Running with the bulls

Mon, Sep 19, 2011

Dear Family,

This week we had a TON of rain! It was crazy. One night Hermana Alvarado and I were walking home at night and it was raining especially hard. So much that there were rivers in the streets. Some people were sweeping the water off of the side walks to keep it from getting in their homes. Cars drove by and waves of water soaked us to the waist. When we were crossing the streets Hermana Alvarado was up to her knees! And then the lights went out. It was pretty rough. but the rain has calmed down a lot now and its all good. That same day we had another crazy experience. I know that the girlies like hearing about my animal encounters so heres another one for you. We were walking down a narrow path to go to an appointment when a man and his herd of about 10 or 12 toros came walking behind us. They started to get kind of close so we started walking faster because we both are afraid of them. Then they started running towards us for some reason! Why, i don´t know, but we started running too! I felt like I was in spain, running with the bulls! Eventually we came to a corner and turned away but we were really out of breath. haha. Oh the animals here. Such an adventure.

So, we´ve been teaching two families that are related and one of the husbands, Amilcar, has a baptismal date but his wife has never attended church. We want to baptize them together so we´ve been trying really hard to get her to come. The other sunday, she finally came! We were in the basic principles sunday school class and all was going well. I usually hold my breath in there because all sorts of crazy can happen with people who have random questions but we want to stick to the basics for the sake of the other investigators. So sure enough, dagoberto threw the teacher a curve ball and asked "does Heavenly Father have a wife too?" A good question but not what we wanted to talk about. The bishop happened to be teaching and explained that we believe that he does. Well, Hermana Ana did not like that at all. She said she had never heard of that and was really bothered by it. We´re praying that she can pray about it or let it go and focus more on the more important doctrine. We have to women we are teaching that have baptismal dates. One is Joseline for this saturday and the other is the daughter of an inactive. Her name is Melissa and she is 13. We´re also praying that things go smooth and that they can continue to progress. Also the, women in the photo I sent were Lorena and her daughter gabriella and her sister Reina. They are still going strong in the church. We´re really happy for them.

Hope you all have a good week. Love you lots!

Rachel

ps. here

and here´s a picture of hermana karen, a member that we recently started coming back to church. she goes on visits with us alot. She´s great! and yes, me with my ubrella as always. President says i have to always use it to protect my pale skin from the son. So i basically feel like marry poppins all the time.

12 Sep 2011

Dear Family, 12 Sep 2011

First of all Happy Birthday Brian and Ruth! I hope you have great birthdays! And dad, snail mail is just as good as dear elder. Thanks! So yesterday Dagoberto came to church again! Yay, that’s 3 times in a row. And he´s been reading every reading assignment I give him in the Book of Mormon. The only problem is that he is not in our area and he is supposed to attend another chapel. And the Elders need to be teaching him and not us. But he says that he wants us to teach him. It’s a bit of a problem. We´re praying he can become detached from us and accept the Elders. This week Honduras celebrated something called Children’s Day. It’s basically where all the kids get to have a party. Luckys! I think you should all get this tradition started in the US so it’s in full swing when I get back. So this week I started to get a cold. One night it was giving me a really hard time. We went back to the house so I could take some Airborne and I was so tempted to stay and rest because I was not feeling well! But I decided to give it a go and we got a reference from one of the members who is 14. Her friend just had a baby and it’s been pretty hard on her mom. We shared the restoration message with her and her husband and they were really touched by it. It was really rewarding. I know that the Lord blesses us when we make sacrifices. Sacrifice brings forth the blessings of heaven. I’ve learned that a lot this week.

Ok, gotta go.

Sorry so short!

Love you all!

Hermana Jackson

And here’s a photo of the women we baptized the other week. I’ll try to explain more next time!

5 Sep 2011

Dear Family, 5 Sep 2011

Thanks for the emails. I love hearing from you all! But sometimes I don´t have time to read them as thoroughly as I would like. Do you think you could copy and paste what you write to me in a dear elder so I can eventually read with more time to enjoy it? Keep the emails coming though. I love hearing the recent updates. And Dad happy birthday!!!! I realized that it was coming up after last week’s e mail. Sorry I didn´t send you wishes earlier but it sounded like a lot of fun. And send my wishes to George too! How awesome that Becca got to go on the boat! That’s so fun.

Ok, so I’ve got 5 minutes now. Sorry this is going to be a shortie but here´s the latest.

We had cambios last week. I don´t even remember that missionary term in English but yeah, turns out I’m here in Comayagua another 6 weeks. I’m happy about that. This area is great and the members are wonderful. Although we do a ton of walking. All of our visits are super far from each other. Our zone leaders suggested this week that we look for a new house or apartment closer to our work. So we’ve been doing a little house hunting lately. Also we had 3 baptisms this week! We were not expecting that one, but the lord has his plans and opens the way for his children to receive these important covenants in their lives. We baptized Hna Lorena and her daughter and her sister Hna Reinita. I have lots of pictures from this week but can´t send them on this computer. Hopefully next week. Also we did splits for the first time this week where I went on my own with a member. I thought I was going to die because I had to lead the way and remember where people lived and direct the lessons and all that. And I had to prepare one of our investigators for their baptismal interview. Scary! But it ended up being a good experience and my temp. companion was really good.

Well, that’s all I have time for today, but I’ll try to write more next week.

I’m glad to hear things are going well and I love you all!

Hermana Jackson