Tender mercies and all sorts of big changes and oh my I have no idea what's happening this week

Ok so starting with just super cool things in our area this week, we found so many people! 

There's a woman we've been trying to meet with for like 3 months, she's so prepared for the gospel, but has a really crazy schedule and really difficult things going on in her life, but we prayed for direction on whether or not we should keep trying to see her and asked Heavenly Father that if there was something we needed to teach her then that she would open the door this time when we knocked, and she did! It's like maybe the third time we've actually found her in all of those months of trying and so we know without a doubt that Heavenly Father answered our prayer. We were able to teach her the next day about the Plan of Salvation and the Spirit was so strong and she already knows that it's true!!!

​One of our superstars that comes out with us all the time, Karem Vidaurri, got her mission call! Washington Kennewick Mission, Spanish speaking of course!

And then we had an appointment with a potential investigator but we realized when we got there that he gave us the number of the trailer park and not his trailer, and so we prayed really hard that if Heavenly Father needed us to talk to this man that we would be able to find him. And so basically we spent an hour knocking doors at this trailer park and asking around for Omar, and finally we saw a teenager walking around and so we started talking to him and after a few minutes we found out that he was Omar's son! He took us to his house and we had an amazing lesson with a super prepared family and we're so excited! Finding families to teach is the greatest thing as a missionary!

​Here's a really awful picture of a really cute kitten that adopted us as we were trying to find a potential and it kept licking our faces and it was just the cutest thing ever!

And then Sunday I was just in a weird mood for some reason, but we had work to do so we went to church and were going around trying to help the members and investigators when all of a sudden the primary children were walking down the hallway and a bunch of them ran over and basically tackle hugged me out of the blue and then went off to class without any explanation and it was just the cutest thing of my life!

And then we had kind of a stressful weekly planning yesterday and our member dinner cancelled so we decided to go to Corner Bakery Cafe (basically Texas's Kneaders) and as we were ordering there was a member of the church behind us in line and he payed for our food! That like never happens to missionaries outside of Utah! He was so nice and so we talked to him for a little bit and then went to sit to wait for our food and another member walked by and started talking to us! He has a friend who just got back from serving her mission here and so he took a snapchat with us to send to her and he was super excited and it was just the coolest dinner ever! Also the food was really delicious. Heavenly Father is so mindful of us and like things like running into people who are actually excited to see missionaries is really nice.

​We took an actually mildly nice zone picture. I love Chamizal zone!

Ok so now the crazy changes. So normal missionaries throughout all of the rest of the world have their P-day (when they email and everything) on Mondayright? And so we're super weird an ddo ours on Tuesday for whatever reason. NOT ANYMORE! President Guffey just told us that STARTING NEXT WEEK WE HAVE MONDAY P-DAY. So that moves our weekly planning day around and none of us are really sure how to do that yet but we'll finally be on the same page as the rest of the world!

The elders tricked us into hiking another mountain and I was wearing my cactus socks and actually got a cactus spine stuck in said socks so it was really funny but also really hurt and also I can't believe I actually hiked another mountain.

And trying to figure out how to do all of those changes is super scary because transfers are this next week and last night President called me to be a trainer! I'm getting a greenie missionary next week! And Hermana Oliphant is training too! (as well as 4 other Hermanas which is crazy because we normally only get 1 or 2 greenies a transfer, not 6!) So since Hermana Oliphant is training too that means one of us is leaving and opening us a new area with their greenie and that person is like 100% me since I've already been in this area for forever. So yeah! We'll find out details on Saturday so next Monday I'll let you know! AHHH! I'm really super excited for a training call and I've always wanted to open an area, but it's kinda scary to do it at the same time and also when we're making a huge schedule change that we don't know how to do yet, but we'll figure it out as we go!

Ahhhh have a great week!

Hermana Martin

Jam Packed Week

HEEYYYYYY everybody! 

OK this last week was so jam packed with so many things! I'll see how much I can remember!

• So right after emailing this last week our zone went hiking to these "caves" which really meant hiking up an entire mountain to see a mild hole in a rock and look out on the desert of El Paso and I thought I was going to die but then we ate McDonald's afterwords and so everything was great.

