Swallowed up in the joy of Christ!

6/7/14 mi familia!!! So this week was good. Still have lots of work to do but we are working on it! it has been a rainy week  but it usually starts to rain at night when we are in our house so that is nice :) Although, it would be fun to get completely drenched one time without standing under the gutter :) We had zone conference this week and there was one thing that our president said that has really made an impact on me. he said he had a message especially for us missionaries, that we are his invistigators and when we listen to this message it is only for us missionaries and to not think in our investigators when we listen but to think in applying it ourselves. First he talked about the gifts we recieve from the atonement, the first is the gift of immortality, the resurection, or the ability to overcome physical death, which is a free gift, everyone who has ever lived, who lives now, and will live will recieve this gift.The second gift is that of Eternal life, Becoming clean and being able to return to the presence of our Heavenly Father, or the ability to overcome spiritual death, but this gift comes with the price of living the gospel the Gospel of Jesus Christ! The only way we can gain the second gift is by overcoming the natural man (mosiah 2:19) and becoming a saint. We went on to talk about how we do this by serving others and really by obtaining the attribute of Charity in our lives. he went on to talk about how many of the missionaries have mentioned how they have had feelings of incapability, of how they can,t really improve and things like that... And then we read about a missionary account in the book of mormon in Alma 31 and how they had afflictions and trials and sufferings but in the last verse it says that all of these things were swallowed up in the JOY OF CHRIST. it was amazing to realize this, that everything that is hard in life, all those things that seem to impede us from improving or making things better can be swalled up in the joy of christ!!! Wow!!!  it really doesn,t matter what happens in this life if we know in whom we have our faith, if we know why jesus Christ died for us, Because of Him we can conquer all things, ALL THINGS, and recieve our place with Him at the side of our Father in Heaven! "oh sweet the joy this sentence gives, i know that my Redeemer lives!!!" .... oh how sweet!! And so now that  i have learned it, it is time to do it... still working on that part i think, but it is only forward and up from here!! i love you all so much!!! hope you have a fantastic week! hermana Taylor                                                                           a picture of me a bunny with a dress and sofia!!

Fresh Starts

6/9/14

mi familia!!!!
So this week was a little hard. We don,t have anyone that has a date for baptism hoy en dia, pero, don,t despair, have have some good references to contact in the weeks to come and we have some really great investigators that just have a hard time coming to church. But all in all, it was a good week. Do you guys remember the hermana peraza, well she was feeling better and then she felt worse again but guess what,We visited her the day before and she was all bummed because she thought she wouldn,t be able to make it to church because all the people with cars wouldn,t be able to pick her up. But lo and behold...She came to church all by herself... in the convi!!!! What??? She is 80 years old and is going through chemotherapy and she pretty much risked her life to make it to sacrament meeting!!! She is MARVELOUS!! She really just amazes me, everytime that we go to see her all she wants to talk about is the church and Christ and her faith and i just love her. LOVE HER LOVE HER LOVE HER!!! 

 Also something funny that happened this week, we were walking on our way to do some service on friday morning and there was a man sitting in the bus stop, i stopped to talk to him and he preceded to tell me "i am one who kills the people" what??? i thought i didn,t understand at first but when he repeated he said the same thing, and i was thinking, "should i run or what??" and then after that he was tell me how he was bat man and then i was just like... ok, he is joking or is just a little confused.... but it turns out htat he was telling me that he is a bar man, that makes drinks in the bar, not bat man, and that is why he kills the people.... "oh, ok"... funny... then we shared a short message with him and he said we could visit him, he also says he doesn,t drink or smoke so that was good. oh the joy of translating spanglish... gotta love it.

June?¿?!!!

