Stake Conf. With Elder Pino 4/30/18

Hey everyone! This week has been super great! Highlights of this week were....

 

1. This Sunday was the Stake Conference of the Stake Reynosa Este (East) and one of the Area Seventy’s came, his name is Elder Pino. He gave a really good talk on ministering and how important it is that we can really search for the people that need us and really love them and minister to them!

 

2. I got to see my convert, Maria, that got baptized almost exactly one year ago! The first time she came to church with us was the last year’s stake conference! She is doing super great and even though her son is very sick, she has stayed active for all this time. The reason she is in the church still though is because of the members that have helped her! This week as we were working in the area I had a chance to go visit her! She doesn’t have a telefono so I was really excited to be able to see and talk to her! When we got there she was so excited to see us and so happy! I remember when I first met her she was sad, and really stressed, and always kind of burdened down! She still has some of the same burdens, but she is so happy and faithful and knows that things are and will continue getting better! Something really cool was her telling us that she knows that God loves her because every time she was down or needed something, one of the members or a friend would go and visit her and take them dinner, or just visit! Also really soon she is going to the temple!

 

3.Today we got to go to Texas which was super fun! We got to go to a really good Chinese buffet and I got to eat Calamardo o Pulpo or (Squid or Octopus) haha or whatever its called. Super fun!

 4. One week back on Monday night was the birthday of the Sister Regalado, aka mision presidents wife! We threw her a secret surprise party and got her flowers and a cake and went to her house in the night! We all went in with the lights off and then started singing and turned the lights on!

 

This week I learned and am understanding even more the joy and protection of being obedient! We can really feel a peace and happiness! It’s hard sometimes but it will always turn out for the best in the end! 

 

 

I love you guys so much and I hope you have a great week!

Elder Hawley

 

 

Don't Wait for Happiness-Seek it A Letter to Elder Hawley 4/30/18

Hey Elder,

It was good to see all the pictures you sent. They are awesome. It appears all that good food you are eating and you haven't gained any weight. You look great! Dad says he just keeps eating the same, getting pretty fat. The new job is too much driving around and paperwork. He says he is going to have to start jogging or something.

Time is just flying by here at home. We are all still super busy. Dad has been trying to get inspiration for new people in his bishopric. Since changes were made with the new Elder's Quorum that took his first counselor Brother Earnshaw as President of the Elder's Quorum. He will be glad when the deciding part is over.

Miles and Dad went on their first mountain bike ride Saturday. Miles got a new mountain bike. He rode his other bike until it wore out and he got too big for it. He loves to ride and is a pretty good rider, but he isn't so graceful at crashing. He flew over the front handle bars. Dad said it was pretty funny to see. He didn't cry or kick and tell his bike it's being stupid. Gives us hope that he is growing up haha.

Jericho got married on Friday. He is so happy. He and his new wife are the cutest.

Tanner received his Eagle on Saturday. All went well until he was playing basketball and hurt his ankle.

Thought for the week "Don't wait for HAPPINESS to be thrust upon you. Seek it out in service and learning."-Dallin H. Oaks  We are so happy that you are doing this so well.

Have a great week. We love you a ton and pray for your happiness, success and your mission always!

Your Family

A Great Week in Camargo! 4/23/18

We just got back from eating ground beef with cactus and beans. Haha it was super great! This week was super great! President Regalado wanted us to go to Camargo and help out the missionaries there! We went and some pretty awesome things happened! First, crazy thing that happend was that there was going to be a bautismo Saturday morning in another little city close by because their church has a place to baptise! The morning of Saturday the missionaries there called us like 10 minutes before we were going to leave and told us that the water had been turned off in the whole city and they couldn’t fill up the bautismal font! Haha and I was so stressed because I had no idea what we were going to do! Then I had a great idea that I had tried to imply in the past but had never worked and that was....the fire department. We called them up and they just kept putting us on hold and sending our call higher and higher until we got to the head honcho. We explained the situation and he said they were happy to help and the only cost was going to be buying the firemen a cold bottle of coke haha. It was crazy. They got to the church and pulled out the hose and boom in like 3 minutes, full. Haha everything else went good with the baptism and the lady that got baptised, later that same day, ended up quitting her job because she wanted to be able to go to church every Sunday!

 

                                             The picture is with the family Lopez!

The second great part of the week was the branch conference of Camargo! Camargo is a little tiny town like an hour and a half away from the next big city! Normally like 40 people go! All the leaders in the big town decided to come and bring their families and we ended up with like 110 people! It was so full the whole church! It was such a cool experience! The coolest part is that the family Lopez, that my companion at the time and I had baptised like a year ago, got called as the president and the counselor of the young women! It was such a great moment to see them get called and see them so happy with their whole family there!

It has been such a great week and I am loving the work! I know this church is true because it brings happiness when things are the hardest. A really great quote that I read in a talk this week!  “Success,” it has been said, “isn’t the absence of failure, but going from failure to failure without any loss of enthusiasm.

Oh and did I tell you guys in July the Mexico Reynosa mission will be changing. It will become the Mexico Monterrey East mission. Because Monterrey is an older mission, they always keep their name. Our mission has had more success, so for that reason we are going to fuse together to help the Monterrey mission out. The areas in Reynosa will stay the same, we are just going to have a ton more areas combined.

Have a great week. Love you all so much!

