Hola!!!!
I am in the field and it is absolutely amazing already! I will start from the very beginning:
Yesterday morning we got on a bus and arrived at our mission home at 8:30. We were supposed to get there at 7:30 but we were late...our bus driver made a couple personal stops on the way to our mission home:) So we got to our mission home which is attached to a church building and our mission President, President Sonne, and his wife were waiting for us. We took our luggage insaide and ate breakfast which President Sonne made for us! It was so nice not to be eating MTC food anymore! After we ate, we had a meeting about our mission and talked about what exactly is expected of us. He threw down some cool facts: 40% of the people our mission baptizes are under the age of 18! WOW! 20% of the people that live within our mission boundries are inactive members of the church, 20% are members, and 60% are non members. Last year the mission had 2086 baptisms, and this year our goal is 2500!!! I'm stoked! They said that the 28 Spanish speaking missionaries bring in over twice as many baptisms as the the other 160 English speaking missionaries. The latinos here are so willing to come unto Christ!
Then we had interviews with President Sonne and Sister Sonne and wrote letters home...you'll probably get it tomorrow! Then other missionaries started coming for the transfer meeting. There were inly 2 sisters that came and only two of us greenies. One of them was English speaking and one was Spanish speaking. I used my smart little noggin and deducted that Hermana Hernandez was probably going to be my companion. But it's kind of supposed to be a secret until the President announces it. So we all sat down in the tables in the cultural hall and President announced the new companionship. I could tell that I'm definetly my Dad's daughter because I tried with all my might to hold back tears everytime he called out the name of a trainer and then a new missionary and they ran up and hugged eachother while everyone else clapped. It was SOSOSOSO cool! I'm tearing up just writing this...what a cry baby( no offense DAD!) Then we all ate lunch together as companionships. Hermana Hernandez is from Mexico City! She is sosososo sweet! I loved her instantly! She's been here 9 months and has been in the same area the whole time. BUT, she has never been to Rose Park which is where we are serving! We white washed this area, which means we took both the old missionaries places and are staring from scrathch! Everyone was so excited because there haven't been Sister missionaries in this area for almost 2 years!!! Were going to clean this place up!!!!
So last night we went back to our house (we are living with members, The Christophers) and unpacked for about 3 minutes before we had a dinner appointment. Oh ya and I forgot to say that I have drive around this crazy city where I've never been before because Hna Hernandez doesnt have an american driver's liscence. So we had a dinner appointment with the Chompo family. They are so sweet! They both served missions and they have a super cute little 1 year old baby!
Then we went to the church building to meet the bishop of the Rose Park 14th ward, Bishop Meneses, and some members because there was mutual. The bishop is great! He is so into this missionary work! They have a goal of 40 baptisms just in their ward this year which is GREAT!!!!! They only have a 50% retention rate so we have a lot of work to do. Then we met Hermano Guitierrez who is the executive secratary and he had a referral for us, Maria Lopez. So we went over to her house and met her and 3 of her kids. She is an inactive member and her kids have not been baptized. So we talked to her, just trying to get to know her a little. She said that she got in a really bad accident a couple weeks a go and she was in the hospital for 2 weeks. It's been really tight. She and her husband are divorced and sh'e living with her boyfriend which is why she hasn't been coming to church. She just flat out told us that she feels guilty and that she want to get rid of this guilt. We shared a little bit with her about repantance and how she can releave herself from what she's feeling. It was so amazing. She was so accepting! And we asked her if she would be willing to prepare her kids to be baptized. She said OF COURSE and now we have an apointment with them tonight to teach the kids the first lesson. She said it would be amazing if they could be baptized and all attend church together. I'm so excited! We're going to try to set a baptsmal date tonight! CRAZY!!!
All in all, I am already loving this work! The Lord works in amazing ways and has prepared so many people to receive this gospel. It is just our job to find them and give it to them!
Today is Pday (only because we had transfers yesterday). it's usually on Wednesday. And president Sonne has asked all of us to watch "Forever Strong", so we're all going to watch it right now as a zone!
I love you all ! I love this work! And I can't wait to see the joy and peace that this Gospel is going to bring these people!!!
Con Amor
Herman Taylor
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