More Baptismal Dates

What a week. 

I am going to keep this short (haha I feel like I always say that but then I end up writing a novel!) this week because we only have half the time to email today because we have a few lessons this afternoon during pday. And holy cow we are excited for these lessons. Ok, so I have no clue what I have written home about Carlos and his group of friends that all live together on the street but man oh man this group is amazing! There is just so much potential and we are so full of faitht that VERY soono many will be baptized. This week we started teaching Saray (I love this name. it is pronounces Sa-righ) who is 20 and obviously from Cuba as well. She is so wonderful. The past few weeks she has really started being so friendly towards us and every time we could go and teach CArlos or Reinier she would come running out of the tent and give us a kiss and a hug and we would chat for a few minutes. We have been praying to be able to start teaching her and Tuesday morning our prayers were answered and we could not be more excited. And there are a ton of super cute JAS girls in our ward that we are going to start bring to our lessons so that she can have friends in the ward (we are actually having a lessonw ith her in an hour at a girls house and then hanging our after and we are going to dye her hair, cute it, and straighten it, she is pretty excited!) Anddddddd........ Reinier has a FECHA! October 19th! Ahhh, see, I´m telling you, this group is amazing and I feel so incredibley humbled and blessed to be here in Barrio 5 working with them. 

Danny is so great but still is ahving a heck of a time giving up smoking. It is so devastating when he tells us he smoked. But, we know that the power of the atonement is real and we are planning on working super diligently with him this week to help him dejar de fumar completely and prepare for his baptism on the 12th. 

AND GUESS WHAT?!?!?!?! I SLEPT 6 OUT OF THE 7 DAYS THIS WEEK!!!!!!" AHHHHH! It has been so wonderful . MIralces are so real! :)

Ok here is another miracle this week. (And sorry, this is kinda more personl but I am SO terrible at writing in my journal, I know Linds, I hear your voice all the time telling me I am going to regret it and what not and I so know I am but at teh end of the day I am SO exhauted and so much has happened during the day that journal writing usually takes the back seat so my weekly emails home are usually full of details that you guys probably dont care too much about or more personal stories but I write them so that I can read them later) I So when Hna Caballero was on intercabios Friday I was with Hna Snelson again and man, it is always an adventure with us since we are both still training and dont speak the language but we were in her area this time and so we were teaching this man named David and he is Jewish and has made some sigificant progress in a short time and he had a date but then decided he didnt want that date and that he didnt know if he should be baptized. Well, we were teaching him Lesson 3 which is the Gospel of Jesus Christ and when we got to baptism he just started laughing and was like no, you already know Im not ready etc etc. Well, I wasnt going to just let it be since we didnt know why he decided to not be baptized so I kept askign him different questions. And he finally told me the reason (which ended up being super small... he is worried that since he was already baptized that it would be a really really big sin to be baptized again) and holy cow the Spirit just took over and and I started talking spanish and I dont even quite remember all that I said but I promised him that if he prayed specifically to know if he would be committing a sin by being baptized again and to get an answer from Dios to see if he should be baptized that he would recieve an answer and then I told him that I knew with all of my heart that this gospel is true and that baptism (with the proper authority which is only contained in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) is the gate to be able to live with Heavenly Father and Christ again and after he just sat there and was like wow, I have never had someone talk to me with such asurety and such power. We just sat in silence for a while and just let the Holy Ghost testify to all 3 of us the truthfulness of what was being taught. He promised me that he would pray. Right before I was going to bed that night we got a call from him telling us that he prayed, recieved and answer and is going to get baptized on the 12th of October!!!!!

. 

It was a good week! 

