Oct 24, 2011

Dear Family,

This key board is really messed up and the spacebar keeps sticking so it takes me an eternity to type one sentence so sorry this is going to be a short one! Thats great that you got to spend time with the king family. Send them all my love. My companion has been sick this week so we didn{t get to work a whole lot. We went to get her tested and found out she has gerardia. Pretty sad. Shes doing a lot better now but still has a bit of stomache pain So i don{t have a ton to write about but i thought you might like to see some more pictures. Here{s a picture of our apartment and the view of the hill from our window. I{ll try to send some more if i get time.

All my love!

Hermana jackson

Esperanza en Esperanza!

Dear Family, 17 Oct 2011

I’ve been transferred to Esperanza! For those of you who don’t speak Spanish, Esperanza means hope. There is definitely a lot of hope in this new area, even though there is also a lot of rain, and large amounts of mud that I didn’t even know existed! I’ve decided that mud is my new enemy. Yesterday, my foot sunk into a pit of brown stickiness and I could barely pull my leg out without it taking me shoe! So, yeah, this place is way different than the scorching heat of Comayagua. It’s more mountainous and definitely colder! I really love it though. It’s beautiful. I tried to take a picture of the view from our window this morning but there was too much fog so I’ll have to send one next week. But here is a picture of my new companion Hermana Nava. She is 39 years old and is from Mexico. She has 7 siblings serving missions right now! Crazy huh?! She told me that she was the first to go and set the example for the rest of them.

So here in Esperanza, we have a small branch. On Sunday, I had to speak in Sacrament Meeting and lead the hymns, teach primary, and Sunday School! Whoa! It’s going to be a new challenge, but it’s been a good experience. I have felt a big change in myself with this new companionship and new area. I feel like I’m starting to reach potential that I didn’t know I had. For example this week, I met my new investigators and gave 3 different lessons with them, I felt prompted to invite them to be baptized. All of them said yes! It blew me away! My faith in the power of the Holy Ghost is growing and my confidence also. Even though I don’t speak Spanish very well, I’m learning that I can still be of use to Heavenly Father. It’s amazing what the Spirit does to people. Last night we were teaching a girl named Keren. She is 17 and her mom is inactive but recently came back last Sunday. In our lesson, they had a lot of questions about her dad who is dead. We taught the plan of salvation last time and they had some time to ponder it and we answered their questions about the Spirit World. Hermana Nava felt prompted to tell them that her dad is in Spirit Paradise right now praying for her to accept this gospel. The Spirit was really strong and we hadn’t really taught anything we planned on teaching but I decided to ask her "will you follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized?" Before I even finished the invitation she burst in to tears and nodded her head and said yes. She left the room for a bit because she couldn’t speak. The Spirit was overwhelmingly strong! I was so surprised by her reaction. I didn’t realize how much the Spirit had prepared her for this step in her life. It was a beautiful moment. Heavenly Father truly guides us to the people who are ready.

Love you all!

Hermana Jackson

Dear Family, 10 Oct 2011

Mom and Dad, that’s great that you had the Lambs over for dinner. They really need that friendship. Keep it up! Sounds like you had a lot of fun with Morgan Jean and Shannon. Thanks for sending the package. I´ll send a list of things for Christmas later.

So, we taught the 8 American girls again this week. It’s so weird teaching in English because Hermana Alvarado and I have really swapped roles. It’s also strange using church vocab in English because sometimes I can’t remember words in English like priesthood. Haha! But it’s really fun and these girls are really special. Last time one of the girls told us that she thinks that God sent us to them for a purpose and she is willing to listen because she thinks we have something that will help them. When she told me that I just wanted to shout,“Yes! You have no idea how important this message is!” It’s going to take some time with them because they are very involved in their church but they are open to listening and reading the Book of Mormon. The sad thing is that I won´t be here to teach them. That’s right I´m going to be transferred. This week! I don´t know where I’m going yet but I will find out this Wednesday. I´m going to miss this area and the members and my investigators but I’m excited for the change.

So, we set two baptismal dates this week! The first one was for Hermano Walter. He looks like Chrisian Bale but a Latino version. It’s weird. But he accepted a baptismal date but he didn´t go to church last time so we made plans to stop by his house in the morning to invite him. So yesterday we were on divisions and I went to his house and his cousin let me in the house. I didn´t realized he was sleeping in the hammock in their living room. He started waking up when I walked in and I did my best in my broken Spanish. I said “Buenos dias!” and then said something like “Are you going to go to church this morning?” He looked really disoriented and confused as to why I was there. My temporary companion was a 19 year old from the ward and she didn´t say anything so I continued to try my best. “It starts at 9. Ok? Alright, we´ll be seeing you there!” It was super awkward! It’s one thing in English but in Spanish...ahhh! Hhhaaha. He probably won´t remember half of it anyways.

