May 26, 2010

Dear Mommy,

This week went really really well. We got a family (that we are preparing to be baptized) married this week. It was pretty cool and i son less thing to worry about so that is good. There have a lot of problems but the gospel message is slowly making a change with them. The little girls in that family are really cute too. I love them and will do everything i can to help them .

This week we also had our District conference. Elder Martino of the 70 came and presided. I dicided we think alot alot as his talk in conference was exactly what i{d been teaching only better and he said alot of things in this conference that i´d been thinking about. They talked alot about the family in the general session and about callings and home teaching in priesthood. It was exactly what needed to be taught. I´ll try and send you some notes b.c it was really good.

A talk i really liked was from My old district president from Taxisco. He talked about the importance of using the time we have well and making the right discsions. he said the people who are not at church for whatever reason ¨made the wrong decsion¨ not to go. It was also cool seeing and talking to people from taxisco again as they were here for the conference. The kids have grown up alot. i also talked to the branch president from Chiquimulia who has now been back from his mission for 2 years and has been branch president for one! Tell eric he should come here and be a branch president.

I amd doing really good and love being a missionary. I´ve been studing the april 2006 general conference talks and have some stuff to send you. I love you a ton and feel your prayers every day.

Love,

Elder Vincent

Dear Mom and OThers,

This week was really good. We had our Zone conference this week with elder Martino who spoke in the last general conference. He´s a convert to the church and served here in Guatemala with Blakes Dad. It was really really good and I learned alot.

The branch is good but there is alot to do. There are alot of problems and its always harder to fix in smaller areas. We are the counselors so we can take more of a direct approch.

Did your mothers day go well? How´d Briggs birthday go? Im hoping to get some letters written this week to send to everyone.

Its really really pretty in this area. I think you would like it alot. Really great lots of trees and mountains but no snow. I like birthdays better with no snow. :) I hope you dont worry to much and just enjoy life. Read the faith that Nephi has in 1 Nephi 3:7 and apply it to your comandment to prepare me and send me out on a mission. The Lord provides a way.

Sorry I didn´t write as much to you this week but I wrote alot to everyone else and dont have alot of time. Remember I love you and the packages were incredible. They made me feel like it was a normal birthday.

Tell everyone that I say hi and remember life is good and dont be afraid to talk to Heath if you need to.

I love you and appreciate you increasingly every week.

Love,

Elder Vincent

ps elder fortin wants a package too :)

May 2,2010

Dear Mom and others,

So just to remind you i turn 20 next week. Kinda crazy right. How are you all doing? How´s life in pc where its still snowing? haha sorry mom.

I just got transfered leaving 4 baptisms in my last area for this saturday but it really doesn´t bother me b.c i have helped build up the area there and now I am in my new area to build it up for my father in heaven and the people here. I would like to see the people get baptized though. They mean alot to me. Especially brandon the little 9 year old boy i baptized. I gave him one of the scripture readers, that you sent me, as a going away present. I put his baptism picture in it and wrote my testimony. He said he´s going to take the book with him on his mission so he can show the people (this is who baptized me and this is who confirmed me). Brandon was like a little brother to me. I told them they´re invited to go live in my room at home :)

So my new area is called Jalpatagua. It is in the same mission zone as taxisco but a different municipalidad (like a county) its in one called Jutiapa. It is alot like taxisco and almost as hot. Its really beautiful but once again there are a ton of inactives and we are the councilours in the branch presidency. I feel almost like I´ve been called as a reactivating missionary as much as a baptizing missionary seeing as none of my areas have had more then a 20% attendance when i arrived. Im happy with that b.c i can help build the kingdom in so many ways. Anything i can possibly do to help these people and my God I will do.

My New companion is Elder Quiros. He´s from Costa Rica and has been out 6 months. He speaks perfect english and always talks to me in English so i always talk to him in Spanish. He seems like a really really good Elder.

My area is about 15 minutes from the Border of El Salvador and like I said it´s alot like Taxisco. I will be sweating almost continually again seeing as its almost always over 100 degrees with the humidity. Its still not quite as hot as taxisco though. That heat was incredible.

There are 6 people in my District (including Elder Martinez my old companion who is now my zone leader). We are really seperated from them though. The closer Elders live about 45 minutes away and then the zls live about an hour 15 away. They all seem like really good Elders and we will do good things.

We had our district meeting and the inbetween city today called oritorio. It went really well. I focused on teaching faith and prayer and shared 1ne 17:49-51 and told them its not how can we reach this goals it´s how can we not when God´s comanded us. We just have to do our part.

