Friday, November 9, 2012

Sacrificar para la Salvación

Hey everyone
I'll start today with some financial miracles.  Due to travel and changes, our monthly money went down the drain pretty fast and we were getting kind of scared for what we were going to do for the second half of the month.  Both of us had very small amounts of money.  One day during the week, my companion left the house with 200 pesos.  During the day, he spent about 70 pesos.  When we got home at night, he pulled out 250 pesos from his pocket.  We went over what he had spent and the change that the stores had given him.  The only explanation for the extra money was the same explanation when Christ multiplied the fish and bread for the multitude!!!!  Later that night, I found a 200 peso bill in my scriptures where I dont remember storing it away.  I thought I had already spent it but there it was.  We also had a miracle in our ward when the leaders finally agreed to make a ward mission plan with us!  Now we will be working more harmoniously with the ward and their goals for the missionary work.  After 6 months of asking and pleading, we got our mission plan!!  My companion and I also came up with a sweet idea to strengthen the families of the ward.  We made these nice laminated posters to measure success in the home regarding living the Gospel.  The chart helps the members keep track of when they do family home evenings, family scripture study, and family prayer.  We believe it will help the members realize that they are missing the simple daily things that protect us from temptation and failure in the family.  We also believe that if the members become more converted in their homes and families, they will naturally share the Gospel more.  They will have the desire to share what keeps them happy on a daily basis.  We also had our activity this past saturday.  We grilled 72 hamburgers while the members learned about geneology.  They had some laptops there to be able to learn hands-on.  We had several members coming out to eat their hamburgers totally excited because they had found several of their ancestors that they had never heard of or found before.  There was also a sister there that lives in very humble circumstances financially that thanked us so much for the hamburger because she had never eaten one her whole life of 55 years.  Even though we ran out of meat and didnt get to eat, we loved seeing the members together, feeling of the spirit of Elijah and enjoying a good american burger! haha  We even bought some A1 sauce and told everyone it was the 'secret sauce' for american hamburgers.  Everyone loved the sauce! haha  Apart from all the fun, we had a great baptismal service on Sunday morning of Lara.  She was so excited to get baptized and her parents supported her the whole way.  They came to her baptism and it was their first time coming to church.  They dressed up in suit and tie and dress and looked great!  I think her parents loved the baptism, especially because we asked them to give the two prayers to support their daughter on that special day.  I think they too will get baptized in a couple of weeks.  Ignacio and Ariana are still trying to figure out their marriage so we are waiting on that.  There are several great investigators that we haved started to help from the Centro ward.  The members do SO MUCH there and even though there are no missionaries there right now, they continue to baptism almost every week because they are truly converted members who love to share the Gospel.  I have enjoyed getting to know them in lessons with their friends because they share such powerful testimonies.  The title of my email comes from a quote that I love by Joseph Smith that basically says that no religion who doesnt ask us to sacrifice all things is able to provide us the necessary faith for salvation.  That is what I talked about in a talk I gave this past sunday in our ward.  I know that the Lord asks us to give ALL.  Sometimes we are not willing to sacrifice our most favorite sins or past-times but the Lord needs us to work in His vineyard so that we can be blessed with the faith to be able to return to His presence.  I love serving Him 24/7, it is a great joy!  Love you all and miss you guys a bunch!
Elder Stutz   

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