In the service of others...

Christmas!  What a week!  Our numbers are a little lower this week but hardly anyone wants to hear us with their families in town and what not. Plus a ton are gone. BUT Christmas day Elder Hughes and I found this couple macheting their back yard. There was a forest of plants and we worked for like an hour and then asked if we could share a message with them the following the day. There was a problem though. The wife insisted that we eat dinner with them, she made us food. And this family was not well off at all there was no way we could so no thank you right. The problem was that we had just had a huge Christmas lunch two hours before AND we had a big dinner with a member planned for that night like an hour and half later. So we ate her food. She asked us if we wanted seconds. We politely said that we really couldnt possibly eat more but thank you so much. She smiled at us and swiftly grabbed our plates and put another helping on. It was rough, real rough. But their generousity and kindness were signs to us of humility. So we invited there family of SIX to church and they were like Yeah! So we are like okay we will call you a ride from a member to come pick you up. Well in typical fashion of people that say they will go to church they neve come. BUT we see the wife after church in the street and she tells us they were dressed and waiting outside and no one came. That made me upset, real upset. Haha but they are super good and the best family we have found in a while. It was a testament to me that service always opens the doors to good oportunities. 

I got to talk to my wonderful family which was awesome. It was great to see them and talk. 

We ate way to much cake this past week with Christmas and a companions birthday..i havent eaten like this in a long time haha.

Not much more went on...except that the family of Geena(the one with the three daughters) finally came to church!  Like all four of them!  It was amazing they have like found serious desires now it is great. January could honestly be a really, really good month for us I am pumped.

Anyway I hope you had a wonderful Christmas and will have a happy new year.

Love you all

Elder Smith

Merry Christmas

I do not have much time this week but i want to write something.
So I hope everyone is enjoying the Christmas season. It truly is the most wonderful, magical time of the year! My Christmas will be slightly different than the years past!  First, instead of snow on the streets, i will be amongst tens of stray dogs.   I got some awesome presents from my great family. 

 I love hearing how great opf a break everyone is having. We get to stay out until 10:30 for Christmas which is going to be awesome. We had a day where every missionary in Reynosa went to offices and we got to talk to old friends and play games ANDDDD watch Elf...in spanish which means i understood roughly 5%.

Awww all is well. I am most grateful for this oppritunity to be here on this mission and to serve my Lord And Savior Jesus Christ.

Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night.   Elder Smith 

Ginger bread houses

MTC district

Mexican Familia

I gave my clothes to another

... My companions are doing great.  We are four in the house right now. Elder Martinez, the new guy, is pretty interesting. He is 22 and has graduated with a degree in some kind of psychology. He tries to read our minds and stuff.  Other than that he is super nice and is a great missionary. We go in twos now though. Elder Hughes is with me and we are really looking for new investigators now. At least that is our focus because our progressing investigators all got baptized.

Oh! I forgot about last Saturday! We were having the baptism for Yazmine and Victor and one of our investigators. Jose, an investigator that really loves the church shows up and says "Oh no i forgot to bring white clothes!" We were like uhhhhh you want to get baptized right now? And he was ready, so I took off my clothes and he used them to get baptized, after a quick call to the president and an interview!  It was so awesome!

We worked super hard this week, and we didnt find hardly anyone that wanted to listen. That was tough but I have faith that they are here. We just have to keep diligently searching!

And now a list, of the things that i miss...

Movies. Movies. Movies.

My mother´s cooking

The High Priests quorom president not wearing tight blue jeans to chruch 

The RED, WHITE, AND BLUE BABY America will always be number one. But dont call the U.S. America in mexico because they consider this whole continent America, and it offends them beacuse they are "Americans" also

Not having to thank God everytime i step out of a car unharmed

U.S. Church. It is sooo much different i cant even describe it

The internet to settle disputes quickly

Nice couches

Carpet 

clean floors

snacks

Decembers that werent 80/90 degrees

Things i learned this week...

I miss a lot of things haha

But i love everyday here and honestly would not rather be in any other place in the world. The Lord is blessing us immensely and i can see those blessing all around me. We have this one investigator that is like 100 percent wants to get baptized. She is 22 and works and goes to school like the entire day. The only problem is that this is Mexico and they pay her like 2.50 and hour. And she is like the best person I have met in Mexico so far. Super nice and totally prepared for the Gospel. She is literally the only young adult here that follows every commandment without going to a church. But she has come to church 3 or four times now. The only problem is her family. Her mom is going through a divorce with her dad, who is like the worst dude ever.  He basically never talks to his 3 daughters. It is a bad situation. But he won't give her permission to be baptized because..well..a lot of reasons. And she is 22 but she is practically under rule because she lives in the house. And it is not at all possible for them to move right now. It is just a bit depressing because if she was in the States, her life would be literally 1000000000000 times better, because really her whole family minus the dad is super smart and sweet. Oh Mexico. Why are you the way you are?

Other than them we have a couple of other investigators that just need to pray with the faith they have. 

Christmas is coming!!! I hope you all are enjoying the season. Remember what this time is really all about! Remember the original gift that our Heavenly Father sent us and the importance of that gift! I love you all. And if you haven't already, look up He is the Gift on mormon.org and share it with your friends! Hasten the work.

On that note..please help the missionaries in your wards. Especially if they are awesome because really, we need the help of the members so much. We need your food, your rides after church, your teaching with us, your REFRENCES, and much more. Please please please understand the importance of missionary work, and really your obligation to share what you know. Muchas gracias por todas de sus oraciones!!

Elder Smith 

Pics only this week - no time to write

So I have a new companion Elder Koltreyon

Well the transfer is almost at a close. I have no clue at this point in time where i am going or if i am staying. Generally we dont get much of a warning for changes. These weeks just fly by to be honest. I am not sure if 11 weeks has ever gone by so fast in my life. 

The weather here. Okay i dont care where you're from or been or seen. There is no crazier climate then this. Okay maybe a slight exageration but it gets freezing one day and then in the 90s(or high 20s celcius here) the next. And rain can just pour for a minute and flood everything. Its like....something that changes its mind a lot haha i cant think of anything to compare it to.

So i have a new companion Elder Koltreyon. It is only slightly impossible to pronounce haha i called him megatron for the first few days when i couldnt rememeber.

Well anyway we had some great experiences this one lady only speaks english and I was just blessed to have the opportunity to be there and teach her because she is so spirtually ready and prepared. She excepted all the lessons and is getting baptized Saturday. I feel really grateful for the experiences with our people this week. 

We did have a lady drop us saturday, the day of her her baptism. Like really bad we tried to talk to her but she didnt want to talk.

Okay so the things i learned this week...

Mexican Billboards consist of two types...really attractive people.....and beer.

Mexican music can be pretty good...or super, super terrible

When you are white, and tall, you are going to get stared at. And people have no shame they will stare at your gringo face for minutes.

Phil Collins knows fluent spanish.
Okay. This is so cool so my companion has some sweet stuff but he starts playing all these Disney songs but the spanish versions right. Like all the famous songs its sweet. And the tarzan songs start to play and im like,..due thats phil collins and hes like yeah he speaks spanish!! How sweet is that!?! My comp says that listening to the songs and writing down the words helped him learn spanish, because it is a lot harder to understand singers than it is in regular conversation.

Anyway thats all for this week. Sorry i cant spell haha. Hope Turkey day was good for yall we didnt do much just had some chicken ya know.

Elder Smith