I am really excited to be here in this new area and help people. I love guatemala. It is so beautiful.

Mom I love you dearly. You are definately the best mother i have ever had ;) Really thank you for everything and especially all of your prayers. There is nothing like the power of a mothers prayer!

With much love,

Elder Vincent

Ps i got your packages and letters from paige and marnie but im waiting to open them until my birthday

April 19,2010

Dear Mom and others,
This week was really really good. How did yours going? I had remembered that it had been 2 years since Matt died and that seems really crazy to me. I know he died doing the Lords work though and that being a missionary is the greatest thing ever. At least it is for me.
Its also crazy that Grandpa would be 90 this week. I know that i´ve never met him but in having his name i feel so connected to him. I know that you feel the conection as well. I am more greatful for my heritage than you can even understand. I owe it all to those who have come before me.
We had our baptism on Tuesday of the little kid Brandon. It was so awesome! I gave him a big hug after. He´s an awesome little kid. We went to his house after to have pizza for dinner and it felt realy good to have a family moment like that again. He can't be confirmed until this Sunday though b.c we had Stake Conference.
Stake conference went really really well. President Alvarado and Elder Clarke were there and President Alvarado was really happy which is good. He said it was the best stake conference he had been too. He was really really happy with us in our zone b.c we brought so many investigators and recent converts and less actives. Elder Clarke gave an awesome talk on the things we need in order to conqure satan. He used five stones from David and Goliath. 1. Obedience and a pure heart 2. Exceptional faith 3. Divine Help from the spirit 4.Preparation and practice 5. Understanding the power of God and his priesthood. - It went really well.
We also have 3 maybe 4 more baptisms planed for the 8th. Hopefully im still here. We´re having success but we need to work harder still and find more families.
The greatest feeling we can feel in this life is the Love of our Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ. We should look for all the love he sends us in our lives and we should thank him continually for it.
LOve,
Elder Vincent

April 12, 2010,

Dear Mom and Others,
This week was really good. My companion got a little sick this week but we gave him a blessing and all is well. We baptized the little girl Fidelina and it was absolutely awesome! She was so happy. She´s an awesome girl her mom is a little specially and her little brother is handicapt and I don´t know whats really wrong with her dad but she helps keep everything in order with the family. She has trouble sometimes just b.c the way she´s been brought up and all the difficulties she´s been through. They´re super poor but are always so happy. I wish i could send you the pictures but from some reason they wont show up on the computer when i try to send them. Idk but its all good.
I Still love Guatemala. We have alot of progressing investigators here. I could see us having 10 baptizms here in our ward in may. I´ll probably get changed though but thats ok as long as they get baptized.
We ´ve been focusing on finding more families lately. I know that will lead to more success and help out the lives of many people and families for many generations.
We had a really good zone conference this week were we focused on faith. We also focus on not putting limitations on our potential. We talked about how we as humans put fake limitations over ourselves or the world or other people tell us we can do things and for some reason we believe them and dont even try. We are children on a God and therefor we should not restrict ourselves b.c God can do anything. I thought of 1ne 17 when we talked about that were nephi´s brothers tell him he´s crazy and cant build a boat. In verse 50 he¨s says God can do all things, if he commanded me to make the water in to earth i would be able to do it and then in 51 he asks them a question i absolutely love ¨How is it that he can not instruct me to build a boat-¨ I love that i can just see him staring them in the face ¨tell me what i cant do with the help of God! I can do it all. I need to have the same attitude here and know i can do all things and can baptize lots of people b.c it is what God has comanded me. I can and will make a difference here.
Im really glad you had fun in mexico at the beach. In taxisco at times i was like 5 minutes from the beach but i never saw it dang it haha i saw the ocean from the mountains though which was cool.
Im glad you´ll got to have such a cool expirience with so much family up at our house. Its always so much fun to be with all of the family cousins and what not. Really alot of my favorite memories are doing things with cousins over all of the years. Make sure to send me or email me pictures. Oh also for my birthday you can send me a USB memory stick so i can save emailed pictures on to it.
I love you a ton and keep working hard to share the gospel, You are the best mom i´ve ever had and never forget that. Dont forget to read john with me before my birthday.
Love,
Elder Vincent

April 5, 2010

Dear Mom and Others,

How are things going? How are you enjoying your vacation? Its it pretty cool there?