6/2/14 Mi Familia!!!  So this week was great!  This week we were with the Hermana Peraza and she is going through chemo therapy right now but she is super amazing. She has been a member for a while and we have been visitig her the past couple weeks to keep updates and keep her spirits high, which is kind of funny because every time we visit her we end up learning something new! So one day this week we visited her with a recent convert, Ana Lazaro, and her daughter, Valeria (yes, I found another valeria :)) (the mom of ana and the rest of her family are not members and we have been teaching them since before i came to this area, they are like forever investiagators that really like when we come but wont be baptized) , and that lesson was great, but the next day we were with ana´s mom and ana and her 3 girls and ana´s brother and ana wanted to visit Hna Peraza again and guess what!!! Her whole family, her daughters, her mom her brother and his daughter all came with us to visit hna peraza. We all squeezed in to fit in her bedroom of hna peraza and we started with the book of mormon 3 nefi 17, what an amazing chapter, we talked about healing and how Christ can heal us. It was a great lesson, and at the end Hna Peraza shared an amazing testimony of how she came to know the truth! It was amazing, she talked about how at first she did not want to be baptized because she was catholic (this is the problem we have with ana´s mom, she doesn´t want to be baptized because she was baptized before and doesn´t want to play games with God) but she took the lessons because her husband was to be baptized and then when the interview for her husband came around she still didn´t want to be baptized but hte missionaries told her that she was prepared to be baptized if she wanted, but she still said no, but the next day, on the spot, she decided to be baptized. As we were listening to how this descision was the happiest decision of her life I looked at ana´s mom with tears in her eyes. It was amazing and I hope it is a turning point in the lives of the Lazaros. We also found Hector Manuel this week who is very prepared to hear the message of the gospel! I am doing so great here and loving teaching and finding people and I am finding that I am enjoying it more and more everyday! I love being a missionary!! I love you guys all so much!!! Love,  Hermana Taylor

wooo hoooo!!

5/26/14 Mi Familia!!! So this week was good. It was kind of crazy and I learned a lot. Especially of how really the Lord has a plan for us and it is perfect. One day this week they had a meeting for all the leaders and trainers so we had to do some weird splits and we were a 3 some for one day. The Hermana that joined us is from salt lake and she has been in the mission for one week and she knows spanish because her parents are from Mexico. But the day before we had this weird split, we had intercambios with the sister training leaders, that is where my companion goes to the different area and I stay here and we have a whole day with a sister that helps us make goals to improve and everything, so on this day was the meeting for all the leaders and so we were just going to change back in the stake center where the meeting was because the sister training leaders had to go to the meeting. (i hope this is making sense) and so we switched and were headed back to our area in the convi (a little van that carries us places) and we were like two minutes from our area after a half an hour drive or more and they call us and tell us that we were supposed to pick up another sister and take her with us for the day... WHAT?? we have to go back???... so we went back and got sister salas. and so we returned to our area and studied a bit and got to work, the 3 of us. We were walking around trying to find people to teach for the day and we found a couple and the lessons were good but it was pretty normal but I was thinking and praying, there has to be a reason why sister salas is here and I prayed that I would be able to know that reason. The next lesson we had was with a less active member who wants to return to church but has been having a hard time returning and talking to the bishop to get a few things settled. This lesson with this less active member was amazing, Hna. Salas had exactly the words to say to help! The less active member went to talk to the bishop the next day!! There is a reason for all things! The Lord has a plan! He knows us!! How grateful I am that He is watching out for me and for all of us and I know His plan so I can recognize that!!! Well, I hope that you are all doing well!!! I love you all so much!!! Hermana Taylor 3 Nefi 17

5/19/14

Piñatas!!!

Mi Familia!

So this week was a good and interesting week, and I have a feeling that this next week will be even better because the 3 nieto girls are getting baptized!!! whoooooo!!!! It was a little bit interesting because their parents will not be baptized but everything seems to working out in their favor. Their gonna be as clean as little baby Liv!!! How beautiful!

I was also wondering what all your favorite animals are this week so if you all could answer this question too! 

So this week I read the talk from Pres. Uchtdorf from this past conference on gratitude and I just love it. Be Grateful! Be Happy! I also read Alma 26:37 and how grateful ammon was for all that he could do with the help of the Lord even though there were many many afflictions for him and his brothers! I love the Gospel! I know its true!

 Hope you all have an amazing week and I love you all more than anything!!!!

 Hermana Taylor