February 28, 2011

Hello Family! 

How are you all doing? Im am doing just great this week as I have worked hard with Elder Toledo. My spanish is definitley improving a ton and a tip of advice he gave me was to just completley forget english and so I have been thinking is spanish all week so if there are errors here im sorry. So we did not have anymore baptisms this week but the blessing of heaven and Fathers armies of Angels are here with us. I love this as I never feel alone. This week as with every week, so much happens. Everyday is completley different from the last and a new challenge and more adversary is there every day. We have had baptisms set up for the next couple of weeks, but with all good there is bad and it is our choice how we will face it. We have an incvestigator, an 11 year old who lives with his uncle and he is such an awesome kid. He is so ready for baptism and just wants to follow Christ but we need consent from his mother not just his uncle. This was very tough on us and on him as we were all hoping that he could get baptised this last week. He is very down but we remember the scripture in nefi that when God gives us a commandment,He provides a way for us to complete it. With time and patience he will be baptizsed and hopefully his uncle also! This week I got to go to another part of my area called El Campo Diez and this is like a rancho and the people there are very poor. There houses are tiny and made out of scraps. As soon as I set foot there I felt a flush of humility and I just wanted to go and hug all the people. I love them. We contacted this one house and taught a 22 year old named Reyes. We lef t him a Book of Mormon and hopefully he will continue to want to follow. When we went back to check on him he ran into his house and got the book and was going to give it back to us. we said oh no no it is your book and he was so happy. To see this kind of living and life here is so different and I just want to teach everyone. I love the people here. Yesteryday we were contacting after church and went to a lady that we contacted earlier in the week and she is a little bit crazy and her husband died 28 years ago and her 49 year old son that was in a accident and now has brain damage lives with her. She works all day at her house growning plants and keeping it up. she is a tough old lady named Ramona. We were teaching her and we were just talking and then I dont know what happened but Elder Toledo said that I wanted to learn to wash clothes by hand as she does not have a washer. She was so excited to teach me and pictures are included with this. Oh what fun. My comps bday is tomorrow so some converts from his old area wanted to come take him to lunch. So they came an hour here to take us out and we went to a part of my area that is by the ocean. I forgot my camera and I wish I could show you were I was today. I will go back. But the ocean ahh so coooool! It is a fishing town called Navalato. Bettweeen Bachigualato and Navalato there are many farms so I saw some awesome mexican farms a sweet sweet places today. I just love mexico. I had no idea what it was like out side of the city and I just love it. Also I love that Elder Toledo has had such an iimpact on his converts. I want to be like that with my converts. Well I just want to thank everyone for all of the great emails that you send to me. I love hearing from you! I dont have time to respond to all but I love reading your inspired words to me and stories from your lives right now! THank you my family. I hope all is well and everyone is just doing great, getting on their knees everyday and pouring out their souls to our Father for all of the amazing blessings he has given us in this life! Pray to Him as He is always listening. Put your faith in the sacarafice and Atonement of Jesus Christ as it is an amazing blessing for us to use if we can have enough faith to work it out the best we can and then simply turn it over to the Lord. THis is something I have loved learning here on the mission. I feel that I have to do this everyday. Ask for the help of our Father, because He is just waiting to open the Heavens and pour out more blessings upon us. I love this Gospel I love Our Father and our brother and Savior. and I know that they have more love for you than you can ever imagine in this life. And I also I love all of you. Take care my family!

Elder Larkin

February 21, 2011

Hello My wonderful family!!

