we taught with the spirit present. We invited them to read the Book of Mormon and pray and we finished the lesson. At the end, L showed us a foto of him with the Elderes 15 years ago. They looked like good friends as the three were on the couch together, but he had never made the decision to get baptized. We are going to stop by to teach from time to time, but despite the spirit, a quality lesson, agency always takes precedence. They´ll obtain for themselves their own testimony later down the line.

It rained a bunch this week and down in las colonias San Juan Bosco and Rancho, the dirt streets were flooded and we were stuck. In order to get to the lesson, we had to cross the waters that were likely contaminated with pollution from up high in the city of Cofradía, but we had a lesson and there was no other way. "A dónde me mandes, iré" we sang as we crossed the flooded street. Good times.

Well, other lessons, other experiences. I`ve been writing more in my journal (more consistent) so I don´t have to worry too much. I´ll send some fotos. CHEQUE!!!

-Elder Lund

Cofradía 1, Zona Cofradía 6/8/15 - 6/15/15

Santa Barbara

¡Buenas!

Good week here in Cofradía.

We started off the week with divisions in Santa Barbara. We woke up early Tuesday morning in order to take a 2 hour bus ride to SB for their district meeting. I stayed in centro with Elder Permenter from Connecticut and Elder Chub from Guatemala. We had some quality lessons. The area is very mountaneous and very beautiful. At one point, we could see the sunset and almost all of the city of SB below as well as Galeras to the side.

We had some really neat experiences this week, but most of the investigators aren´t truly progressing towards baptism. We had plans to visit L but he wasn´t at home. He had started drinking a lot and his "wife" didn´t want to deal with anything so she called the police and they threw him in the jailhouse. We went around 7:30PM before dinner to go visit him. He was still pretty drunk but we had a small yet good lesson on word of wisdom and the atonement. We left him a Plan of Salvation pamphlet so he could read in the morning. There was just one jail cell...it was basically a block shed with no bathroom or even a bed. In fact, he was sleeping on the concrete floor when we got there. We tried visiting him later in the week but he was never at home.

On the other hand, we are still seeing great progress with M (Mother and mother-in-law of recent converts). She is reading a lot in the Book of Mormon and accepts everything we teach her. She is planning to be baptized this Saturday.

On Friday, we had a leadership council with all the Zone Leaders, the Assistants, and President and Sister Dester. We talked about some items of business for the mission and what we can do better to improve. The Assistants talked a lot about "el comprometerse" to accomplish the visions we have for the mission, our zone, our companionship, and ourselves ... I thought of dad and how he always tells us to be "doers" and not "ideators". After the consejo we went to migration for my companion and then to a baptismal interview in Paraíso. I did the interview and the candidate had a lot of faith and courage. Her family had gotten baptized 2 months earlier but she couldn´t because she was living in fornication. She had the faith necessary to leave the marido when he didn´t accept to get married. She has been blessed with a job and other blessings. PILAS.

Sunday was a little disappointing because we were expecting a big turnout at church from investigators, but only 2 came. On the other hand, we had visited some less active families and 3 families came! During testimony meeting, a family got up to bear there testimony but the dad said that people were gossiping about his wife and started saying stuff not appropriate for a testimony meeting, but between the accused and the bishop. The spirit kind of left the meeting and got out of control. After church, we visited an investigating family who live in Gracias a Dios #2. No one from the bishopric could come so we walked out...it took us 55 minutes! They truly make the sacrifice to come to church and have come 3-5 times now. They are a reference from members. It was a beautiful walk and my comp and I talked about the mission and stuff.

Didn´t do much for p-day. Studied, cleaned the house, washed clothes, ate delivery pizza, and slept in the hammock. Well, that´s all I have. CHEQUE!

-Elder Lund

Cofradía 1, Zona Cofradía 5/26/15 - 6/1/15

Not Tourists

Multi-Zone Conference

¡Buenas!

Another quick week here in the mission field. Hit the 17 month mark and it´s already June...wow.

We had a good week here in Cofradía. On Tuesday, we had a multi-zone conference (Zonas Merendón, Yojoa, and Cofradía) in Chamelecon. It was a really great conference and we learned a lot. Unfortunately, we came straight to internet after playing soccer and I forgot my notes, but I´ll try to remember some specifics of what we learned. We talked a lot about the Holy Ghost and his critical role in the work of salvation (missionary work, retention, reactivation, etc). President Dester said something that was kind of "fuerte" but I really liked it. He said that without the spirit, we are just tourists here in Honduras, and that if it were so, he would not be here... he would choose to vacation in a different country. Direct, but very clear and informative. We also talked about the importance of doing the Lord´s will and not having fear to do what is right. We watched a talk by Elder Uchtdorf to future mission presidents about getting rid of our fears and how Peter became the great apostle despite his weaknesses.

Good work week as well. We are seeing great progress with Mari, Jose, Leonel, and Cristina. We were hoping to have a big turnout for sacrament meeting (8-12 investigators who had a really really good probability of going) but only 5 showed up. The most important is that Mari came because she has her baptismal date for the 13th of June. She is progressing well, left her church group, her church responsibilities, and is reading the Book of Mormon daily. She should be good to go. Other investigators aren´t progressing as much as we would like them to, but that´s the norm sometimes.

Well, I don´t really have anything else. CHEQUE LEQUE!!!

-Elder Lund

Cofradía 1, Zona Cofradía 5/26/15 - 6/1/15