2016.07.25 Nuevo Laredo

Davis, O, and Elder L.

Hey Mom!

O got baptized! and she got confirmed! and our zone was the most baptizing zone this change! Awesome week! O´s story is a good one. We were praying at the end of the first week this last change to know where to work, and after praying we looked at the map, and we pointed to a colony named "las torres" so I looked at elder L and he said "I think we should work there too." So we made a list of all of the less active families and contacted them all. We found O and her kids, who are all members. We started to teach her, and she had some stuff in her life that wasn´t quite in line with the gospel. she wanted to change everything, but she said it wasn´t her time yet. we prayed and we fasted for her on fast sunday. We kept going with her, being persistent and inviting her to be baptized on a certain date. She refused, until one day we went to her house and she told us that she was going to move (as I told you last week.) Well that was her wake up call, thinking that she could take that for her new start. She made plans to quit her new job, to do a lot of stuff, and then after two days she decided not to move, but she still planned to quit her job and rechange her whole house, etc. She felt very prepared after the baptismal interview, and she had a great experience with her confirmation. I baptized her and Elder L confirmed her. I feel that she was one of those people that my patriarcial blessing said I would find, because she told us that one of the reasons why she decided that it was her moment to change was the happiness that elder L and I emmulated.

Sad news, Elder L is getting changed for the last change noooo! My new companion will be Elder M for the last 3 weeks, and I already know him and he´s super awesome, so it will go well. These last three weeks are going to be just as the rest of my mission, all I got!

Have you got the iternery yet? I didn´t. I´ll tell the secretary to send it to you today.

[Davis will be returning to Los Angeles Intl. Airport on Thursday, August 18.]

Love,

Elder garner

2016.07.18 Nuevo Laredo

Dear Mom,

The mission home is organizing bags to donate and throw away clothes of the old missionaries. The executive secretary called me this week and told me that he would get me a direct flight from MTY to LAX. I imagine then that I will land in LAX, not Burbank, but that it will save a lot of time to have a direct flight. I have not received a printed nor emailed form of my itinerary, but I´ll check on that and will have it for you next week.

Sounds like you had a pretty fun week.We had a really good week as well! Elder L and I were  able to visit a lot of people, and we found quite a lot of new families to visit. The toughest thing is getting them to church, it´s always been like that. We start since Friday to really commit them and get them rides from the members, and then we commit the members to help us and then we go on Saturday to assure everything, and then we call others in the evening. We have members come with us Sunday morning to pick some up and then others pass by for the other investigators that they know. We had a lot of support from the members this week and there were a lot of people who committed to come to church, but this week we only had four people in church. It´s OK though, because we did everything we could to help our investigators to go to church. Some great news is that we are going to be able to baptize every week for the rest of the mission!!!! YEA!!! We have to work hard for it but we can totally do it!!!! This week we have an investigator named O, who we were struggling with a lot. We prayed for her, fasted for her, we taught her, and she prayed a lot too, and one day we arrived and said that she was going to move to live and support her parents, and that she wanted a new start and wanted to get baptized before she left. Then, two days later, she told us that she decided not to move, because her brother said that he would take care of their parents, BUT that she still wanted to change her life and be baptized! she is going to have an interview with the mission president (we can repent of all things) so if everything goes well she will be baptized this week. We´re just on standby until tomorrow, when the interview will take place.

We´re going to keep working hard! I just realized that I´ll be home in less than a month, which is pretty crazy, but it doesn´t really bother me. I would like if you could send me my classes and teachers and stuff, that´d be nice.

Love you mom!

Elder Garner

2016.07.11 Nuevo Laredo

Leadership training meeting (before going to the hospital)

Hey Mom!!!!

Sorry I didn´t tell you too much about the hospital last week. We stayed in the hospital and Elder L had a super cool bed that moved up and down, and I slept on a futon that they had. President McArthur´s counselor, who lives close to the hospital would bring me food. One day was fast sunday so he didn´t have to bring me food for a day, but to break my fast his wife made me meatloaf, and it was really good. (en español se llama pastel de carne)

A meaty pastel llama.

we tried talking to all of the nurses, because their were many with specific responsiblilites, but there was one that we could talk to well, and we gave her a book of mormon and got her direction! We got home by bus, that took about 4 hours, but it was ok because I printed off some talks to read.

