Zone Conference

Hola everyone! 

Wow this week was amazing. 

We finally got Beyonce back from the autobody shop this past Thursday! But then we had to drive her straight to a Pep Boys to take care of a water leak and went back to work with our extra car but when we went to pick her up a few hours later they said they couldn't do anything so Friday we took her into the dealer to finally be fixed which was no problem since we still had the extra car. But last night the assistants to the mission president had to take the car so today we're back to bikes and buses! But hopefully she'll be done by tonight! And we're getting pretty good at using the bus system here! 

Also I keep forgetting to mention, no one in the spanish ward can play piano and so it's up to the missionaries here to play for church. We've always had elders here in the ward that could play but this last transfer our pianist got transfered to El Paso and the new elder can't play piano so for the last few weeks I've been the Miranda ward's pianista! 

I still can only play with my right hand but no one can even tell and I've been improving a lot in the past few weeks! But yeah it's really scary every week.

Yesterday we had a big zone conference and all of the zones in the south (so basically us and all of el paso) came up here to Cruces and the mission president spoke to us and Elder Bennet from the quorum of the seventy came too! It was so incredible and we all felt the Spirit so strongly! I love zone conferences because they always help us to stay motivated and get out there and work, even and especially when it seems hard. And since El Paso came up here I got to see my Hermana Moss, my CCM companion!!! That was a HUGE tender mercy for me, I've missed her so much! 

Excuse the awful lighting, we were far too excited to see each other, to consider leaving the gym

All of our investigators are doing incredible. We have a lot of baptisms planned for the next two months which is so exciting to see! There's just so many prepared people out here who are ready and willing to follow their Savior, Jesus Christ! It is the most amazing thing in the world to watch and help others fall head over heals in love with the gospel of Jesus Christ like I have! 

Something I've been thinking a lot about this week, and especially at the conference yesterday, is how incredibly blessed I am to be able to have the knowledge of this gospel, of how much my Heavenly Father loves me and all of His children, and how I can live with Him again and with my family for eternity. I still don't quite understand why I was blessed to be born into this church where I've been able to have this knowledge and understanding my whole life but I was and I want everyone to be able to feel that peace and love that I get to every single day. Missionary work is the most incredible and joy filled work I've been able to experience and I'm so grateful to be out here! I miss you all and I'll see you in a little over 1 far too short year!

Hermana Martin

Thanksgiving!

Ok so it was another pretty uneventful week so this should be short. 

We survived Thanksgiving! Normally missionaries have anywhere up to 5 dinners on holidays but we were master planners and just scheduled a lunch and a dinner so it was absolutely perfect. Lots of turkey and tamales. It was delicious. 

And all of our investigators are doing awesome! And one of them finally came to church!!! It's been like 2 months since an investigator has come to church so that was a great day. He's this really sweet 79 year old man that we found walking around this random trailer park and he's so excited to learn more about the gospel and how to come closer to Christ. 

Every day I am so grateful that I get to be out here teaching amazing, prepared people like this investigator and that I get to constantly teach and testify about how much their Heavenly Father loves them. It's seriously the coolest thing. Well I love you all! Have a great week!

Hermana Martin

Beyonce and Bikes

Wow this week was crazy, I don't even know where to begin. 

Ok so last week after we did all of our emailing and grocery shopping and everything we went to drop our car at Caliber Collision because like a month ago we were driving through Vado which consists entirely of poorly made dirt roads and it was flooding like crazy so we ended up smashing into a big pot hole and the front bumper has needed a little tlc ever since so we FINALLY got cleared to get her fixed. 

So we take her in and they're like yeah we already have all of the parts, it should be a quick 4 day fix! So we're freaking out but we have bikes and it's not too unreasonably cold right now so we leave with our bikes (which was a whole ordeal, the zone leaders here had to take my bike to a pep boys and then an actual bike store and get a part to fill up the air because apparently my bike has a european valve or something funky but now we know and I'm all set for the future!) but so we're going along with our bikes for the week and we had a lot of rides from members thank goodness because they felt bad for us because bikes, wind, and skirts is a really bad combination. 

So she was supposed to be done maybe Friday but we got a call from the vehicle coordinator, Elder Funk, and he said that they had to order another part and that our car would be a whole other week so we were just freaking out but we have a ton of help here, Heavenly Father has so obviously been looking out for us, so we figured it wouldn't be too bad to tough it out for another week. 

Then Friday morning Elder Funk called and said he had good news and bad news. The bad news was that our car was still definitely going to be another week. But the good news was that there was an extra car down in El Paso that they would bring to us the next day! I literally fell to the ground crying I was so happy. So Saturday morning the assistants to the mission president showed up with our beautiful borrowed car and we get to use it until ours is ready again! 