So we had a baptism for Melisa. She is the daughter of an inactive and she is 13 years old. Her baptism was really beautiful. Yesterday I asked her how she felt after she was baptized and she said “Senti un gran alegria en mi corozon!” which translates to something like a great joy or feeling of happiness in my heart. She later told me she wants to serve a mission. After hearing that I had a gran aleria en mi corozon too! There is nothing happier than hearing something like that!

Also, last night we found the sweetest family, couple and their 2 year old daughter. They live in a tiny room without windows and it’s about the size of an office cubicle. There were no chairs and no bed, just a blanket on the floor. At first they didn´t want us to come in because they were ashamed of the living. We started teaching them the first vision and the spirit was so strong and they were really receptive. At first I felt really bad for them but while being in there I had the strongest impression of how happy this couple was and how they were truly humble. Hermana Alvarado told me she felt the exact same thing. These people here are amazing. They´re such good examples to me and I hope I can help them receive the fullness of the Gospel.

Love you all! Hermana Jackson

What a week!

Dear Family, 2 Oct 2011

Did you all just love conference?! I´m sure you did but maybe not as much as I did. No, just kidding. But this was one of the most special conferences I’ve experienced. I will admit that I was praying I could get the chance to listen to it in English. It’s just so much better hearing it from the source and actually understanding everything they´re saying. When we got there Saturday morning the Elders were getting a TV set up in English but the problem was that I was the only sister that spoke English and I’m not supposed to be alone. The elders started making phone calls to see if I could get permission to be with the Elders by myself. So I started to worry and prayed a lot that I would be able to. It was 3 minutes before starting and I still didn´t have permission but the Zone Leader got ahold of the President just before it started and he said I could go! I know it might sound like a little thing and that I should have been so worried about it but I felt so relieved and grateful just like President Monson said when he found his 5 dollar bill or the other speaker who mentioned his experience finding the quarter to buy chicken. Heavenly Father is very much aware of us and loves us so much that the things that the little things that are important to us become important to Him. So during the first session during the beginning of President Packer´s talk, the power went out and we didn´t get to watch the last bit. But we were able to watch the other 3 without problems. Going through all of this made me so much more grateful for the opportunity to listen and I realized what a privilege it is to listen to our Prophet’s voice. Overcoming all of these obstacles made me so much more appreciative attentive. I soaked up every word in contrast to before the mission when I was a little more casual about the event. I also received really specific answers to questions about my investigators. At the beginning of this week we were contacting in the evening and came across a house of 8 college age girls that only spoke English. 4 of them are from the U.S., 2 from England 1 from Jamaica and the other from some island in the Caribbean. They are all here serving at a school teaching English. They were really receptive and had a TON of questions. The second time we taught them they had a bunch of really tough questions about the fall and it really tested me. I´ve learned a lot in the Book of Mormon this week and I think the Spirit helped me out a lot but I felt more motivated to study diligently and understand our doctrine better. The girls weren´t trying to bible bash or anything just asked a lot of whys that I wasn´t able to answer.

I´ve got to go now but I’ll tell you more about them later.

Love you all!

Hope you enjoy the photos, I’ll have to explain those more next week too!

Hermana Jackson

Mon, Sep 26, 2011

Dear Family,

This week we went to Marcala for a training with the President. He basically called us all to repentence and it was really intimidating but good. I learned alot from him. Afterwords, our group got to eat together in a resturant near by. I sat next to an elder who told me about all the scary things he had eaten on his mission so far. He said he ate frogs, rats, turtle and bats! eeew! luckily i haven´t encountered any of those and i hope i never will!

This week we had a baptism for Joseline. Yay! She is really special. Her mom is Hermana Lorena who we baptized a few weeks ago (she´s in one of the pictures holding the baby). In the beginning she wasn´t interested in the church but the week after Lorena and gabby (her sister) were baptized, we were in their house teaching them a lesson and all of a sudden Joseline told us she wanted to be baptized too. It was such a tender mercy! So saturday was her batpism and it was super stressfull becasue she showed up an hour late and pretty much everyone else showed up somewhere in between and the bishop who was supposed to baptize her, didn´t show up at all! But don´t worry, we found another priestood holder that was able to perform the baptism and it went really well. Hermana Aurelia, one of our recent converts (pink shirt on the right) spoke at her baptism. I was a little nervous for her becasue she can´t read and i wasn´t sure how it would go for her, but it turned out to be a really beautiful talk. Also, Lorena bore her testimony after Joseline was baptized and the spirit was so strong. She has such a powerful testimony and so much faith. Also hermana Karen was the other speaker. She was inactive right before i came and now she is really active in the church and is our number one go to person to accompany us during lessons. It was really beautiful to see all of these women together in one room and witness their progress and how much their testimonies have grown.

Hope you all are doing well and getting excited for conference this week becasue I sure am!

All my love,

Hermana Jackson