 

I love you all so much. and I am so grateful for your emails each week and for your prayers. Haha and if you guys are ever bored feel free to write me a letter and send it to me;) ;)

Family, I want you all to know that I know, without a single doubt that this church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Days Saints is Christ´s church and it the only true church on the earth. I know that it has the power of God to perform saving ordinances like baptism. I know that we can repent and that Christ is so so merciful and is at the door knocking, waiting for us to let Him in. I know that feelings of peace and comfort follow sincere repentance and I am so so greatly that I have this knowledge of this gospel in my life. I feel truly humbled to have been born in this gospel and to have been raised in a family that is strong in the gospel and that Christ is the center of our home. I know that we are sealed together for eternity and I am so grateful for this knowledge and I am so grateful I have this opportunity to share this knowledge with this people here in Spain. 

Con mucho amor, Hernama Heims

BAPTISM

Holy cow what a weekend! I literally feeel like my heart is going to explode with happiness and love for this gospel and this work! Carlos was baptized on Saturday and it went SO perfectly (except for one thing which I will wirte about in a second jaja). he was so so so excited and ready and the turn out was incredible. He invited several friends and his brother that lives 30 minutes north of here and they all came and none of them are members and they all loved it and ahh it was jsut so amazing. Actually, his brother is being taught by the hermanas up north, we are teaching one of his friends (more on him later bc he is amazing too! ) and another of his friend is being taught up norht as well and we just found out yesterday that they set a baptismal for the 12th. They are all from Cuba and living on the streets here in mardid. There is a youtube video that explains their whole story, it is really really neat and if I have time at the end of the email Ill tell you the name so you can watch it although only Wade and Reilly will be able to understand. Anyways, ok so we went by to talk with him saturday morning and he was just on cloud nine it was so wonderful to see. And then he arrived at the chapel at 4;30, the baptism wasnt until 6 but he was too excited to wait any longer! So we met him there and took tons of pics and ah man I cant even describe to you the spirit that was there. Just absolutely amazing. The talks were great, the baptism went perfectly, there were yummy refreshments and everyone stayed and chatted after with him and he was just in heaven, and so were we. Then he was confirmed yesterday adn recieved the Gift of the Holy Ghost to complete the baptism. Wonderful. 

Ok, and one thing about Carlos, he reminds me EXACTLY of dad! Seriously! I have been thinking and thinking and thinking that there was something about him and was just so familiar and then the other day it hit me like a ton of bricks when he was helping us in our lesson with REinier that he is exactly dad. His personality, super strong testimony, and just his whole demeanor! When I realized this it made me incredible happy! 

HAHAH ok you are not even going to believe this.... so the only part of the baptism that didnt go so well was the "special musical number"...... can you guess who sung?????????  Mom, I can never ever laugh at you for singing at Lindsay¨s baptism ever again. So Hna Caballero has a really good vioce and likes to sing at the beginning of some of our lessons (sounds teribley strange but it invites the Spirit SO perfectly and actually our investigators love it and make us do it if we forget) So Hna Caballero has this song that her mom sung at her baptism and it is super pretty and she planned on singing it on Saturday. But last week she told me that I am going to sing it with her and obviously I said heck no but she insisted and then Carlos insisted as well. So, yes, Hna Caballero and I sung a duet at the baptism. JAJAJ. Seriously. oh my. terrible. Because here is the thing, Hna Caba has a super great voice but it is not super loud and strong which meant that you could totally hear mine. And the tune was some random one that her mom made up so it wasnt one that I was familiar with. Anyways, Im pretty my face was as red as you can get and what not while we were singing. Ah, so stinking embarrassing. 