BLESSINGS. 

Hopefully we get our car back soon though, I don't want to put too many miles on a borrowed car. Also we have a bond with our car now since we named her Beyonce because she's a survivor like the Destiny's Child song.

Also, I don't know if anyone remembers the fun washer machine flood incident a few months ago but we've been out a washer and dryer ever since so we've been going to a laundromat and we actually found a really nice one! 

But so Wednesday morning we get a call from the zone leaders saying "hey, can we bring your washer over at like 11?". Apparently a member somewhere in Las Cruces had an extra one and they are amazing elders so they picked it up for us and now we have our very own washer machine! Wow it really makes everything so much easier! We've really been so far passed blessed here. 

As far as our investigators go it's been a great week as well! We're still finding new people and 5 people have set they want to be baptized and set a date! Which is absolutely incredible. The only thing is that they all have a hard time getting to church but we're working on that and hopefully they'll all be able to make it soon!

As crazy as this week was it was so jam packed with obvious blessing which is so cool right before Thanksgiving. A part of a scripture we've been sharing a lot this week that I love is "that ye live in thanksgiving daily, for the many mercies and blessings which he doth bestow upon you" (Alma 34:38) and I love love love this scripture because this really is such an amazing time of the year filled with such a special spirit as we think about all of our many blessings and as we look forward to the Christmas season but we can keep this special spirit with us all year long and we should! 

We are blessed so far beyond belief every single day and we should give thanks for all we have continually. I remember growing up one of my teachers in church asked us to think about everything we thanked our Heavenly Father for the night before and what would our life be life if we woke up with only those things left. There's a whole lot that I'd be missing and that was a big wake up call for me. I challenge all of you to live with a spirit of thanksgiving in your hearts, especially during this holiday season, and I can promise that as you do so you will see the Hand of the Lord in every single part of you life. He is always there and He loves youso much. Have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Hermana Martin

Fun fact: a lot of people in spanish call Thanksgiving 'Dia de Pavo' which means 'Day of Turkey' and I just think that's really funny

4 Month Mark!

Hola! 

Wow I can't believe that today is my 4 month mark! Time has flown by! Anyways transfer news... 

Both Hermana Espinoza and I are staying here in Las Cruces! And since she finishes her mission at the end of the next transfer I probably won't get transferred this next time either. I should have a nice long while to spend here in the Miranda ward! 

Two exciting and non related to missionary things this week, we went to this little restaurant here called Bosa Doughnuts and Burritos (it sounds weird I know, they're seriously the best doughnuts I have ever had) and they had Mexican Coca-cola! I absolutely LOVE Coke and the Mexican ones are the best so that was a lovely blessing this week.

 Also our car had a mild meltdown! It kept overheating and so we managed to drive it home and the next day one of our members came over and helped fix it so now we're all good to go! That day showed me how grateful I am to have a car available to use because we had to use bikes for a few hours and man cars are so much nicer!

For actual missionary work, this week we've been finding a lot of new investigators! I'm so excited that we get to stay here and continue to watch their progress! Our little area has been growing tremendously and it's so exciting to watch and to be a part of! The only sad news this week is that this weekend was scheduled to be our investigator's baptism but he hasn't been able to make it to church so we have to push it off a little bit, but it'll be soon! I'm just so filled with joy every time we get the opportunity to teach him. He loves our Savior and His gospel with all his heart and it always reminds me of why I'm out here serving. 

There is so much joy in this work, there are no words to describe it. We get to talk to and teach so many incredible people every single day here and hear little bits about their stories. I am shown every day how much love God has for each and everyone of His children as I get to hear about how these people I am blessed to meet have seen the hand of God in their lives. It just teaches me how we can always trust in God because He is always there. 

One of my favorite scriptures is Psalms 46:10 "Be still and know that I am God". Just trust, have faith, and be still. Missionary work is certainly stressful at times but I always try to remember that no matter what happens, no matter what trials come our way, we can just be still and trust in Him and everything will work out in the end.

Hermana Martin

Quick Email

I've seriously been sitting here for like 5 minutes trying to remember anything noteworthy that happened this week. 

It's getting dang cold! And apparently in the winter it gets really windy here. Yesterday a stop sign got blown down. That was pretty cool. 

Um it really was a good week, everything is moving along smoothly here. This area has been growing TREMENDOULSLY in the past few weeks which is so cool to witness and be a part of! We moved our investigator's baptism date to December 5th and he's is so excited! And we committed three of our other investigators to baptism on the 26th of December! Hopefully they make it! 

I just feel so blessed to be able to be a part of the work here. Every time we talk with our members about missionary work we just talk all about the indescribable joy that we get to feel each and every day. It's hard work, there's no question about that. I'm constantly exhausted mentally, physically, and spiritually but I always have just enough energy to do what I need to everyday and I'm so happy all the time. I never thought I could be this tired and this happy at the same time. It's amazing.

