Week 53

Querida Hermana Lutze,

NO PUEDO CREERLO! Has alcanzado un ano! It's gone by so quickly for me... I can't believe you'll be home in six months. I'm sure you feel like you just want time to slow down and it keeps speeding up. I know that's how I felt as my mission came closer to its end. I remember crying when I had to remove my missionary badge!

Life here is crazy as usual. We spent a ton of time in the yard this week... pruning, cleaning, mowing twice to cut the grass shorter, and cleaning up the divots after they aerated. Work is always busy... The kids have fall break this weekend. I hope to spend some time up at Papa's. I think Marissa and Hannah are coming out to the house as well so we'll spend some time with them. I enjoyed the temple on Thursday while Natalie was volunteering. I love the promises made to us in the initiatory. BYU won their game on Friday in double OT 28 - 21. Such an exciting game and yes Hannah didn't have a voice at the end.

Hannah's busy with school and stressing over her grades. I just keep trying to build her confidence. She did go on a blind group date on Saturday and had a blast. I'm so happy for her. I'm sure she'll share the details with you.

Natalie is happy to have a phone now. She's finishing up the Book of Mormon and her Personal Progress will be complete. Hallelujah! She just finished driver's ed and can't wait to get her license. 

Jakob is taking a break for a couple of weeks from soccer. They will move up to Group A play this next year. They only have Premiere D1 and D2 above them. I hope they move up to D2 after spring. We shall see. 

Three things from my week...

First I'm always amazed at how the Lord works. He knows the big picture and we sometimes forget that! We get caught up in details that aren't so important. So I learned from Sister Miller that Kim Butterfield had surgery recently so I felt I should take something to her. I was going to do it right after my next two errands but felt prompted to go now. I thought OK he knows she's home... She wasn't there and so I left what I'd brought on the doorstep with a note. Mmm? Why did I have that prompting? Fifteen minutes later I was in Smith's and happened to run into Carolina and her mom Viviana that I visit teach. They've been extremely hard to find and I knew the Lord had adjusted my schedule so that we could meet in the store. The Lord knows the big picture.

President Skousen gave an awesome talk today in relation to the Good Samaritan and loving those around us - less active, same gender attraction, singles, and early returned missionaries. It really should be published. It was that good! I'd never thought of the Parable of the Good Samaritan as Christ and we are the innkeeper. He turns the injured, the sick, etc to us the innkeepers to care for. If you haven't thought of it in this way take a moment to reread it thinking of Him as the Good Samaritan and you as the Innkeeper.

Lastly, Elder Jaden Howell wrote this week and related what Elder Bednar had taught to them in their Tuesday devotional. Elder Bednar said he takes notes on Conference on one sheet of paper. (What?!) For each talk he writes three things... the doctrine, the invitation, and the blessings promised. My invitation to you this week is to do this with one of the recent talks. We did this for FHE tonight and it works so well!!!

Te amo muchisimo!

Mama

Week 52 (Do You Trust the Lord Completely?)

Dear family and friends,

Well, well, here we meet again. The weeks are so strange because every day feels like four days (morning, before la comida, after la comida, home in casa) but every week feels like just one day that just flew by!! I'm pretty sure that my time is now speeding up!  So crazy that I almost have a year now!

Well, let's see what happened in my week...

Monday It was our awesome Actividad de Zona! Hna Jimenez and I were in charge of the activity and the Elders of the movie. (They decided who got what, of course!) However, our activity turned out awesome! We ate breakfast and then divided them into teams. Their first task was to go on a wild treasure hunt (goose chase) which then led them behind the church. There they found a bunch of minute-to-win-it games. First, they had a competition to see who ate the watermelon without hands the fastest. The team participant who won first went to the next game. And the teams that lost had to do it again. The next game was "pescar las  llaves" which is incredibly hard and hilarious! They had to fish the keys. The next game they had to sort skittles into the correct cups in less than a minute (harder than you think). Then they had to run off to the zapatazo. They had to kick their shoe onto a table (also harder than you think). Next, they had a bowl of cotton and with vaseline on their nose they had to move all the cotton to the other bowl. It was hilarious!! And the last challenge was to look for their strip of paper in a bowl of flour with their face. They then had to run and find the playera of that person's name. So much fun! I feel a little evil ;) Like an evil mastermind. But the point is that my team won ;). After that we played basketball and soccer and then watched the Croods. No me diga. That movie is about mil veces funnier in the mission and with the missionaries!!! We were dying of laughter!! That was our awesome activity. 

