Another Great Week in Mexico!!!

Hola,

It has been a busy but fun week here in Mexico.  Dall congrats in making class officer!!  That is super cool! Sounds like there is a lot of coming and going in the house, that is cool, better busy than bored.  

 

It has been quite the eventful week.  Last Monday we went to Chapultepec, which is like the central park of Mexico city.  They have about 30 museums there, we went to 4 it was awesome!  The one museum was a castle and was super old and on a hill so you could see the whole city, it was pretty sweet.

 

This week one of my investigators, Carlos, had a dream, that he saw a picture of Christ and it was fading away into the background, and he heard a voice that said "follow me" and then he woke up with the thought that he needs to come to church with us!! So he couldn't come this week, but he is super excited to come next week, with his family Jesica, y Axel. 

 

Another one of our investigators, Fransisco, was super hesitant about coming to church, not because he didn't want to but because he works day to day selling hub-caps for cars.  He doesn't make that much, just enough to eat for the next day for him and his family.  He was very worried that if he closed up his shop he would not have food for his wife or kids.  We told him to pray and have faith and the Lord would provide for his family.  He told his wife that he wasn't going to open up the shop on Sunday and was going to go to church with us.  She wasn't to thrilled about the idea, but she supported him in the end.  He came to church and loved it.  But the best part about it is that his business is doing better than ever and he made 4 times as much money on Monday as he usually does.  He knew that it was a blessing of the Lord and has excepted to be baptized on the 27 of May.   I am so excited for him.  Because of this miracle, now his wife is listening to us too.  It has been awesome.

 

I am also learning about the blessing of delegation.  It has been hard working with the ward and teaching all of our investigators because we have so many but that is why we have a Ward Mission Leader.  What a blessing it is, I have never really taken advantage of them before, but now we are working with ours and it is a huge load off of our back.  Life is great,  what can I say more?

 

Con Muchísimo Amor,

Elder Joe Fuell 

180 lbs and all muscle!!!!

Hola,

It has been an amazing week here in Mexico.  Congrats Dall on making the top 10!!  That is super cool,  Its like the top ten funny things on David Letterman, #1 Dallin Fuell ha ha.  Kate, you are coming down to Mexico in a week, are you super excited?  I would be, Mexico is awesome.  Mom I am glad to here you are enjoying your time with your friends in England as well as the Beef Wellington.  

 

Yeah we are pretty close to the Volcano not as close as I was in Ixtla, but I am sure the president will pull us out if things get to crazy.  It has been pretty funny with Elder Brito, he is from Tabasco Mexico, the Yuctan Jungles and all that stuff, and his whole mission he has been over there on the nicer side of the city and he is always super scared here,  I guess maybe I would be scared too if I hadn't lived here for a year, but it is all normal, and I am bigger now (180 lbs, all muscle ;) Dall) so they usually don't mess with me, and they are all two poor to carry a gun so really there is no problem at all.

 

This week we focused on teaching lessons to investigators with members present.  It was super good because it got the ward excited about sharing the gospel and it gave more support for the people who were investigating the church.  Not only that, but the church attendance of our investigators doubled.  What a miracle!!

 

One of my investigators is in a band, he started writing all this music about the stuff we were talking about, he has a song titled Prophets, and Celestial obsession, Jesus Christ.......different.........It is a rock band but I haven't had the chance to listen to the CD he gave me because we cant listen to music. But you guys can look it up on YouTube and tell me how it is.  The name of his band is Milvulbrek, he said you should just search that.

 

Yeah Zone meetings are pretty cool,  I love my zone leaders they are awesome guys.  Every week we have an interview with one of them and sometimes the president comes but not every week.  I will miss President Chavez, he is super good at teaching, I will miss his lessons a lot, but I know the new president will have new talents to offer as well..