Love you all and hope you have an amazing week!

Hermana Martin

Last Week of Being a Greenie

Hola everyone! 

This is week 6 of my second transfer out which means this is my last week of training! That still doesn't make sense in my head. Anyways that also means that next week is transfers so I'll be emailing on Monday! We find out Saturday night if we're staying or getting transferred but fingers crossed I get to stay here in Cruces for a little bit longer! I doubt I'll get transferred since Hermana Espinoza goes home from her mission at the end of this next transfer so I think I'll be here until the end of the transfer after that so the end of January but who knows. President Miller isn't exactly predictable. 

This week we just went and talked to A LOT of people. Which is awesome because we found a bunch of potential and new investigators! We haven't been able to find a lot of Spanish speakers the past few weeks but this week we could really see the hand of the Lord in His work here and we were lead to some primarily Spanish neighborhoods that we didn't even know existed before! That was so far beyond exciting, we're finally getting new people to teach! 

The funny thing about Las Cruces is that seriously everyone and their mother here has "guard dogs" but most of them are Chihuahuas. Seriously almost every house here has a "Beware of Dog" sign and you look and there's 3 little Chihuahuas running around. So we met a lot of dogs this week and only one was a real guard dog! I had to ninja jump off of that porch to safety, that's something I'm going to need a replay of in heaven because it had to have looked so cool. My super girly scream wasn't though. But don't worry parents, we're being safe! Other than that there's nothing major to report here. 

V for Vado! I love driving down there, it's so pretty

It's been raining a lot which means flooded streets which is really fun from the safety of our little car! Oh and this past week we had a stake conference which means that all of the members around Las Cruces all met together for this one Sunday and leaders from the area, including the new president of the Albuquerque temple and the second councilor for the New Mexico Albuquerque mission spoke to us and it was such a beautiful meeting! The Spirit was so strong and I kept thinking about what amazing members and examples that I am so privileged to serve with here! 

They are such great examples to me of exercising their faith, which is something that I've been studying a lot about this week. Well I started out studying patience and discovered how incredibly intertwined faith and patience are! One of my favorite scriptures I found in my studies is Alma 17:11 "...be patient in long-suffering and afflictions, that ye may show forth good examples unto them in me, and I will make an instrument of thee in my hands unto the salvation of many souls." This talks about how if we exercise faith in God we can trust in Him and that everything happens for a reason and that He is always with us and with that faith we can have patience in our afflictions and with that patience we can be great, strong instruments in the hands of God and that is all that I want right now. The more faith we have the more patience we can have as we trust His plan for us. 

I love patience, it is my favorite Christ-like attribute but it is also one of the hardest for me and I think for a lot of people. But I have already seen more blessings than I could possibly begin to understand as I have tried to have the faith to have the patience that I need to be a good servant for Him here in Cruces. This work takes A LOT of patience. And I am so grateful for this opportunity to try a little harder to be a little better each day and to exercise both patience and faith at every opportunity. I love you all!

Hermana Martin

Week of Blessings

Wow this was a crazy week. Which is awesome because last week was really hard (thus why greek food was the most notable thing for me) but this week made up for all of that and a whole lot more!

I seriously don't even know where to start, plus we had zone conference which was way cool last Wednesday. President and Sister Miller came down and our zone here in Las Cruces combined with the Mount Franklin West zone in El Paso which is where Hermana Holding is now so I got to see her again! 

Las Cruces Zone

Zone conference is so awesome and pretty much we spent a whole lot of hours in trainings and activities which pumped us up to get back to work and give it 112% out here. We are so blessed to have the Millers watching over us here, they are just the sweetest and such amazing, strong people, I always feel so inspired whenever I get an opportunity to talk with either of them! 

This week we were FINALLY able to teach one of our investigators again (it's been about 4 weeks which is an awfully long time). With every appointment we've had recently something has gone wrong and we haven't been able to teach him. 

Pero this last Saturday was a day of miracles and we were able to go with one of the members of our ward here and we talked about the Plan of Salvation (where did we come from, why are we here, what happens when we die) and the Spirit was so strong the whole time, it was like a sucker punch to the gut and it was the best thing ever. At the end of the lesson he actually asked us when he can get baptized! BLESSINGS MAN. He just loves this gospel with his whole heart and teaching him makes me so happy! 

We have him on date for the 14th of November (and I really hope he is ready by that date because that's my parent's anniversary and how sweet would that be to have my first baptism on such an important day!) We are so excited for him and I can't wait to see him continue to progress and learn! 