Tuesday I had my first Intercambios in my area (despues de 2 semanas) and it actually went surprisingly well considering that I don't know my area. We walked a little lost, but not too lost. and besides when you are walking lost it is the time when you can always find the best people right!?............Although, I found someone a little too good. We talked to a  group of people sitting in front of their store and one of them began to talk to me in English and started to ask me if......I wanted to marry him.......uh........uh......uh........NO! No me diga! I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I didn't know if he was speaking English or Spanish or if I was understanding correctly!? Just when I started to think that nobody would ask that question for a long time, that the first time someone would ask me that would actually be the person that I did want to marry. He stole my "first time to be asked to get married" moment in life ;). It really surprised me and he really insisted, so I invited him to go to church with us. If he arrives, well, then we can teach him the gospel, so he can find his real true love ;). Life of "la guerra."

Wednesday Well another great day of work. My companion returned with me and then we got to work! It was great because we found new investigators in one day! (That is rare here!) So it was an awesome day. 

Jueves They told us out of no where that we have to get the inventarios to them Lunes!!!????? Ma!!!!???? So we had to run off to Los Ranchitos. We went to Bermejillo and Cuauhtemoc to do their inventarios. They live about an hour away which meant one hour in a taxi with no air conditioning. It was a marvelous ride! But it was fun to see more of Gomez Palacio. Then we returned to our area to eat around 330 or 4 (We were in Los Ranchos for about 6 hours!) Then we had to prepare a video for the zone and that was pretty much our day. 

Friday was my first Consejo de Lideres and it was AMAZING! The zone conferences are even better when you recieve them directly from Presidente. I felt like I learned so much! Now I just hope I can help the missionaries learn a lot as well. Afterwards we ate lunch/linner. It was sopes bien bien ricas with a salsa tan tan tan tan rica!! with a dessert of Chocoflan tan tan tan rica! I have a lot of learning to do when I get home. And that was the awesome day with the Hermanas Lideres and Lideres de Zona de Torreon y Gomez Palacio.

Saturday was a normal day. But we found some great nuevos and we had a great member to accompany us. 

Then in the night time we had our baptism!!! Woo hoo!! We baptized a boy of 10 years whose name is Irving. and let's just say that this was the strangest baptism I have EVER been to in my entire life. He was a little TOO excited to get in the water. So excited that he jumped in and started to swim!!! Que oso!!! I couldn't believe my eyes!! They baptized him but he was still being wild! So we had to talk to him about the importance and sacred nature of this ordinance and we had to baptize him again. It's a miracle my nerves survived that day ;) But the point is that he got baptized.....Woo hoo! 

Sunday was a normal day. I always love going to church. However, the proselyting after church is always terrible because everyone is going to their church or they are partying or they are drunk or on drugs or they just straight up don't want to talk to you. So ya, Domingos are rough, but they pass quickly.

Well that was my week and it was quite the week to say the least. 