The "cave" we hiked to

• The english ward sisters (our missionary BFFs really) had an animal die in their apartment in one of their vents or something so they came and slept over for 4 days and it was so fun! It was definitely an interesting challenge trying to coordinate 4 showers in one hour and we didn't sleep a whole lot, but we loved having them! And now they're moving in to a really nice apartment so it all worked out!

SLEEPOVER! 

• We watched the women's session of General Conference on Saturday and that meeting is definitely going to be one for the books! All of the leaders and the apostle that spoke brought such a special spirit into the chapel we were in and I think everyone left that room crying from the messages we heard and how they touched our hearts. I'm so excited to hear more from the leaders of the church and especially the prophet this next weekend!!!



​Us at the temple, it was really windy so don't judge my hair

• Yesterday we road tripped up to Albuquerque to go to the temple and it was SO AMAZING! I love the temple so much! I didn't realize how much I missed it until I walked into those sacred walls and felt that special peace envelope me. The temple is such a perfect place to receive revelation and just generally feel of God's love for us! I'm so sad we won't be able to go back until April, but we have a lot of work to do until then!

We took a "nice zone picture" in front of the temple. I love all of these people so much

​We also took a sweet selfie which I don't have so here's a picture of us taking the picture

• Our investigators are doing amazing! We feel really strongly that Heavenly Father wants us to help 3 of His children enter the waters of baptism here in this area for the month of October and so we're working really hard to find and teach those elect sons and daughters that are ready and waiting for the gospel and we have a lot of people preparing for this month! Tons of miracle stories, I'll share them as their stories continue progressing because there's too many right now!
• So Saturday was one of the most amazing days on my mission so far, without question. We didn't have any appointments planned so we had a whole day of knocking doors on our schedule, which normally is not exactly a missionary's favorite day (it is so much more fun teaching lessons!) but we know there's a lot of people we need to find so we prayed really earnestly the night before for Heavenly Father to lead us to which part of our area we needed to focus on. We separate everything by colors for ease and so we decided to work in Dark Blue because that was the answer both of us received. We would drive until we felt impressed to stop at a certain house, and knock that street until we felt impressed to leave and just spent the whole day like that. It was so amazing (and exhausting, but a really good exhausting) to be so in tune with the Spirit and driving away from each street we were essentially in tears because we knew without a doubt that we had talked to every single person that the Lord had sent us there to see. Being a missionary is so cool! I have truly never been more exhausted, happy, or filled with love at any other point in my life than I am right now and I love every second of it!

​The sunset over the border fence. I love this area <3

This next weekend we all have the opportunity to listen to the leaders of the church, the apostles, and the current living prophet of God. How amazing is that?! I encourage each of you to really be pondering this week in questions that you have for God and to write them down, then watch General Conference with those questions where you can see them, ready to take notes. I can promise with out a shadow of a doubt that you will be able to receive answers to each of your questions if you put in your part to listen. I've seen it every time I've done this and this is one of the best opportunities to receive personal revelation. Utilize it! 

Love you all, have an amazing week!

Hermana Martin

Mermaids

Hola Everybody!

Ok so this week was kinda a bum week because Jose moved to Oklahoma (we set an appointment with him and confirmed at like 5 and by 8 he had decided to go was on his way so....), two of our investigators spent the entire week in Juarez and we still have no idea what exactly is happening with them, our investigators who are still here were impossible to find so we didn't teach like any lessons, and we just were not good at figuring out how to use the Lord's time effectively. 

​Our 8 o'clock appointment last night ended up sending us home with half of a tres leches cake, 4 hot dogs, and a bowl of ground meat. But at least they gave us a convenient carrying tray! I'm gonna be gordita by the time I go back home

So yeah, bum week. BUT I love bum weeks because the next week you get so pumped to do better and to fix everything and to really not have another bum week and so yesterday in weekly planning we set great goals and have plans to improve and yesterday was already so much better! We were led to 2 super prepared potential investigators and we're planning for a baptism this weekend for one of our current investigators and it's going to be so good!

Also, funny story. So we were trying to find a less active member, but we weren't sure which apartment she lives in so we asked some kids who were playing outside (she has a son about their age so we figured if anyone knew it would be them!). They led us to like 3 different apartment with families that matched our description, but none of them were the right one. We told them thanks and as we were leaving we had this lovely exchange...

Like 9 Year old boy: So are you like mermaids?

Us: What?!

Boy: Are you mermaids??

Us: What do you mean?

Boy: You know, those ladies that go around and talk about God!

