dedication

hey, im sorry about last week, it was crazy and complicated because it
was a national holiday and practically the whole city was shut down.
last week, we went to a group of pyramids called xochicalco
(socheecalco for all you gringos) and it was a blast! we got burnt a
little, but it was worth it. we took a ton of pics, and ill send some
today so you can post them. i feel bad that i havent sent pics in a
long time, i hope you at least had pics of me to see in my blog. last
week, we baptized german! our first week in the area, and we start
baptizing, it feels so good, and it builds the members trust to see us
get right to work. german was very excited and very well prepared.
sadly he didnt get confirmed, because his baptism was after the
services, and the bishop, after telling me that he would be confirmed,
changed his mind, so we will have to wait till next week. also we had
to talk in church, which i felt was very good and spiritual. in the
ward, the first councelor, ex mission president and ex seventy, pres.
gaona, congratulated me on my talk for being very sincere and simple,
and right to the point. that was fun to hear from someone like that.
and i think the ward is going to be great. in the last two weeks, we
have been able to meet a lot of the ward, and who the leaders are to
go work with them. we are starting the fhe thing and have had some
success, as well as more excitement from the leaders. i think this is
whats really going to get this ward going like it should. this week,
we finished the baptisms and confirmations of german and two of his
daughters: gina, and jenny. they are 10 and 8, but adorable! it was
so much fun to watch them giggling and bouncing in their chairs during
the baptismal service waiting to be baptized. everything went well,
and they were all confirmed, and german received the aaronic
priesthood! we are slowly moving along. luckily german has been well
accepted into the ward, and even if he wasnt, he would keep going. he
is very independant, and is dedicated when he wants to be, so he is
doing really good, and happy to give a good example to his daughters.
the ward is pretty good to accept and welcome new people. this last
week, we had 7 in church, and almost all of them saw someone they knew
and felt really happy to be there. we have been receiving a lot of
references this last week of people that are ready to be taught.
sadly they have had to go through many hard times to get there, but
they are finally there! yesenia is one of them. we found her
saturday, because she is the neighbor of a member, and he is way cool,
even went to church. she had a hard marriage, where her husband beat
her, and didnt help at all with the kids, etc. jsut hard, but she is
so excited to start praying and talking to christ for the comfort.
this week we will challenge her for baptism for the 17 of december.
please be praying for her, and also that she can find work. we have
found a lot of dry members(investigators with years of going to
church, but never getting baptized) that we found this week, and seem
like they could top it off. one of my best converts, sonia in
acapulco, was a dry member that felt the spirit and changed
immediatly. they are luis, minerva, and margarita. we also found a
super golden family this week, thanks to the zone leaders, they are
the mom, reyna, and her two daughters that are listening to us,
maritza and diana. so great! reyna also needs your prayers to stop
smoking, and she is working hard. they all went to church twice and
are progressing for baptism of the 10th!
elder sonntag is doing really well, and we havent really had any
arguments or problems, we just need to get better on teaching a little
quicker, which comes with speaking better spanish. he has had some
stomach problems since the time he entered in the mtc, and this last
week we went to the doctors to see what was up, we did a few tests,
and will see probably this week the results. he is really excited,
and very dedicated to working hard. while he was in the doctors
office with hna. spannaus, me and president got to talk about the
area, comps, and future plans. when adam miller goes over, pres tells
him hi. he explained a few concepts of the importance to study and
get a good education first, and then work hard. i have been trying to
prepare myself to study hard, now, so i can go back and be diligent.
i ask for your prayers, in this time as i try to find what i desire,
and what i dont desire. thats what president explained that i have to
do to find out what i want to study. so lets see how it goes! if you
have any suggestions, im completely open. haha.
mom, what you mentioned about grandpa brig mitchell, you know, its not
the first time i have thought about that. i have read helaman 5:6 a
few times, and i always think to when you named me brigham in his
behalf. its touching, as well as being words of caution. i know who
i need to live up to, and what my name is, or who my name is. it
really makes me want to be better, and try so much harder to leave it
all on the field! i have been working so hard to stay focused, and i
actually dont think about home that much. when it comes, i quickly
change my thought, and get focused again. thank goodness for short
memory. haha! just kidding. i really do love the missionary work, and
am so grateful to be here. i hope that i can do all that the lord is
expecting of me in this, my last area, and with elder sonntag, who
might be my last companion. its intersting to be in this position, to
be one of the older guys, or leaders of the mission. all is going
well, and im still working hard, and i will until the very last day of
the mission. thanks for the quote by elder holland. cant wait of the
package!
love you all, and thank you for your support and prayers. thank you
all who have helped be get to where i am, spiritually, emotionally,
physically, and financially. thanks maryjo and sharon and emily for
your help. it really means a ton. i really do love you all, and i
thank you for what you have done to get me here. take good care, and
we will talk next week.