This week I have been thinking a lot about the Second Coming of Christ, probably because I just arrived in Matthew 24 which is all about the end of the world. I have come to realize that we are really going to have to be firm in the faith and in the testimony of Jesus Christ like so many said in Conference. We are going to have to be stronger, more filled with the spirit, and more obedient than ever in our lives. We have to be prepared for this day and the day of preparation is HOY. We have to know Christ as if He lived in our very home or was part of our own family. We have to know Him and learn to truly trust in Him 100%. I often think of the "Trust Game" where you have to fall back straight as a board. There are 3 types of people. The people that won't fall back, the people that start to fall back and then get scared and take a step back to catch themselves and the people that fall back, completely trusting. We have to find out which of these three we are. Do we not trust at all, trust a little, but only what we can see or do we trust COMPLETELY in the Lord? And I know that for what is coming we need to learn to trust completely in the Lord. We have to know Him, trust Him, and follow Him. If we don't, the day will come when the world is in chaos and our trials are bigger than we ever imagined and if in this moment we don't trust in the Lord, we will not be counted among the noble and great ones. We will not be counted among the elect. This is why we are always teaching of the small and simple things that we must be doing. A relationship grows through small and simple things. Our friendships grow because we spend time and talk with that person and have great experiences with that person. Our matrimony grows because we give them attention, we show them our love, we serve them. It is the same with the Lord. If we want a good relationship, we must serve Him, we must give Him time and respect. We have to talk to him often, We have to love Him and have spiritual experiences with Him.  

This is my invitation to you all this week. Analyze your relationship status with Jesus Christ and your Heavenly Father and find ways to improve it, to make it stronger, so you can be prepared for what lies ahead.

I love you all!! 

Love,

Hermana Lutze

Week 52

Querida Hermana Lutze,

Gracias por las fotos de tu actividad de Zona! I knew you were in charge when I saw the fun 'minute to win it' games. :) Life here is busy as usual. We have some sad and yet happy news... Mama Belen passed away peacefully on Tuesday. I'm happy for her but sad for Bertha. She'll be all alone now. Dad and I were supposed to be in Cedar City over the weekend so he left Wednesday night for the Friday funeral while I left Friday morning with Natalie for Cedar City. We met up with Brent and Amy for our first play at 2:00 - Murder by Two. It was a 90 minute play by two people solving a murder. It was hilarious! The two guys were amazingly talented on the piano and the one guy played about seven different people often switching from one character to the next with no pause! He was incredible! We ate dinner that night at Brody's - a delicious Mexican restaurant. Brent, Amy, and I ate a dish that was a boiling pot of chicken, steak, and shrimp with onions, cacti, and zucchini in a yummy sauce. You ate it like fajitas. The next day I drove Natalie to St. George to spend time with cousins. Then Brent, Amy and I went up to Cedar Breaks. We hiked Crystal Springs and took some gorgeous pictures of the fall colors!!! We then met up with Dad at the hotel. He had made it back from the funeral. We all went out for sushi! It was delicious! We ate six rolls between the four of us. We then went to our other play - "the Cocoanuts." It was also funny and very well done. It was a Groucho Marx play, if you know who that it is.

Hannah's busy with school and is so happy that Marissa is finally back up here. By the way the family is all safe but the Cronins still don't have power from Hurricane Matthew and I'm not sure the Weights have gone back yet to their house. They were part of a mandatory evacuation.

Natalie is enjoying life with a phone now. She's working hard in school and finishing up driver's education. She has road and range in a couple of weeks. 

Jakob is working hard in school as well. He played in his last game on Saturday and scored the only goal for their team. It ended up in tie. I'm sad I missed his last game. He stayed with Howells for two nights since our plans got all messed up.

I've been thinking a lot about the words of Isaiah quoted by Jacob this week. In 2 Nephi 6:13 we read, "Wherefore, they that fight against Zion and the covenant people of the Lord shall lick up the dust of their feet; and the people of the Lord shall not be ashamed. For the people of the Lord are they who wait for him; for they still wait for the coming of the Messiah." I've been pondering on what it means to 'wait' since I want to be one of His people! Am I waiting for Him? What does it mean to wait for Him? I think it means to come to Him, to be still and know that I am God, to never deny the Christ, to endure to the end, to develop Christ-like attributes while we wait and to not become part of the world.

I love you and pray for your success!

Love,

Mom

Week 51 (General Conference - Listen, Comprehend, and Act)

Dear family and friends,

Well, la verdad, I can't even remember what happened this week. It passed by so fast with so much to do!