Us: Yes, we are 100% mermaids, actually.

So that was delightful and still brings us joy.

A bunch of us sisters got real Hatch chile burgers in between conference sessions on Saturday because Texas

And of course GENERAL CONFERENCE was this weekend!!!!!!! It was incredible, of course, I mean it's the living prophet and apostles and other general leaders of the church giving heaven inspired council and direction to us so. I don't think I made it out of a single session without crying, the Spirit was so powerful! I can't even pick a favorite talk, there were like 3 that I swear were written directly for me, but an overarching theme that I felt was how much our Savoir loves each and every one of us individually. His grace truly is sufficient to be able to help even me, no one is exempt.

He loves us and knows that we really can't do this by ourselves, but we were never meant to. The plan is and has been from the beginning that He would always be there, through rejoicing and through sorrows, to carry our burdens and help us solider on. To help us progress to be the individuals that our perfect Heavenly Fathers knows we can be. He loves us with a perfect, infinite love and He's always waiting for us to just turn to Him and allow Him to help us. I know with all of my soul that my Redeemer lives, that He is there to comfort me when faint, to wipe away my tears, and more than anything to love me with an all encompassing, perfect love that heals any and all scars without a trace. I love my Savior and I love this gospel! I love being a missionary!

Hermana Martin

Viva Mexico!

Hey! Computer problems, not a lot of time so here's the highlights

• Hermana Oliphant and I are getting along awesome! She's super cute and this is going to be a great transfer!

• Friday was Mexican Independance Day so we partied real hard. It was so fun and our recent convert Nancy got us dresses from Juarez to wear!

• Yesterday we had a big zone conference so a bunch of us missionaries met together and President came down and we had a super awesome, spiritual training meeting basically.

Love you all! Have a great week!

Hermana Martin

NANCY GOT BAAAPPPPTTTIIIIIZZZZZEEEEEDDDDDDDDD

​Hermana Bosch was able to make it over to see and support her and I promise her kids loved it, they just hate taking pictures.

Nancy is so cute!!! She was so excited all week and she has such a strong testimony and every time we go over to teach her she explains these principles way better than we ever could and she's so converted. She told us afterwards that when she went under the water that she felt like God was hugging her and she felt more than heard the words "Hija, estoy contigo" (Daughter, I'm with you). It was so sweet and the Spirit was so strong! She's already seen so many blessings in her life and she can feel a huge difference. I love my job!

So this whole week was kind of crazy, in the space of 4 days I had 4 different companions and I was in charge of my area that whole time so it was a little stressful to say the least, trying to remember all of these children of God that we're working with right now, getting members to appointments, figuring out how to get to appointments without a gps (it was Hermana Bosch's so of course she had to take it) and just general mayhem. But I prayed a whole extra lot and everything worked out! Hermana Oliphant is awesome and she's getting to know the area super quickly! It helps that we're using the old school map so we get to visualize where we're going. And since I have no idea where I'm going 80% of the time, every time I start driving I just sing "Let the Holy Spirit Guide" and somehow we always get to where we need to go!

The area is doing awesome, this week was awesome, and everything is finally starting to settle in!

​Hermana Bosch finally emailed me pictures. This was our best attempt at taking a nice picture with the elders we split the ward with.

There are so many awesome things I learned in studies this past week, but I think one of my favorites is the story of when Alma and Amulek were trying to teach and help the people of Ammonihah and were thrown into prison, and after they had suffered for many days Alma says

"'How long shall we suffer these great afflictions, O Lord? O Lord, give us strength according to our faith which is in Christ, even unto deliverance.' And they broke the cords with which they were bound;"

I LOVED this because it really shows how important not just faith, but specifically faith in Christ is. Through Him we can do all things, we can overcome anything and everything. But we have to act along with that faith. We can't just pray for help and sit there and wait. Alma and Amuleck had such faith in Christ that after they prayed they acted and tried to break the cords, and they did. God loves us, He is always there to help us! I can testify from seeing examples in my own life and the lives of many others that when we have faith in Christ and act, we will see miracles. When we do our little part, God always makes up the rest.

I love you all! Hope you have a good week!

Hermana Martin

Miracles Man!​

Hola everybody!

This week was so good!