Things are really good here in Guatemala but the city was really really deserted for Holy Week. We got some good work done still though. We have one baptizm set for this week with a little girl from one of the poorest families in the world. Its really sad but she´s excited to get baptized. We also have 6 other people who have accepted our challange to be baptized we just have to set baptizmal dates for them. We are hoping to set all those dates this week and one more. We could really use your prayers so we can make it happen.

So i finished the Book of mormon too. It was cool to read it for the first time in spanish. There are still quite a few words i dont know but i understood everything which was really cool. So listening to conference we recieved a new challange that elder anderson gave us in the last talk. We are to read a study the gospel of John in the Bible so im challanging you to read it with me before my birthday as a birthday present to me, ok.

I absolutely loved conference. The last one i felt like they talked more to new members and investigators but this one was more the family and the parents. You all will really benifit to watch read and study these words of the holy prophets. They are our connection to the heavens. Since they were talking to parents alot and im not a parent yet i took notes for things that will help me when im a parent one day but i really tried even more to apply the tteachings to my present circumstances. I tried to apply myself to being a parent and my investgators the children. I learned alot about how to teach and help my investigators b.c of this.

I especially enjoyed Elder Wilford W. Andersons talk about the atonement bc it was almost exactly what i have been teaching on my mission and expecially and especially to one thick shelled investigator that we have now that went to that session. He said conference was just ok and that later he would tell me what he liked and didn´t like. It made me feel pretty sad. There is nothing bad about conference!!!! I also enjoyed Elder Martinos talk (he´s a 70 for central america and came and talked to us when i was at the ccm) It was about embracing trials b.c we need them and its our attitude that makes all the difference. These are two things I have been really focusing on the members i´ve been teaching especially less active so it made me feel good to think that i was maybe doing something right. I even tell investigators that i pray for trials everyday b.c i want things to be tough so i can have resistance and be stronger. More like my heavenly father.

So I have another specially birthday request but i´ll wait to write it to you until its closer to my birthday. Tell heath congrats on bball and i really hope that you enjoy your trip and are safe. Work hard to help others find our father i heaven. We are only selfish if we will not.

I love you a ton

Love,

Elder Vincent

March 29,2010

Dear Mom and others,

Things are really good here in guatemala. The new email is alot bigger so you dont need to save my emails anymore. You can just forward the ones you get from me to other people. I got ann´s wedding invitation this week which meant alot to me (the guy looks really nice). I also got the letter from Jackson which was really cool. Things I would maybe like for my birthday, first off letters from people, especially cousins who have served missions with experiences and what not. next for things to get me to just keep at home a new dog tag for the one i lost and the black football backpack from the highschool and a black football hat. Other then that idk maybe a small hymn book in english and books of mormon in italian and french and Pictures!!!! other than that i dont need much i just love to get spiritual letters.

This week was really good. My comp is getting nice and adjusted to the mission but he has a culture shock moment everyday. Im really glad that i got to go to the ccm (mtc) in guatemala. He´s really excited and motivated to be here which is really nice though.

This week our big acomplishment was that we followed the spirit to get the written permission from a crazy dad for a little girl to be baptized. Her name is fidalina escobar and we are going to baptize her april 10th. Her dad doesn´t know how to write his name so we just got him to write si (which means yes mom). She´s from probably one of the poorest families i´ve ever seen but she really wants to be baptized. Her moms a member.

This week I also gave a talk in church. They asked me to give a talk on mission work so I did that but focused on the real purpose of mission work, which is so that we can help others to use the atonement and how there are other our friends and family who are suffering b.c they dont have the understanding of testimony that we have. So we need to help them and show them how to release there burdens. I feel like it went really good but i don´t know if anyone listened except the investigators that were there which made it worth it. Its kind of crazy that me (quite little searle) gave a 20 minute talk in spanish. haha Im so glad to have a understanding and testimony of the atonement.

Im really happy about all the mission work that is going on back home. You´ll should really keep seizing this opportunity to share the gosple with so many missionaries out from our stake and especially our ward right now. Im really happy that mary is progressing. You should tell heath to tell her to write me a letter. Also invite as many people as possible to watch general conference.

Im healthy safe and happy so you should be happy. I love guatemala but i dont love how fast the time is going. I hope you have a ton of fun on your vacations and that you stay safe. I´ve been trying to write you all letters but we dont get alot of time. I should finish the book of mormon by tomorrow and hope that you all are close too. I love you a ton and tell all the cousins and friends i say hi.

Love,

Elder Vincent