Grateful!

 

Holaaaa yall como están?

I hope you all had a great week!  

This week we went back to the city of Oaxaca for a conference with Elder Ochoa!  He is a General Authority and in the General Young Men's presidency a few years ago!  The conference was so so amazing!  It was such a special experience to learn from someone who is a special representative of Christ!  The Spirit was so strong!

Also when we went to Oaxaca and I got to see ELDER PANO!!!!!!!!!!! Also there were a ton of missionaries there so there was a lot going on and me and another Elder had the same suitcase and there ended up being a huge confusion because and he took my suitcase and left so it was almost a huge mess but everything worked out in the end hahah.

This week I was thinking a lot about the Prophet Joseph Smith.  I'm starting to read the book Saints in Spanish to practice mi español and I absolutely love learning more about the life of Joseph Smith.  He was an imperfect like every one of us but he was called of God to restore his Church.  I am so incredibly grateful for the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ because it is full of tender mercies and life changing promises.  Being here in the mission and seeing how the gospel truly changes people's lives it is obvious to me that it is real.

Because we are studying the Old Testament this year I think it is so special that many of the promises the Lord gave to these people and their descendants thousands of years ago apply to us!  That is so incredibly special!  The Lord always keeps his promises when we do our part.  I am so incredibly grateful for all of these things and as well for temples!  I think it is one of the biggest blessings we have that we may be sealed to our family for time and all eternity!  I know the temple is the house of the Lord and there is peace there.  I am so excited to back to the temple after my mission with all of my family and feel the joy and love that is there with them!

I love this gospel!

Dios Existe

 

Mazunte

Mazunte

Hello everyone!  I hope you all had an amazing week!  

This week there were no iguana attacks but we did see the same iguana from last time climb up a palm tree so that was cool, but now I'm kinda scared that an iguana is gonna drop from a tree and attack me which would be quite a fright.

This week I went back to the center of Oaxaca to renew my greencard because I have a year in Oaxaca!  But I had to take like a 12 hour bus ride but it's not that bad and feels fast.  Going to Oaxaca was fun because I got to see Elder Oswald, Moa and Hermana Funke because we all got here together!  We also went to the grounds of the temple to look at it and I absolutely love it so much!  I know the temple is the house of the Lord!

I absolutely love testifying when we teach people because the Spirit is so evident.  It is very interesting to teach people when they have a lot of doubts.  It is obvious that the adversary uses little things to try and distract us from the love and joy the gospel brings.  For example this morning we went with our branch president to see the sunrise from a super cool lookout point over the ocean.  We were waiting for the sun to come out but we didn't see it because from our perspective there was a rock in the water directly in front of where the sun was coming up.  In order to see the sun we had to change our position.  I think the gospel is very similar.  The beautiful gospel is there, but sometimes we let the adversary put tiny rocks in our way to block our view.  I invite all of you to put yourself in a position and do the things you need to do to be in the warmth and light the gospel brings.

I just thought of that analogy as I was writing this and I'm pretty proud of myself I'm not gonna lie   but the sunrise this morning was ABSOLUTELY gorgeous!  Seeing all of the ocean and the sun it was evident to me that there is a Supreme Creator!  How special is that!?

Love Elder Lacey

Iguana Attack!!

 

More dinosaur than iguana

Hi!  I'm just going to start off with explaining the title because it was crazy.  So yesterday we were in the chapel because Church had just finished and a kid walks up to us and was like elderes want to see the iguana?  So obviously we responded with "si" because who doesn't want to see an iguana.  Ok so he shows us this room and the door is shut but we see through the window that there is a giant iguana in the corner of the room.  We don't know how it got in but let me tell ya this thing was more dinosaur than iguana.  It was the biggest iguana I've seen in the wild and looked liked it wanted to eat all of us.  

So a group of us were looking at the iguana through the window and a brother walks up and he was like they don't do anything you just got to go grab it.  But I've seen jurassic park and know you shouldn't mess with dinosaurs so I wasn't gonna do it.   Anyway, this hermano walks in the room to try and grab the iguana but the iguana freaks out and starts running for the door that is now open.  Let me tell you when that thing runs it straight up looks like it wants to kill you because it extends all its spikes and it waves all its claws.  So naturally seeing the dinosaur charge in our direction the entire group that was standing at the door screamed and ran away.  Elder Cortés and I ran into a different room to find a safe haven BUT the iguana went into that room WITH US. When Elder Cortés and I saw that we just looked at each other and screamed  we got on chairs to try and escape its deadly grasp and finally we got out of the room with our lives.  If you have seen the movie "she's the man" mine and Elder Cortés reaction were pretty similar to the spider scene in that movie just for some context 

After that an older sister from the ward walks in the room and just picks it up LIKE IT WAS NOTHING.  So that was awe inspiring to say the least.  So we all got to take pictures with the iguana so that was fun.  In one of the pictures you can see the absolute fear in my eyes from the traumatic experience I had a few moments before.

We went on exchanges this week and a lady that we were twins so that was funny.

We have to find a new place to live because we're getting kicked out of this place so I hope we aren't homeless 

I'm now a profile Facebook missionary so I can post stuff on my profile and search for people to teach on Facebook so I'm excited for that!

A really cool scripture that I found in Alma 41:11.  Here Alma is talking about how the natural man goes against God and his nature "they are without God in the world, and they have gone contrary to the nature of God; therefore, they are in a state contrary to the nature of happiness."  

I thought it was interesting that it said they are contrary the nature of God and contrary to the nature of happiness.  For me this means that the nature of God is happiness!  I love that so much!  It is so special that we have a Heavenly Father who is happy!  If you are having a hard day or week remember that and ask him to teach you how to be happy as he is, and he will do so!  I love him and our Savior Jesus Christ so much!