Ok so on to Reinier and the miracles that happened this week with him. So he is 23 and lives with CArlos on the street (I want to take a picture of thier tent set up thing adn send it to you bc it is actually pretty legit. Anyways, he met with the missionaries in Malaga hace 2 anos or something like that but nothing came of it. Then he started seeing the changes in CArlos and asked if we would teach him! So we taught him the restauracion and he loved it and wanted to learn more. Well, Hna Caba had to do intercambios (still cant remember what they call them in englsih, quizas exchanges or splits or something) so I was left with our area and our investigators for a day. My comp was Hna Snelson who just came into the field this transfer. We were both kinda nervous about how the day wold go but it went so well. Seriously the whoel day was miracle after miralce. WE taught Reinier the PLan of Salvacion and he said he loved it and knew it was true. When we asked him what his purpose was in this life he said to follow Jesus Christ by keeping the commandments and being baptized. HA! Perfect! Carlos was in the lesson with us and was bearing his testimony the whole time (Ive said this before but really, there is nothing in this world like hearing your investigator bear their testimony! I was almost in tears several of times!) and helping us out when we were struggling with the langauge. And Calros kept referringt o "our church" when he talked, as if he was already baptized and what not. It made my heart happy! Anyways, Reinier came to the baptism and loved it! And this last week every time we went and taught Carlos REinier would make sure he was there to listen in and then we would come back later in the day and teach Reinier. Anyways, we plan on giving him a baptismal date tomorrow when we meet with him and we are way excited! 

And lastly Dani!!!!!! DANI HAS A FECHA!!!!!!! Oct 12 he is going to be baptized! AH, once again, by heart is just too happy to even begin to describe the last few lessons we have had with him! We fasted with him to help him stop smoking completely (he used to smoke at least a pack a day and now he has been doing so good but every few days he caves in a smokes 1 or 2). And last night we taught him once again the importance of baptism and we went throught the baptismal interview questions with him and decided on a date that we know he can be ready by! We are so excited! We know that through our faith in this fast and through his continued efforts and most importantly help from Christ he will be able to quit smoking. It is the only thing that is preventing him from being baptized. 

Ha ok so one more miracle. So when I was with hna snelson we has 10 minutes before we ahsd to go catch the metro to head to a lesson with Carlos so we decided that we would contact until then. We contacted this lady who said she wouldnt give us her number but that we could go to the bench across the street and share with her there. We were completely taken back because that just doesnt happen here and the fact that by this time we only had like 6 minutes before the metro would come that hna snelson and I kinda panicked and taught the msot CHAOTIC lesson ever. We both felt inspired to teach a 5 minute lesson about the restauracion so we did and let me tell you... chaos. We were literally all over the place. But at the end the lady, Isabel said, you know I feel complete peace and tranquilidad when I am with you. We about died. And she gave us her number. Just one more testimony that really the most important thing is the Spirit. 

There is actaully so much ore that i want to tell you about but this email is already super long and I am sure you dont want more rambling. Plus I am just about out of time. 

Oh but I cant forget this... so I got my hair cut last monday, Yeah, definitely not the best decision I have ever made. I dont know what I was thinking going to get my hair cut when my comp only speaks spanish, the people there only speak spanish, I dont speak spanish, and to top it off it was at a hair school. Haha yeah seriously what was I thinking?? Thankfully hair grows back. haha. I am laughing now about it but last Monday I definitely wasnt laughing. hah. The guy literally took probably 60 percent of my  hair, pulled it to the top off my head and just started chopping. When he started doing this I literally thought I was going to die. oh my. 

Ok thats it. I hope you all have a wonderful week! I love you! Thank you for your prayers, I feel them and I need them! 

Love, Hermana Heims

PICTURES

Elder Ballard came to visit

Hello family!

Wow I cant believe it is Monday again, I feel like I just wrote you
yesterday. I hope you all had a great week. From your emails it sounds
like it was fun! I am jealous you all partied in AZ without me! Thanks
for all of the pics. I love each one so much!

