Letter #8 10/27/14

Mi comp Hermana Clark from Spanish Fork

Holy smokes, y'all! I AM HERE.

You have all these thoughts in your mind about what your mission has in store for you, and naturally, at least from my experience, you are ALWAYS wrong. Hahah, life's a lot like the most beautiful joke that ever was, haha. So back in the days of the CCM, I spent my life trying to convince all the Chile bound elders in my district that I would be speaking Spanish just as much as them and yada yada yada. Just keep this in the back of your mind. Welp, transfer meeting was on Tuesday and I got my first companion and area. Hermana Clark has been out nine months and she is from Spanish Fork. She's great and nice and SO SIMILAR TO ELPHABA it's creepy. Hahah. She has helped me so much and her demeanor is smooth as cream which contrast nicely with my airheaded, all over the place, emotional wreck-ness. I love her and we have good laughs. 

  I'll let you know that we got assigned to Burkeville. It's in the southernmost area of the mission and it's got a bit of a reputation. When Sister Wilson came and asked Hermana Clark and I about our area, she gave me quite a fright when she basically forced herself to be excited for me.. hahah. She exclaimed 'Burk for lyfe!' before quickly walking away. At this point i'm way confused, so I force Hma Clark to give me the deets.. basically her and her previous companion opened this area up for Spanish from little to nothing last transfer, so we're still in the process of getting Spanish work going here. And it's really hard to get Spanish investigators to come to English sunday meetings because there's no Spanish Branch around these parts. And I was super down for that, a challenge! The green-ness of my missionary being was way too pumped for that, and I continued to tell her that I would do anything as long as I wasn't speaking english. She was a little quiet, but not too long after that President came to tell us that both the companionships in our branch will be doing English/Espanol work.. Needless to say, I have been sufficiently humbled. "I'll go where you want me to go, I'll say what you want me to say" has been given many a new meaning as I have the privilege of saying the things he wants me to say in the way he wants me to say them, and a lot of the time that means english and it was really hard at first. I didn't understand why Heavenly Father would give me this mission that's completely opposite of everything I ever dreamed, and I had many a breakdown this past week, but I have learned SO MUCH. That Heavenly Father rarely gives us what we want, but he ALWAYS gives us what we need. I have learned to love these people so quickly, and to really internalize the fact that our Savior has SO MANY different kinds of sheep. And he wants ALL of them to blessed by the gospel. And I have this beautiful blessing to share the gospel to people from so many different nations and tongues.

  This week has been nuts, though. I can't even remember a day to day thing so I'll just tell you about some cool people we are teaching and some neat stories.

  First off, I mean we're probably not supposed to choose favorites, but I love this kid named Luis Mario! He's the coolest, he's 12 and he just barely arrived to the states. His parents have lived here for a while, but He just arrived. My first night, we went over to teach his family a lesson. (His fam rules too, by the way) but only he was home. So we taught him a lesson on his porch. He lives on this beautiful ranch and the sun was setting so beautifully and I just knew that was what Heaven was like, hahah. It was a good little lesson and I got to introduce him to El Libro de Mormon. I also accidentally answered yes when he asked if I left a novio (boyfriend) in Mexico, it happens often that you answer really incorrectly and weird to questions when you don't understand a lick of spanish, haha. But he now makes fun of me always for loving Hispanic boys and tries to hook me up with his friends in Mexico, hahah.

  Another hispanic family we are visiting is La familia Garcia. They're kids are nuts crazy and SO fun. The parents don't speak any english, but the kids hardly speak spanish and speak more like ghetto kids, haha. It's so funny, they really are very confused with who they are racially I think, haha. But anyways, we've had a few lessons with them and we got invited to their daughter, Gabriella's, birthday fiesta!!!! That was on Friday and, OH BOY I literally almost died. You have never seen fun until you have been to a real live Fiesta de cumpleanos and got in on the intensity that is the pinata. Hahah, it was loco. I got knocked down by the crazy crowd of humans running for balloons filled with money and.. I don't even know. It's cool, because they invite 400 million amigos to their parties so we made appointments with a couple of their friends, and strengthened relationships with other friends that we had met previously. There's no shame in trying to find Spanish Speaking humans around these parts, so a lot of the times we racially profile homes and if you see a cute little hispanic girl riding her bike around, OF COURSE you are going to try to find out where she lives. Haha, I love them SO MUCH.

  But I also LOVE the english speaking humans around here. We work with an incredible less active family and they are just wonderful. We work with a ton of less active people from the branch and that is really cool. Just trying to bring the spirit into their lives a little bit more. We have also found a lot of humans to teach, both hispanic and non-hispanic.. haha, it's a little bit of a blessing because we get the opportunity to talk to EVERYONE. Because we can teach everyone here. 

  I don't know if it's just I'm still super green, but every second I just feel like Alma where he exclaims that he wishes he were an angel, have the wish of his heart to tell every human everywhere about the gospel and Christ's love for them!  There are so many people I see everyday that we simply don't have time to talk to and it breaks my heart. Ah, but I know they will have a chance because they've been promised it!  And I know that if we are diligent in or work here, we will find the people that we need to teach at this moment in time.  It reminds me of the quote by Mother Teresa, something along the lines of "I may just be a drop in the ocean, but without me the ocean is one drop less".  Oh a beautiful scripture I found in my personal study, D&C 123:15-16.  Sometimes it feels like these little things we are doing here don't really matter, but by small and simple things we are laying the foundation for a GREAT work!   And a big ship, Christ's gospel, needs the help of small helms such as us.  And to answer your question, people are nice to us for the most part.  Most people here have GREAT faith in Jesus already, and it's really very hard to be mean when Jesus is the topic of conversation I think.

  I'm sorry this email is actually the worst, but I am loving life here! It's hard at times, and I miss Mexico more than life, but it allows me to relate to all of these hispanic people who also miss Mexico even more than me. People are wonderful, and I have just been enjoying the opening of my eyes to SO many different cultures. At times I even have a hard time understanding english speaking folk here, we are DEFINATELY in the south. (I got called a yankee the other day for telling someone to have a 'way good day', hah. And if you don't drive a Chevy, you're no friend of a good portion of the humans here in Crewe.)

  I have felt the hand of the Lord in my life so much though! I know sometimes He doesn't always bless us how we'd like, but He will NEVER leave us alone. When we really ask him for help, He WILL help us. We taught a lesson to a minister the other day and almost got him crying. The Lord is with us. He speaks through us by the Spirit to bless these people! I am so grateful! 

Love y'all! <3 ///// Les amo, mi familia!


Hermana Yost


P.S.  It's BEAUTIFUL here!!  Holy smokes, I cry large tears every time we drive anywhere (and let me tell you, we drive EVERYWHERE #thecarlifethough) because it's just this beautiful magical autumn wonderland.  I feel so blessed and I think if anything I was called here to testify of the beauty of God's creations because LOS ARBOLES. <3  AHHH.  It's hard to feel discouraged when you're driving through a heavenly mix of red, orange, yellow and green.  The people in the branch look at me like I'm nuts when I rave about the beauty, but I just can't help but love.

Hermana Sivilla the girl whose place I am taking.  Everybody here loved her more than life.  I'm trying my hardest to fill her shoes, but it's really hard.  Haha, she's incredibly awesome and I talk on the daily with people about how much they miss and love her.  It's a little the worst, but a lot the best.