This week was just filled with blessings and miracles so I couldn't even begin to cover a small part of them so I'll just suffice it to say that God really is at the head of this work and He unquestionably looks out for His servants. 

After my hard week last week I've really been focusing on patience and faith, which are a lot more related than I realized before this week. In my personal study time one morning I was drawn to one of my favorite books in the Book of Mormon, Mosiah, and started reading in Chapter 23 and it was a story that I had never paid much attention to before but it is hands down one of my favorites now. It's about a prophet named Alma and his people who where trying to be righteous and follow the commandments of God. Their enemies marched in and in order to avoid war and death the people surrendered. During this whole difficult time they prayed continually to the Lord and they exercised their patience in this time of affliction because they had so much faith in God and that He listens and was aware of them. 

The story continues how the Lord was always with them and after this trial of their patience and faith they were delivered out of bondage and returned to a city where many of their brethren lived where they were able to tell of their miracle story and strengthen the faith of the people there. 

I am so far beyond grateful for this opportunity I have to serve. For people like our investigator who have come to love this gospel with all of their souls and for this opportunity I have to have a front row seat on their journey back to their Heavenly Father and embracing the light of Christ in their lives. I am so grateful that I have a Heavenly Father who loves me enough to give me hard weeks so that I, too, can exercise my patience and faith and so that I can learn and grow along the way, and that He knows me well enough to give me such an amazing, miracle week following it so that I can have the strength to continue on and love this work. 

I can testify, without a single hint of a doubt in my heart that God knows and loves each and every one of us more than we could ever begin to comprehend. He is always there. No matter what. No questions. And what beautiful knowledge that is.

Hermana Martin

Week 15 I think

Hola! 

The days here are such a blur, it's so hard to remember everything we did by the time emailing comes but I'll give it my best shot! Plus I swear every time we have an appointment here the investigator or member decides to go and visit Juarez so a lot of stuff got cancelled this week and we don't really have any exciting progress to report but the work here is still doing great and slowly but surely we're seeing progress in our investigators and in our little Spanish ward here. We have some new investigators that we're working with and have a lot of hope for!

It's just been a pretty slow week so honestly the most exciting part ​was probably Friday night. We didn't have a dinner appointment or much food left in our apartment so Hermana Espinoza and I decided to eat out. Fun fact: greek food is my absolute favorite and I just figured I was going to have to wait 18 months to eat it again because where in the world in New Mexico are you going to find greek food? Yeah well I saw a restaurant across from NMSU and we figured "porque no?" so we ate there. Wow. Blessings man. That was seriously the best greek food I have ever had in my life! Friday was a really hard day but that dinner made everything so much better. So that was my little miracle this week. 

Really I can't remember anything other than that though. Tomorrow will be zone conference and I'll get to see Hermana Holding again and President Miller is going to come down so I should have more exciting news in the next email, lo siento! I hope everyone has lovely weeks!

Hermana Martin

New Companion, and General Conference

Wow ok so I think I left off at transfers. This whole week has been a blur. So my new companion is Hermana Espinoza and she's awesome! She's been out here for like 15 months already and it's nice having a companion who has a ton of experience and is good with the language. 

I miss Hermana Holding SO MUCH. We had gotten so close and had all of these amazing plans for this upcoming transfer and it's been hard transitioning to a different Hermana but she's doing awesome in her new area and we've been able to make a lot of progress here in Cruces. Besides that I don't think anything too eventful happened. 

Our investigators have been doing well, steady progress which is all we can really ask for. It finally has been getting under 100 degrees here and we've had a lot of cool lightning storms recently which is one of my favorite things so that's been a really nice little tender mercy. 

We've found a lot of new investigators and are finally busy again which is a missionary's favorite thing. The more appointments we have to figure out how to juggle, the more people that want to hear about God and that's pretty cool. 

We just got back from visiting Hatch, New Mexico, green chili capital of the world! Some Hermanas that cover that area live in this cool remodeled Catholic church with a bell tower and everything that a member up there owns so we got a tour of the church and played sand volleyball in the courtyard which was so nice since I haven't been able to play volleyball since I left the CCM. We didn't do much in town but hopefully I'll be able to visit there again soon! They seriously just have chilies drying out on the roofs and hanging from beams and all sorts of crazy stuff.

But of course the best part of this week was being able to listen to General Conference. We got to watch all of the sessions in a local church building here (I ended up becoming the "tech guy" somehow and help set up the broadcast and the translators for my ward members who came). The whole time I couldn't help but think about what a privilege and a blessing it is that twice a year we get to listen to inspired leaders of the church, working under God's direction and authority, give us advice and council on how to live better, and happier lives and how to be more centered on Christ. 

 All of the talks given where AMAZING and it's so hard to pick just one thing to focus on this week because I learned so much. This was one of my favorite quotes though:

Transfers!