Tuesday morning we were told that we were to prepare our Actividad de Zona for this coming Monday!? So we spent the morning organizing.  The afternoon was normal except for our encounter with the poor man whose wife came at him with  a machete. No me diga! His hand was literally sliced open and you could see everything including the muscle! So cool! I hope we get the opportunity to teach him :).

Wednesday was my first Intercambio! Woohoo! It went really well I think! We worked hard. We talked in the night about some things and I think I was able to give her some advice and words of wisdom to help her be even more amazing! This is what I like about being an Hermana Lider.  I have the opportunity to influence the lives of others - to uplift, to inspire.

Thursday we were still in intercambios and we tried to get as much work done as possible!

Friday morning we planned Las Playeras for the activity and again tried to do as much work as possible in our area!

Saturday was Conference!!!! Yay!!!! I can't believe it! What an amazing conference! I have never been so impacted by so many talks! Normally there are a couple that don't interest me as much, but this time, every talk was so good and direct that I loved every single one!! After conference we bought the stuff for the Zone activity and spent all afternoon and evening preparing the activities.

Sunday was another amazing day of Conference with another round of incredible talks! We had lunch with la familia Maldonado. Hna Moguel (x misionera de la mision) returned for a reunion! It was so fun to see her!  Later that afternoon. we tried to get a little more work done in our area. We finally got the signature to baptize our investigator! Yay! That night we finished preparing!! Crazy day!!

Well, rapido, I just want to testify to each of you that every single word that was said in this conference is true and is of God. Our leaders have been called of God to guide and direct us. And we, as the people being guided, have the solemn responsibility to listen, comprehend, and ACT. We must apply what we have learned so that we can be blessed and prepared for the future. I hope you all paid attention to how much they talked about prayer, personal revelation, repentance, obedience to the commandments, and staying true and faithful to the gospel as we go through trials. I know that many things are going to change very fast in this life. I know that we have a lot of hard times ahead and very soon. The end is nearing and our leaders are preparing us so that when the Savior comes we won't be the wicked that are cast out and burned, but the righteous who are saved. We all need to improve and step up our membership in the church. I encourage you all to re-read the conference messages. Take notes on how our leaders want us to change and prepare and then set goals in your life to make those changes. We have to act now before it is too late. I know that Thomas S. Monson is our prophet now in day. I know that he and his apostles and other servants speak on behalf of God.  I know that if we follow their counsel we will NEVER be led astray. However, we have to hold on to our faith and fight the good fight.

I love you all so much!! Hope you have a wonderful week!!

Con amor,

Hermana Lutze

Week 51

Querida Hermana Lutze,

This week was busy with work at work and work at home. It's that time of year where I need two of me-one to do the yard and one to do everything else. Hannah's been really sad this past week. She hasn't done as well as she hoped on her exams. Please pray for her that she will have what she needs to get into the nursing program. She's been pretty distraught. BYU finally won another football game on Friday in the last 2 seconds of the game. :) Natalie got her phone this week... she's pretty much done with Personal Progress. She just needs to finish the Book of Mormon. Jakob's team won and tied in their two soccer games this week. He has one more this Saturday but Dad and I will be in Cedar City with Brent and Amy to see a couple of plays. (However Mama Belen isn't doing well... We received a call yesterday so Dad may end up out their in the next few weeks for a funeral.She's home on hospice.) We were called last Sunday to go on Trek again. :) You and Hannah will get to stay with Jakob while we go with Natalie. 

Conference was so incredible this weekend! I loved it! I attended the temple on Friday. I desperately needed the peace and comfort the temple brings. I love the clarity I feel after I've been in the temple. It truly puts everything in its proper perspective. It's amazing to me how you often think you don't have time but when you make time for the temple the Lord proves you wrong time and time again. I was able to do initiatories and a session in three hours and then went on to do everything on my list and a million things that weren't on my list. 

