Michelle's Last Letter from Honduras!!

This is Michelle's last letter. We are so proud of her and the work she has done in Honduras. Today we welcomed a new sister into our mission from Honduras. She told us that when she was in the MTC she met another sister from Honduras who had lived in a branch Michelle served in. She said Michelle was super hard working, dedicated and a great missionary. That was fun to hear.

We are also very grateful for her wonderful mission president. Michelle thinks the world of both him and his wife, and from all we know about him we would have to agree they are pretty awesome. She was so blessed to be able to work with them.  

Hey family,

Its been a good week. I have been working hard. 

We had intercambios on Thursday. I was in my area. We found 6 new people and 2 new families. We put 2 baptism dates and one was with a family. It was a great day. We also had 5 lessons with members. Who is finishing the mission thinking about home? Definitely not Hna. Wagner! She is working like crazy! :-) 

So Presidente decided to throw everyone off guard. usually cambios are on Wed. THis time they are tomorrow. looks like I should start packing.  I have been avoiding it. But tomorrow after changes we will train the new missionaries quickly and then send them off to work. I am not sure where I will spend the day. Wednesday we go to the temple and then spend some time with President and Sis Fortuna. I heard a rumor that there will be a Thanksgiving feast. That would be acceptable. 

So looks like today is my last day in my area. I haven{t said goodbye to anyone, but I have only been here 6 weeks, so they shouldn{t be too sad. 

Saturday night we had our baptism. There was a lot of support from the ward. That was great to see. It started late, which isn't new. It was a great, and short, baptismal service. 

This Thanksgiving I am more grateful than ever for the experiences of this last year and a half. I have come to know my Savior as never before. I know He lives and loves me. I know He carries us when we can't find the strength to carry on. He literally gives us strength beyond our own. I have felt him carry me in these 18 months. His arms are open and He beckons us to come unto Him. The greatest joy I have ever felt is when I have truly repented. Through Christ we can become clean again. Any heartache or sorrrow can be erased. This year I am grateful for my Savior. I am also grateful for the Restored Gospel which allows me to have an eternal family. You never realize how much you love your family, until they are far away. My love for all of my family members has increased as I have come to know and rely upon Jesus Christ. The family is ordained of God. He has a purpose for us. The greatest joy comes as we follow our Savior, Jesus Christ, as a family. I know it. I have felt it. 

I love you all dearly. I also love these people in Honduras. Lately they have all been asking me if I am super excited and happy to return home. I have struggled to find the words to explain to them that while I am excited to be reunited with my family, I am heartbroken to leave the country and the people that I have come to love. I have given my heart, might, mind and soul to this work. It is the most gratifying work I have ever participated in. 

Share the restored gospel with everyone that crosses your path. They are not strangers, but our brothers and sisters who are seeking for the truth. They don't know where to find it. It is our responsibility to find them and rescue them. If there is something that I have learned, it is that missionary work is not confined to full time missionaries. Do your part. Jacob 1:19

Love you all. See you shortly. 

Michelle

Enduring to the End . . .

Hard to believe but Michelle gets home NEXT WEEK!!! She will fly here to Guadalajara and spend the month with us.  We have not mentioned the end of her mission to her at all, other then to comment on the need to endure to the end:-) but she must think we are worried about her since she is always trying to reassure us she is continuing to work hard. 

Dear Family, 

Okay, first things first

1. I plan on basically leaving everything here in Honduras. A. Because after hand washing everything for a year and a half it is now ugly B. Because there are people who need these things more than I do. But I do plan on having a few outfits, as I can´t come home naked. 

2. I have never been in an area that has been even close to touristic, so don´t expect souvenirs. 

3. Don´t worry, parents, I am still working hard. You should never end a race slowing down. On the contrary, you should give a good kick at the end. This week is going to be a week of miracles. 

This last week was good. We played capture the flag last monday for a zone activity. That was a fun one. I fell, but quickly recovered. 

Tuesday we had intercambios with the sisters in OJOJONA. I was with Sis. C. She is 19, but was engaged before the mission. She studied at BYU Hawaii. She had a crazy story. I love getting to know the sisters. 

