Week 56
I am back! It has been about four months since the last time I wrote an email for all of you and just as anyone would expect, everything has changed. I have been back in the mission field for a month now, so before I tell you about my week I'll give a summary of the last couple of months :)
My "mission intermission" began at the beginnig of March and lasted for three months. When I arrived home at 3 a.m. there was snow on the ground, a completely different house and 2 older siblings who were both now married. It was quite the drastic change in such a short time, however I know the Lord knew I needed to be home at that time. I got to get to know my new brother and sister in law better and strengthen family bonds. It was even more of a miracle that I was able to see my niece be born and later hold her in my arms. I was even able to be an answer to my dad's prayers who had been praying for help as he had a seemingly impossible amount of work to do on the house/yard while still working. During all of this, I enrolled in classes at BYU to keep myself busy and my focus changed to school mode, and then quickly the day for me to leave again came faster than I ever could have imagined.
Now I am writing this with a month in Washington D.C. (at 10 p.m. on a Sunday night because I know there won't be time to write it all tomorrow) In fact, that is exactly the reason why I haven't written anything the last three weeks. The culture in this new mission is incredibly different. One of its three main focuses is urgency due to the culture of the people who live here. For me, the adjustment and especially my new companion were two huge challenges that made me use all of my time talking to my parents for help. But now that I've got a better hold of my situation, I have been able to focus better and have found the time to write this email! With that said, here's my week!
My first week here we were able to meet a person named Rafael Medina who is about 50 years old. Is was only through a phone call, but we got to know him really well, and he was even able to meet some members through the group phonecalls we did at night. We taught him lots of things and he testified that he knew they were true, including the Word of Wisdom. He struggles with alcohol, but we were able to get him to commit to quit drinking and he even promised us he would throw away all the alcohol he had in his house! He was progressing so much, and we felt inspired to invite him to be baptized, which we did, and we planned to have it on August 1st. However, this week we called him every night, and not once has he responded since last Sunday. We are worried that he might have slipped up and be ashamed to admit it and so he's avoiding our calls. I admit that that is something hard to do because I have made mistakes in my life that I had to admit I did again to my parents, but I was able to get through them because of the love and support they gave me despite my failures. I hope I can apply those loving techniques to Rafael as well as my parents did to me.
We spent this entire week preparing for Sunday. We prepared lots of Spiritual Meetings (it's through WhatsApp and we ask members to prepare a topic to teach for 20 minutes, and then throughout the week we invite our investigators - here we call them amigos - to one of the meetings according to which topic the need or the time they need). Overall we had plans for 19 amigos and 10 of them had confirmed with us by Saturday which is better than usual! However Sunday rolled around and as the time for each meeting came we made the calls and by the end of the day only ONE single amigo answered. It was incredibly disappointing and I felt bad for all the members who prepared things to share and didn't get to share them. However, there is always next week to try again!
There are so many other things that have happened and amigos met that I want to talk about, but there never is enough time. I am grateful to be a missionary today despite the endless challenges that seem to confront me. My family helped me to recognize that God is the only one who knows my feelings that my companions or even mission president won't necesarily understand. He knows what will make me learn and grow and he knows how to help me through it. As I rely on him, he has supported me with tender mercies that keep me going day by day and week by week. I read in Alma 30 yesterday that "the devil will not support his children at the last day" and the difference between that and Alma 31:38 is this: "And the Lord provided for them that they should hunger not, nither should they thirst; yea, and he also gave them strength, that they should suffer no manner of afflictions, save it were swallowed up in the joy of Christ.". Sometimes I feel angry, frustrated, hopeless, or unworthy but I know that no matter what, Jesus Christ will support me at the last day. That knowledge doesn't mean I don't feel those feelings anymore, but rather I have learned that it's ok to be sad sometimes. Life without sadness would be void of happiness too (2 Nephi 2:23). Even the Savior himself is a man "aquainted with grief". We will never experience the level of grief and sadness that Christ felt, but we can experience his infinite love telling us he knows how we feel and that we can make it through. He will support us. I know it. I love all of you and thank you for your support. You are answers to my prayers. Till next week,
Elder Z. Hilton