I've been thinking about Nehemiah vs. Lehonti. If you'll remember Nehemiah told those that were trying to distract him that he was doing a great work (rebuilding the wall around Jerusalem) and that he could not come down while Lehonti eventually gave in and did come down and then he was poisoned by degrees. That's so like Satan... He gets us to slowly decrease our obedience to the fundamental practices in life like scripture study, prayer, church and temple attendance. He poisons us by degrees until we harden our hearts and are eventually past feeling without even knowing it. I've also been thinking a lot about the command of Jesus Christ to Peter "When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren." How do we know when we're converted? In my mind we know we are converted when we do... We don't just know and feel something but we are propelled to action. This shows our conversion which in turn strengthens our faith continuing in an upward cycle. The same could be said for downward cycles as well. Finally I've been thinking about the words of Christ to his disciples when some of them walked no more with him. He turned to the twelve and asked "Will ye also go away?"  I loved Elder Ballard's talk on this today and relating it to church members that are losing their testimonies and leaving the church. It's imperative that we hold onto the iron rod! I love most how Peter responds to him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life. And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God. This brings me back again to conversion. To believe is a testimony but to be sure is to be truly converted. We are up and doing!

Te amo muchisimo!

Con amor,

Mama

Week 50 (Do I Submit Willingly to the Lord?)

Wow ............ this was the craziest week ever! I have never had so much to do in the week for other people and basically have no time to work in my own area. It is a miracle that the Hermanas Lideres baptize every month!  So let me give you the details of my week.

Monday: Well I arrived at my new house and put everything in its place. We went to Reunion de Distrito. We had a surprise party for Hna Martinez (my old companion) because now she is home in Salvador!! I couldn't believe that she was going home!! That means that I'm getting old in the mission! No!!!!  We ate a delicious chocoflan cake. No me diga. I have to learn to make that at home.....sooooooo good!

That night the Hermanas couldn't make it home to their ranchitos in time. So they had to stay in our house. It was a mini sleepover on the hard tile floor. but it was nice to spend some time with some of my old companions (Hna Martinez, Hna Santiesteban).

In the morning all six of us ate breakfast and then they left for their ranchitos. Tuesday we had the Despedida meal de Hna Martinez. It was muy rico! It was a consume de chiva (goat) with the family Maldonado. So good! Strange....but good :). Chiva tastes really different from vaca. Then the rest of the day was basically spent in saying goodbye to people she loves. We only worked in our area for about 1 hour.

Wednesday: In the morning we dropped off our beloved friend (after we went on an adventure to the Eiffel tower of course) at the office. We then went to la comida and worked in our area for about 3 hours after which we had to go teach a class.  Then it was time to go home. We worked on some projects to redecorate our home.......It is going to look increible y genial! I will have to send a picture when it is done.

Thursday: In the morning we had a meeting with the asistentes, hermanas lideres y lideres de zona. It was a good meeting where we talked about the problems in the mission and how we can fix them. Then in the afternoon we had another meeting with the zone leaders to make plans for a capacitacion that we are going to have Friday (The next day-we are so prepared.) We talked it over, divided the topics and went to go make our Powerpoints. That was our whoooooole day. We did basically nothing in our area.

Friday:........da da da......the first zone conference of Hermana Lider Hermana Lutze!!! Ahhh! I didn't know what I was going to do or what was going to happen. However it went really well. I think. We gave our part of the capacitacion and I think it impacted them well. We had to talk to them about some hard things (rule breaking stuff) and about gossip and such. Plancha.....bien bien planchadas. But I think it went well and that we will see more righteousness in our zona. I think they felt the spirit and that is what is important. Then we went to la comida. We worked in our area for about 4 hours and then went to coorelacion misional and home.

Saturday: We actually worked in our area all day!!! It was a miracle!! We found some amazing people that I think are going to get baptized!!

The bad part of the day was that we came home to find that there was no potable water. Nada! We had no water to use the bathroom, to wash hands or dishes. Nada! So they had trucks passing by with water and of course we didn't have buckets!! So we had to call members and ask for buckets as fast as we could!! We filled six buckets. I hope it will be enough for the next three days.

Sunday I took an amazing bucket shower in the morning-freezing, refreshing. It was definitely a new experience. At least I now know I can do it if necessary. We have church at 12 here (killer really) and after church we went to eat and to preach. We found two women who I think for certain are going to be baptized!! They are so interested in the gospel!! Yay!!

