"Good Tortilla"

 Hellooo everyone! This week has been awesome!! I'll just share a few thoughts I had during some of the lessons!

We had exchanges this last week and we taught a sweet mom named Viviana who wants to get baptized but can't because her boyfriend won't marry her. It's causing a lot of family problems and it's sad to see. He said he will go to church with her, but only to the catholic church, so she can't come to our church even though she still wants lessons from the missionaries and to be baptized. She shared a few thoughts that were really powerful. She talked about some reasons that her testimony had been strengthened that this church is the church of God. First, she said how she was inspired by the idea that we don't baptize babies, because she saw the importance of agency!! She also talked about how she knew that it was God's church because of missionaries like us. How it just makes sense that God would want His gospel to be shared and spread around the world in every possible way. I felt so much joy hearing this from her and knowing that just my being a missionary for the Church is a way that I'm testifying of it's truth to others!

A few days ago Hermana Van Brocklin and I found a cute family as we were biking along the street, and they speak pretty much zero Spanish, pure Mixteco. Generally, the Mixteco-speakers we work with speak at least a little Spanish and we can do most our teaching in Spanish, but not these guys. It made me really grateful that I knew how to do a contact in Mixteco with them, because I'm sure they wouldn't have given us their number and address if we had only spoken Spanish to them. It felt like their demeanor toward us really changed as soon as we started speaking Mixteco. It reminded me of the scripture in D&C, chapter 90 verse 11:

"For it shall come to pass in that day, that every man shall hear the fulness of the gospel in his own tongue, and in his own language, through those who are ordained unto this power..."

Even though we can generally get by in contacts and lessons with Mixteco-speakers who have picked up Spanish by speaking mostly in Spanish (with a few Mixteco phrases thrown in here and there), I recognize that the Spirit can testify with even more power when we as missionaries are doing our best to speak in these people's native language. We ended up having our first lesson with the pure Mixteco family on Sunday in their house, and it was such a beautiful experience! I still have a longgg way to go with my Mixteco teaching (and Spanish too hahah), but even as Hermana Van Brocklin and I struggled to find words as we showed pictures of Christ and explained His sacrifice, I knew that the Spirit was there because these people recognized that we were doing all we could to communicate with them in their native tongue. Also thank goodness for gospel pictures hahaha

My mission has also helped me come to appreciat Book of Mormon videos on a whole new level, because they help our friends who can't read still come to understand the Book of Mormon! Before my mission I thought they were just cool videos, but now I see the magnitude they have, and that technology can have for good in general!

We made homeade tortillas for our district activity today and that was super fun!! And speaking of tortillas...

MIXTECO FUN FACT:

So there are a lot of words that don't exist in Mixteco. Our friend Alex, who teaches us, said that there isn't even a word for "food," they just say the name of the food they're talking about.

My fav food name is the one they have for bread.

tortilla = "xita"

good = "va'a"

bread = "xita va'a"

So basically when they say "bread," they're just saying "good tortilla" hahaha

SPIRITUAL THOUGHT:

Lately I've noticed myself doing something I should NEVER do. I've been second-guessing a lot of our spiritual experiences.

Sometimes we find friends in really cool ways, where it feels like God put us in the right place at just the right time. Sometimes we have lessons that leave me feeling like I'm on fire!!! The Spirit is so strong!!!

And then, sometimes those people we find or teach stop answering our calls. Sometimes they don't show up at church like they said they would. And I start to think to myself that maybe God didn't guide us to that person, it just happened, and then it ended.

My comp and I are excited after leaving a lesson and start talking about how this person is going to progress so fast, and then I say to myself that I can't let my heart get too invested yet because they might not. I start to hesitate to share finding or teaching stories in my email, because I feel unsure if the person will keep learning with us and I don't want to end up disappointed.

But this week I had a strong impression come to me. If I felt the Holy Ghost testify to me through a lesson, or if I found a person in a miraculous way who ended up not progressing, it was STILL A SUCCESS. It was STILL A MIRACLE! Because it impacted someone else, and it was a part of God's plan! I was put in someone's path in the right place at the right time for a reason. And even if for whatever reason they didn't leave feeling the Spirit speak to them because they weren't ready to receive it, I felt the Spirit! And THAT is a miracle!

My invitation for you all is to recognize the promptings of the Spirit and miracles in your life and write them down!! Don't convince yourself that it was a coincidence, because it wasn't!

I love you all!

Hermana DeMordaunt

1-Translating for Sacrament Meeting

2-exchanges with hermana nelson and treats in a cute part of guadalupe:)

3-rootbeer floats

4-comp pic at the dunes

5-dinner with the other hermanas:)

6-our friend Alejandro brought us a fruit platter

7-exchange day with hermana morgan!

8-sand dunes!!