Serving in the Mexico Mérida Mission of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Monday, January 6, 2014

Lia the Trainer Opens a Brand New Area!



Hola Familia,

Pues, two grande noticias (big news items)…

UNO, your package came!!! From the 2nd of December!!! It only took a month to get here which is amazing. Thank you for the goodies, mum (only the almonds made it in recognizable form but everyone loved them) and I LOVED the CDs. They worked! And your letter was wonderful, mum, thank you. I've gotten a few other letters from the beginning of December, too. It seems like sometimes the hand-written ones get here sooner than the dearelders. I don't think I've gotten any dearelders from December yet.

Can you please tell Sally thank you for the card and gift $?  I needed it to buy a new watch and it saved my sanity. :)

TWO, we had transfers today and... I am a trainer!! I am going to open the area of Gineres, which is the residential area attached to Centro, so it's a pretty city. I know it a little bit because we had been going there when we had references, but I still don't know where anything is. The blocks are HUGE city blocks so I will definitely get my workout. And we won't waste time traveling between Madero and Gineres!  Hna. Torales will stay in Madero and we're in the same stake so she'll be able to fill me in on all of our investigators.

I've been feeling everything in the past 24 hours... at first the news didn't even faze me, but then as we were going to the trainer capacitacion (training meeting) I was suddenly filled with dread.  But I realized that Heavenly Father called me to do it because he will completely enable me to do it. There is no reason that it can't be an incredible experience. I have no idea what it's going to be like or what in the world I am going to do, but I feel very peaceful right now that Heavenly Father will help me do whatever He wants me to do. 

You guys will get to meet my “hija” (the “daughter” she will be training) next week. :)

To the left is my birthday present to Hna. Torales, because one time I played hymn this at a baptism and it happened to be the song she had been looking for since she heard it by the MoTab. There's a small quote from it in Spanish in our missionary manual, but the rest of the song is only in English so I translated it. I also wrote out the English with the pronunciation guide we've been using. 

 This is the pronunciation guide we've been using-- with the signs from my dictionary but with words she already knows how to say. We didn't get to finish it before transfers. :(

Ah, I wish I had time to write everything I planned to write!

Well, one thing is my realization of the reality of Satan and the way he has permeated my thinking my whole life in ways that are so very subtle-- and so very much an impediment to my happiness. He is so sneaky. Being a missionary is a CONSTANT battle to recognize that if I am lacking faith or feeling despair, it's him, and I just need to pray and pray and pray that Christ will help me to 'hedge up the way of my enemy' and ‘not shut the gates of thy righteousness before me' (can't remember how it's phrased in Nephi's psalm but it's something like that). Neph's psalm explains how I feel so perfectly I just want to read it out loud. 

Thank you to mum and Grant for writing out the instructions to the DearElder. Lots of people have been asking for the instructions in Spanish.

Mom, I wish I had time to write and tell you how perfect your quote was. Thank you.

Love,
Hermana Ludlam

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