Monday: Took another bucket shower. Delightful! and we worked on our house decorating some more.

That is my week. It felt like a month but also went by really fast. So strange the mission.

I have been thinking about the Article of Faith 13. "We believe in being honest, true, chaste, benevolent, virtuous, and in doing good to all men; indeed, we may say that we follow the admonition of Paul—We believe all things, we hope all things, we have endured many things, and hope to be able to endure all things. If there is anything virtuous, lovely, or of good report or praiseworthy, we seek after these things."

Our capacitacion was on "Representatives of Christ" and asking the question if we are truly representatives of Christ. Often we say many things but are we actually these people? Do we do the things we say we should do? Everyone talks about how a disciple of Christ should be or what we should do but do we just talk or do we act?  For this reason I like the 13th Article of Faith because it explains a lot of what we should be and do. It says we should be honest true chaste benevolent virtuous and in doing good to all men. How many of us actually live every one of those attributes? And do we believe all things that we have been taught by our leaders, that we have been counseled by the prophets and apostles to do? Do we hope all things? Do we have a strong hope of things to come- a hope of eternal life? Do we endure all the trials given us and do we hope to be able to endure all things that will come? I think this is one of the most important things. Do we actually hope that we we will be able to endure all things? Do we have the desire to be so strong that we can overcome whatever comes our way?  Do we have the desire to be able to resist all temptation? Do we ask God to give us mountains to climb? Are we willing to submit to the will of our Heavenly Father? These are all questions we have to ask and attributes we must develop. Something that has really grabbed my attention this week is how Christ was led - willing to suffer for our sins and to die for us on the cross. He never complained, never fought back or argued, and submitted willingly to all things. We must do the same - submit willingly to all things that God would see fit to place upon us, stand firm and exercise our faith as President Uchtdorf has explained. I know this life is not easy. But I know that we can become better and stronger as we willingly submit to the Lord and let Him help us, lead us and guide us. I know without this submission, we will not make it very far.

I invite you all to answer these questions that I have asked and to study the 13th Article of Faith. Look at your lives and look for ways to submit yourselves more fully to the will of the Father.

I love you all!

Con Amor,

Hermana Lutze

Week 50

Querida Hermana  Lutze,

Life has been the usual crazy this week. I worked 40+ hours due to two conferences. The one was held at Thanksgiving Point. I thought of you as I passed the Museum of Natural Curiosity. :) The other conference was a trauma conference held in Park City. You dad came up and we spent Friday night in Park City. We ate dinner at the Loco Lizard with some of my co-workers and their spouses. I've been busy with church meetings-Presidency meeting and then helping with the food for the General Women's Meeting Saturday evening. I hope you were able to listen. Sister Oscarson and President Uchtdorf gave amazing talks! I know I'll refer to his talk on faith for years to come. 

Hannah is working hard in school. Joshua's farewell was today. She came over for that and I think some of her roommates are coming over for Conference weekend. Her friend Natalie's farewell was today as well. Natalie and Jakob are busy with school and other activities. Jakob's team continues to win. They have three games left. Two this week and one the following Saturday while Dad and I are in Cedar City. As of right now Rose is coming to stay with them. We shall see.

I enjoyed my religion class on Thursday. We talked about Matthew 14:24-33. Truly the Lord is a 4th watch God-meaning sometimes He expects us to walk in faith and may not help us until the 4th watch. But He will help us. He invites us to come to Him. He's always there waiting for us to come but we must act. When we act we show our conversion! We know something, we feel something and then we do something about it! This in turn increases our testimony! Truly Jesus Christ is a God of mercy! When Christ said to Peter "O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?" He was not rebuking Peter. He was asking Peter to tell him about his fears! When we take our fears to the Lord it is then that He can help us. It is then that we recognize our dependence on Him and His Atonement. Through the Atonement we are cleansed, we are healed, we are restored, we are identified, we are strengthened, and we are ultimately transformed.

I love you!