Families can be together forever...

AHH I have less than no time this week!!! We have to be at our dictrict meeting in like 10 minutes but I'll type as fast as I possibly can!!
So the other week I was reading in.... I don't remember where but I ended up somehow in Malachi. And I recognized chapter 4 vers 5-6 I believe, cause it's a scripture mastery, and it talks about the prophet Elijah (Elias in español) being sent by God to turn the hearts of the children to their fathers or algo asi [something like that].. And forever I had no idea what that meant! But then I was reading in Doctrina y Convenios (I think its seccion 110) and Elijah came to Joseph Smith and Oliver Cowdery in a vision and gave them the keys to do the obra vicaria en el templo [temple work]! And then I realized what that meant!! ANND in the Book of Mormon a BUNCH in like 1 and 2 Nefi I think, it talks about the Lord fulfilling his promises that he made to our fathers, and all about the covenants and promises he made with our fathers, and I think that's talking about the work that we can do in the templo for the salvation of our ancestors! And in DyC 138 it describes it way good, but basically, "turning the hearts of the children to their fathers" means that we can do like baptisms and sealings and stuff in the temple, well for everyone, but especially for nuestro propios antepasados[our own ancestors]!! And that's why family history is so important! AND in this evangelio[gospel] one major principle that we stress is that families can be together forever. And that principle is like, everywhere in the scriptures! And I never even realized it! So I gave a talk about that in sacrament meeting last Sunday when the first counselor asked HG and I if one of us could give a talk cause they were short some speakers or something, so I volunteered. And had like 30 minutes to prepare. But it was easy to talk about family history and everything cause there's a lot of scriptures that I read haha:) BUT just yesterday in la capilla [the chapel] the stake presidency came to our ward to talk, and they all talked about family history too! So that's the topic for the week.

Pray for Maria to get married and baptized soon!! We're so close!

I got kissed this week:( Again. Dangit.

And we preached to a police officer.

And we got to go to the temple to teach a lesson and that was fun.

Ok I have to go now! Mucho amor!

HS

Ok can we talk about food for a second?

No I don't really miss any electronics. And I miss hiking so much!!! We are doing our own form of hiking I guess. in skirts. and heavy backpacks. (I got a new backpack today in centro! And a new watch cause BOTH my watches broke:(...) 

Her bedroom- the simple life!!

They adopted Pinky the dog - for a while

Ok can we talk about food for a second? Who knew the gift of tongues also meant that the Spirit makes everything you eat taste heavenly??? I LOVE the food here! I look forward to it every day. And vegetables are like the equivalent of candy. Like, a tomato is a rare delicacy. So HG and I bought like 7 the other day to make for breakfast or dinner (We only get fed lunch by the members) And usually we just get tortillas, and beans and some sort of meat. And habanero. Everybody here serves habanero with everything. And HG hates it but I LOVE IT! And I always love the food we get but when we get a salad or something... oh man. So this morning for breakfast we made toast with tuna and grilled onions, and cut up tomatoes and avocado on top, dipped in beans (Frijoles here are often in soup form.) And oh my gosh. I don't think I have ever been so excited about eating something in my whole life. Literally. 

Lunch with Hermana Williams and her companion (Sam's MTC companion)

Happy reunion with Hma Williams

Ok so HG and I were talking about how the people here give directions, which consists much of "por aca, y por alli..." and HG was saying how that's like 10 times better than in her country cause how they do it goes something like this "So you go down this road and count one, two, three, corners, then turn left. and not right. cause if you turn right, you will go the wrong way. and after about 5 minutes, you will see a big tree, and then you're not there yet. so you have to go about 2 more minutes, and then turn right this time, not left. And then, you have to look for the little red store on the corner, and you're not there yet, but you have to go inside the store and ask the man who works there which way to go next, cause sometimes I get lost too and I always have to ask him where to go and he tells me.."

Ah dang I have no more time again!!!! But I love you all dearly and I have a really good spiritual thought for next week! 

Families can be together forever!! And like, everything we do somehow relates to this principle. Even in the bible. It's cool. 

Exciting adventures from a gringa in Mexico!

HG [Samantha's companion] and I walk everywhere. Our area is not too big but its LONG so we walk A LOT. La capilla [the chapel]  is about a 15 minute walk from our house so not too bad. We never get to go to the temple unless an investigator is getting sealed.... missionary rules :( triste.

That cardboard cutout of me is so creepy... where does it live?

Samantha made a guest appearance in Park City

 (cardboard cutout courtesy of her Grandma Mimi)

Your adventures sound so fun and I can't wait to see you all again! Too bad that won't be for like.. 16 months more..

I don't know if I'll be able to send pictures on this computer but I will try! In case I can't here's a cool story from last night...

So we were teaching this lady (let's call her Maria) that we always teach 'cause she lives super close to us, and her 2 daughters and niece are all members (not active at all but they always come out and listen to us when we come over) and she really wants to be baptized but she can't cause she's not married to this guy she lives with (we'll call him Juan). And Juan doesn't want to get baptized. And a lot of the time when we come over he's outside drinking with his friends and is always drunk and never wears a shirt and I don't know... we avoid them whenever they're drunk cause they scare us. But yesterday HG invited them (I guess invited isn't the right word cause HG is rather... persuasive. its more like commanded) to sit and listen. So there's two drunk guys with their beers listening to me try to talk about coming unto Christ and being perfected in Him. Then one guy starts saying stuff that apparently isn't very nice so Maria and her niece escort him inside. And then Juan starts arguing with HG about why we don't worship Guadalupe and get baptized as babies and all this stuff that doesn't make any sense. And HG perfectly logically explains everything perfect using the scriptures and everything. And then the topic turns to why he should get married 'cause his family would be stronger and if he loves Maria he should marry her so she can get baptized and they can be a happy family and all that jazz, and Maria jumps in and starts talking about how hard it is for her when he's always drinking and she just wants to be a family and everyone's talking over each other and it's pretty tense. But long story short, we have a date for them to get married! January 28th! And I probably will get transferred to another area next week so I don't think I'll see it...:( Also, Juan was drunk so who knows how reliable his commitment is. But I don't know. I just feel like in the mission you have so much hope for people and know that they can change.

This week we had a lot of people that argued with us(HG) about our church and she got pretty discouraged but I had a math teacher that once told me, when arguing with someone, you will never change their mind, even if you're right, and they know it, and you know they know it, they will never admit to it cause they're too set in their ways. But what you do is plant a seed, and over time, they will come to realize that they are wrong and they will change.

So if bearing our testimony is all we can do, well that's probably the best thing we can do. Over time the Spirit will work on them and they'll be curious about what we said and look more into our church and then down the road when other missionaries find them, they'll be ready to listen. Anywho, those are my palabras de sabiduria [words of wisdom ] for this century. Sorry I can't tell you more whats going on, trust me, there's a lot [Samantha has to travel to an internet cafe to receive and send emails and she only has one hour every week to do it , which apparently goes by VERY quickly!] Maybe next week I'll tell a funny story about baptizing a cat. Or a sad story about little kids torturing a cat. Or a cute story about a newborn cat I saw yesterday. There's lots of cats here. Tune in next week (especially you Shelley) to find out what happens next in the exciting adventures of this gringa in Mexico! todaloo!

Hermana Smith