We had a great day and worked hard. We found a family and had some great lessons. The people opened up to us a lot. 

The next day we had intercambios with the other sisters from O. I was there with Hna. H. It was great. We got along instantly. It was like I was with my best friend all day. We laughed the whole day long and had a lot of great lessons. We reached 10 contacts for the day, so that was good. 

We planned with them the next morning. Then I was finally with my companion in our area. I kind of missed her those days. 

Thursday night we visited C. She is doing well. She is ready for her baptism this Saturday. It has been a miracle. She is so special. 

We also visited the Fm. Vallecio. The husband went to another departamento (like a different state) to work, so our baptismal date with them fell through. It is hard here because everyone lives in such poverty that they let temporal things overrule spiritual things. We try to help them understand, but they have a hard time developing the faith that the Lord will bless them more if they go to Church than if they work when they see their children starving. It is heartbreaking. 

On Friday we had a miracle! We found a part member family. They are super excited to start working towards a baptismal date. here's the kicker. He is 28 and she is 16. We will need a member every time we teach them and it will be super expensive or them to marry. But she is a recent convert and did her personal progress already. But then she got pregnant and moved to Tegucigalpa. Okay, so she needs to understand a few things better. 

Sunday everyone gave us food. It was weird. But good. But one family invited us to dinner and made us eat a super spicy chile. They said that every elder that has eaten it has cried. My companion and I, with only our pride, were able to chew it for 1 min. That was the standard. Then I spit it out and wanted to cry. But I didn´t. Turns out that if you put salt on it, it takes away the burn. It was fun. 

This week we finish intercambios with our sisters, and have a meeting to train the new trainers. Woohoo!!! 

Love you all, have a great week. 

And the work goes on. . . .

First off, Happy birthday Dad. You are getting to be pretty wise... 

Okay, This week was crazy. 

Monday-- zone activity. We played soccer. Like always. I hate soccer because I am still not very good at it, but I am getting better. 

Tuesday. We had intercambios with the sisters from the Quezada. They are in a trio. I was with the newbie, Hna. L. She is waiting to go to Oaxaca, Mexico. Stinkin visas. They are all doing great, so that was super nice. My granddaughter in the mission is training her. Mi nieta has now had 2 daughters that have gone to Mexico. Rebels! 

Wednesday we had the first evaluation for the nuevos. It was good. They are a solid group. Presidente starts off talking about the commitments they made as they came to the mission and the blessings they and their family will receive. Then we verified 12 semanas and their schedule--as in made sure they are following the 12 week program and doing what they need to be doing during the day. We played games and practiced. I had to talk in English a ton because they are all new and didn't understand Spanish. I gave everyone a copy of my language plan because most of the Americans don´t have a good idea of how to study Spanish. Hopefully the plan will help them. Now my companion is following it to learn english. 

Thursday we had intercambios with the sisters from Las Americas. I was with Hna. Q y Hna. D. It was a smashing time. We have something in the mission that we call, The 3 Golden Rules that we have to use every lesson. 1. invite to be baptized 2. invite to chruch 3. ask for references. We always have to do it. Because we were a trio, we each had a rule. I had to invite to Church. They needed a little bit of help to do it every lesson, but it was good in the end. 

Friday we had a multi zone conference. We participated again. We did the same thing we did the last time, but we did a better practice.This time they had to find out the concern of the investigator with inspired questions and listen and feel the spirit and use the Book of Mormon to help. It was a lot more specific, and it turned out better. 

We also took a PMG quiz. I missed one question. I got 118 out of 120 points. I felt so disappointed that I missed that one. But that is why we keep studying. But I did feel pretty good because I did better than the assistants. I know that is prideful, but I don´t care.:-) 

President also committed us to doing 10 contacts every day. We are taking with EVERYONE!!! It is great! 

Saturday was a bit rough. Despite that we have been talking with everyone, we weren´t able to find a lot this week and all of our members fell through. Yuck. 

