Letter #49 4/30/12 Baptism!!

This last week was great. We spent the whole week working with the 3 baptismal dates that we had. I cant remember if i had already told you about an investigador named A, but he got baptised!! The other 2 fell through, but i'm so incredibly happy for A! The whole week he was stoked for his baptism, but thursday we went to visit him and the first thing he told us was "i'm not going to get baptised tomorrow". I won't lie, i was a little bit worried, but we shared a few scriptures, listened to the spirit, and we able to resolve all his concerns and when we left his house thursday he couldn't wait to get baptised the next day. We had a few problems friday, first of all A lives 30 minutes away from the prayer house and has no way to transport himself so we had to find him a ride. Second, we don't have a baptism font, just a giant tarp that you put inside a metal cage and fill with water from hose. Normally that's not a problem, but Friday happened to be the only day in the history of Angostura that they decided to try to fix a few pipage problems and shut down the water for the entire morning! The whole day friday we were running around trying to find a source of water and there was nothing. The third problem was that the branch doesn't have any baptismal clothes. It was definately the most stress i've had in my whole mission but the whole time i knew that it was all going to work out okay. In the end, they ended up turning the water on in time to fill the font half full for his baptism, he's a heavy guy and it was extremely hard pulling him out while he was in a straight soldier position. We were also able to find clothes and a ride. I can honestly say that every prayer i said that day was answered. I have a stronger testimony that God loves us and is always going to provide us with what we need if we are diligent. But i was so happy to have a baptism!!

 

We have a few more reallly potential investigadors that we're hoping will get baptised in this next month. This last week we found a teenager named M, he came to church yesterday and loved it, even though he was the only teenage boy there. He's 15 years old and is awesome. I've always enjoyed teaching younger people. Here, the kids are a lot more intelligent than the adults and tend to comprehend the gospel pricipals a lot better. This week a member of the Seventy is going to come and speak to us! Everyone is pretty excited, i can't remember who it is but í'll be sure to tell you.

 

Thanks for all the emails and for sending that package, i'm sure everything you sent will be perfect. I've really enjoyed this change so far. I've had a great time with Elder Calleja. We are 2 really different people but we have a blast together and are working super hard. It's nice to have a companion you can joke around with, we're hoping to have a good second have of the change together and have more baptisms!! Well love you all, thanks Grandma and Grandpa for the email!! Have a wonderful semana!!! Elder Mecham

Letter #48 4/23/12 Happy Birthay Mckell!

Hola familia! Hope everyone had an amazing week! Wow how exciting! Mckell's birthday, lexi leaving to Spain, how awesomw! Thanks a ton mom for awnswering my questions, i'm looking forward to reading all that. Since i started my mission i've been really interested in the history of the church. This week was pretty normal, but it was a great week. I'm really enjoying it here in Angostura. The heat is getting pretty intense here but it's not slowing down the work. Elder Calleja is a trooper and we're getting along great. This last week we started doing spinning classes! Haha there's a small gym next to our house and we've been going every other morning. It's no Abby at lifetime but i'm pretty happy just to have the oppurtunity to go.

This past week we challenged a lot of people to get baptised, we actually have 4 baptismal dates for this Friday. I will be SO happy if we can just get away with 2. Our investigador most potential is named A. He's awesome but doesn't really talk much so it's hard to know exactly what he needs. He has a date this Friday and right now he is saying that he's super excited. One problem is that he lives really far from our house so we haven't been able to visit him as much as we'd like. He goes to the extension of the branch. And yes it's true, the extension is held underneath the shadow of a giant tree, and the bathroom is a hole in the ground surrounded by bed sheets. But all the people that go are great. We bless the sacrament every week and it sound like we also speak every other week. This week we're going to focus a lot of our attention in A and trying to help him get prepared. We've been praying a ton for him so that we can know how we can help him get prepared. After teaching him the 10 commandments i asked why he was going to keep them and he said so that he could get baptised. He's super excited, but we have to keep doing our part so that everything works out. One thing i've learned in the mission is that God seriously answers prayers when we have a real intent. I've been trying every day to pray with more desire and i've been able to feel myself grow so much, yet i still feel like i have a ton i need to improve. 

This past week the President of Angostura gave us a ride. It was pretty sweet. Also, about the whole mothers day phone call. Mothers day here is the 10th of May. I'm not sure if the call will be on the 10th or on the Sunday, but you should try to keep both days open. Sounds like the package made it home!!! I hope you enjoyed all the fotos and videos i took. Each video was filmed with much love. If your wondering about the game that's not there it wouldn't fit so i'm saving it for the next one. Well love you all!!! Hope you all have an amazing week. Love Elder Mecham

Letter #47 4/16/12 Angostura!

