Hey mom!
Another good week here in Panuco. The time is literally flying by here! I didn't realized how long I had been here already. I guess thats what happened when you work hard and have fun doing it.
Haha I'm glad my pig pictures helped someone. And hey, missionary work isn`t just about people that aren`t members. It`s the work of salvation and the work of Christ, and making someone smile is definitely part of that.
We had a good week here in Panuco. We have a few really good investigators that we are teaching but we still need to find more. And less actives. And we are still focusing on converting the active members too. Yes, a lot of it is the culture but a lot is that they just don`t understand what the gospel is and what it means to be a member of the church. Mexico has such a twisted idea of what Religion is and who God is that its hard to change that way of seeing things. But that doesn't make it impossible. Its definitely a trial that has strengthened my testimony and increased my knowledge and made me realize that I never want to be less active and I hope I never forget everything that I am learning here.
Honestly there isn't tons to tell you... Probably because I haven't been keeping my journal very well and so I cant think of anything to write to you OR that the amazing things that happen to me every day are so normal and I forget that they aren't normal for you guys haha. I have a goal to write in my journal more often. Part of being exactly obedient. Instead of sharing experiences I will write a little about what I have been learning personally, maybe that will be of more help...
The mission is hard. I mean, they always tell you that but there's just no way of understanding just how hard it is without doing it. And its hard in ways that you never imagine. Everything I was worried about before doesn't even matter anymore. The heat doesn't bother me much anymore, the food I have learned to love, my Spanish improves every day, and I love Mexico. What I never imagined was how hard and tiring emotionally and spiritually the mission would be. Meeting new people every day, coming to love them, and then having them reject you or fall away or lose interest. Days full of appointments and they all fall through, Always wanting to be better and do the best but not seeing results immediately. It`s all really hard. But what I have learned from my mission is something I have probably been hearing my whole life but it never really sank in. The Atonement has two parts. The redeeming power, the power to cleanse our sins and forgive us for the mistakes we make. This power we have to use every day. Its the part we focus on most. But the other part, the enabling power of the Atonement, is equally as important. God sent us here so that we would grow, and he allows us to suffer a bit so we CAN grow. It would be impossible to change if everything was just easy. Sometimes we have a trial and we pray and pray for the Lord to take it away, and we get frustrated and lose faith when He doesn`t do anything. During my training, I prayed for God to take me out of Mexico. I wanted to be anywhere but here. I prayed and prayed to God that something would happen and that I would be able to serve somewhere else. Somewhere more comfortable. And guess what, it obviously never happened :) (And thank goodness!). But what I learned in these moments early on is my mission came when I changed my prayers a bit. Instead of praying that God would take my problem away, I prayed instead for the strength to overcome it, and that's when things started to change. My circumstances didn't change, but I did. I was made a better person through Christ. Through his Atonement I was strengthened. He comforted me and made me stronger. There are examples of this power in scripture, too. When Nephi was tied up by his brothers, he didn't pray that God would take the cords off for him or that Laman and Lemuel would be struck down, but he prayed for strength. As Elder Bednar put it in a talk called "In The Strength of the Lord", "Instead of praying for his circumstances to change, pray for the strength to change our circumstances". (Part of that talk is in the March 2015 Liahona, but the full version that he gave at BYU is better.) When Alma and his people were persecuted and enslaved and forbidden to pray, the Lord strengthened them so they could support their burdens. He didn't take their burdens away. There are so many examples of this power. Joseph Smith and the early church, the pioneers. The power of the atonement is not only to redeem us from sin, but to strengthen us beyond our own abilities and to change our nature. Its the only way we can become more like Him. I am forever thankful for this opportunity that I have to be here in Mexico. I love it and wouldn't change it for anything in the world. Every day I strive to apply the Atonement's enabling power, sometimes called grace, in my life. I know that my redeemer lives. I invite you all to do the same that Moroni invites us to do at the close of the book of Mormon: Yea, come unto Christ, and be perfected in him, and deny yourselves of all ungodliness; and if ye shall deny yourselves of all ungodliness, and love God with all your might, mind and strength, then is his grace sufficient for you, that by his grace ye may be perfect in Christ; and if by the grace of God ye are perfect in Christ, ye can in nowise deny the power of God.
I love you all and miss you lots.
Elder Skalla
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