But Sunday was a day of miracles! We found 9 positive people and 2 families. We ended the week with 5 baptism dates with 2 families. We found such a great family. We contacted them walking up the hill to get investigators for church. It is never to early to contact! :-) They have been waiting for missionaries. They are so ready. His brother is a bishop in the other mission. 

Also this week I contacted everyone in a huge van. We take the van from the bottom of a hill to the top. It is pretty far. Like 5 min. I contacted the lady next to me, and then decided that I might as well contact everyone. Hello, listen to me, I am a representative of Jesus Christ... 

I have also been studying how we can teach the restoration with just the Book of Mormon. It is life changing. Now I am going to do it with every lesson. It is literally the most powerful tool we have. 

That is all. Have a great week! 

Love,

Chell

Life in my new area . . .

Buenos Dias. 

So today they fumigated our house. Thats nice. There is also a random cold front. I am in a scarf, super long skirt and long sleeve shirt. Weird. 

So when I got to the area there basically weren't any investigators. I feel like that always happens. Missionary work is hard work. But there are a ton of recent converts. 

We basically only work in an area called Altos de L. As you can imagine there are quite a bit of hills. But it is a tiny area, but there are always new people. 

We found a new family the other day when my companion fell. They are  the Cruz family. They are super positive. They want to get married, but have financial issues. they also have heard a lot of bad things about the church. But they are reading and praying to know the truth. They couldn´t go to church this week, but are preparing to go this week. 

There is another family named the Meza  family. She has gone to church with us twice. Her husband is a guard to one of the neighborhoods, so he works for 24 hours every other day. The sunday that he was supposed to go to church he got cold feet and hasn´t showed a lot of interest in the church, but he doesn´t know enough to say that he doesn´t want it, so we are going to be quite persistent with him. He at least needs to know what he is denying before he denies. it. They also need to get married, but they want to. She is menor de edad, so it will be L. 650 mas. No big. She is 18, but to be mayor de edad they need to be 21. 

We are also working with a part member family. He is a taxi driver, so he has no time. He has gone to Church twice while I have been here, but won't commit to a date. As dad would call it, I think he has a favorite sin that he knows he needs to give up but doesn´t want to. 

There is also a mom of a joven in the ward named C. who has decided to progress. She will be baptized Nov. 22 if all goes well. 

We had a great experience in intercambios. I was with Hna. B in S (old area) and we visited a young girl who has a baptism date. Her mom was there and we started talking to her and we got her to accept to go to church. This was huge because she didn´t want anything to do with the church. But we helped her feel why she needed to Come unto Christ through inspired questions. If she goes to church she can prepare to get baptized and her husband can finally get baptized. They just need to get married. 

We have been practicing inspired questions a lot lately. It is changing our lives. Teach people, not lessons. A good question can open a hard heart to the gospel. Our goal is to talk less than the investigator in our lessons. It is rough because usually we like to hear the sound of our own voices, but it has been incredible to see the results. They understand a lot better. 

We have started zone conferences and we are teaching c. 10 de PME with Teach people, not lessons from 12 semanas. The first one we did went really well. We have one more this week. 

This week we have the primera evaluacion de nuevos y una conferencia de zona and 2 intercambios. It should be a fun filled week. It should be one of our craziest weeks. 

My personal study is the best part of my day.I love the scriptures. I love the Book of Mormon. Everyday I read something that I can use to help my investigators. Today I read in Alma 5. It is super powerful. We need to make the changes we need to make TODAY and not procrastinate. What a shame would it be if we had to stand before God today and if we were guilty. 

For my birthday we had Mission Council. It was good. I think I forgot to tell you that my daughter, Hna. Montaño is now a HLE. Well, she is such a blessing. She called Hna. Fortuna and had a huge cake ready for me. It was like a surprise birthday party. She also gave me a necklace and a hymn book with notes in a few of the hymns we sang together. My companion wrote me a note and gave me a hostess cupcake. And a few of the other sisters wrote me notes. The whole Consejo sang to me and then smashed my face in the cake. Then we got back to our area and worked super hard. All in all, it was a good day. 

Mom and dad, I read your emails, but didn´t respond. Sorry! But I was super grateful for them and took a picture to be able to read them better later. 

Love you all!