Mmm...My Mind is Blank?‏

(A/N: Alejandra here! Hello everyone! Sorry for the late update. Believe it or not, she actually wrote on Monday...I just got busy with school which started up on Monday...Have fun reading!)

Well... this week wasn't as exciting as last week...we didn't get stuck in a different area over night. But it was a pretty good week!

We taught the Ramos family yesterday. Hannah and Izzy both have a baptismal date! Hannah on the 17th of September and Izzy on the 20th of September! Yesterday in our lesson with Javier, Elder Davis and Elder Pace (the hmong elders in Merced) came down and Elder Davis invited Javier to get baptized and he accepted! He said that he was glad for  the spiritual uplift Sister McArthur, Sister Horan and Brother Betham were giving him! He is really accepting the gospel and he really loves coming to church. The ward has been amazing with him and giving him all the friendship he needs! I'm so excited to keep teaching him!
 

Noemi and Miguel!! I love them!! They also have a baptismal date for September 20th! I'm so excited! We have 6 investigators with baptismal dates!! September is going to be super crazy, but so well worth it!! I can't wait!! I'm going to be so tired!

Sister McArthur is leaving tomorrow morning... :(   I'm really kinda sad, but I'm glad that she has served her mission so well that she doesn't look back with regrets! I'm so thankful that she has been my trainer! I have learned so much! We cry together every once in a while...but it's okay, because we laugh about it later! :) I can't believe I've already been out on my mission for 3 months. I feel like it was yesterday that I was telling people I had 17 months left. Now I only have 15, thats a little over one year...that's not too bad! ahh! It's going to fly by!

 

Ooh, spiritual moment this week. On Wednesday, we had district meeting. Towards the end, Sister McArthur asked Elder Boyes (our zone leader) for a blessing and then I decided to get one also. Elder Davis (hmong) gave me my blessing and it was really comforting! He didn't even ask me why I wanted a blessing, but he hit every single point that I needed! I know that when we receive blessings it really is as if Heavenly Father is talking with us. I am so thankful to be surrounded by worthy priesthood holders that can give me a blessing whenever I am in need of it. I am so thankful that we have the restored gospel and have the proper authority and the priesthood in this earth today. I know that without it, we wouldn't have the true church on this earth today.
I love being a missionary! Absolutely love it!

Until next week!
-Hermana Ramos-Escobar

My Crazy Adventure to Yosemite!!‏

(A/N: Hello everyone!  This is Alejandra, Hermana Ramos-Escobar's older sister! I just want everyone to know that with each blog update, it is just me copying over an email she sends to her family. She's not the one that comes in and updates this blog. Just wanted to make that clear for everyone. Here's the email she sent on Tuesday, enjoy!)

Well, yesterday was a crazy day!! We went up to Yosemite yesterday for our last time with Sister McArthur and let me tell you...we had quite the adventure. Oh my goodness!!

Well first of all, let me re-wind. On Sunday night, Hermana Garcia joined us! She is a member here from the ward and is doing a mini mission with us! She is going to be with us until Sister McArthur leaves, so she came with us Sunday night. Oh and also, we went over to Izzy's house. I know I have been talking about Izzy a lot, but she also has two sisters named Hannah and Olivia. Hannah is the oldest and we have started seeing so many miracles with her! She was not very interested in the church when we first started coming over. But lately, she has been turning around! Well, on Sunday, we went over and she told us that she wants to get baptized! She decided that she is going to get baptized with Izzy in September. But then we started talking about it, and their aunt said, "You could do it before Sister McArthur leaves! You could do it on Saturday!" So that is a great possibility! We are praying that their dad will give them permission! We're so excited for them! They are such amazing girls! I love them so much!!

On Monday morning, we went to Yosemite with the Horan's and it was soo much fun! Sister Garcia and I got stopped twice in Yosemite by other members just because we had our tag on and it was really great to see how small the world is! Yosemite was soo much fun! I am sore from hiking so much, but it was the best ever! Very worth it!

Well, we were coming back down to Los Banos and we notice that a fire had started up in the mountains. We were in Oakhurst (2 hours away from Los Banos) and stopped at a gas station and got drinks and such. But when we tried starting the car, it wouldn't turn on. We had to get it jump started and then it was still acting up! So we went to a car shop and Brother and Sister Horan were trying to fix it. They spent about 3 hours trying to fix the car. In the mean time Sister Garcia, Sister McArthur and I were making phone calls (trying to be productive with our time, and cancel all our appointments for the day). Everything just started turning around!

