27th of February 2012

Hey all,

ok first off here is a link that was sent to me, its a short video about missionary work, a member showed it to us while we were at his house this week it is really good. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BMIoiUO61tU . there are spanish subtitles obviously because a mexican sent it to me but that doesnt change the quality of the video, eh? :) 

     Anyway, this week was fun as iwas threatened to be deported HAHA it was one of the funniest things i have ever seen, but i had to go to the migration office to renew my FM3 non-migrational permision card, which is like my license here in mexico, but i didnt have the first card they gave me last year cause we always have to send it back to mexico city and then they sent me an electronic permission to print out the renewed card in the city where i am serving. the lady didnt understand that (she was just the receptionist) and when she called the official over saying i was here illegaly she handed him the paper, which he read, he than handed me my passport and the permission i had printed out and said ´´its the first door on your left´´ my companion thought it was the funniest thing, but thats the least important part of what happened this week.

     We had a baptism this saturday right after a stake tracting activity. the young men and young women came to our area and we taught them how to contact someone, or knock on their door, and then we all went out and knocked on every door of every person that live in this one colony that is fairly new. from that activity we have 86 new refferals, and we have about 3 weeks worth of knocking doors done in 2 hours. it was probably the coolest part of the whole week. other than the baptism that is. Miguel Angel Madrid Geronimo was baptised, his sister was baptised a month before he was and helped us alot while teaching him the lessons. it was a super spiritual baptismal service.

    Also, we are teaching Dolores, who was a referral from a lady in our ward, and she is one of those people that we leave the pamphlet with her that is for the next lesson we will teach when we return. She reads it like 4 times and then teaches us the lesson before we can say ´Hola´ the next time we come back. She is a great investigator. :) very easy to teach.

    We also contacted one of the referrals that was given to us from the activity this saturday. the guy is about 23 and his wife is expecting a baby. he is from chiapas but lives here in nuevo laredo and has since hes been like 9. but he told us he wanted to read the book of mormon because he is looking for the true church and feels he can find out some answers by reading it. he couldnt have been more right! we are super excited to teach him, even though his schedule is super tight cause he works 2 jobs and studys, he sleeps from 2 to 6 in the afternoon everyday. tough schedule.

     Anyway, thats the update this week! Love you all!

-Elder Paden W Allen

Yep 2/20/2012

Sup all,

This week was fairly boring, not a whole lot went on. i had to do alot of splitz with my district so i spent alot of time traveling and traveling. i spent a day in Anahuac, which is in the next state, Nuevo Leon. its alot like good old malad even though its like 4 times the size. its very very very small for this part of the country. the city i am in right now is a bit bigger than Logan i think its safe to say.

We{re teaching a lady right now who is about 40, she has 3 kids and her Brother just came back from a high security prison in guadalajara, shes a single mom named Dolores. she is prepared beyond belief. she basically teaches herself and we just sit there and gawk. this week i returned to read my journals and i have realized that i am not anywhere near who i was before i left. i realize now how much i had to mature, and  like they say here......Y Lo Que Falta! we´re starting to change where we are working but not too much because if we continue baptising like we have been in the colony where we are working they will split the ward and form a new branch and construct a new chapel in this colony because its super far away from the chapel right now. we just have to find more worthy priesthood holders.

Anyway thats the update this week, Love you all and talk to you next week!

Elder Paden W Allen

13th of February 2012

Hello everyone,

This week was particularly strange. it was long but short at the same time and we did lots of work with out accomplishing ANYTHING. it was difficult as it was cold and rainy all week, one day snow almost fell. it was great!

Tuesday was by far my favorite day this week. I didnt sleep at all monday night, a half an hour to be exact, and tuesday was the zone conference. We always start a zone conference with a demonstration of pictures of Baptisms. There were a ton from our area and it was good to see them. but there was one photo in particular that when i saw it i felt the spirit SUPER strong. it was the picture of sister Martha Alicia de Lazaro, and her daughter Gabbi. I saw that picture and just started bawling cause i could feel the spirit so strong. Here is the funny part. after the slideshow i had overcome the tears and was all right, but we started singing the opening hymn and it was the same story, i started to bawl, it was quite embarassing cause i had to say the opening prayer. needless to say i said a quick hard to understand prayer, the Mission Pres was conserned that maybe my mom had died or something. He requested a special interview with me and i told him it was just a series of super strong spiritual expiriences. It was one of the best yet most embarassing moments in my mission. the only time that  was more embarassing was when i said that an investigator was sexy instead of a good person, a noobie mistake in my first area. Its a difference of one word that is easily misunderstood by americans. i used ´´estar´´ instead of ´´ser´´, but thats a different story.

