August 5, 2019

Week 82: The Keystone of Our Religion

We had a great week this week. As far as success goes, we are having success but it is moving slower than I would look. We know its just a trial of faith. This week I had an experience that I really believe I should share with you all. This week I have been thinking a lot about the word ¨Testimony¨ and what it is. I have been studying a lot about testimonies and how we can strengthen them. We all know that reading the Book of Mormon is a very important part of having a testimony. We know it as ¨the Keystone of our religion¨ and Joseph Smith himself said...

¨Take away the Book of Mormon and the revelations, and where is our religion? We have none.¨

I decided to really focus on the Book of Mormon and the power it has in our conversion to know that the Church is true and that Joseph Smith was a prophet. I have always had a powerful testimony of the truthfulness of this Gospel but I honestly felt that my testimony of the Book of Mormon shouldve been stronger. I decided to read the Book of Mormon again, meditate about it, and ask of God again to know that to know that it was true (the awesome part of growing in you testimony is that you can ask many times if these things are true). I started to read a lot every day. Every free moment I had I dedicated it to reading the Book of Mormon. I prayed at the beginning before I studied and after. Little by little I felt small impressions of the things I read. I kept reading as much as I could. One day we went to a far away small town named Sonoyta to do transfers with some other missionaries and the hour ride I read the entire way both ways and even when we got back to Rocky Point I walked off the bus readying with the book in my hand. I remember that I had just started reading the book of Moroni and I started with a prayer and then started to read. I ready the whole book of moroni before we went to bed that night. I finally had arrived to the moment that I was waiting for. I closed the book, got down on my knees on the hot floor and began to give thanks to God and I finally asked him the question after saying ¨God, I have dedicated the time to sudy, meditate, and to pray to thee to know if this book is true. I am willing to accept the answer you give me so that I might continue preaching of this book¨ and then I asked him. After I prayed, I stayed kneeling down for a couple minutes and just waited. I slowing felt a warm and loving feeling come over me. As I waited, it became stronger. I sat on my bed thinking and meditating for a while knowing that God loved me and that the book was true. As I got in bed that night and laid in my bed, the feeling became even stronger. It was one of the most beautiful feelings I had ever had. That feeling never left me once that entire night until I fell asleep. I could recieve an answer again that the Book of Mormon was true. As I write this, my heart continues to burn because I know that the book is true. And like they said before...

¨And we give our names unto the world, to witness unto the world that which we have seen. And we lie not, God bearing witness of it.¨

I can say the same now. I give my name to the world and I lie not God bearing witness of it. If you have not read the Book of Mormon, please do it. You can recieve your own testimony and you can know for yourself. It is time for our to be self reliant in our own testimonies so when the hard times come, we will hold to the rod and not let go. Follow the Prophet Harold B. Lee´s counsel...

¨Youth should let no day pass without reading from these sacred books.¨


I Love you all


Elder Smith

July 15, 2019

Week 79: First week in Rocky Point (Puerto Peñasco)

Hey guys! We have officially finished our first week of the transfer in Puerto Penasco. This week was pretty interesting and I have a lot to tell you guys! Penasco is truly a magical and interesting place. To start, in my area there are NO paved streets. EVERYTHING is sand. It is pretty crazy. I have never experienced something like Penasco in my entire mission. The weather is pretty cool here. It feels like really humid but we feel the beach air so its pretty nice.

We have been teaching a lot of families. This week we taught a lady named Maria that wants to be baptized. We invited her to read and pray about the Book of Mormon and she did it and she told us that she knows its true. Right now she is going through some hard stuff with her husband but we are trying figure things out so that she can be baptized. We taught her about the Spirit and Elder Bednars videos ¨Patterns of Light¨ and we talked about revelation. It was a super rad lesson.

I had some crazy things happen this week! When we went to eat yesterday at lunch, as we ate cockroaches were walking on the table around our food so that was cool. I got to kill cockroaches as I ate lunch that was a first. Also yesterday, we were teaching a man on the street when all of a sudden his wife came and they had a huge fight. I literally thought they were going to fist fight in front of us and we calmed them down, taught them, and then we took their beer so they couldnt drink it. We asked the guy ¨Hey would you like us to take your beer so you can start to change now¨ and hey told us yes haha. It was pretty cool. This week also an american family came to church and they helped us with some rides to take investigators home. I also got to speak in church. It was a pretty cool week. I love Penasco. It was a pretty normal week and we are going to have a lot of success in the next few weeks. Our zone had two baptisms this week and we will have 6 this week! I love you guys thanks for your support!