Well, this week was good. We have been contacting up a storm this week
which has been fun and exhausting but hopefully several of the
references we received will meet with us this coming week and we can
start teaching more people. But, like I said last week, the few people
we are teaching are wonderful! I wanna talk about Carlos because holy
cow he is just incredible and so so prepared and ready to be baptized
this saturday! We meet with him every single day and it is always the
highlight of my day. It really is a testimony to me of the power of
the spirit because I cant understand him whatsoever but the spirit is
so so strong in our lessons that I can just feel the spirit testify to
me what he is saying is true and that he really does have a super
strong testimony of this gospel. He gets money from people who walk by
and he has been saving 10% of it for the past 2 weeks so that once he
is baptized he can pay his tithing. Also, so he had the baptismal
interview lesson with him the other day in preparation for his
interview yesterday with the DL and we were talking about the word of
wisdom and what not and Hma Caballero and her old comp had obviously
already taught him this principle awhile ago but apparently it didnt
quite click in his head because the day after our lesson about the
interview he said he had started fasting right after we left and was
going to end his fast later that night to help him have the strength
and ability to quite smoking. This shocked us for several reasons.
First, we had no clue he smoked. He never smelt like smoke and they
taught him the word of wisdom and he said he understood it and would
live it etc. But the coolest thing is that he had a testimony of
fasting and fasted on his own for help. He told us that since that
fast he threw out all of his cigarettes and has not had a desire to
smoke since. Pretty darm amazing. I know that the power from fasting
and praying is so so real. We also took him to the temple and did a
temple tour this week and it was so wonderful. I finally can send pisc
so I will send a pic of him in front of the temple.

Fernando is great but is beign stubborn and has a lot of fear that we
are trying to help him with. We keep inviting him to pray to know if
what we are teaching him is true, along with other commitments as
well, and we keep goign back and finding out that he fulfilled the
committed to read etc but he has yet to pray to find out if what we
are teaching is true. He loves coming to church. loves the Book Of
Mormon, has been to 2 baptisms and loves them but refuses to pray
because he says he is scared for the answer (he obviously knows what
the answer will be). When he was in the States for surgrey and
recovery for 5 years and was all by himself he said the only thing
that never failed him was his church. And so he is says he is too
loyal to be able to change churches. We taught him that the important
thing is to be loyal to God and Jesus Christ, not necessarily the
church itself. Anyways, its been challenging with him and after much
prayer, we both feel that if this week he still wont commit to pray
then its probably not his time.

We have had several other lesson 0 this week and several of them have
failed us which is always to sad. They always tell us "... I´m
sorry..." and we think to oursleves, no we are the ones that are sorry
because we know that this is their salvation.

Hermana Caballero is still as great as ever. I honestly dont know how
I got so blessed to be able to learn from her and be her companion.

Well, that is it for this week.

Ohhhh my gosh, how the heck did I forget.....

ELDER BALLARD came here on saturday and at the very last second we got
a text saying that he rearranged his schedule to be able to meet with
the missionaries for 1 hour the following day! We were all so stoked!
We were able to shake his hand and the whole hour was just amazing. He
spoke about DyC 11 and said "your desire is directly proportional to
your success". he also gave us the advice to carry around a small
picture of Christ with us and whenever we are feeling down or
discouraged or just need help to just take a second a look at the
picture and remember what happened in the Gardin of Getsemani. Way
cool huh? So, today Hermana Caba and I are going to the church book
store to get a nice, small pic of the Savior to keep with us always.
Anyways, this devotional was wonderful and was jsut what I needed.

I hope you all have a wonderful week. Thank you for your love and
support and prayers. I need them and I feel them.:)

I LOVE YOU!

Love, Hermana Heims

Cute new Apt

Hola Familia!

What a week.

First off, I have to tell you about my comp because I am pretty sure
she is the most incredible missionary I have ever met and I feel
completely humbled and so grateful to be able to work with and learn
from her. I honestly hope and pray that I can become a missionary like
her. Her love for our investigators and for this work is pretty darn
incredible. Everything she does she does for them and for the Lord.
She is insanely funny, works super super hard, and pues, I dont know,
she is just great and I am feel so blessed to be her companion. Oh,
and she is super super patient which I appreciate a ton too! But,
wow-eee there has been a TON of silence this week and it is about
going to kill me. And I can tell it is about going to kill her too.