 

I have some money now to buy some white shirts, I haven't been able to find any yet, but I will let you know when I do ,or if you need to send more,

 

I was reading in the Liahona (Ensign)for this month, the message by the Prophet, it was super awesome!  As I read it I knew that he is a prophet of God, I know that anyone can receive the same witness by the power of the Holy Ghost, I am grateful for him and his example. I love you all, and am excited to here how everything goes this week.

 

Con muchisimo amor,

Elder Joe Fuell  

Another earthquake!!!! I slept through this one.

Hola,
It has been another great week in Mexico, here is the news.
We slept through a pretty large earthquake, (I had no idea).
I received the letters from both grandmas, and I have already sent you letters telling how much I love you both.
The zone leaders lost my birthday package on the bus! What a wonderful birthday surprise ha ha.. Its all good because President Chavez said he will reimburse whatever the cost was.

Elder Brito is my new companion here, he is way cool and a hard worker, he wants to learn English really bad so we are just about always speaking English in the house which is way good.  It has been awesome working with Elder Brito.  He is from Tabasco.  He is a really hard worker and we have been having a lot of success.  Everything is pretty good.

I love reading the Book of Mormon with my investigators, there were a couple of times when we did that this week and the spirit was just super strong. I also talked in church last Sunday.  I talked about prayer, and shared the marble story ha ha.

I cant really remember anything huge that happened this week, but I know there was . . . all the weeks start to blend together when you do the same thing everyday ha ha.  I will take better notes next week so the letter next week will be a bit more descriptive.

I love you all,  have a safe trip and a fun time mom.
 
Con Muchisimo Amor,
Elder Joe Fuell

Semana Santa (Holy Week)

Hola,

It has been quite the week down here in Mexico,  I still haven't received the package, hopefully I will receive it within the coming week.  Yes Katie, there was another earthquake last Monday when you wrote me, but we didn't feel it again because we were on the bus.  ha ha it is funny how that works. 

 

This week was Semana Santa (Holy Week), which is like Easter only they make it a week long.  It was pretty tough, because everyone was out of town.  What they do here. . .  shoot!!! I just got called by the zone leaders, we have special changes (transfers), my companion Elder Sweetin is going to Xochimilco, which just really stinks because we were working super hard and gaining success.  I guess that is what the Lord wants right now. Anyway, super bummed for the change...

 

Back to what I was saying..... but what they do here is the take some guy and he carries a cross to this big hill and they reinact the crucifiction.  Its pretty crazy around here.

 

Easter was good!  It was awesome to focus on the Lord and his Resurrection.  Birthday was good. 

Elder Sweetin and i went to McDonald's and ate big macs.

 

Because everyone was gone for the week, it was pretty tough finding people this week, but with the help of the Lord we found two families really awesome!! Which ended up to be 12 new investigators in all.  The day we found them was super hard for us, we were fighting discouragement consistently but it just goes to show how the Lord blesses us after our trials and after our faith.

 

Congrats  Dal with the track meet, that is awesome. I love the pics. Way to go.

 

I love you all,

Con Muchisimo Amor,

Elder Joe Fuell 

As an add-on for this weeks letter

The young men's president of our ward has asked the 16-17 year olds about what would be some concerns that they had about serving a mission. 

Now for those who don't know, serving a mission is not an obligation.  It is a choice that these 19 year old young men make and 21 year old if you are a female.  Missions are paid for by those going on the mission, or by parents, or sometimes by others contributing to help the youth go. 

The young men's president decided to ask us parents who have missionaries on missions to write their responses to the concerns of the 16-17 year olds.  So here is what Joe wrote back:

Not knowing the language if you get sent foreign – it comes, you´re on the lords errand

Being on my own- you are never on your own, you always have your companion and the holy ghost

Leaving family- they are always with you in heart and spirit

Weird/know-it-all companions – There are weird/know it all people everywhere, get used to it

No freedom to do what or go where I want. – That is a lie, you get to do a bunch of stuff you want, it is a mission not prison

Changes at home while I am away – there will be changes at home if you stay

No friends when I return- whatever! All your friends will probably leave on missions and you make a ton of new friends on the mission

EVERY single thing is spiritual – Mosiah chapter 2 last verse. read it

Homesickness - wears off after 3 months

Two years is a long time -  It will be two years later with or without you.  It is like a Popsicle. You can eat it and its gone, or you can not eat it, and it melts and its gone.   Either way it goes, so you might as well take advantage of it.

