Visas and a Baptism.

This week has been a full one. We started out the week with me getting my visa on Tuesday. That was certainly interesting. We went early in the morning to get to the office building bright and early. There I saw a lot of my friends that I came in here with, and I learned that I probably have the best Spanish out of all of them. We separated from our companions and we went to the Visa building. My companion went with two other missionaries to their area. When we got to the building, they gave us minimal instructions and sent us in. We had practically no idea what we were supposed to do. When we got called up, we were all told that our pictures on our Visas were too far away, and that we needed to take pictures closer up. We went out of the building and there was no one waiting for us, so someone called the mission president and he called the secretary that was in charge of us. He came and we went to take pictures in an other place, went back to the original building, and gave our fingerprints and our signatures and Bam! Suddenly we all have visas for the next 3 years?  By the time I got back into my area with my companion, it was already seven in the evening; we had missed four of our fixed appointments. That was a bummer. We had expected to return at 1 in the afternoon or something. But oh well. We still had our last fixed appointment, a guy named Daniel Clemente. He is also they guy that I baptized last Saturday! He's really cool. He works as a newspaper photographer. Before his baptism, he had an infinite amount of trials. His wife wants a divorce; his kids are sick, and many more things. But he stood strong and I got to baptize him. I don't know if I'll meet anyone this prepared for the gospel again in my mission, man it was really cool! And afterwards, his brothers started asking about the church and wanted to learn more! They are not in our area, but it doesn’t really matter. It felt awesome. 

We were also supposed to have a baptism next week too. Supposed to. Unfortunately, he had problems with the word of wisdom, and relapsed last Tuesday. We asked him why he wanted to be baptized, and all the answers weren't involved with his own desire. He mainly wants to be baptized because his wife wants to go to the temple with him. After the lesson, his wife messaged us and said that we shouldn’t waste our time, and that we all plainly saw that he has no desire. We responded that we know that he can be baptized, and we know that if we work with him, he can find that desire. So that was basically the trial of the week. 

Yesterday we got to sing for the ward. We were going to sing Divina Luz which is “Lead Kindly Light” In Spanish (which is my favorite hymn by the way,) but the Hermanas wanted to sing something about missionary work, so we sang “Called to Serve.” It was still cool, and the people in my ward commented that I have an amazing voice, which was also real cool. What isn't real cool is that the ward isn't exactly motivated for mission work. The ward goal, for reference, is 10 for each companionship. We don’t get any. We keep trying to find ways to inspire references.

Today one of the sisters in our ward had a birthday, and we celebrated in the chapel with cake and stuff. That was real fun. Then we went to the store, bought some food, got our haircut, and now I’m here writing. It’s awesome here! I hope you guys are having fun. Oh, and also, my p days last till 6 now. Its great!

Con Amor, Elder Schuhmacher

An "all right" week.

We had an all right week. We should be having a baptism this week too, should all go according to plan. My feet are consistently getting better. Anyways, I’m doing fine. I received Omi’s letter last Wednesday, and that was nice. The money was still there, all that jazz. I used it to buy a bus pass for the day. 

Anyways, could Lisa possibly send over the recipes for her bread and cookies and such? I got a less active member who would really like to make some of that stuff. 

And yeah, the week was good. As for stories, there isn’t really anything to share. I’ve really been reading a lot into the parables of Jesus. One of my favorites is the one about the lost sheep. It’s in Matthew 18:12 through 14.

12 How think ye? if a man have an hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth he not leave the ninety and nine, and goeth into the mountains, and seeketh that which is gone astray?

 13 And if so be that he find it, verily I say unto you, he rejoiceth more of that sheep, than of the ninety and nine which went not astray.

 14 Even so it is not the will of your Father which is in heaven, that one of these little ones should perish.

If the joy of one person coming back to the path is so great, how big is the joy of multiple?

You asked about my stomach.  My stomach is great! The Hermanas in my district, not so great. Apparently since I eat spicy that helps the stomach not get sick? I dunno.

Also tell J to look up something called "Pokémon Reloaded" on the computer. I think he'd like it. One of the member’s kids told me about it. 

Love you! 

Here are some pictures from the MTC that I forgot to send over.  I hope you like them!

Answering questions from home.

Here are the answers to your questions, Mom!

HOW ARE YOUR FEET?

My feet are actually doing a lot better. Neosporin, some patience, and a lot of taxis seemed to do the trick. Thank you for your prayers, they helped A bunch. But please don’t stop!

WHAT WAS THE BEST PART OF YOUR WEEK?

My week was great; we got a lot of stuff done. We have been running around, always really busy. We have 8 investigators. Four of them have baptismal dates. Best part of my week was probably when we decided to buy pancake mix. That made this week a whole lot better.  I’m really so grateful you taught me how to make pancakes!