Hey!

Lo siento that I forgot to mention last week that every 6 weeks here (every transfer week) our P-day gets switched to a Monday because transfers tomorrow is going to take up so much time. So hola a day early! 

Hermana Holding and I were sure that they wouldn't switch either of us this transfer, I still need to finish my training this next 6 weeks and we're both pretty new to this area, but Friday night President Miller called and asked Hermana to be a sister training leader and so she has to leave and she'll be going either to El Paso or Albuquerque, we won't find out until the transfer meeting Tuesday morning. So yeah that's been sad, I love her SO MUCH and she's been such an awesome trainer, plus I'm a little scared about having to introduce my new companion to this area and being the most knowledgeable about it for a few days. But I'm sure my new Hermana will be absolutely AWESOME if President Miller trusts her to finish my training so I'm excited to see what this next transfer holds. 

We haven't been able to teach a lot this week, our investigators have been really busy so there's nothing much to report there. One awesome thing this week though, so there's a soup kitchen here in Las Cruces that the members of the church here mostly help run and they needed to repaint and so all of us missionaries here were more than willing to help! Friday afternoon we cleaned and taped off the walls and then Saturday morning we were able to paint! We probably got more paint on each other than the walls but we did a really good job and it was a lot of fun! 

Also this past Saturday we were able to watch the broadcast for the women's session of General Conference and wow! The Spirit was so strong and I just feel so grateful that we get the opportunity to listen to the leaders of the church and their divinely inspired messages twice a year! One talk that I absolutely loved was from Linda S. Reeves and she talked about how he "happily ever after" doesn't ever come until act 3, that this life is really hard and sometimes it feels like it's too much and we can't understand why all of these bad things are happening, especially when we're trying to be a good person. But then she talked about how the fullness of all of these blessings that we're earning down here by our good works will be given to us in heaven and how, yeah right now is really tough, but once we receive the fullness of the blessings of heaven we will ask "Was that all that was required?" What's waiting in store for us is more amazing than anything we can possibly imagine and if we are able to keep that eternal perspective, all of a sudden those really hard things don't seem quite so hard.

I'm so grateful for this knowledge. I'm so grateful that I have a Heavenly Father who loves me enough to challenge me, sometimes more than I think I can handle but He knows I can do it and He is ALWAYS there to help. I'm so grateful for the understanding that everything has a purpose, every trial and hardship in our lives, and that when we're through and surrounded by the fullness of the love of God that these trials will all seem so insignificant in comparison with the pure joy we will feel.

Hermana Martin

There is help and happiness ahead

Hola! 

This week has been a little crazy but good! 

On Thursday we did this thing called exchanges where the Sister Training Leaders did this little swap thing so I went down to their area, El Paso, with one of them and the other sister came and stayed up here with Hermana Holding for a day. They're both super sweet and it was great to get to know one of them, and the El Paso area a little bit. When we first got there it was raining so hard that in the about 15 seconds that it took me to run to the apartment I was completely soaked head to toe but at least the lightning was really cool! The members down there are really nice and I met some awesome investigators, and then at the end of the day I was able to come back to Hermana Holding and my area. 

ThenFriday was crazy because we had this huge ward fiesta. So I guess Cinco de Mayo is really more of an American thing and in Mexico they celebrate the 16th of September and so we did this big party and talent show to celebrate. One of the members let us borrow her folklorico (a traditional dance) skirts so we could dress up a little bit. There was SO MUCH FOOD. I got to eat authentic mole, tamales, paella (there's a member from Spain), and all sorts of crazy stuff that I have no idea what it was and man it was so good! And the talent show was fun, especially when a few of the members danced folklorico which is so pretty! All of us missionaries sang the Mexican National Anthem and the members all loved that we took the time to learn it so that was really nice. 

Missionary work hasn't really been progressing lately though. Our investigators, even the one with a baptismal date, just don't want to put in the effort to come to church so there's really not much more we can do to help them at this point which is really sad for us, we just have to hope that some day they'll have that desire again. 

But so the past few days we've been really focused on finding new investigators which has been interesting since we've talked to a whole lot of people but there's two that we're starting to work with who are both really interested so that's been a HUGE blessing for us lately. But yeah nothing too exciting to report this week. 

One thing we have been focusing on though is just getting back to the basics with faith. We need to have the faith to find new people to teach and we need to help those people develop their own faith. Without that base, there's no progression that can happen. And how amazing faith is! Faith is the opposite of fear and when we can embrace everything just seems a little better, a little easier. There's a quote I love from Jeffrey R. Holland that says

"Don't you quit. You keep walking. You keep trying. There is help and happiness ahead. Some blessings come soon. Some come late. And some don't come until heaven. But for those who embrace the gospel of Jesus Christ, they come. It will be alright in the end. Trust God and believe in good things to come."