It’s not where I wanted to go / where will I go. -  There is no such thing as a bad mission.

It’s expensive – there is no price on salvation for OTHERS, the price of souls is great in the sight of God

Leaving the girl- If she is the one she will wait

Losing out on school- You will be better at your school when you get back  if you go.

The commitment – be a man, that is a dumb excuse

Will I fail- it is better to try and fail than to fail to try

My diet –You can find good food all over the world.

Shyness/fear of speaking, lessons, being in front of people- God gives us weakness so we can be strong.  If you are shy the mission is an awesome opportunity to overcome that

Lack of confidence (what if I don’t know what to do?) – Follow the spirit, your leaders, and preach my gospels, the scriptures.

Medications I need to have – talk to brother Sykes(Pharmacist)

Losing faith- You are more likely to loose faith out of the mission than on the mission, because you do the things that will build your faith every day

Worthiness - being sent home early for not clearing things up properly.- clean things up and get back out.  If that is your fear before you go,than clear things up properly before and that wont matter.

General Conference Was Fantastic!!!

Hola,

 

Wow, it has been a great week here in Mexico.  We have been working way hard and conference was awesome!  Today for P-day we went down to the Zocolo ( downtown D.F.) and we found an IHOP.  We forgot our cameras, but you should have seen how much we were smiling as we ate our American Pancakes ha ha. 

 

So we found a bunch of cool families this week.  We have been finding a ton of people and here are a couple of happenings with some of them;  Eduardo and his family are really cool.  One day we just felt like we should knock on his door,  He was super cool.  He told us that was weird that we just felt like knocking on his door because him and his family just felt like joining a religion recently but are not sure which one to join.  He is in a band and sings.  We are looking forward to a jam session in the future ha ha.

 

We also found Jesus and Vici who are really cool.  They are Jehovah's witness, usually the Jehovah's witness never listen to us, but they did and so did almost all of their family.  They are super cool, we gave a lesson about the plan of salvation the lesson was super powerful.  And he says that he has no doubts and that the spirit has convinced him.  Trouble is he works on Sunday, but his family should be coming to church.

 

We just changed day light savings time yesterday (thank goodness) we live next to a bunch of roosters and they would start crowing at 4 in the morning . . .  I am still getting used to it.

 

So Elder Sweetin and I had this awesome idea, and we got the permission from President Chavez to hold a football (soccer) tournament.  It should be pretty big as we have already invited 5 wards not to mention all the investigators that come out.  We are going to be having it on the 21st of April.

 

Conference was awesome!  It is like the Superbowl.  The sad thing is the church where we went to watch it, which is are ward building, is 30 minutes from our area in a microbus.  And riding on a microbus down avenida Tlahuac is a once in a life time experience. Its like the Indiana Jones ride at Disney land without seat belts and half of the time you have to stand because all the seats are taken.  We had to go down everyday!!  It was way fun ha ha.

 

All of the talks where awesome!  I loved Elder Anderson´s, Elder Erying,  and Elder Holland's talks.  They where all great!!  I really liked Elder Bendnar´s from priesthood sesion.  Dall and Dave, I sure hope you pulled something from that talk like I did.

 

Our Church is just off of Avenida Tlahuac which on calle payasos, I believe it is in colonia nopales.  If you go down perefieico which was a border with quetzal you will hit Tlahuac.  The name of the barrio is Mirasoles, in Estaca Iztapalapa.  I forgot our address I will give it to you all next week.  I love you and am glad to hear you are all doing well.

 

Con muchisimo Amor,

Elder Joe Fuell