We were able to set a baptismal date with Noemi and Miguel, they will be getting baptized on September 20th. We were also talking with a member that has been helping us with one of our other investigators and he mentioned to us that she is ready to get baptized! She has been going through a lot of things recently and has decided to get baptized! We will be going over to her house tonight to talk with her and set a date with her! Also, we were talking with Kimberly and she showed us on Sunday night that she got her temple recommend!! She's going to the temple on Tuesday the 26th of August!! She's going to do baptisms for the dead! We were really excited about that, but yesterday night, during all this commotion going on, she texted us and told us that she found information on her grandma that has passed away and may be able to do her baptism in the temple!

There were so many miracles happening during this time!

Mind you, we got to Oakhurst at about 3 in the afternoon and we were at the shop until about 6. Then it was decided that it was not safe to drive the car back because the alternator was not working correctly. Therefore, Brother Horan called a tow truck. (By the way the fire that started 3 hours ago, is still going and traveling a lot!!) The insurance company told us that they couldn't come get us because all the tow trucks were being used to evacuate people from the fire AND that it wasn't possible because they closed down all the roads to and from Oakhurst due to the fire. Entonces!!! Sister McArthur, Sister Garcia and I were stuck in Oakhurst 2 hours away from our area and didn't have a way out or a way for people to come get us...and it was now about 7:30-8 at night. Oops.

So, we called the district leaders, zone leaders and mission president. They gave us permission to stay the night at Sister Horan's Mom's house which was about 30 minutes away. I'm pretty sure this never happens in a mission!! It was practically like we were on vacation on our mission! We went over to her mom's house and we were there until noon today. Then we drove back to Los Banos, the Horan's van was towed and we rode with Sister Horan's mom! It was such a fun night!!

But my point in all of this is that even though we had all these tribulations, all these things going wrong, we still had soo many miracles. It went to show that Heavenly Father is really watching over us. I know that it is only because of him that we were able to get home safely, that we were able to get to Sister Horan's mom safely, and that everything worked out. I know that He's watching over us. I am so thankful for all the blessings I have been able to see just in these past 2 days! It has really been such a great blessing and miracle

OOOH!!! By the way!! We found a girl named Alexandra!! She is soo cute! She's 14 year's old and I absolutely love her! She ordered a bible on Mormon.org and she came to church on Sunday! Turns out that her mom is a less active member! She's going to get baptized soon, I can tell!! I'm so excited to teach her! :) I get so happy just thinking about her and how much potential she has to be so strong in this church!! I love being a missionary! :) I never want to leave!! :)

We Found Another Friend! :)‏

This week was so fun!! And we saw a miracle this week! It was the best!

 

So Friday, we spent 3 hours sitting in the house planning for our whole week. It's kind of a pain but it is necessary to get done. So it's well worth it! We were looking through the list of members to see who we could visit, we decided on a family and we're like, "Okay, ya sounds good!" So we went on with our day! That same night we get a call from a random number. I answered and turns out it was the same family that we had planned to go visit! He called and just told us that he had just recently moved back and needed some spiritual uplifting and was told to call us! So we set an appointment up to go visit him/the family the next day in the evening. That next day we called the Horans so that they could go with us and let me tell you, I am soo grateful that they came with us!

 

We pulled up to this old looking house, it was kinda creepy looking. And we walked up and the man was there and he's like, "Oh, I've been waiting for you guys!! Come meet everyone!!" He took us back behind like, two houses and there is a group of people there and he starts introducing us to everyone. I think they were all friends...I have no clue...but then one of his friends is like "Come inside! Come inside! Let me give you tour of the house!" Turns out his house has a lot of ancient stuff in there! They had stuff from about 1820's and from the 1920's! It was crazy! Apparently, he does reenactments of the Civil War. So he has all this stuff. He also has those big huge dresses with the hoops and told us that we can come back whenever and try them on! Haha, that'd be fun! He showed me a Victrola and I got to play it!! It was super cool!! It didn't need electricity or anything! I felt really cool, haha! :P Then Sister McArthur got to play Abraham's Lincoln funeral song! Apparently, it was an original. Ya...it was really cool. So we spent all this time going through his house and we're like, "Oh, we gotta go..." and he's like, "No wait! Let me show you a Book of Mormon one of the Elder's found in my book case!" So we went over and he had a Book of Mormon from the 1920's! It was really cool and inside of it, there was a pamphlet of Joseph Smith and some church information! It was super cool!

 

On a more spiritual note, last Monday we were on exchanges. I was with Sister Olson and we went out to knock on doors. We knocked on this one door, it was our last door, and this lady opened it and just started talking to us. Her name is Sandy and she was super kind to us! We set a return appointment, which was yesterday. We went over yesterday and we were super late for our appointment! :(  It was bad! So we went and knocked on her door, and no one was answering. We called her and no answer. So finally we decided to just leave a note and go. We were getting into the car, and right as I was about to shut the door, I looked and Sandy was walking across the street! She came up to us and was told us that she had been waiting for us and was about to call us! So we went into her house and just started to get to know her.