1. Presidente Zepeda
2. Rocky Point El Camaronero

July 8, 2019

Week 78: Super week

Hey guys! This email isnt going to be super long but I justed wanted to let you guys in on somethings that happened this week. My last week in Caborca was a great one. We baptized 4 people and confirmed 5 people on Sunday. It was truly a miracle. Last week I talked a little about Satan and his tactics that he uses. This week we say ALOT of that again with the baptisms. Our first convert that got baptized is named Ximena. For a long time her mom didnt give her permission to be baptized and finally her mom gave it too us after MONTHS of waiting. On the way to her baptism, a man almost hit us in his car on the way (I have it recorded) and at the other baptism with Esmeralda and Yolanda their sister came and she is crazy. She literally was making a huge deal of everything in the baptismal service and was acting like a little girl. However, we were able to have success. I am truly grateful for all that I have learned in Caborca. I am not going to lie it is a hot, dusty, and run down place but Heavenly Father was able to teach me a ton and humbled me a lot. I was able to make friendships that will last forever. I love Caborca. I truly feel satisfied for all that I could accomplish in Caborca. We ended up baptizing 16 people in this transfer! All of it was made possible thanks to our Heavenly Father.

July 1, 2019

Week 77: A week to never forget

This week was one of the hardest and most amazing of my entire life. Doing the Lords work here we truly see miracles and we feel the Spirit daily. It is truly an extremely hard experience but it is something so special that it is all worth it. This week I only want to share one experience that happened this week but it was one that really made me think and changed my point of view on many things. Every since I have been here in Caborca, I have known a youth named "Ramiro" that is 16 years old. Every since I have been here in Caborca, I saw him spending time with the youth in the branch and to be honest, we thought he was maybe a member. One sunday, we ate lunch with the Branch President and he was there with his friends (after we all went to church). After lunch, out of nowhere, we started talking about the mission and the experiences we have had. Ramiro heard every one of our 4 testimonies of the mission and the youth there got really excited about serving missions. Ramiro even got excited and said he wanted to serve a mission. Little by little, we started to teach him and we could see that his testimony was growing. We also saw how strong Satan started to attack him. Out of no where, he started to work every day except sundays. He would go to church but we could never teach him during the week for work. We taught him over the phone and thought of everything we could do. After that, out of no where, he had to work on sunday. He had never had to work on Sunday. He wanted to get baptized but he had so many things in his life that were holding him back. One day, we were super down. My companion and I had fasted, prayed, and tried to get in contact with Ramiro the entire week and nothing. One day at night we were going to go to an appointment but we felt the impression that we needed to go to Ramiros house. We got there and knocked and he had arrived from work. We could talk to him and explain that Satan was trying to do everything that he could so that he wouldnt be baptized. He agreed and also told us that his parents gave him permission to get baptized but that they werent going to support him. In spite of the conflict, we set up a day so he could be baptized. We all decided that Sunday would be a good day. That sunday, his boss WITHOUT notifying him beforehand told him that he had to work. Then we set up the baptism for wednesday because every day he has a lunch break and we were going to baptized him on his lunch break. Out of nowhere, he had to work longer that day. Finally at 9 at night, Ramiro was baptized. It was literally the hardest baptism I had had in my entire mission. Satan literally was attacking Ramiro the entire time and the ENTIRE day. I had never seen Satan work so hard so that a person wouldnt be baptized. That night when my companion and I got back to the house exhausted. We talked and we hadnt told eachother but both of us had been been tempted and tried in that day. I personally had a really difficult day for some reason and I felt like Satan was throwing lies at me the entire day like "you arent a good missionary..." "He wont get baptized..." "Why are you even trying?" I felt a spiritual burden the entire day and I was struggling. My companion experienced something similar. We realized how true it is that we are in Gods work and He is real but something even scarier. That satan is really real. He doesnt only want us to feel bad but he literally wants to destroy our souls. That night we discussed a scripture and that I had found a couple days before hand. Its is found in 3 Nep
hi 1:20-23

20 And it had come to pass, yea, all things, every whit, according to the words of the prophets.

21 And it came to pass also that a new star did appear, according to the word.

22 And it came to pass that from this time forth there began to be lyings sent forth among the people, by Satan, to harden their hearts, to the intent that they might not believe in those signs and wonders which they had seen; but notwithstanding these lyings and deceivings the more part of the people did believe, and were converted unto the Lord.