Peace and Blessings, 

Hermana Martin

White Sands and Goats

Ok I don't have a lot of time to email this week and so I'll just sum up the main points:

• WE MOVED! Our new apartment is SOOO nice. We have clean water, a garage, we each get our own bathroom, and a normal air conditioner so we don't have to yell over the roar. We're seriously spoiled. The new address is 1000 La Fonda #U Las Cruces, NM

• I'm emailing a little later than normal because we went to White Sands this morning! It's really cool but it's really just a big stretch of really soft, white sand. We call it New Mexico snow.

• We learned how to make empanadas from a family in the ward and apparently we did a good job because we were officially told that we are wife material now. But really they were so delicious.
• One of our investigators with a baptismal date has an adorable 7 year old daughter who made us party hats out of cups and the picture is horrible, lo siento, but we thought that they were fantastic.

• While we were contacting in Old Mesilla last night (which is my favorite place here, it's so cute and we call it little Spain) we saw a couple taking their goats for a walk and I absolutely love baby goats so seeing even grown up goats was pretty cool. Also it was just a really funny sight.

• We cover this area called Vado which is pretty much just a lot of farm land, mostly dairy farms, but there's a lot of mosquitoes down there and we were outside talking for five minutes and Hermana Holding got 98 mosquito bites. Luckily I remained more or less unscathed but yeah I've had to help her not itch her legs constantly. Poor thing!
• We haven't had a ton of progress with any of our investigators this week but they're all doing well and we're super excited to see how this week goes!

Ok so spiritual thought for the week, I think 1 Corinthians is my favorite book in the Bible and I was reading a little out of it this week and really the first three chapters are just absolutely fantastic and it's so hard to pick just one thing to talk about but I think my favorite thought was at the beginning of chapter 2 where it says "when I came unto you, came not with excellency of speech or of wisdom declaring unto you the testimony of God" and Paul talks about how he spoke with the power of the Spirit and the power of God instead of relying on fancy words. This was really comforting to me because I definitely do not have an excellency of speach when I teach in Spanish, but I have learned to rely on the Lord and on the Spirit to convey this message into the hearts of the people I get to talk to. I really can do nothing on my own, this is His work and He is with us every step of the way and I am so grateful that I get to be His missionary! I love you all and I hope you have a fantastic week!

Month 2!

Hola Familia y Amigos!

Wow I can't believe that today is my 2 month mark! Crazy stuff man, it's been flying by. The CCM just feels like a blur at this point. So the work here has been awesome, the ward is making leaps and bounds and is really starting to become strong which has been such a HUGE blessing because missionary work is really hard without the full support of the members and leadership of the ward. Our investigators have been doing well and we found two more this week!

When we met one of our new investigators we found out the Elders had given him a Book of Mormon a few days before and he told us that he had read some of it, already knew it was true and wanted us to teach him all about what that meant and this church. So yeah you could say that that was a really good day. He has so much faith and you can already see the light of Christ and the hand of God at work in his life, he is such a joy to teach! 

And one of our investigators decided this week that she wants to be baptized! We have her scheduled for the 26th and so we're so excited and have been working with her a lot to make sure that she is 100% ready and truly believes in this gospel. 

We've been really busy with a lot of lessons to teach and a lot of members to visit which is everything a missionary could really ask for because that means that we're being productive and contributing something to this work so we're exhausted all the time but we're beyond happy. 

Oh update about our lovely apartment, so this past Wednesday morning Hermana Holding went to put in one last load of laundry right when we woke up and when she went to check on it an hour later the whole laundry room was flooded. Like a good few inches of water and the washer machine wouldn't stop running water and it was like 7:30 in the morning so no one was awake to answer their phones to help us but a few minutes later some elders (our incredible ​zone leaders actually) called back and came over right away to help us. We couldn't find knob to turn off the water but after a few minutes of panicking it just stopped so that was a really nice miracle. The elders came and helped us get as much of the water out as we could and an hour later a repair man came to try to get some of the water out of the carpet so all was well. But yeah, so WE'RE MOVING! The carpet smells all moldy now and we have to go to a laundromat to wash our clothes this week so that was just the push we needed to find a new apartment and we should be moving in this Friday! It's so nice with a garage, two bathrooms, and clean water. We're so excited! But we certainly had an exciting morning that day and we were laughing about how we had the water to go with our sand to make it a complete beach! And in the mayhem the dryer got moved to the living room and left there and so naturally Hermana Holding and I tried to fit inside and finally took some pictures.

