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From:	Callie Horton (callie.horton@myldsmail.net)
Sent:	Mon 1/20/14 9:21 AM

Familia y amigos!

 

I hope y'all are doing fabulous! Life here in Virginia is wonderful! I love this place. I love the people. I love the beautiful language of Spanish. La lengua de los angeles. Filiberto is doing soo good! When we talked to him this week he just talked about how he was able to work so much harder because he has the gift of the Holy Ghost now ha-ha. He's a gem. And he quit one of his jobs this past weekend because he didn't think that the environment there was good! His faith seriously amazes me! And he decided that he wanted to come to the Mechanicsville ward yesterday to visit and then he went to the Spanish branch after. All 3 hours of both. I don't even know if I could do that! He is just in love with the Church now. And our Bishop announced that he was baptized during sacrament meeting and he just so proudly raised his hand and waved at everyone with this huge smile on his face! Ha-ha. We are so proud of him, but it is even better that he is so proud of himself. He also told us yesterday that when he returns to Mexico that he is going to teach his family about the Church. They told him that they weren't interested in it, but that they completed supported him, but he said that he will help them understand. He's the greatest! Sometimes it’s cool to think about how one new member of the Church can actually bring so many others to the gospel. He will definitely be a strong member that brings many to the knowledge of this gospel.

 

I can't believe that I forgot to talk about Valeria and Fermin last week! They are soo amazing. I think I mentioned them before a while back. But we have been teaching them these last couple weeks and holy cow! They are some of the most prepared people I have seen so far on my mission! They just take it all in like champs. Everything just makes perfect sense to them. They have so many great questions too which is awesome! And they have asked us some questions that the answer is sometimes hard for people to hear that have just started investigating the Church, but it wasn't at all for them! It just all makes perfect sense. And Fermin just has the cutest grin on his face the whole time. Sometimes when we say stuff they both just get super excited and start explaining it back to us to make sure that they understood or if the one of them understood and the other one didn't, the one that understood will excitedly explain it to the other ha-ha. They are seriously like bouncing in their chairs in excitement! And we had a super powerful lesson about what happens after this life with them last week. We had a wonderful member with us who I've talked about before, and she was just so amazed by the excitement and the spirit that was in the room. We asked her to bear a short testimony and she just cried and was expressing how she could tell that they had so much excitement about the stuff that we were teaching even though she didn't know exactly what we were saying. It was super powerful. And cute little Fermin got up and got her water to comfort her ha-ha. They are so amazing. We love teaching them so much.

 

A lot of our investigators expressed their true feelings to us about baptism this week. Hermana Pratt says that she brings that out in people haha. Veronica is one of them. She is doing soo wonderful and is sweeter than ever, but the road to baptism might be a long one, but that's totally ok. She will make it there. We have a lot of walls to break down, but we know it will happen. Our investigator Josue came to church for the first time yesterday! He went to the English ward that is closest to where he lives with his neighbor who’s a member. He is so close to setting a baptismal date too!

 

Being a missionary is absolutely the best decision I have made in my life up to this point! I can't even believe that this week I will hit my half way mark... Ahh that is so crazy! This time is going way too fast. It is cool to reflect on what I have done up to this point though. I am very glad for the person that I have become, but I know that I have so much more learning and growing to do. We have been studying a lot about goals and visions and such lately, and one thing that I read in a talk that President Wilson gave us was that when we are trying to follow Christ and do the things that we need to be doing, we can see more clearly the vision that Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ have for us. I would completely agree with that. It has never been clearer than it has on my mission the person that I have the potential to become. I am so far from that, and will probably work my whole life to try to get there, but I can constantly set goals and such and grow closer every day to that person that Heavenly Father needs me to be. I have so much more growth that I need to do and I am so grateful that I have so much time left to do it! My mission has seriously been such a blessing. I don't know where I would be without it or all of the wonderful people that I have met here in Virginia.

 

I hope you all have the best week ever! Find something to be grateful about every single day. I love you all!!!

 

And now I close mine epistle. I am Hermana Horton.