Dec 9, 2013

Holy cow, so this week once again went by so fast! So I got to admit, the Christmas season is nothing down here like it is there in the United States. Every 5th or 6th house has lights out. If that... But to be honest I havent been really missing it as much as I thought I would. I was missing thanksgiving more! This week went pretty well as far as the work goes... We finally had investigators in church today! It was a family we found on Tuesday. It was a reference from a brother in our ward who is a champ! His name is Hermano Olivo and actually his whole family is awesome. But he gave a reference to this family, the Sanchez Figueroa Family. The dad is Roberto, his wife (kinda, they arent married officially) Erika, and their two boys. (7 and 5 years old) But seriously, I was just really grateful to be able to teach these people this week. Erika is more interested, Roberto is kinda just doing it so his family is better. But Erika is reading the Book of Mormon and is really enjoying our visits. We taught here about 3 or 4 lessons this week, and only found Roberto in the house once so we werent able to put a baptismal date on them but hopefully that will be a story for the next week! :)

This week we also found Erick Palacios in his house. We have been visiting him ever since my first week I got here to Plazas, Tizayuca. He will get baptized eventually, I am almost positive. He just had some trainings for work on Sunday like 5 weeks in a row and so he wasnt able to come to church. Now is wife is super pregnant and is expecting the baby basically whenever haha! So I am thinking another week or two and he will be going to church again. He only went once! He is a champ though, we have taugh him basically every thing and also his wife who is less active. They have even been talking about getting married in the temple so I am just really excited for them :) 

It is still hot down here. I put on sunscreen every day! The sun just burns like crazy. It has no mercy! Especially for a white boy like me.

Yesterday, I got to watch the Christmas broadcast, I really liked Elder Nelson's talk. I love how he just focused his entire talk on the Savior. Also the pictures of Jesus got to me as well... Honestly, the whole reason why we feel happy here on this Earth is because Jesus is our Savior. He is our example, and should be our best friend! The best gift that anybody could ever give us is the Atonement He gave to all of us! Also, yesterday Elder Vazquez and I had the opportunity to give talks. Our topic was obedience. I based my talk on the talk given by Thomas S. Monson that he gave in the April general conference of this year, it is titled ¨Obedience Brings Blessings¨. It is so true that statement. The talk basically talked about how every law we need to live, every commandment Heavenly Father gives to us is a blessing. It is not something to limit us, but rather another commandment to live so that He can bless us! For example, the Word of Wisdom, if we live the Word of Wisdom, we will be able to live happier, healthier lives. It´s so simple! But because we are humans, we dont always want to obey. President Monson also said in this talk,¨this life would be so much easier if every one of us just obeyed every single commandment.¨ I feel like that is the same for our trials, if we endure our trails well, Heavenly Father will bless us due to our obedience and diligence and we wont have to stress about not doing the will of the Lord. 

I think that has been my focus of this week. Really trying to align my will with the will of the Lord. I know this is a lifelong commitment, but I know that as you and I continue to do this we will be able to become better children of our Heavenly Father. I testify that as we become more Christ like every day, we will be able to accomplish exactly that. We will align our will with the will of the Father. Just like Jesus Christ did! He was ALWAYS obedient, He was ALWAYS humble, He NEVER complained, and He NEVER did anything contrary to the will of the Father. I know Christ is our Savior and I am so grateful to be able to represent Him for these 2 very short years! 

I love and miss you all very much, 

Have a great week!

Elder Hixon