But in the midst of all of the chaos of this week and our little flood I've been thinking a lot about the song I learned in church when I was little about a wise man who built his house upon a rock and a foolish man who built his house upon the sand and how when the rains and the floods came the man on the rock was safe, but the foolish man lost everything. I've also been thinking a lot about how important it is to have faith in Christ and to have Him as our foundation, our rock, because that is the only sure foundation in this world. 

A classic scripture came to mind,  Helaman 5:12 which says "And now, my sons, remember, remember that it is upon the rock of our Redeemer, who is Christ, the Son of God, that ye must build your foundation; that when the devil shall send forth his mighty winds, yea, his shafts in the whirlwind, yea, when all his hail and his mighty storm shall beat upon you, it shall have no power over you to drag you down to the gulf of misery and endless wo, because of the rock upon which ye are built, which is a sure foundation, a foundation whereon if men build they cannot fall.". 

I know that as we allow Christ to be our foundation, as we put our faith and our trust in Him, that no trial, no sorrow, no temptation is too great. With Christ all things are possible and all hope is available. I'm so grateful for this knowledge and for this opportunity I have to be so close to Christ and His gospel and to help others find this light and hope.

Love you all and I hope you have fantastic weeks!

Miracles and Beaches

Hola familia y amigos!

 Wow the work is really picking up out here in Las Cruces, it's been an incredible week! I'll just mention a few of the many miracles we experienced this past week. 

So as missionaries we try to have members come out with us to teach investigators and help them feel comfortable and start having friends in the church but the members here are so busy that it's really hard to get those member present lessons so Hermana Holding and I have been praying a lot for help with that and doing all we can, working diligently and such and this week during planning we managed to get 6 member present lessons scheduled when last week we barely got two and one of those was a surprise (I'll talk about that lesson in a little bit). We are so excited and hope that this momentum keeps up! 

Ok so that surprise lesson. So we've been working a lot with the less active members of the ward one of those is a nurse. She has a hard time coming to church herself because she's a nurse and has had to work on Sundays but she loves to share the gospel and the things that make her happy so one day, out of the blue, she called us with a referral to teach her friend. We scheduled an appointment to talk to her more and that was a whole thing (long story short we had the wrong trailer number and thought she bailed on us and we were really discouraged) but she came and brought her friend! So right then we were able to have one of our long hoped for member present lessons with an incredible investigator. 

Seriously her friend has gone through so much in her life and she is such an amazing and strong woman, it has truly been a blessing to get to know her. And then both of them came to church on Sunday so the blessings and miracles just keep coming! Also on Sunday, there's a lot of just clerical tasks that the ward has been needing to take care of and hasn't been able to for enough weeks that the members were getting a little frustrated, but this past Sunday the Bishop was amazing and got so much done and taken care of and we're really seeing a lot of progress and a renewed excitement in the ward.

And we have two investigators that are an amazing couple and really just soak up the gospel, they are so fun to teach!, but their marriage has been struggling a little and so they decided to wait to get baptized until their marriage was stronger. We've been talking to them a lot about temples and the fact that families can be together forever and the Spirit is always really strong as we testify of that and on Sunday 3 members had just gone to the temple for the first time and so they bore their testimonies of their experiences and the blessings of the temple and the wife felt the Spirit so strongly she started crying and said something to us in Spanish about baptism so we don't exactly know what she said but we're so excited to teach them tonight and talk about it! So many blessings man.

On an unrelated topic, we've had an exciting new development with our apartment! The water has sand in it! Not every day but it's been pretty often recently (but we have plenty of water bottles so we have clean water to drink so it's not a big deal). The best part is though that our shower curtain is a beach scene and so it's really funny to see the sand at the bottom of the tub and then the curtain. It's definitely the closest I'm going to get to an actual beach for the next 16 or so months so I guess I'll just enjoy it while it lasts!

I'm loving the work out here and even though it's really hard at times, there's no place in the world I would rather be and nothing else I would rather be doing. Seeing the joy in peoples faces as they feel the truth of God's love for them and how their family can be together for eternity, there's really nothing like it. I love this gospel and I love my Savior and every minute of every day out here I am so grateful that I have this opportunity to serve.I love you all and I hope that you have an amazing week!

Alma 29:9 "I know that which the Lord hath commanded, me and I glory in it. I do not glory of myself, but I glory in that which the Lord hath commanded me; yea, and this is my glory, that perhaps I may be an instrument in the hands of God to bring some soul to repentance, and this is my joy."

Love always,

Hermana Martin

Hola!

Wow ok this week has been crazy! 

I'm definitely in New Mexico because it's really hot here but it's starting to cool down I guess because we actually haven't gotten up to triple digits the past few days I think. Also, Las Cruces is the home of New Mexico State University so we actually live right next to it! 

The people here are AMAZING. Like seriously everyone is so nice and gracious and even the people who don't want to talk to us (usually) are still nice about it. 