 

She said that she was confused about Jesus, God and The Spirit because she didn't know if they were separate people or what was the deal there. So, we explained the Godhead and it cleared up her question. Then, she had told us that she didn't know how to read the Bible because there are so many different bibles and they said different things. So, we explained the Book of Mormon to her. And then she was telling us that she was terrified of death! So, we taught her the plan of salvation! It was such an amazing lesson! It was so filled with the spirit and it was incredible being able to answer questions of the soul! And THEN, about half way through the lesson she tells us that her fiance is LDS and she didn't even know that he was LDS!! When she told him that we were coming over, he just told her to not offer us coffee or dark drinks, and then he told her that he was LDS! How crazy is that!?

It was such an incredible experience to find someone that is soo ready! She is so willing to learn and is soo ready! I'm so thankful for all the prayers that have been said! There is such a great power with prayer!

I love teaching people! I love being a missionary and teaching others what brought me so much happiness! It's incredible to think that I'm doing the Lord's work, that He trusts me enough to teach His children. I absolutely love being a missionary!

 

Much love!

-Hermana Ramos-Escobar

(A/N: Just in case you're unsure what a Victrola is (just like I was unsure) here are some examples of what they are! :D )

Keep My Commandments‏

 Kimberly got baptized!! It was such a good day on Saturday! She was baptized and confirmed member of the church on Saturday and you could see such happiness in her face! It was a really neat experience! We were getting really nervous on Saturday because the font wasn't filling up as fast as we needed it to be. It had been running for 45 minutes and it was still on the first step! So, guess what?!! I got to go swimming!! Haha, not really. Sister McArthur was wearing a maxi skirt, so I got into the font to double check that the plug was in correctly. That's about the closest to swimming I get in my mission! Haha, but it was fun! We were able to fix the problem...Who am I kidding, it wasn't us. Brother Forman was able to fix the problem. He went and turned of the softner filter and the font filled up in no time!! After that, everything went great!! It was really great to see Kimberly so happy!

 

The Young Women are in girls camp this week and Izzy was able to go with them! So that's going to be a really great opportunity for her and her sisters to really feel the spirit and become closer to our Heavenly Father. We're hoping when they come back we can sit down with their dad and just really see what is holding him back.

This past Monday, Sister McArthur and I were soo busy! We were in charge of our Zone activity on Monday, and we had CHRISTMAS in August!! It was a lot of fun!! We got sooo many decorations to decorate the Relief Society room and it was filled with Christmas stuff!! We also made little Santa Booties and filled them with candy for the rest of the missionaries to take with them! Didn't know that a whole year of sewing in high school was going to come in handy! :P Just kidding, I kinda figured it would help! Haha, but ya, it was lots of fun! But that is the reason for why we weren't able to e-mail on Monday. We were running around everywhere! Then after the activity, we had exchanges until Tuesday night, therefore we couldn't e-mail yesterday either! So that was a bummer! But at least we could do it today!

 

Yesterday was really good! I was able to lead the area and I felt pretty comfortable doing it. I have been really trying to step it up and lead at least half of the lessons, because I know that after this transfer, I will most likely have to do it anyways. I'm glad that I had the chance to lead the area yesterday because I was able to reassure myself that I can do this. I feel very confident in what I was doing which was really great!
 

I loved having Sister McArthur back! I love how hard we work and how well we get along! I'm starting to get kind of sad knowing that she is going to be leaving so soon. I feel like I just want more time with her. She has taught me soo much and I am so thankful for that.

I want to share a scripture that really touched me this past week. It's in Doctrine and Covenants 6:37. It says:

 

"Behold the wounds which pierced my side, and also the prints of the nails in my hands and feet; be faithful, keep my commandments, and ye shall inherit the kingdom of Heaven. Amen." 
 

I really loved that scripture, this whole section is starting to become my favorite. Jesus Christ is telling us: "Look at me. Look at all I did for you. Look at what I went through for you. Please, just be faithful. Please, just keep my commandments. I want you to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven." Jesus Christ paid so much for us, and all He is asking us to do is to keep His commandments. That's it.  The commandments are something that Heavenly Father has given us to keep us safe. That's all. Just to keep us safe and to assure us that we can return to live with Him. 

 

I love the commandments because they have kept me safe. I love Jesus Christ, all that He did for me. And because I love Him, I will keep His commandments and I will serve my Heavenly Father and my brother Jesus Christ with all my heart! I love this gospel and I love preaching the gospel. I love bringing happiness to others!

 

Thank you all for supporting me!! I love my family more than anything in the world!! I love you!!

Love always,

Hermana Ramos-Escobar