Ok so first off we had stake conference so everyone in our middle third of El Paso all came and met together on Sunday and it was PACKED! Our stake was just created in February so it was the first stake conference and naturally it was super amazing and inspired. President and Sister Guffey came to speak and all of the talks and testimonies were just what we and our investigators and members needed to hear. We have the best leaders ever here!

​Most of the missionaries in the zone with President and Sister Guffey

So update on Nancy, Luis, and Jose (the miracle from last week's email). Nancy and Jose are pushing forward and preparing to be baptized on September 3rd! Luis had some complications that we're working with him to overcome but he's such an amazing son of God and we've already seen him grow and understand so much in our short time knowing him. Nancy was able to get a priesthood blessing two days ago and yesterday she told us how amazing her day was and how she's felt so much peace and comfort ever since the blessing. They are all so strong and without a doubt elect children of God!

Another incredible miracle, there's this super cute older man, Enrique, that we've been teaching for a few months (really my whole time back out here). He's super funny and has such a desire to learn! His wife passed away about 6 years ago and we know that she has already accepted the gospel and is just waiting for him because we've felt such a strong spirit and love whenever we teach him. He's been preparing for a long time now. So we set a baptismal date as a goal for him for August 28th (next Sunday) and we've been talking to him about it and he told us Sunday night that he absolutely wants to be baptized, that he knows this is the true church and he can feel the difference in his life already, but that he didn't feel ready yet and wanted to wait about 3 or 4 more weeks. So no problem, our job isn't to pressure anyone into the church, we're just here trying to help people come unto Christ. But as Hermana Bosch and I were trying to set a new baptismal date for him for September both of us got a really strong impression that no, it has to be August 28th. So we shared our feelings with him and just asked him to pray and ask God if he should prepare to be baptized this next Sunday so that he could make the decision for himself. That was absolutely the most beautiful and humble prayer I've ever heard in my entire life. He asked God if that was truly His will for him and even though he didn't feel ready, if God wanted him to be baptized on the 28th he would do it with pleasure. Hermana Bosch and I were both just bawling because the Spirit was SO STRONG and we know that for whatever reason and whatever plan God has for Enrique, he needs to be baptized on Sunday. And Enrique being the amazing and humble disciple of Christ that he is is now excited and preparing for Sunday. We seriously cannot stop screaming with joy. 

​With our stake president, President Sandoval (he's super funny and also an amazingly inspired leader)

I cannot and never will be able to adequately describe in words what it feels like when you get to watch the process of someone letting the Light of Christ into their lives and especially when they want to take the step to be baptized. And it's nothing about getting more numbers in the church, there's no way I'd leave California and my family and school and everything in my life to come all the way here to scorching El Paso, Texas just for numbers in the church. But watching people learn and understand and start actively walking towards God and the path to eternal life and happiness in this world and the world to come and understanding that families can be eternal and knowing exactly what they can do to have that promise, that's what true joy is. That's why I'm here and why I came back to the mission. 

There's a scripture in Alma chapter 29 that I absolutely love. In verse 9 it says

"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."

There is absolutely no better feeling than knowing that we were able to be an instrument in the Hands of God to help and bless one of His children. All we have to do is listen to the Holy Ghost, the thoughts and feeling we get to help and serve others. It's hard to hear sometimes, but listening makes all the difference in the world!

Being a missionary is the greatest thing in the world! Love you all, have a great week!

Hermana Martin

I have no idea what happened this week.

Hola everyone!

I survived transfers but Hermana Bosch didn't so that was sad, even our apartment started crying (the AC broke and was dripping from the ceiling for a little bit). Her new area is only like 15 minutes away though so I'll still get to see her every so often! So I have to take over the area and we don't have a gps so we're using an old fashioned map and it's certainly interesting! My new companion is Hermana Oliphant, she's from Utah and I actually got to meet her when I came back to the mission! She was one of the greenies in the group that I met up with in Salt Lake so I was excited to be able to see her again. And my MTC companion, Hermana Moss, got transferred to the area right next to us so I'll get to see her all the time! I don't remember much from the past week though. Lots of goodbyes for Hermana Bosch. Yesterday I dropped off Hermana Bosch in the morning but Hermana Oliphant wasn't coming in until late so I got to spend the day with Hermana Jolley who is the closest thing to a real life Disney princess. Sorry, that's really all I've got right now though, taking over an area takes up a lot of brain space I guess. Well love you all, hope you have a good week!

Hermana Martin