Hey everyone, thanks for writing me! I had a good week of getting to
know the members and investigadors here and all the area. The area
here is huge!! Here in Angostura we have the prayer house, but in a
little pueblito about 40 minutes from here we have an extension
sacrament meeting every sunday, so we go to both. In the meeting here
there are about 30 people that go, and in the extension there are
about 15 or 20. Yesterday we were busy with the church meetings all
day until 6 in the afternoon. The extension is litterally in the
middle of nowhere. You drive about 25 mintues on a highway heading
into pure corn feilds until you hit a tiny little city made up of
about 50 houses, and from there you take a dirt road heading into what
looks like nowhere for 15 minutes until we arrive to the city were we
have the extension. It´s incredibly small, but the people are great.

We have a few really potential investigadors right now. B is a
girl that lives in the extension city. She wants to get baptised but
needs to get married first but before she can do that her boyfriend
needs to get divorced... But she´s awesome!! We also had a cool
experience yesterday with an investigator. We found him thursday
and invited him to church. We passed by his house sunday morning to
remind him and he said he coulnd´t go, but we promised him that if he
goes he´ll feel something amazing and we love it but he still wouldn´t
commit and we left. About half way into the sacrament meeting he
walked in and said he felt it was what he needed to do. After the
sacrament meeting he told us he felt great and wants to keep coming
every week! He should get baptised really soon.

Elder calleja is great. He works hard and we get along great. And the
best part about being here is that Elder Garcia( my first companion)
is my zone leader!!! He´s awesome!! I have so much love and respect
for him and i´m glad i´m going to get to learn even more from him.
Well i hope you all have a wonderful week, love you all!!!

Elder Mecham

Letter #46 4/09/12 Happy Easter and Transfer!

Landon's birthday packages from grandma and mom!  Love the "birthday brownie" with candles!

No idea who these men are!  This is the first picture yet that Landon has been in his suit!

Looks like a wonderful family, taking care of our missionary!!

Hope you guys all had a fantastic week! And a great Easter!!! How exciting! First Easter of my life that the Easter Rabbit didn´t come... Nobody really believes in that here. But all is well here in Angostura. That´s right, Angostura. I left my farm town paradise!!! But it´s alright, the Lord definitely knows how to make me happy because he stuck me in another area almost the same!! The only difference is that here we only have a little branch and not a ward, and that there´s members here with washers. Last change i washed by hand every week.. I´m pretty excited. From what i´ve heard the area is massive here as well and we do a lot of traveling in the back of trucks. I was a little sad when i found out i was leaving Ahome but now that i´ve arrived here i´m pretty excited to meet knew people and see more places.

We had a pretty decent week in Ahome, despite the fact that there was absolutely nobody!!! It was "semana santa" and EVERYONE goes to the beach for basically the entire week. We had a lot of fallen appointments and also had a lot of problems finding rides because all the trucks were heading to the beach and jam packed of food and beer for the week. But Elder Peterson and I had a nice last week of working together. I feel like we ended the change really close friends. My new companion is Elder Calleja. He´s from Mexico City and has a few months in the mission. I´m looking forward to working with him, from what i can tell he´s incredibly humble and is going to be great. Sadly, we never had a baptism last change, but this change we´re going to work like crazy and see if we can recieve a blessing or 2. I plan on printing off a few of the Conference talks today since i couldn´t really see anything last week. I´m super stoked to work here and continue serving the lord.

Thanks again for the package, for the next one you send there´s really not anything special that i need. Well i love you guys a ton, have a wonderful week and stick strong to the Gospel!

Elder Mecham

Letter #45 4/02/12 Happy Birthday Landon!!

Hey everyone!! So first of all, thanks a ton for the packages!! I got 2 today, one from mom and one from Grandma. Everything you guys sent was amazing!! Thanks so much. It was a great birthday present. We had a pretty decent week. I had an incredible birthday present to be able to go to the last hour of the morning session of conference yesterday! Sadly there wasnt enough space in the church building and the missionaries werent able to enter.. But we had a fun time outside trying to listen! Unfortunately, the was all of conference i was able to attend.. The rest of the sessions we werent able to bring investigadors. I was pretty happy that we were able to go to anything judging that we had to go all the way to Mochis to be able to watch.

 

P and G got married!!! Still not a baptism, but i know its in the near future.

 

We were able to find someone that i think i could classify as escogida!!  We found her through a street contact we made earlier in the week. She is about 30 and has a real desire to know the truth. We gave her a Book of Mormon and the next time we passed by she told us she had only read a little but really liked it. We asked her how much and she said she read 3 chapters!! In 2 days!!! Thats a whole lot for the majority of people here. Hope she progressing.

 

So we have cambios this saturday... Im more than a little worried that there going to take me out of my little farm town paradise. I love it here!! The people are all great and i know were going to start seeing some real success really soon. Ill be praying that whatever happens will be what the Lord wants. Well love you all, have a wonderful week!!!