How is it all going there? I am doing just great as I have worked harder than I have in my life. Elder Toledo has been working me hard and I have been learning so much. It has been great as our area really has exploded! Our investigators needed him and it really shows. Well sat was my first convert baptism. Her name is Paty a 15 year old with such great intentions to follow our Savior. About 3 or 4 weeks ago we were heading to an Hermanas housse to eat lunch and we were early so we contacted some houses. The first one was this lady named Gloria and we found out she was a less active member. She was so suprised that we were there and just was so happy to see us. THen we left and and invited here to church and all and then sunday came and she did not come and we thought nothing of it. Then 2weeks ago she came with her daughter Paty. Wow we were so excited and Paty loved the church. So we set up an appointment and we taught here over these last two weeks. Then this last week she was baptized. It is crazy the opposition that comes when doing such righteous things as baptism. She was so excited and asked me to baptize her. The strange Elder from the US that cant really talk, but she wanted me to do it. I was so honored and will remember this special day forever. I loved feeling the presence of Angels there on the other side. Not only our family but hers too. Ahh the mission is great. Elder Toledo wants to baptize every week this change so Im good with it. Working with Elder Toledo has been fun and difficult. We come from completley different backgrounds so I have had to learn alot to work and be effective with him. I love my companion as he really takes good care of me. I have learned so much from him as he really is an amazing misssionary and teacher. It has been a pleasure. Well the miricales of the mission never cease while we work our hardest and stay completley worthy. There are so many people here and are just waitng for us to knock on their door and invite them to come to Christ. I just am completly amazed. COming from Utah were most all are mormon or know alot about the church, There are so many here that have never even heard of the church and last night we taught this new family and the daughters have never heard of Jesus Christ before. I have such great work ahead of me and cant wait. Also I had my first experience of casting out bad spirits. Its quite scary and I cant really describe it but we have another new investigator now. I love being on the Lords Errand. His work is so amazing and we are all apart of it. If we have any particle of faith in Him we are to serve others and share this amazing gospel with them and all of the Amazing blessings we have recieved from Him and our Loving Father in Heaven. There are so many stories I can tell already but I dont have alot of time. Family I love you aso much and you can show your love to me by showing your love to your Savior. Keep His commandments. This is everything. Do you kids remember the seceret to this life? its simple, keep His commandments 100% of the time and your life will be so happy. I love you all and ¡Cuidense! con amor,

Elder Larkin

February 14, 2011

Well hello my family!

 Jared what a sweet birthday and Forced Unleashed 2 amazing!! Bailey happy birthday this week as I don't think I will get another chance to send a email later. Well whoever is in charge of my face book, accept Geovanny Flores as my friend as he is a member here that pulled the prank on me. He is awesome. Well yesterday we were sitting at a members house and we got a call and they said, We need to have a baptism for my son. So Elder Wirkus said that I would do it so I had my first Spanish baptism. It was not one of our investigators but a sweet kid from another ward. We did not know the family at all but they were so grateful that we could have a baptism. It was very cool and now I have 2 baptisms. The ward mission leader here said , yes 2nd of many to come so I'm very excited. We have 3 investigators that look like they will get baptized this week. So exciting! Well today were mission changes so I am no longer with Elder Wirkus. So sad as we went and said bye to some of his converts yesterday we left them in tears. I want to work hard so that I can have such good impact on people lives just as Elder Wirkus had. He is now is Angostura a Ranchito with one of the Elders from my MTC District Elder Brown. And now I am with Elder Toledo a Native here from Vera Cruz. I am excited to see how things go but also sad to lose Elder Wirkus as he was a very great friend to me. And now I have to lead the area for a while and this is something that scares me a little but I have really come to know that this is not my work but I just work in the Lords work. I need not worry because He is constantly guiding me and will never lead me astray. I have really loved the mission and I cant believe that is a been 1 month today that I came to Mexico!!!!! Ah it just flies! I love the members here and all of our investigators and I get to see how the gospel changes peoples lives right before my eyes. It is such a blessing to me to be here on a mission. I love the area here too. I don't feel like I'm in another country or far from you as this is my home here too and I just love it. Oh and my new companion doesn't speak a lot of English so I will be learning more Spanish over these weeks than ever before. I will try to send some pics next week as I forgot my memory card and camera today but I wont next week. This week though has really been great as we worked our hardest and it really showed with the investigators we have now. Pray for them too that they may have strength to fight against the opposition. I told Elder Wirkus a couple of weeks ago that I think its cool as we are inviting people to come unto Christ but at the same time to join the Fight against Satan whether they want to or not. The mission is just great and I love it so Much. Well I hope all is still well at home and you are all being nice to each other. I love you all so much. Have a great week!

Elder Larkin

February 6, 2011

Hello Family!

