Dec. 12, 2017

This week was a little slower, I'll be honest. We only had one full day to actually work in our area due to a bunch of meetings and stuff. But we had transfers last week and I am staying at least one more transfer in Hidalgo and i couldn't be happier. This is seriously the best place I have ever lived. My new companion is Elder Grimshaw and he is awesome! I may have mentioned him before because when I was in Espartaco he was in my district and we had some awesome exchanges together. President knew we were really good friends and I just asked him a few weeks ago if he would send Elder Grimshaw to be my comp and he did! I honestly didn't think it was going to work but we are super excited.

On sunday we had a family home evening with the Velazquez Guzman family that we baptized a while back and it was awesome. We wanted to do something with the Light the World initiative and we came up with the idea of bringing cookies to people's houses like we do back home. Nobody does that here and so it was going to be something new for them. Well it turned out really well. They told us that they have a lot of family that live close by but that they really don't get a long. We convinced them to let us bring them some cookies and it was a miracle. They invited us all in and we shared a little message about Christmas and said a prayer with them. We later invited them to have another Family home evening together next week and they all accepted! when we left, the mom (concepcion) told us that she had never seen her family smile like that before. We were able to testify to them about the power of Christ to heal families. Just like they were able to see changes in their immediate family, we promised them that if they keep showing little acts of love for their family, that they are going to see more miracles. It was a really cool experience for all of us.

those are kind of the highlights of this week. Like I said, we didn't do a whole lot of work this week due to a bunch of meetings. I also fogot my camera so I can't send any pictures. I will update you all next week. Adios!


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Elder May

Dec. 4, 2017

Hola every body! This week has been fantastic and full of miracles.

 We were able to baptize Naomi, Fernanda and Berenice on saturday and they were confirmed yesterday. We were pretty scared that the baptisms weren't going to go through because of certain circumstances but it all worked out. Berenice is 17 and I explained a little bit about her situation last week. Well, during the week we went to visit her and plan her baptism more. We also needed her mom's signature because she isn't 18 yet. When we asked her mom for permission to sign the baptismal record she said "I won't be singing anything" and was pretty upset that her daughter was going to be baptized. That alone was pretty frustrating because her mom was with us in every lesson and knew perfectly well that we were planning a baptism. She said that her daughter has no respect for her and is really rude and that she wouldn't be supporting her in this decision. (side note: we were in exchanges and I was with Elder Ceja) Well, Elder Ceja and I magically turned into family counselors and tried to work with them. The mom said she wanted her daughter to change and show her some respect. Berenice shared that she wanted to take this step because she wants to change and start over. She said she feels really good about what she is learning and wants to improve. She also said that whether she signed the form or not, she would continue going to church and trying to improve. That really impressed us and brought the spirit into the room. We testified with all of our hearts that baptism and following Jesus Christ is the only way to really make a definite lasting change in our lives. The appointment lasted about an hour and a half and was really intense, but the spirit was really strong. By the end of all of it, her mom signed the form and we could all breathe again. We always try to get her mom to pray but she always refuses, but this time we invited her to say the last prayer and she accepted. That alone was a shocker. We all knelt down and she said the prayer and by the end, she was crying. It was a really spiritual experience for all of us. A little intense, but spiritual.

Being a missionary has given me many opportunities to help people make changes in their lives. That night with Berenice I was able to strengthen my testimony even more about the power of Christ that can heal all problems. It is because of him that we can all leave behind our difficulties and challenges and be changed. All of us have many faults and shortcomings, but we have all been placed here to be redeemed. This is God's great plan of redemption and all we have to do is follow Jesus Christ. President Ezra Taft Benson said "When you choose to follow Jesus Christ, you choose to be changed."

Have a great week!

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Elder May

Cool bottle someone gave me

Well, I don't have much time today because we hiked a volcano all day so this has to be fast...