This week was hard to find new people to teach but it was good for me as it was a reguvinating expirience. :)

Love you all!

Elder Allen

Most Recent: Week of Tears 2/6/2012

Family and friends.

This week was one of the hardest weeks i have had in my mission. I had to do lots of traveling to Anahuac. i small town in my District. it took up alot of time and i had to do a baptismal interview. that wasnt the hard part. the hard part was we lost practically 3 days of work in our own area. it was depressing. I had nightmares all week long. didnt sleep hardly at all. We didnt have any investigators in sacrament meeting. it just wasnt too fun. it just reminds me that Even missionaries have trials. actually missionaries have about 50% more trials than a normal person. We had a super awesome period of blessings in this area and now we are seeing the trials.

The weather has been crazy. Super cold then super hot. its not the most enjoyable thing in the world. Tomorrow we have a Zone conference in Monterrey. it will be good. I am putting even more of my heart into the work this week. before i have been working with reservations. this week is a new story... Elder Allen SUPER MISSIONARY!!!

With Love,

Elder Paden W Allen

 

D&C 4... Word.

Second week training

Friends and family,

 This week was a good one. we had 5 baptisms and we are working hard. we had a leadership conference in Monterrey for the district leaders. It was good and we learned ALOT there wqas a bunch of stuff tht i learned there that helped me drastically to understand what it is exactly that I have to do as a missionary. Which is a super good thing cause i was a bit nervous, not anymore though :) we did lose lots of time however and we didnt find too many new people to teach, which will be difficult to make up for in the coming weeks. But the work is definetly progressing in this area there are alot of people that are more than ready to hear the gospel. Its really awesome to be involved in the work of the Lord in this period of time!The people that got baptised are: Sergio, Rosa Maria, Jessica, Pedro, and Jose Manuel it was a bit complicated to get them to the service but it all worked out in the end :) Thankfully :) It was one of the most spiritual baptsmal services i´ve been apart of in my mission.

Love you all!

Elder Allen

P.s. this week i had to move the pictures i had on my desk into my room cause they were making me trunky LOL

New Responsibilities

Friends and Family,

This week i aquired several new responsibilities as District Leader and Trainer. Its wierd but thats ok, not liking the whole giving permission thing, but its my job now. I dont feel any different i think that is why its so wierd.

My New Companion is from Sinaloa Mexico, Cuilacan, His name is Rùben Daniel Hernàndez Valle, hes little bigger and reminds me of a samoan, he like to sing Disney music, i think i`m gonna have Tarzan stuck in my head in spanish for the eternities, Not a bad thing... ``En mi Corazon...´´

We had a super awesome expirience this week as we contacted a refferral form a member. we found the son first, he`s 19 and acccepted a baptismal date. we found the parents later and had a supèr spiritual lesson teaching the plan of salvation. As Missionaries we are authorized to promise blessing by the power of the priesthood and in the name of Jesus Christ, but only when the Spirit prommpts it. I had never done it in my mission. They had a daughter die young about 12 years ago and we promised them with that authority that if they strived to follow christ with all their hearts, accepting ordinances and covenants they would see their daughter again and would be able to spend eternity with her. It was super spiritual and was special, one of the most powerful expiriences in my mission.

This week i fought alot with allergies, Spring seems to be starting here and as such the pollen etc is running rampant. For 3 nights i couldnt sleep even with allergy meds becaus ey eyes we super red and itchy. Not been a fun adventure.

Thats all the super exciting news for this week, Comments, suggestions, jokes and Gossip are all welcomed and will be responded to the next week end.

Love you all,

Elder Paden W Allen

Week in the house

Hello All,

So other than the fact that tuesday we lost the whole day trying to donate blood, well my companion anyway, as i´m american and cant do it. We were there from 7AM to 6PM.. not good. thursday and half of friday we were in the house resting as my comp had half his toenail cut off because he had an ingrown toenail... Not fun also we dont have a whole lot of time caus etoday are transfers and my companion is saying goodbaye to everyone. He is going to monterrey i will be made trainer and district Leader... Super nervous about that. Dont want to screw up... Sorry its short this week you´ll get the full update next week, NO TIME this week.

With Love Elder Allen