Come What May, and Love It

well, i guess i will start out letting you know about changes. elder solomon stays in atzingo with an elder that has about 15 months in the mission and i got changed to the area on the side of atzingo, one of the biggest in the entire mission, called la pradera. i am with a missionary that has 5 months in the mission, and has just completed his training. he is from holiday utah, and his name is elder sonntag.
he is like 6 foot 4, and likes to rock climb! haha. i barely know him, but he started in acapulco, right when i left, and had a really good trainer. i am really excited to be with him, and during the week, we will take a picture and ill send it to you.
well we finally baptized and CONFIRMED someone. it was mariana, the fiancee of our old ward mission leader luis. she was great, and passed her interview with flying colors. in her baptism, there were only eight people, all that she wanted. her, luis, elder solomon and i, her future in laws, and her close friends, adan and mayela. elder solomon and i sang a song of oh my father, first verse to the original tune, the second, i sang the original and he sang it to the tune of come thou fount of every blessing, and the third was a melody of come thou fount. it was really cool, and we were commented on our song.
later, she was confirmed on sunday and it was really good! yesterday was the first time i had ever blessed the sacrament in spanish, i will admit, i was a little nervous, but tried hard to be slow and emphasize it differently than everyone else. it was nice. the funny thing was i really didnt have to say goodbye to anyone, because we well share the same church building, and i will continue to see them all. the only hard thing was that we had to get to know the area of pradera, because its huge! we are going to open it, and we didnt know anything about it or where we lived etc.....
we tried to work hard this week, but it just didnt work how we hoped it would, to be able to find 25 people . we worked hard and had some success, but we jsut couldnt find some people we wanted, or really get ahold of guillermo again. so im sad to have to leave some things undone, but what else can i do... just keep a smile on and keep working so that i can have the spirit and work hard. appearantly there are a few possible baptisms this week that the sisters left us, so we will see if we can get the members to help us get around and start to know the area.
well i ask for your prayers, to help us be guided by the spirit in this new and huge area. pray for baptisms this week for us, and as well as joseph, he said they could baptize 5!im proud of him. its rough, and he said he might have a tough companion, from guerrero, but im excited for him. baptizing is what keeps a companionship happy and funcional. love you all, and thanks for writing. take good care.
elder facer

