A focus on families

Hola Familia!

This has been a great week working in the Lord´s vineyard.

This week our zone had interviews with the president on Thursday. President Smith informed us that we would also be interviewing the missionaries about their area books, so that was fun. The interviews lasted the whole morning, and then President and Sister Smith ordered pizza for the zone. Then we all listened to President Smith speak for about an hour. As always, it was very spiritual. He talked a lot about the importance of working with families and in finding families.

President Smith was going to do our interviews after the meeting but didn't have time, so he told us that he and his wife would love to get to know and see San Juan(because they have heard a lot about San Juan haha), so today they came over to our house to have companionship study. It was so neat to learn from President Smith and his wife. The spirit was so strong. We all shared about what we learned during our personal study, that we do every morning before companionship study. After that, we had our interviews which also were very spiritual, and then they left!

One thing that my companion and I have been focusing on this week is families. President Smith taught about what the prophets have recently said, "That the Lord is hastening his work." President mentioned to us that the Lord is also hastening his work on the other side of the veil. The Church and its members are working more than ever with family search, to help their ancestors and to help unite families for the eternities, that have already passed on. If that is what the Lord is doing on the other side of the veil, then what he really wants is families to be together. So we know that the Lord is preparing families to make these covenants on this side of the veil too. Knowing that really helped my companion and I to trust in the Lord and to focus on families last week. We are now teaching 3 complete families! The Church is true and is the only church on this earth that has the authority to help make families eternal families.

Elder Corbett

Tortilla Total 1751

At the market in San Martin

Cooking

Our kitchen

Our bathroom

Dogs!!

This is His work and His glory and we have the privilege to be apart of it

Hola Familia!

This has been a good week! Our trio went back to just the two of us as Elder Myers had changes this week.

Things with Hector are better. His wife still doesn't want him to get baptized, but she is letting us visit him. He even likes to visit our investigators with us! He shares his testimony at the end of every lesson. We put a baptism date for this Saturday and he said that he wants to do it.

Also Jenny who we were teaching, and had a baptism date for the 31st, had to move to Guate for work. She did promise us that she will send us photos of her baptism! It's bittersweet to not be able to be at her baptism, but I feel blessed for the opportunity to plant the seed that lead to her conversion.

We were talking with a family who had recently reactivated in the church. We were telling them about how Jenny was moving and that we weren't going to have a baptism that Saturday and the dad said, why don't you guys baptize my grandson Dani? We were like isn't he already baptized, and they said no. They said that he was waiting for his uncle to get home from his mission to baptize him, and last month his uncle got home. So the 31st, we will be having a baptism!

Also we saw a cool miracle this week, as my companion and I were praying to find the Lord's elect, we felt that we should go visit an investigator named Delia who the missionaries had dropped about a year ago. The reason why they stopped visiting her is because the owner of her house was a pastor of another church and he told her that if she came to our church that he would kick her out of her house. As we arrived at her work, she told us that she had been wanting to talk to us. She said that she had recently moved and that she now wanted us to come visit her. As we got to her house to teach her and her daughter, she told us that she wanted to get baptized, but was confused about it. We immediately taught her about the restoration of the church of Jesus Christ. She told us that she would pray and read the Book of Mormon and that if she received an answer, that she and her daughter would proudly get baptized.

I'm grateful for the help from the Lord. I know that this is His work and His glory and that we have the privilege to be apart of it.

Elder Corbett

Tortilla Total: 1731

/Teaching on the street corner

Teaching Hermana Flori and her family

Dancing in the park

Guipil

We are seeing miracles everday!

Hola Familia!

This week has been a great week for us in San Juan, as the three of us are seeing miracles everyday!

The biggest miracle that we have seen this week is with our investigator Jenny. We found her one day contacting in the street. Now she is reading the Book of Mormon everyday! This week we told her that she needed to pray to find out if the church is true, and that she needed to pray and ask God if she needed to get baptized. The next day she told us that she got her answer and that she will be baptized the 31st of January.

I would ask you all of you to remember Hector in your prayers. He has been progressing and still has the desire to be baptized, but his wife and mother-in-law, who are of another faith, do not want him to get baptized. Yesterday we were in a lesson and his wife came out and told us to leave,that her husband was not getting baptized and that she would rather see him a drunk in the street than baptized in the church. Instead of fighting with her, we decided to be quiet and show respect. But can I just say that Hector bore his testimony to her, that he knew that the church is true and that it would be better that he died doing the right things of God. He said that there is not anything that will stop him from making a covenant with God. Instead of fighting, he bore his testimony to her, and it was one of the most spiritual experiences that I have seen on my mission.

Also this week I got a call from President Smith, that a group from Utah was going to come to build houses in our area, and that one of them knew my dad. I thought that was pretty cool. So today, they came and picked us up and took us to the construction site to help out. We got to meet and make appointments with the families that are going to live in the houses! It turns out that the guy doesn't actually know my dad but he does work with Uncle Jared!

This has been a great week and I hope and pray that all goes well with Hector!

Elder Corbett

Tortilla Total 1715

Elder Corbett and Elder Doty with the construction crew

Jenny, one of our investigators

Eating steak!!

A picture of our zone with Elder Duncan

Saying goodbye to Elder Zambrano

Starting off the new year with some tamales, fireworks and a baptism date

Hola Familia!

This year has been a good year so far! My companion and I started off the new year by eating some more tamales, watching fireworks and by setting a baptism date with Hermano Hector for the 17th!

We have seen a great change in Hector since the first time we met him. He told us that he feels that something is missing in his life. He said that he had a dream where his house was really dirty, so he tried cleaning it with soap and it didn't clean it, then he tried with sandpaper and it wouldn't come off. He even tried with acid and he couldn't clean his house. Then he used some sort of water and the water cleaned his house! Wow, we thought that was awesome! We then testified to him and told him that his dream was an answer from God. That our bodies are temples and the only way that we can be cleansed from sin is through baptism. He then agreed that he received an answer from God and told us that he wants to be baptized!

I was a little sad thinking that I was going to have changes and that I wouldn't be able to be at the baptism. But I think the Lord might have heard me as the assistants told me that I won't be having changes! This means that I will be here one more change with my companion who will go home in February, and then another change to show my new companion the area! So that means 3 more months In San Juan Ostuncalco. Also President Smith called me yesterday and told me that he was going to put us in a trio for a couple of weeks so that we could help a missionary focus on the mission. Right now they just called and said that they are on their way to drop him off, so we have to go a little early! Love you guys!

Elder Corbett

Tortilla Total 1696