Our piso is tiny. And when I say tiny I mean itty bitty. Haha but
somehow we all make it work. The bathroom is so small you ahve to sit
sideways on the toilet to be able to fit. haha. But, it is so darling!
The walls are all yellow and white and there are super cute
decorations all around. I really like it! But, since there are 4 of us
living in it and the area authority wants only 2 per piso Hma Caba and
I are on teh hunt to find a new one.

I am still not sleeping at all and President and Hma Jackson are
worried about it so I got meds last week to help me sleep but they
didnt work. Its ok though, Heavenly Father is blessing me with just
enough energy to get through the day.

Pues, our investigators....

Hma Caballero had a few baptisms right before I came and then also had
one on Saturday so right now we only have 3 investigators. These three
investigtors are pretty rock solid though!

Carlos lives on the street and they found him through a reference from
his brother how is being taught up north. He is incredible. Seriously.
I cannot for the life of me understand him. Like at all. But I feel
the spirit so strong in our lessons with him which is so neat. On
Monday we decided to aks him to pray with us and pick a date to be
baptized and immidiately he said Septiembre 21!!!!! Woah. The Spirit
that we all felt when he said that date was amazing! I know that the
HOly Ghost testified to him and to us at that moment that he can and
will be prepared by this day. So, we are helping him prepare to be
baptized by the 21st. We meet with him everyday in a little alley
thing right off of the street that he has a little tent thing set up
on. He is 50ish and from Cuba. He came to church yesterday and told us
he felt uncomfortable in his clothes he was wearing so we asked the
elders and they said they have a huge bag full of white shirts and
pants from elders that have recently gone home so we are hoping we can
find some stuff to fit him and he can feel more comfortable at church
in nicer clothes.

Fernando. Oh what a guy. He is crazy. But great. The Hermanas found
him a few weeks ago but he hasnt been interested in listening but on
Monday when Hma Caballero and I were walking back from Carlos´s house
we saw him in his Pizzaria and stopped to talk to him and he totally
opened up to us and told us his whole life story and how has a strong
desire to learn more. We teach him every single day at his pizza shop
and he is great. He has had quite the rough life from being kidnapped
and almost beaten to death (He had to go to the states to get plastic
surgery on his face), to a rough family life, to no job, to now having
a job but still barely making is. We are obviously certain that this
gospel is exactly what he needs to help him overcome his past and live
a happy life. But oh man, he asks so many questions, which is great
and all, but his questions are about the smallest littlest tiniest
details that have no significance in the grand scheme of things and he
wont move on unless he understansds them all. Thankfully Hma Caba is
great at keeping control of the lesson and not getting too off topic
while still answering his questions, because in the end, we are
teaching people not lessons.

Dani. Dani is younger. Late 20s I believe. He knows the church is true
but is having a heck of a time quitting smoking. But we are hoping
this week we will see significant progress and give him a baptismal
date. He was doing so well for a whole week and then had a really
crappy day at work and almost got laid off and so at the end of the
day he resorted to smoking. We were devastated when he called us and
told us he had just smoked 3 cigarrettes. But, thankfully we have a
loving, long-suffering, merciful Heavenly Father who will continue to
forgive us and continue to help us if we use the Atonement of His Son.
Man, I just love this gospel. It is so perfect! It just makes sense!

Well, this week our focus is families. We fasted yeterday for help to
be guided to families who are ready to hear and accept and we set
goals to help us find them. We are really excited! We actually found a
family from the Dominican Republic (There are TONS of people from
there here and they are seriously the best people). Husband, wife, and
4 kids. All are baptismal age except the youngest who is 7. We met
with them yesterday and taught them the Restauracion but at the end
the dad said it wasnt their time and they weren´t interested in
hearing more. We were pretty darm bummed. But when we were leaving we
invited them to English class each week and they all said they really
wanna come and that they have been wanting to start learning english.
We also invited the 12 year old daughter to a baptism this coming
Saturday and she said yes and seemed super excited. Then, as we were
walking out of the door the dad apologized perfusely for not offering
us something to eat or drink (tender mercy since we were fasting) adn
said, I promise "next time" there will be fanta. So we left feeling
fairly hopeful that eventually there will be a next time.