23 And it came to pass that Nephi went forth among the people, and also many others, baptizing unto repentance, in the which there was a great remission of sins. And thus the people began again to have peace in the land.

Even though Satan is working hard, Satan will never have success. I want you all to know how important it is be shield against Satans attacks. Even though it sounds harsh and scary I promise and I say this of experience if you are not ready and those darts come and you are not ready and dont have a plan, you will fall. I promise you. You need to be built on the foundation of Christ (Helaman 5:12). The scriptures say that when man build on that foundation, they cannot fall. I know that to be true. This sunday, during Ramiro`s confirmation, President Jimenez said in the blessing, "I bless you that one day if it is the Lords will, that you will be able to serve a mission some day." Hearing those words, it was all worth it for me.

June 10, 2019

Week 74: What whilt thou have me do?-Paul

This week was one I will never forget. So many things happened and I have learned so much. I hope I can remember the most important things to tell you guys. This week we had our Zone Conference with all the missionaries of Caborca. President Myers told us that we could teach anything we wanted to the missionaries but something that would help them progress and have more success in the work. We decided this week to fast to be able to recieve revelation to know what to do. This fast that we did was one of the hardest I had ever done. It was super hot, we were thirsty, and sometimes we felt like we could have fainted but we needed the extra help. In fact, that night when we slept my companion and I both woke up super early in the morning really week and we couldnt move. We were super thirsty and we kind of started to panic. Luckily, we could relax again and we feel asleep again.

I had an amazing experience that morning when we woke up. Before that point, we didnt really have an idea what to teach the missionaries and I was started to get stressed out. That morning, the alarm went off, and as soon I opened my eyes, I immediatley started thinking of the apostle Paul. I started to think in his life as a missionary and everything he went through. In my bed I turned my eyes to my night stand and saw my book "Jesus the Christ" by James Talmage (one of my favorite books) and I right away started to study the section that talks about Paul. I jotted down ideas and studied that morning about his life. I told my companion what had happened and we decided to teach the missionaries about Pauls conversion story and how our investigators can have a conversion. In the zone conference, we taught about the Pauls beautiful conversion story and life. I was truly grateful to be able learn of him and will always be an example to me. In some sense, I feel that Paul and I have went through similar experiences (except being in jail jaja) and we both have the same goal to be faithful servants our Heavenly Father.

This week as well with the fast that we did we were able to see many miracles. This week two of our investigators told us that they recieved an answer that the church is true. They said "When I said my prayer, I waited for an answer and I felt something and I started to cry but I dont know why." We were so amazed and explained that it was an answer from God. Those 2 people will be baptized the 29th of this month.

The last experience that I want to share happened this week as well. On saturday, we decided to say a prayer to be able to find a family that we could teach and be baptized. In the street, we said a prayer and as soon as we finished, we saw some kids outside a house and we went to go to talk with them. We started to teach them and soon their mom came out and presented herself and said her name was Merarith. She told us a little about herself and told us that she has had many problems in her life. We taught her a little and explained that if she would go to church that her life would be better and she could trust in the Lord. We invited her to church and said she would go. We told her the address and everything. Honestly I didnt think much about it. The next morning, we recieved a text message that said "Hi its Merarith I am getting ready to go!" She went! Even her kids. I am excited to see what is in store for her because we believe it was the family we have been searching for.

I love you all

Giddy Up

Elder Smith

1. Marieath and her family at church
2. Leon Bridges style
3. Caborca Zone in Rocky Point Zone Conference
4. The Dorks
5. Coming home from Rocky Point with Sister Myers
6-8. Dumb bike crash from getting chased by 4 dogs