That´s pretty good advice mom. Looks like you´re doing a great job in college. Keep going and you will get your diploma!...oh wait. I´m probably just going to mention in my homecoming talk that my little brother thanny is the cute priest on the stand (then everyone will laugh and he´ll blush) 

I still don´t know how to cook.

This was a really good week. Elder L is feeling a lot better, and so we have been able to work a lot more. We had one experience on wednesday, where we suddenly got a phone call from a member in Torreon Mexico! They told us that she had a reference for us that wanted to get baptized, and so we decided to go with him immediately. Well, he really wanted to get baptized, and we had a really awesome lesson with him, where he shared a little bit about how he was searching for the truth for 5 years, and how his friend had introduced it to him. He´s a widower, whose wife passed away three years ago. We asked if he could go to church this week, and he said that he had already asked his boss if he could get work off on sundays, well he did! and so now he has a baptismal date for the 6th of august!

We had another experience where a member had brought a neighbor to the fathers activity that they had in the church, and he told us that he wanted to get baptized too. He came to church, and it´s true, he told us that he wanted to have more peace in his life and be baptized, so he also has a baptismal date for the 6th. He´s a blind man, but he still loved church. We have a really good pool of investigators. There is a partial member family that a member gave as a reference to us that wasn´t able to come this week because they had an accident in the family, but they´re great as well and they should be baptized soon. You can see that all of these people are coming from the members. It is true that members are the best missionaries. Really, we as missionaries are called to teach full time, while members are called to find full time. That´s something that Elder Bednar said in a general conference a while back. It´s been like that for the most part my whole mission, So that means that when I get home I´ve got to really look hard and find people that the missionaries can teach, even in utah and BYU 

I put sunscreen on everyday and I drink a lot of water. I eat pretty healthy as well, at least that´s what Elder L tells the other people.

I love you mom!

Elder Garner

2016.07.04 Nuevo Laredo

[Message from Mission President's wife June 27]

Elder Garner asked me to email you to tell you he won't be able to email you today. He is doing fine just busy!    He will be coming to the office Thursday for leadership council on Friday. He said he would email you then!  He's a great zone leader and we love having him here in Monterrey!
Love, Hna McArthur

[June 30]

Hey Mom!

Sorry I didn´t write on monday, the ciber´s computers weren´t working, so I talked to Sis. McArthur and she said that I could write you when I got here to the offices on thursday for the leadership council on friday. We are having a blast up in Nuevo Laredo! and we are working very hard with the members, they´re all amazing here! (or there since I´m writing from Monterrey.)

Announcement: President´s Executive Secretary asks if I can return on the 20th instead of the 18th. I think that it would be best to go directly to LAX if that was the case because there should be a direct flight, but if there was one to burbank that would be even better. I´ll talk to him to get my itinerary and I´ll let you know the next week.

Elder L is getting better. We had a great experience in the zone, because we had three baptisms in the zone that came out of no where! and this week every area will baptize! I´m so excited! Miracles are happening everyday, because the Elders are taking steps to grow their faith. It is truly wonderful.

Well I´ll write a short letter for today, but I love you! Happy anniversary! ask dad "is it everything you hoped and dreamed for?" [Davis is referring to the golfing on a trip we took that week.]

Love,

Elder Garner

[Message from Mission President's wife July 1]

I talked to Presidente and the reason he wanted the two elders to leave a couple of days later was so we could take them to the airport. Which of course we love to do!  We will be busy and unable to take them on the 18th. We have made arrangements for someone else to take them so they will be able to leave on the 18th as originally planned.
Thanks
Hna McArthur.

[July 4]

Dear Mom,

since I emailed you on thursday I haven´t really done anything, this is why:

after the leadership council, Elder L decided it would be good to go to the hospital to solve things once and for all. He was ingresed since friday and we just got out today at 4:00pm, so I didn´t really do anything. I finished Doctrine and Covenants, and the pearl of great price, so that was a productive use of my time.

Hmmm, I don´t have much to tell you, the 18th is fine. we have to catch the bus soon, so this letter will be quite short  I do apologize. But I love you and I´m grateful that you sent me awesome pictures of what you´ve been doing. Que loco que ya es julio.

This is going to be an incredible week. We are going to see a lot of miracles. I can feel it. Let´s just make the pathway bright with the faith we have, and when we walk into the darkness of the unknown, Jesus Christ will guide us, if we only have the faith to carry on.

Love,

Elder garner