We are still teaching some awesome families and should be having some baptisms in the next few weeks! We are pretty excited for all of them. We have actually been finding a lot of new investigators that we don't have enough time for all of them. My companion and I thought of an idea of passing a calendar around in the elders quorum and having people sign up to do splits with us to help us be able to teach all of these people. We were pretty nervous about if people were going to write their names but to our surprise, almost every day for the next 3 weeks has 2 names. There are some days where 3 people wrote down to come with us. We are really excited to see what kind of success we can see with this much support from the ward.

Have a great week!

some pictures of the volcano. It isn't active anymore so we hiked down in the crater and ate tostadas.

Elder May

First off, my mom told me that I sent a picture of a grasshopper instead of the death squad. I couldn't see what picture I was sending and I guess I guessed wrong. But the grasshopper is a different story. We found him in our house and caught him. We didn't know what he eats so we gave him some pancakes and juice. He died the next day. I guess he doesn't eat pancakes and juice.

We had another week full of miracles here in Los Hornos. We have been working with a lot of great investigators. We only have one worry though. Just about all of them need to get married. It looks like we are going to be planning about 4 or 5 weddings in the next month or so if all goes well.

We have been working with a family named the Torres Belmont family. They are so amazing. The mom is a less active and her boyfriend and their two daughters are investigators. They love the church and are progressing so well. They also love to give us food and that is an extra bonus. The mom works selling quesadillas and tacos so she cooks really well. The girls love church and even bought some new shoes to match some of their dresses. They are 9 and 8 years old. We are hoping to get them baptized by December 2.

We have been seeing the death squad more and more and they are doing okay... They are all men except for one. The one woman in the group is named Dominga. It is in front of her house that we meet with all of them every time. She is the only one who doesn't drink or do drugs. She is the one who always invites us because she wants all of them to change and stop drinking. She is really funny and so loving. She is one of the poorest people I have met out here but it is impossible to visit her without her giving us something to eat. She gets mad if we keep refusing. We invited her to church and honestly didn't really expect her to come because the church is about 30 minutes away from her house (walking). But she came all by herself and it made our day. I don't have any pictures of her but I will try to get one this week.

We are seeing so many miracles in this area and I come to love these people more and more every day. Mexico is really one of the most amazing places I have ever been.

Have a great week!

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Elder May

Hello everybody! I feel like I say this every week, but this last week was pretty great! With halloween and el dia de los muertos we have some interesting stories.

First of all, these people know how to go trick-or-treating. I don't think I have ever seen so many people knocking on doors asking for candy. They had kids in lines waiting up to 30 minutes to knock on some doors. There were also some random horses in the middle of the street with no owner. That made me feel like I was back in Grantsville for a second. Halloween was fun and all, but it actually made it a little hard to work for about 3 nights in a row. However, we were still able to see many miracles this week.

We received a referral from a member to visit a lady who works in a quesadilla shop. We found the shop and everything and found the lady. We didn't really know what to say to her, but I had a cold this last week so we just walked up to her and  I asked her for a napkin to blow my nose. She kind of looked at me funny and didn't really say anything. Luckily though, there was another lady there who is missing half her teeth and seemed a little crazy. She offered me a napkin and we started talking and eventually got a good conversation going. The crazy lady is named Dominga. She lives in one of the poorer houses that I have seen, She has no electricity or gas in her house. She does all of her cooking on a fire pit outside and also warms up her bathing water on the same firepit. She is very humble but one of the nicest people I have ever met. She asked us if we could visit her on Saturday and we agreed. I'll be honest, we didn't know what to think of her. We meet a lot of crazy people here and weren't too sure if she was just going to be another one. We came to the appointment and she had set up in the street in front of her house a little table with a nice table cloth and buckets for seats all around. She had invited about half of the neighborhood and they were there waiting for us. It was her and 5 other old guys whom we have met before. These guys are garbage truck workers and are always drinking and sometimes give us a hard time. We ended up getting to know them and they are great people! They call themselves the death squad. They call themselves by that name because with their drinking and drug habits they never know when they are going to die. I tried not to laugh. We ended up teaching them the power of repentance and that we can all change. During the lesson, every time that someone would walk by in the street they would invite them to listen to us. A few people would come and listen for a while and then some would leave but it was a really cool experience to teach a lot of people in the middle of the street like that. At the end they all left feeling really motivated and excited that they can change. They all gave us hugs and thanked us for helping them. These men are some of the most humble people I have met and we could feel their desires to change. It may not be easy, but we know they can do it. Keep the death squad in your prayers!