Elder Hawley

Preparing in Times of Prosperity A Letter to Elder Hawley 4/23/18

Hey Elder,
Sounds like things are going great.  It's good to hear you are busy. Hang in there when you feel crazy busy. Time is going by so fast. We are sure there are important lessons still to be learned and we believe you still will meet people you can change right up until the last day of your mission.
Dad had to speak in church. He talked on preparing in times of prosperity. It's easy to rely on the Lord and give sincere prayer in times of trial. But do we have enough self discipline to do the things you should each day when things are going good. 
We have had a very busy week. It was Malia (and dad's) performances of Seven Brides for Seven Brothers. It has been so good. Tuesday night is the last show. It is being recorded so you can watch it when you get home. It has been so fun!
Scriptures for the week: Alma 13:28 "But that ye would humble yourselves before the Lord, and call on his holy name, and watch and pray continually, that ye may not be tempted above that which ye can bear, and thus be led by the Holy Spirit, becoming humble, meek, submissive, patient, full of love and all long-suffering."
Helaman 10:4-5 "Blessed art thou, Nephi, for those things which thou has done; for I have beheld how thou hast with unwearyingness declared the word, which I have given unto thee, unto this people. And thou hast not feared them, and hast not sought thine own life, but has sought my will, and to keep my commandments.
5 And now, because thou hast done this with such unwearyingness, behold, I will bless thee forever; and I will make thee mighty in word and in deed, in faith and in works; yea, even that all things shall be done unto thee according to thy word, for thou shalt not ask that which is contrary to my will."Have a great week. We love you a ton!!!
Your Family

March Mission Pictures

February Mission Pictures

January Mission Pictures

Serving His People A Letter To Elder Hawley 4/16/18

Hi Elder,

 

How are you doing? How was your week? We miss getting your weekly updates. We appreciate that you are super busy and involved, but we hope you will still write us what you are doing each week so we can add to your "mission stories".

 

Life continues to be super busy for us as well. We are doing good, though. The kids are working hard to keep up their grades and make it through the last term of the school year. Megan actually has three jobs right now. She is working on Saturday mornings at a dog grooming place, Cross E Ranch on Fridays and Saturday afternoon/evening through April, and she got hired on last week at Genuine Comfort HVAC doing office work helping the office manager.

Our weather has been the typical crazy Utah Spring weather. One day raining or snowing, another day 70 degrees and sunny. How has your weather been? 

Scriptures and thoughts for this week:

When we help one another, we serve God. (What a great way you are helping by serving a mission). King Benjamin, a great king in Book of Mormon times, taught his people this principle by the way he lived. He served them all his life, earning his own living instead of being supported by the people. In an inspired sermon he explained why he loved service, saying:

Mosiah 2:17-18...17 And behold, I tell you these things that ye may learn wisdom; that ye may learn that when ye are in the service of your fellow beings ye are only in the service of your God. 18 And if I, whom ye call your king, do labor to serve you, then ought not ye to labor to serve one another?

Thomas S. Monson said, "Perhaps when we come face to face with our maker, we will not be asked, 'How many positions did you hold?' But rather, 'How many people did you HELP?' In reality, you cannot love the Lord until you serve Him by serving His people."

Elder Jose L. Alonso said, "I know that our Heavenly Father and His son, Jesus Christ love us and are willing to help us to act as we love one another as They have loved us. I know that by serving and forgiving others with real love, we can be healed and receive the strength to overcome our own challenges."

Dieter F. Uchtodorf said, "By becoming the answer to someone's PRAYER we often find the answer to our own."

We hope you have a great week! We are proud of you, love and miss you a ton!

Your Family

Long Time No See!! 4/16/18

Haha it’s been a little bit since I sent emails home...sorry about that! We have been super super busy! But some fun or cool things that have happened lately, I got to baptise the wife of one of my very first converts! She is super awesome and loves the church! She called me and told me she wanted me to go and baptise her! I gave her reference to the sister missionaries and also a really awesome family whose daughter just turned 9. I got to baptize her too! I love them. 

Then like two days ago we had a Family Home Evening with some cool members and made brownies with them! Haha it was just mostly so they would borrow us there oven, but they are super nice. 

A new AP is one of my old companions, Elder Cisneros. He will be awesome. I love the guy! Also we got to watch a movie with the mission president and his family! It was because the whole mission got to watch Coco but we didn’t get to watch it because we were busy, so the sister invited us over.

Today was fun because five new missionaries got here! They are from Bolivia, Guatemala, and California! Tomorrow we are going to be training them!

We have been busy traveling and working in the zones! Sometimes I am gone for days at a time. This week we will be traveling all week to the different zone conferences.

Crazy thing acutally that happened this week is the office got broke into, Saturday super early in the morning! They went through all the stuff and took a huge box of phones but jokes on them....they took the broken phone box haha. They didn’t really take anything else really important, just a projector, that was a bummer.

To finish a really cool story....like two months ago we contacted a family in Matamoros that are from Texas. They were super awesome and nice, and we got their information and sent the referral to the missionaries over there. For like three weeks I was checking on the computer to see if they had contacted them yet and it still said no??? Then just this last week I saw that there was a check mark next to their name in the system and that the missionaries had passed by and visited them but that was all it was. I wanted to know what else happened or if they accepted or something cool happened, so I decided to call the family to see what was up. I called and the mom of the family answered and I started to talk to her and asked if the missionaries had passed by and she said yeah! Then she said it was actually a little bit of a miracle that they passed by. She explained that her husband had gotten in a really bad car accident and that her husband had passed away. Then the next morning the missionaries passed by. She said that she knew that they had been sent by God. The missionaries had taken almost two months to finally contact them, and when they did it was when they needed it most. 

It was very sad to hear that news but I know that God loves us and we have trials and problems that we go through, but we are never alone. He is always with us and will always give us the ways to be able to rise above the problem. We just need to trust in Him and do everything we can to follow Him, and everything always works out. His timing is perfect.

I love you guys so much and miss you, but I am loving it here too!

Elder Hawley

 

Misson Pictures 4/16/18