WHAT WAS THE HARDEST PART OF YOUR WEEK?  

The hardest part was probably this morning. One of our investigators is a

Boxing trainer, and we worked with him this morning. Yeah, I was boxing, it was pretty awesome.  That was a tiring experience to say the least.

WHAT WAS THE BEST THING YOU ATE THIS WEEK?  THE WORST?  

The worst thing I ate? Cant think of anything I didn’t like. All the food

Here is great! Of the weirder things, I have eaten lots of cactus. Its not that bad actually.

WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SCRIPTURE THIS WEEK?

Definitely Alma 36:3. " And now, O my son Helaman, behold, thou art in thy youth, and therefore, I beseech of thee that thou wilt hear my words and learn of me; for I do know that whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day."

Whatever trial you are going through, God can help.

WHAT'S THE WEATHER LIKE THIS WEEK?

The weather was almost rainy, but it never happened. Mostly really sunny.

ARE YOU SLEEPING WELL?  

I’m sleeping great! The beds we both have are giant.

ARE PEOPLE ON THE STREET NICE TO YOU?  

People on the street usually don’t say much to us.

HAVE YOU GOTTEN ANY MAIL OR PACKAGES YET?

I haven’t gotten anything yet. Elder Lopez says that they will call us from the mission office when we receive a package.

WHAT DO YOU DO ON YOUR P DAYS?

Well, we shop, study, workout, write, eat, clean. Not in that order. We haven’t gotten the chance to do anything exciting yet, but I’ll let you know if we do!

WHEN DID YOU FEEL THE SPIRIT STRONGEST THIS WEEK?  

The spirit was strongest at one of our investigators lessons. We were talking and reading Moroni 7. Eventually we asked him to baptism, and he said yes.

Moroni 7:41 And what is it that ye shall hope for? Behold I say unto you that ye shall have hope through the atonement of Christ and the power of his resurrection, to be raised unto life eternal, and this because of your faith in him according to the promise.

42 Wherefore, if a man have faith he must needs have hope; for without faith there cannot be any hope.

DO YOU MISS ME?  :)

And of course, yes, I miss you guys tons! But I don’t let that distract me!  I love you guys.  Tell everyone I say hi!

2nd full week in Mexico!

Welp, here I am again. And THIS TIME I brought some pictures. Some. Mainly of our house, but whatever.  The reason I don’t have a lot of pictures is because we aren’t supposed to bring our cameras around. Ya know, because of the whole possibility of getting robbed thing. 

Anyways, it’s still awesome here. Still having a great time. My feet are killing me though. I got blisters and such. It hurts, and the moleskin stuff that you gave me doesn’t exactly work. We went to a person in the church that is a "doctor" (I didn’t buy into it too much,) and he treated me with...magnets? That was weird. Someone here obviously doesn’t know how magnets work, and I don’t think it’s me. Or maybe it is me. I don’t know. 

The food here is still awesome. We’ve eaten a lot of different things, and its all great. 

I’d like some things from you, by the way. 1. Duct tape. What is it for?  A better question might be, what isn’t it for.  2. Patriarchal blessing. 3. The talks you and Brother Wasden gave at the sacrament meeting. 4. Shoe insoles that might possibly not give me blisters. (I have them on the bottom of my toes.  It doesn’t feel good at all. I try to switch off with my shoes, but both have soles like tortillas. One pair does feel better than the other, I don’t know if there is an easy solution to this one.) 5. A little photo book of everything. Family, friends, everybody…I’d like some pictures. 

We are in a place that you can find on Google maps called Santa Elena, Cuautitlán, México

Yeah, we are busy. We’ve got 3 people we are going baptize this month, so that’s really cool. Also the water situation is a solid “probably don’t use it.” I use tap to brush my teeth, but I don’t swallow it, we don’t drink tap. Ever.  I haven’t received any letters. When I do, I’ll have to wait for Monday to go get them from the mission office. 

Well, one really cool thing this week was we had one investigator who had gone through ten missionaries and hadn’t agreed to be baptized. His wife is a member and he has been attending church for two years. He didn’t want to be baptized because his family's strong Catholics. My companion was a bit skeptical but I told him, “you just gotta have a positive attitude!” So we talked to him and I asked him if he would be baptized and he said yes. It was pretty awesome. That’s my big missionary lesson of the month: a positive attitude changes everything.

My companion is great. Actually, it almost seems as though we are the only missionaries in the area without problems. Lol

And you asked what did I eat today?  Today we didn’t have lunch. Well, I had an orange. This morning we got to go to a member’s house and eat zopes. They are pretty cool.

We take turns doing the dishes. And yeah, we go to the grocery every week, this week he was all like "what cereal do you want" and I said I didn’t care and then he said he didn’t care so I just said well I like Trix and then it was done.

  

Love you!