Fasting brings miracles

wow, well i dont know where to start. i have had an incredible week,
and as i can hear, so have all of you! alyssa is having good progress
on her finger, all of my nieces and nephews are wonderful and growing
super quickly, and everyone else is working hard to complete with
their family responsibilities and the lords. that makes me so happy
and proud to have been born into this family that has been growing and
learning for over 5 generations in the church! its humbling and so
spiritual to see how the lord has decided to bless me with my
situations and trials. congratulations to tara for being nominated to
be a leader for your team! its a big responsability, but as you pray
for love for your team, and how best to guide them, they will all
follow you and respect you. its cool to see you recognizing your
attributes and trying to apply them. also it was good to hear from
joseph this week. he is doing good, and is happy to be in the work.
thanks scott for your letter, and emily, alyssa, betsy, and shauna.
it really does my heart so good to see all the support that i have, in
the hard and good times of the work. thanks also to bishop williams
for his letter and inspiring words.
well, this week, we worked hard, and really tried to stay focused on
working and having a lot of appointments. we did! and because of
that, we had a huge blessing which i am going to talk about later in
the letter. haha so you will have to wait.
elder solomon and i have been working on our teaching style to learn
how to be better united. chapter ten of pmg is amazing for our
teaching abilities and has changed the way i teach. elder snyder was
very smart to start me off with that and i have tried to finish it off
with elder solomon. we also had a wonderful zone conference that
talked about it. i cant remember if i told you that we are having
zone conference this week, its wierd not being zone leader and hearing
about all this stuff a month before, now i only hear about it a week
or two before. i was incredibly impacted by the conference this time.
usually president repeated the conferences from last year, so i went
thinking i knew what he was going to talk about, but i was made
humble, and was taught a ton! the spirit was definately there, and
taught us what we needed to change, and how to better ourselves in the
lords work. president asked us three questions at the end that really
impacted me they were: how will i know if i love the lord? how will i
know if i am his true disciple? how will i know if i know the lord? we
had to answer them with straight scriptures and were taught a lot. we
need to keep the commandments and serve our fellow man to really
answer those questions. it taught me what i need to do and how i am
doing in my spiritual progress. then hermana spannaus talked about our
desires from elder oaks talk in conference of may. she brought out a
lot of good quotes and points, and taught me how to have righteous
desires that will make me a better servant of the lord, and help those
around me. she gave examples in the book of mormon of missionaries
and captain moroni. it was cool the planning and preparation that
each of them had to receive the help of the lord, as well as their
faith that the lord would work miracles in their lives.
now i will talk about our miracle. saturday we started our fast and
decided to fast that the investigators we had would go to church,
because that is a stastistic that we are really lacking right now in
all the mission, i imagine in all the world. so we worked really hard
for them to teach them the importance of church and the sacrament, and
had to respect the agency of a few people, but as sunday morning
approached, we started working even harder and had a prayer in our
hearts for the investigators. we went looking for them for about
1-1/2 hours and a lot of people told us that they were going to go,
and most of them went. saturday night we taught a family that some
inactive members had given us, and the inactives and their referral
went, and three families we went to also went! in the end we had 13
investigators in church! a super miracle, i think its the most in
sacrament meeting ive ever had. so we knelt down and thanked the lord
for his merciful hand and for allowing these, his children, to
progress at this time. i know the hardest sacrifices we give to the
lord, results in wonderful blessings, but when he gives them. i was
very humbled and touched to see how the lord is still working in such
a hard area for us. there are no bad areas in the mission, they all
have been blessed by the lord to be ready to be harvested! i know
its true, and now i dont really want to leave the area! there is so
much work to be done here. the members were really excited to see
our work, and alot wanted to help and offered it in this next week!
this is the lords work. i feel it so deep within my heart, and i know
he is the good shepard. he directs this work, and knows us personally
and what we need to keep going. i love him, and am now working to get
to know him better.
by the way rosy, from acapulco says hi, and as well as emmanuel, elder
snyders convert who went for his endowments last weekend! so great.
by the way, by the way, we usually dont do much in church, its a
ward, and we teach gospel principles class and help in priesthood. we
have two decent organists from the ward, so neither of us play, but
maybe in a baptism. speaking of baptisms, mariana will be baptized
this week, she is the future wife of or ex ward mission leader and is
super prepared. she is way excited, and we made her program last
night
love you all! thanks for your prayers and love. its great to hear
from you all, and that all is well, i cant wait to see you in 7 weeks
for christmas, but im not waiting too much on it, because there are
more details during with our investigators. have a wonderful week! i
love you all
elder facer