Bringing Families Together

Several months ago our former mission president, President Crickmore, transferred us to a ward called Huehuecalco. From the start we have felt the inspiration of that move. We’ve been able to help several people, with whom the Lord brought us together.

On Wednesday, we went to the Mexico City Temple with Magdalena and two sister missionaries. For a number of weeks, we had been preparing her by teaching her about the temple and helping her to find some ancestors for whom she could do the work. We found information for her to do two sets of grandparents. The tranquility and power of the temple touched her deeply as did the opportunity to perform baptisms and confirmations for her ancestors, beginning to the work of uniting an eternal family.

Last night we baptized a woman named Alma. She is the one that I talked about last week, who had resisted the efforts of missionaries for several years. Her husband spoke at the service and tears flowed freely as he told of his many years of prayers and hope for this moment when his family would now have the opportunity to be sealed in the temple for all eternity.

One of the prime efforts of our missionary work is bring families together.

On Dying and Living

In the mission there are many sayings to parallel life. When a young missionary comes into the field, they are born and their first senior companion is their father or mother. When a missionary leaves for home, he is said to have died and his last companion is like an undertaker, preparing him for death.

Chrise and I have about 3 and half weeks in the mission. Suddenly, there is not enough time to get everything done that we want to get done. So many people we want to see and investigators that we want see baptized. Its eerie to realize that practically everyone left in the mission will outlive us in a mission sense (and probably in a secular sense too). This week we began training our replacements in the office.  We will be replaced by three elders since there are no missionary couples available.

Even in our last weeks the Lord continues to bless us. We have been working with a young woman for several weeks. Her husband is a member and she has come to Church for several years, but has resisted the teachings of many missionaries. I started our discussion today by asking her what doubts she might have to prevent her from being baptized. She talked about her traditions learned in the Catholic Church since she was child. I told her that I love the Catholic Church and that there is a difference between beliefs and traditions. We are not here to take away the truths that she has, but to build upon them. I asked her if she believed that Joseph Smith was a prophet and he restored the Church of Jesus Christ to the earth. She said yes. I asked her if she believed there was a living prophet today upon the earth and to this she also said yes. She also affirmed that she was willing to obey all of the commandments. Finally, we read together the following verses from the Book of Mormon:

Mosiah 18

8 And it came to pass that he said unto them: Behold, here are the waters of Mormon (for thus were they called) and now, as ye are desirous to come into the fold of God, and to be called his people, and are willing to bear one another’s burdens, that they may be light;

 9 Yea, and are willing to mourn with those that mourn; yea, and comfort those that stand in need of comfort, and to stand as witnesses of God at all times and in all things, and in all places that ye may be in, even until death, that ye may be redeemed of God, and be numbered with those of the first resurrection, that ye may have eternal life—

 10 Now I say unto you, if this be the desire of your hearts, what have you against being baptized in the name of the Lord, as a witness before him that ye have entered into a covenant with him, that ye will serve him and keep his commandments, that he may pour out his Spirit more abundantly upon you?

In response, tears wet her eyes and she said that is what she wanted. As we die in the mission field, someone will begin a new life. 

Friendship and Love

As I write this entry, my heart is full. There are so many people here in Mexico that I care about and want to continue to know. For example, there is a boy, named Victor, who we helped teach and baptize. He is very shy and gives the appearance of being angry. When he comes to Church he sits by himself at the very back. I’m always very glad to see him and let him know so. Today, while I was teaching a young mother, someone else that I have really come to care about, in the chapel, Victor came in. When he saw us he turned back through the door, but I called him to come back and gave him a hug. He went past us and sat down at the chapel piano and began playing some beautiful music, which I sure he made up. After I finished teaching, I went over and told him that I was going to try to arrange for him to have some lessons. He gave the closest thing that I’ve seen to a smile.

Today also Miguel came to Church. I wanted to jump up and down for joy. We’ve worked for so many months with him and his wife, trying to get them to come to Church. Miguel is an alcoholic. During the months that we have known him, he started on the wagon, fell off, and recently returned. I really want him to be baptized. I know it will be a big catalyst for change in his life. Both he and his wife are the same age is my older children. I’ve told them more than once that I think of them as my children.

Then there’s Dr. Ortiz and his family. This week they took us with them on a family trip. This is the second such trip. We went far to the south to some fantastic caverns and then to one of the prettiest towns in Mexico. On the way there and on the way back, his beautiful young daughters asked me to read them stories. Chrise and I have drawn so close to this family and feel so overwhelmed and undeserving of the love they have showered upon us.

Finally, I have to mention Hermana Arenas. She works in the office with us and has been a tremendous blessing in our lives. Yesterday, she took us on a trip to Mexico City. She wanted us to know the Mexico that she loves. We went to the National Museum of Anthropology and the ruins and museum of the Temple Mayor of the Aztecs, both were incredible, but not as incredible as the friendship of this young woman. After visiting the last museum, she took us to one of the best restaurants I have been to anywhere in the world. For an hour we sat and talked and laughed together.

The afterglow of this week and the love we have both given and felt is the reason my heart is so full and it is only the tip of the iceberg of what Chrise and I have experienced here in Mexico. 

History and Prophecy

Fields of very tall corn surround us for hundreds of miles in all directions. Corn has been the staple of the Mexican people’s diet for countless generations. It’s planting and harvest are a time for celebration. Though ears of corn are eaten, it is found more commonly in a range of foods from soups to tortillas and pastries. There are also a number of varieties of corn grown. Here in our own little lane, our neighbors have planted what they call black corn. The stalks are more than fifteen feet tall and its fruit are a delicacy used for making a deep blue colored tortilla.

We live in history. Villages, towns and cities all bear pre-Columbian names like Ozumba, Zentlapan, Zoyetzingo, Cuautla, and Xalco, to name just a few. Many of the people we meet have lived in the same area and even some in the same village for many generations. They still bring their products and crops to market every week like their ancestors did before them. When I talk to people about the ruins such as Teotihuacan, which is not too far from here, they politely show interest in what I’m saying, but to them it’s part of life, something that has always been there.

When I teach these people the gospel, I can’t help but think that I am looking into the faces of someone who could have the blood of those who witnessed Christ’s coming to the new world. If John Sorenson is right in his book, Mormon’s Codex, that event took place just a couple of hundred miles from here in southern Veracruz. Nephi, Jacob, Alma, and Mormon lived in this land and I’m part of fulfilling their prophecies, taking the restored gospel of Jesus Christ to their kindred.