I am very happy that I have the opportunity to share the power of Christ's atonement with people. It has brought me so much hope and knowledge that we really all can be cleansed and perfected through the repentance process. I know that God lives and that Christ is his son who was sent here to suffer for us. And he suffered for us to give us the chance to be changed and be happy.

have a great week!



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Elder May

Hola everybody. This week has been pretty great. I explained a little bit about the Velazquez Guzman family in the last letter. They were confirmed last Sunday. We went to their house on Wednesday for another lesson. We were going to teach them about the temple and prepare the dad and the 12 year old son to receive the priesthood. We had it all planned out and when we all sat down and were ready to give the lesson they gave us a nice surprise. They said "so yesterday we went to the church for the young men's activity and the bishop ended up giving us the priesthood. Also Aldahir (the 12 year old) is going to go the temple tomorrow. He even has the information to be baptized for his grandpa.". It was a pretty cool surprise, I'll be honest. They had already taken the initiative of meeting with the bishop and doing their family history.

The next day, Aldahir went to the temple with the young men and he loved it. He actually went by himself. His parents asked us if we could walk him to the church so he didn't have to walk through there by himself. Funny story though... You'd think we'd be responsible and keep him safe as we were walking to the church right? Well I have walked those roads to the church about a thousand times so I was just kind of going through the motions and not paying attention to the things around me. We were walking past this parking lot in an apartment complex and out of nowhere my comp and Aldahir just stopped. I didn't pay much attention and kept walking. Well they stopped because a car was coming and I didn't see it. The car didn't see me either... So I got hit by my first car on Thursday. It wasn't going fast at all and I just kind of rolled off the hood. It was an old lady too and she was freaking out. I just gave her a thumbs up and a smile a kept walking. 


We have been working with another family as well. The Belmont family. The mom is a less active who found us in the street and asked us to come by and teach her family. We went by that same day and had a good lesson with all of them. Her husband's name is Carlos and they have two little girls ages 9 and 8 named Fernanda and Naomi. We taught them a couple times in the week and they came to church yesterday! They had to leave after sacrament meeting because the house of Carlos' sister collapsed in the earthquake last month and they have been spending a lot of time helping her get resettled and back to normal. We are really excited about this family, they have so much potential.

Have a great week!

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Elder May

Hello everybody!

I am sorry that I have been slacking a little bit lately with the emails. I need to do better at writing them.

These past few weeks have been amazing, like always. The highlight of these last two weeks would have to be the baptism of the Velazquez family. We found them by going through the area book. We saw that the missionaries had been visiting them about 2 years ago but didn't have much success with them. My comp and I felt that we should go visit them one day and since then we have seen miracle after miracle. The mom was able to change her work schedule to be able to come to church. She works from 7:00 am on monday until 10:00 pm. She sacrifices a lot for her family. The dad stopped smoking and drinking to be able to be baptized with his family. They all read the scriptures and say their prayers as a family now every day and are progressing so well. They have the goal to be an eternal family. They have to be members for one year before they can be sealed as a family. They were baptized on October 14, and want to be sealed next october hopefully before I go home from my mission. That would be the greatest experience i can imagine to have in my mission.

We have also been working with a lot of other families and couples. We have a lot of people who need to get married and with my wedding planning experience, we are ready to go.

We had transfer calls last saturday and I will be staying here in Hidalgo for another transfer to finish Elder Vargas' training. I am super okay with that. He is probably my favorite companion and we have been getting a lot done here. I love this area and love my mission! Time is going by way too fast. Each transfer goes by faster than the last and it is starting to freak me out.

I love you all, have a great week!




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Elder May