We had zone conference this week and WOW! Seriously it was so amazing.
We were all sent a message the night before asking us to be thinking
of how we can have more baptisms and how we can become better
missionaries. The ZLs talk was super great! They gave us time as
companions to set goals and talk about the questions for a bit. Then
the Hermana Leaders (Hma Caballero is one of the Hermana Training
Leaders... told you she is wonderful!!) talked about the importance of
having the spirit with us when we teach. Seriously their talk was
incredible. Woah. They talked about trusting in Heavenly Father and
how when we aks for the spirit to be with us in a lesson or we ask for
the spirit to guide us, we need to TRUST that Heavenly FAther will
send the Holy Ghost to do just that. They also talked about how if we
dont have the spirit with us in our studies in the morning in
preparation for our lessons, then we are not going to have the spirit
with us in our lessons. Anyways, it was all simple doctrine and things
we are taught everyday as we read Predicad Mi Evangelio but the spirit
was so so strong in that meeting. It was awesome and just what I
needed actually.

Pues, I think that is all that I wanted to say. Sorry this email was
kind of a ramble one. ha.

Oh, real fast... good news!!!! I a sure you have heard it but Elder
Ward came BACK! Holy cow! We were all so excited when we were told
this at Zone conference! Miracles are so real!

I love you family! Thank you so much for your prayers... keep them coming! haha

I hope you all have a great week!

Love, Hermana Heims

New Native Companion

Holy cow I have so much to write and absoultely zero time today.
Transfers were today. Ready for it........... My new comp is Hermana
Cabellero.... From SPAIN. Meaning she only speaks spanish. And when I
say only speaks spanish and no enlgish I really mean it. She knows
words like hi bye whatever, father, etc. but nada mas. I got the call
on Saturday and have practically been freaking out since. Pero, I know
that it will be good for me and I know that Heavenly Father will
strengthen me. We´ve spent the last 3ish hours together and well, its
been pretty silent. But I am hopeful that that will change within the
next few weeks. Its funny how life works, especailly the mission. But,
I know Christ is right by my side and somehow this will work out.

I also left me area. Yes, I had to leave Maribel, Fatima, y Luna. Oh
man, yesterday was so hard saying bye to them. We all cried and sweet
little Luna kept saying, but no, you are my missionaries and you are
the ones supposed to teach me etc. But by the end she quietly said,
Its true, I cant be selfish, you have to go change other peoples lives
too. Ahh, totally melted my heart that litttle one. She asked as we
were leaving if we could have family hug. So darling. Fatima was
actually really upset too and could barely get through church with us.
It was a really sad day but I know that the new elders that took
Hermana Munden and I´s place are exactly what our investigators need.
ANd we told them that and although they dont believe us now, they
will! BUT! The super great thing is that I am still in the same zone
(I am now in Cuatro Caminos, so still in Mardid) which means when
Fatima and Luna get baptized I will be able to go!!!!! Ah! Saying bye
to sweet Belen was so sad as well. She is just not finally starting to
really open up to us and confide in us. She already emailed me this
morning!

Oh my, it was also so hard saying bye to all of the MTC teachers that
were in my ward. And not being able to live by the temple anymore.

Well, today I just organized my room and after we are goiing grocery
shopping and then to a chinese restuarant with our district and then
we have a few lessons tonight. I am excited to meet our investigators.

Ok, I have lots of pics to send but hopefully I will get to them next week.

I love you all so much!

Love, Hermana Heims

PS I HAVE A NEW ADRESS. But, I dont know it. haha. So, send everything
to the mission home. The address I left you with. Mom, have you sent
th package yet? I hope not!