Week 26: January 22-28, 2019 Fog, Fog, and More Fog

Hey Everyone,

The weather here in Zacualitpan is pretty cool. As you probably know from the subject, we almost have fog everyday here in Zacualtipan. It actually is super cool but makes it a little hard to learn the area. haha but its way better than being in the blistering heat. 

Right now we are working with a family of four females (51,28,12,7) They are super awesome. All of them have received a testimony of the Book of Mormon but still are afraid to take that jump of faith to change religions. The most promising of all them is the 28 year old Fabiola. She really feels then need of the gospel in her life and wants to make changes for the better. But Satan is working hard with her to make sure she does not get baptized. She decided that she was going to read as much of the Book of Mormon that she can this week and fast from food all week long, to find out her answer. We are praying that she receives the answer she needs to be happy for all eternity. We have been spending time with the family here and made peanut butter bars (google Snowdelicious.blogspot.com for the recipes) and no bake cookies they both turned out great! It was really fun and reminded me of home. The Family Rojas is super great they just need to take that leap of faith. 

So here in Zacualtipan we have a Branch that consists of fourteen people. 12 of those being women, the majority here are all recent converts and/or have a shallow base of knowledge of the gospel. We are spending a lot of the time helping to fortify them and help them progress together. The Majority of them have a strong testimony but don’t know what to do because the only example they have is us as missionaries. We definitely need more Sacerdocio (Priesthood) here in Zacualtipan and Molango. They people here are great. 

So the same hermanas give food the same day of each week. On Friday I was able to meet with an Hermana that is super sweet but medio loco.(kind of crazy) This family is very special and have a pet chicken that lives with them. It doesn’t have a tail and literally climbs over everything, the bed, the people, the dinner table, the clean dishes. It made it really hard to stomach down the food. They are super sweet, but it was really gross. 

This Saturday when we were coming back from a cita,(appointment) we got this impression that we needed to contact this group of people. This group of 30 or so people travel about 2 hours to sell all the vegetables that they grow by hand. They sell all of these in an open air market called Tianguis where everyone sells everything. The tianguis lasts two days and so they all end up sleeping overnight here. There were entire families- several of them in fact sleeping on the ground next to the presidencia. (presidency) They are all super humble and Elder Bolaños and I were able to share a message with all of them of the Book of Mormon. They were all really receptive and super sweet. We gave a way 3 Books of Mormon all that we had left so that they could read. They were all very interested and I hope we will be able to talk with them again. The spirit was extremely strong when we testified to the group of people about the Book of Mormon. 

Love you all!

Love Elder Snow.

Uno Mas from the Mission Home

Week 25: January 15-21, 2019 Molango

Hey everybody!

This past week has been amazing! Zacualtipan is so beautiful, I love it here. I now live on the third floor of a huge yellow building and there are so many people here who have never even heard of our church, which is great! This area is beautiful and is super foggy about 85% of the time. Some days we can't even see the other side of the street. Along with the high elevation, its pretty cold here, and on occasion can snow. It is extremely green and is super pretty. Here in Zacualtipan the chapel is a House of prayer. It has about 15 members that come every week - including us and the misioneras. Every Sunday I get to go to 4 hours of church because our branch has two services one in Molango about 50 mins from Zacualtipan where the sisters work and one here in Zacualtipan. So we spend most of our Sunday traveling and in church which is super awesome. This Sunday I was able to speak in church, and honestly, it was a super awesome experience, usually before a talk I spend hours writing it to make it perfect. This week I didn´t have that much time, so I kinda forgot about it. It was really awesome, I ended up speaking for 25 mins without anything prepared, which is something I have never done before, let alone in another language. It truly was great to have that experience and see the growth I have made since I entered the mission. 

So this past week I was a little bummed out that I was no longer training my son Elder Zacarias. But over the course of this week, I have learned so much and realized time and time again that this new area is exactly where I need to be. The will of God is much greater than my own. My companion elder Bolaños is super chido, and all of my weaknesses are his strengths and all of his weaknesses are my strengths, I feel like we are the perfect team. It is great. 

So the investigators here in zacualtipan here are golden they follow up with almost all the compromises we give them and have been progressing super fast. I love it here so much. Right now we have seven people with a baptismal date and they are all so amazing. In specific four of them are a family, named la Familia Rojas. They are super great and know the truth of the church but are struggling with dropping coffee. Which as you all know is my specialty. jajaja I was able to talk with the grandmother and help her understand the importance of the palabra de sabiduria, and so far in the past few days hasn’t drunk a single drop. This family is super awesome and they taught me this morning how to make bolas (a round tomal) They taste super good. This area is so great and I am so happy to serve here! 

LOVE YOU ALL; stay safe, stay strong.

LOVE ELDER SNOW 

  

Uno Mas from the mission home.

I have updated pics from Week 23

Week 24 January 8-14, 2019 Zacualipan

Hello everybody!

It has definitely been a heck of a week hahaha. So, as I spoke of last time, I had a little bit of an issue with my stomach. I ended up going to the doctor. There I was able to run some tests and they found that I have salmonella. According to the doctor, there are 6 different types of salmonella and I have five of them. haha. I’m feeling pretty good, I just have occasional stomach pains. I am taking 2 grams of amoxacilna every day to get better. It is super fun. It's actually not too bad. 

Also, fun experience, this Saturday, at 9:00 pm, the hermanas from San Juan, (sisters in my district) called me that hna Gonzalez had hurt her leg really badly and needed a ride to the hospital. They were calling everyone they could and could not find one. So I started calling everyone and was going through all the contacts until 14 calls later I finally found someone. Many people answered their phone, but the problem is that all of Mexico has no gas. The pipes that usually bring the gas to all stations was cut off because people (guachicoleros (gas stealers) ) have been stealing gas and the government was fed up with it. All the gas is now escorted by the army to the stations. All the police officers here are considered corrupt and the army are (supposedly) the only honest people. One member named Emanuel drove Elder Zacarias and I to San Juan for the Hermanas and then took us all to Pachuca so the hermanas could see the doctor.  It was super crazy, the member also loves to drag race so it definitely was an experience to remember. He drove fAsT. On the way there we saw miles and miles of cars waiting for the gas at the gas station and even more people waiting with gas jugs. It was insane. Luckily the Hermano had a stockpile of gas (and is probably a guachicoler (gas stealer) too) and was able to help us. When we got in Pachuca we were going to the hospital and we totally wrecked into another guy that was doing something not so appropriate with a girl. No one got hurt but it definitely added to the craziness of the night. God definitely protected us because not a single one of the 5 us had a seatbelt on. 

Cool update, CAMBIOS were today, and yesterday (Sunday) at 4pm I got a call that i would be changing areas and companions to Zacualtipan. I am writing from here right now and it is seriously so much bigger than Guerrero. My new companion is Elder Bolaños, and I am super excited to work with him. He is from Pasto, Colombia. He is honestly a great guy we’re gonna work hard and have fun too! This area is a lot colder and very far from the center of the mission but it is super cool here and hopefully, we will have a ton of work. Here in Zacualtipan we have a house of prayer which is super cool. But yeah that’s everything from the week! Love you all. Stay strong for God is on our side. 

LOVE,

Elder Snow.