The ward here is a lot smaller than I'm used to and we have a lot of work to do to help them but they are amazing and I am just astounded by their strength every time I meet a new family. The area Hermana Holding and I cover is huge and we just have the south half of the ward! Our little part is probable about the same size as Roseville (so like 20 to 30 minutes to get to the opposite side) but less populated because people her like to have some land and there's some farming area and orchards and stuff. It's really pretty in some spots, it kind of reminds me of driving down Riego Road back home. 

Hermana Holding and I get along really well (which I'm so happy about, two amazing companions in a row!) and we both just really want to get to work and do our part here as best we can. We have a couple investigators that we're working with teaching right now but I haven't been able to meet all of them yet. No one is really close to baptism yet but that just gives us more opportunities to teach them and get to know them! 

Oh so pretty much everyone here speaks English really well so we actually hardly ever use Spanish but Hermana and I have been trying to be more diligent and pushing ourselves with the language so that when we do teach someone who only speaks Spanish we can be ready. The members here are really awesome at helping us learn Spanish and there's this one really sweet elderly sister, Hermana Garcia, who loves to have us over and she helps us a lot with grammar rules and stuff. I think someone said she used to teach Spanish in a school somewhere but anyways she's an amazing teacher and we love spending time with her and helping her with her yard and stuff. 

Well we certainly have a lot of work to do here, we've mostly been focusing on getting to know the members better and showing them how we're here and ready to work and that they can trust us because this area has had a history of disobedient or just not hard working elders but we're here to fix that! So yeah, it's been a good but crazy week and there's a lot left to go! 

El Campo!

Hola! 

Ok so I finally made it to NM! The flight was a little tricky since we only had 50 min to get through customs in the Houston airport so we missed our flight by like 10 min and so we had to wait 7 hours for the next flight, but I had two other Hermanas who I absolutely love with me and we just kind of explored the airport and we ate at Whataburger which was really good. And there were a couple members who came up and talked to us at the airport and helped us out (that's how we were able to get Whataburger) and we just felt so blessed. Heavenly 

Whataburger!

Father really looks after His servants. 

We got to the president's house pretty late but we got some initial training done and we all slept really well. When we woke up we went to the transfer meeting where I found out my area and companion! 

I'm serving in the Las Cruces area (really south) and it's really hot here but there's actually some green so I think I'm really going to like it here. My companion is Hermana Holding and she's actually from Folsom! She came out just 6 weeks before me and normally you would never train another missionary until you were 12 weeks out at least but I guess President Miller really trusts us and has high hopes.

Me and Hermana Holding

 I don't have a lot of time to email but I have some pictures of my last week at the CCM and my new companion! Love you all and I should be able to talk more next week!

Probably Last week at CCM

Wow ok I'm on my last week here I can't even believe it! 

The days feel like an eternity but the weeks feel like a day if that makes any sense haha. My flight leaves here Monday morning and I have to be at the bus to go to the airport at 3:30 in the morning so that's going to be interesting but I'm so excited! 

All of the Hermanas in the Casa

This week was harder because we had two districts in our branch that were the week before us and all of us were really close (my old roommate Hermana Murphy was in one of them) and they all left this last week so we miss them a lot but I'm so excited for them and they are all going to be incredible missionaries! 

We're getting a new district in our branch later today to replace districts A and B and since Hermana Moss and I are the only sister missionaries left we're the new sister trainers which pretty much means that we're in charge of organizing the music in church this Sunday and making sure that the new Hermanas that come in are comfortable and settle in quickly. So we really don't do much but we get a cool title for a week. 

Finally a picture with our roommates

My Spanish has been coming along so well and this week I've been getting pretty good about being able to conjugate in things other than present tense as I talk and teach which is really cool because that's been the hardest thing for me here. 

Um there really haven't been a ton of noteworthy things this week but the elders in my district have adopted me as their mom because I sew up their ties and pants and stuff because they apparently rip them all the time and I always seem to be the voice of reason when they have bad ideas haha. 

ABQ Hermanas

The rest of this week is going to be spent packing and finishing up our last teaching practices and then next thing I know I'll be in Albuquerque! Wow ok. I'm pretty sure my P-days will be on Tuesday in the field so I guess start expecting Tuesday emails from now on! 

PS I've been so immersed in Spanish these past few weeks and so I'm starting to lose my English (especially spelling because I was really bad at that before too) so lo siento if there's a lot of spelling mistakes and stuff, I'm so glad you guys can't see how many of these words had to be fixed with spellcheck.

PPS I forgot to charge my camera this week so I'm waiting for the missionaries who just left to send me the pictures we took so no pictures this week but there's gonna be a whole bunch next week

¡Les amo!

Hermana Martin