Hermana Baeza 1/7/2013

Subject: HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY KATIE AND TREVOR! :)

FAMILY! Okay, I'm a little stressed right now haha soooo here we go!

Thank you for the letters that I received: Abby (FINALLY GOT THEM! Okay, loved everything! I need your school address so I can write you back so email it to meeee), Sister Florian (Gracie girl! She is so big now! :( I miss your kids!), Mommy (love you!), and Veronica (WHATTTTT! YOU ARE GOING ON A MISSION! OMG! I love this!). So, Katie Hume, my bfflaeae! Or something like that ;) YOUR BIRTHDAY IS ON WEDNESDAY! Woo!! 22! Crazy how we met when we were what...9? 10? I love you so much and miss you tons! Please send me your address where I can write you! I promise not to have any other missionaries call you anymore... ;) I mean come on, you had to expect that one coming at you haha! But seriously. No more phone calls! Just write me! I want to know how you are doing! Anddddd...Trevor (weird) Ewing! Happy birthday! I know I said I would write you a letter...but lets be honest, I haven't had any time but your son gave me a hard time about it so yes, now I feel guilty. Hopefully this shout out makes up for it? OH! and GUESS WHAT! So Sister Orellana sent out a referral from the teaching center a little while ago and the family eventually received missionaries and got baptized! BUT...guess who taught that family? ELDER DAVID ARCHULETA! haha! She was on speaker phone with the family, him and his companion. So, she like kind of unofficially talked to him via phone. So cool! I met this really awesome family during the week. They even gave me two referrals! They were awesome! It was cute, I had to go do something else so I told them to enjoy the rest of the visit and the younger one said to his mom, "wait, I don't want her to leave...she's a COOL missionary!".... :) yessss! I'm a cool missionary haha!

I had one of the coolest experiences in the teaching center this week! I have been trying to call this girl Laura since...July and I have NEVER gotten a hold of her. It was right before I left to go off-site and she actually called me back and left a voice mail and sounded super interested! I kept trying to call her back and I got nothin. So, I leave off-site and eventually came back to the VC. I call her and again, left a message. A few days later I got a voice mail from her AGAIN and she said she is available all week long so to call her back! I called her and guess who answered? LAURA! I was stoked! She has a friend that she grew up with named Olivia (lolz) and she has been such an example to her with being a member of the church. She always loved her family and always felt good when she was with her. They have been friends forever and whenever she thinks of finding a church, she always thinks of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We had an amazing conversation and I got to share my conversion story to her. It was so cool! She even wanted to go to church on Sunday! I'm hoping the missionaries actually got in touch with her but I hope this goes somewhere. She is sincerely seeking for the truth and she just wants answers! Since being back to the VC I've been able to gain a greater love of the teaching center. I love talking to people on the phone and sharing the gospel to them! It's a lot harder because I can't tell if they are actually focused or not lol but it is so powerful!

We had our New Years day devotional with our mission president and it was amazing! We are getting 34 missionaries in March. 34! THAT'S A LOT! Which means we will need 34 missionaries to train which is crazy! I have a feeling that a lot of sisters will be sent out from the VC to go full-field to help train these sisters who are coming into the mission. I doubt we'll be getting a lot at the VC but I hope he send me out to the field again! I love the VC but...being out full-field is sooo much fun. It's hard work, super hard! But, ahh! It's just more fun. He invited us to strive to be more obedient then ever because we are the sacred group that will be training these new, young missionaries. It is us that needs to teach them how to be obedient, how to do missionary work, and how to be successful. I was super pumped after the devotional and decided to take on this 40 day fast challenge. It's a challenge that Elder Petersen (from my MTC district) sent me during my..second transfer? It's where you prayerfully choose things to "fast" about that are preventing you from being obedient. I feel like this transfer has been "easy" in the sense that my companion is so awesome. Sure, I get stressed out and run out of patience at times because I struggle understanding her at times but she is seriously the most adorable person ever! She WANTS to be obedient and it is just so great! However, this has been my most challenging transfer so far...and we are only starting week 4! I feel like I've been sooo distracted and I need to regain my focus again. So, we have some companionship goals that we want to "fast" about and then I have some personal ones to "fast" about. And, when I say fast lol I don't mean fast from food and water for 40 days...just, don't do the things on the list for 40 days. And, I'm already losing haha! I feel more tempted then ever to do the things on my list but it's been allowing me to pray more to my Heavenly Father during the day to help me. For the record, it's not like I'm doing anything horribly bad haha it's just, my mind is thinking about things that I don't need to be so worried about or so focused on while I'm a missionary :)

Yesterday we almost didn't take the sacrament! It was bad haha. The wards all switched times and we thought the YSA ward was still having sacrament meeting at the end but...the new schedule said that they start with sacrament meeting which meant we missed it. BUT! Because everyone has been out of town for the YSA ward, they kept the schedule normal so that everyone was still able to partake of the sacrament. For the first time in my life, I was sincerely sad that we almost missed taking the sacrament. I mean, I played it off by telling Sister Set, "welp, it's not like we knew right? It's okay, we'll just take it next week" but I really did want to take it! When we found out that we were able to still partake of the sacrament, we were thrilled! I was so grateful during sacrament meeting. I NEED the sacrament every week because haha I sin every day! I make mistakes every single day. Yes, missionaries also sin...crazy right? :) I feel like last week I was so quick with my words with Sister Set because I have to repeat myself a million times but...who am I to lose patience with her? She's in a country she's never been to speaking a language she didn't grow up speaking. It's funny, I always wanted a companion that was learning English because I wanted to help her speak the language better and here I am, with a companion learning English and I lose patience with her. I'm not mean by any means!...I just, ugh, it's hard haha but it is teaching me to be humble, patient, loving, and how to serve her with all of my heart! If you think about it...she really is preparing me to be a mom! Watch, I'll most likely have a child who struggles in reading and by the experiences I am learning this transfer...I won't be perfect on how to raise that child but I will reflect on what I've learned on my mission and apply it to them.

I want to close with this hymn:

1. 1. Go forth with faith to tell the world
   Of Jesus Christ, the Lord.
   Bear witness he is God's own Son;
   Proclaim his wondrous word.
   Go forth with hope and courage strong
   To spread the word abroad
   That people of all nations
   Are children of our God.
2. Go forth with love to tell the world
   The joy of families--
   That we may be with those we love
   Thru all eternity.
   Go forth to serve and do your best
   With no thought of reward;
   Then you shall know the boundless joy
   Of serving Christ, the Lord.
3. Go forth with pow'r to tell the world
   The gospel is restored,
   That all may gain eternal life
   Thru Jesus Christ, the Lord.
   Go forth to preach his glorious truths
   Of peace, of joy, and love,
   That all who heed his holy word
   May praise the Lord above.

I love my mission. More then anything. It is the best thing ever! It makes me soo happy when I hear about my friends from school going on missions. This work is sooo important...I can't emphasize it enough! It's funny, well, not funny but we invited two people to be baptized this week and they both said no. Two days in a row. It has rough! But...then I was humbled when again, I was reminded of the incident when the missionaries invited me to be baptized...and I said no. And, here I am, on a mission :) I hope you all have a wonderful week! I love you all!!!!

Love,
Hermana Baeza

"Heavenly Father loves and trusts His precious daughters, and now, as never before, is the time to flood the earth with their virtue, their strong spirits, and their light. They are worthy and prepared to serve the Lord. They are incredible. And they are changing the world." - Sister Elaine S. Dalton

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