 Wow another week already! I cant beleive it. Well Jared happy birthday and I heard about you asking Maren to the Dance. Good Work. I also got your dear elder letter this past week and I was so happy to hear how excited you are for your mission. THis is so great! You are going to love it so much. This past week was very fun as there was seminary for all of the District and Zone Leaders, THis meant i was on divisions for most of the week. My first part of the day on Tues I was with Elder Fernandez Paz from Uruguay. He was so hilarious and completley crazy as he ran around smelling where the spirit was leading him. It was very entertaining for me. I then worked with another Elder from our district named Elder Hooper from Eagle Mt and we had a wonderful time working together in his area and in mine. I was a little nervous to run the area with out Elder Wirkus but we did gerat. I have learned so much this week about teaching and much more spanish also. It is coming along and everyday I understand people better and better as I pray for the gift of tounges always. On SUnday I had a very great experience as I got to listen to the ama<ing testimoies of the ward members here. I was almost in tears as one after another got up and shared breif and strong testimonies of the Savior and the restored Gospel and the Book of Mormon. I was amazed to see the strength of the Church here and I just loved it. Right after testimony meeting Elder Wirkus said, ok you are teaching Gospel Principles today. Ahh I had no idea what to do so I just prayed and we had a very good discussion about Obidience. All of our investigators there were so happy that I could teach that class. It was tough but I made it through just fine. Mexico is so great and I really have loved every moment. I get to wake up every morning srudy the Gospel and then go talk about it with people all day and be a positive influence in their lives. What is not to love? Its just great. So I am so glad to here all is well and that the Isreal trip was so great! Im glad you are all safe. Give my love to Char and Brent as I felt really off this week and I felt that death was near at home. I thought alot about this and had some good inspiration. Death is definitley not the end. It is the begining to so much after this life. As we do our best in this life and follow all that has been given to us and love everyone, we can know that through our marvelous Savior that all is well. Our father in heaven wants the best for us in this life and is always, always waiting to hear from us in prayer. He is listening and He will strengthen you. He will give you that which you need to continue on. I have come to know this better than ever during these past weeks. He wants us to be happy and to be our best everyday. If we keep this in mind, all is possible. It is like this morning, as we were walking to our District mtg I had many thoughts in mind about tough things I have to do on the mission and then I had the thought of, dont think about that and just start thanking your God for the amazing things He has given you and instanly I was comforted. Well Family, I have so many stroies to tell but not time. Oh also it was very cold here this week but we were taken care of so do not worry. My family, I love you all and know that you support me with all of your hearts and I feel this every day. Thank you so much for all you do for me and for eachother. Never stop taking care of eachother. I love you and have a great week.

 Elder Larkin

January 31, 2011

Hello my loving family.

 

Oh it is so great to hear from all of you again. I love the Emails I get from all of you all week and Nikki I think thats so cool that you made a blog for me. The cool thing is it will be there for ever. A digital scrapbook! Well I know you are all just waiting to hear from me and I want you to know i am doing great! My companion says we are in a little bit of an apostasy right now as our contacting and finding new people has been tough. The family that was so ready last week has really slowed and we have tried to talk to them everyday. I had a feeling that they would probably would take so time so we will have to continue to wait. So we do live very close to the Culiacan airport and it is loud sometimes. It is so strange that that is where we flew in over 2 weeks ago and now it is all just a different world. The members here are so great, and i love all of them o much. We had a ward missionary activity last Friday night and 2 of our investigators came too. So fun as we gathered together and watch the Finding faith in Christ film. It is so beautiful and the Spirit was so strong there. I loved it and so did our investigators. All of the ward is set up just like ours in Utah with primary and young mens and womens and all. The youth play a big role in missionary work here when we are teaching teenagers and it is so cool that they get to have these fun experiences already. Well the food here is just great and the members really loving cooking for us. The relief society set up every month where a different hermana gives us a huge lunch every day. They like cooking what we like sometimes and we had mashed potatoes and stakes one day!!! ah so good. Well lunch is really the only meal so its great that you have to eat everything or they get offended. Breakfasts are small and ligh and I dont really eat dinner. Just a snack in the night.

There is no time. So with this and all the walking we do, I have lost like 10 pounds already and am ready to loose more. Don't worry though I will take care of myself. Oh and one day we had to into the city and sign some papers for our visas and I did not know but all from my district had to come and we all got to go together to sign the papers.

Ahh I loved seeing my brothers again and how much we have all changed in just a week and to see how well we all are doing. So so awesome and then they were off just as fast as they came. Brenna I was so glad to hear that you got to go to Church this week. That is wonderful and continue to be a good example. I am so sad inside at the same time for Caroline and hope that she will want to return and be happy. Well one of my favorite investigators this week was a guy named Jonathan Cruz, a Christian learning English so our whole time with him was spanglish.

HE said at the very beginning he has not felt the spirit for a long time and we had a 2 and a half hour conversation with him and the spirit was so strong in this lesson. He was so grateful at the end and said several time s during it that he felt the spirit. We will see where he goes with this. I am excited to continue to find these people who are just waiting for us, Gods answer to their prayers. Well Take care my family and dad and Nikki Be safe!! I love you all so much and continue to do great in all you do! Chix great job on your reading!!!

 

Love Elder Larkin