Week # 9 Feshhhhhhh

October 21, 2013

       Feshhhhhh (fetch) that’s what all the Mexicans in this mission say haha. I love it. Wow the mission is so great. We are seeing so much success, we are working 18 hour days and are teaching and walking and teaching and walking. Its crazy! We have 15 people in our area with baptism dates but they wont come to church and i don’t know if I have mentioned this but in our mission it is a rule that the investigators go to church 5 times before they can get baptized. Or else we would have 5 baptisms every week. Everyone here just wants to be saved and live with their families, but for some reason they don’t want to put forward the effort which sucks but we wont give up. This work is too great to just give up. And it is so sad to see so many dead missionaries that just don’t want to work and just are here for crap reasons. Feshh I am here to save souls, not here to impress the hunnies or my mom, or to say I served a mission, or even to find a wife that only wants a returned missionary. (These are all great reasons, but not the right ones.) I am in no way a perfect missionary, I want to hit my companion so bad at times haha. I sometimes am not as diligent as I could be in my studies or my prayers. But I am here for the right reasons. I am a pair of arms legs, eyes and mouth for the Lord for 21 more months. I will never be a dead missionary. I am going to work until I can work no mas. I am running myself into the ground for the lord. We spend 8 months of our missions sleeping. That sucks!! That means for the other 16 months I am going to run myself into the ground cause I only get those 16 months ONCE!

       I want all of you who will serve a mission to commit to yourselves to be an instrument in the hands of God cause that’s what we need here. If you are not going for the reason to bring many souls unto salvation then just don't come. We don't need you. We need people that will preach with power and with authority and if your not going to give it your all then please either change or don't come. Freak I was coming here for the wrong reasons and to be honest I was planning on serving a half effort mission but I’ve had a change of heart. I have seen the change in people’s eyes. They become happy and purposeful you would be surprised how many people live an un-purposed life. This gospel gives you purpose.

       We were walking down the street and I got a prompting to talk to this family sitting on the curb we were talking to her, and I found out she spoke broken English, because she lived for 2 years in the USA. She got deported and lived homeless in Tijuana for a while then she moved here, and was making money boxing for a local gym. She is really good! She had brain cancer and lost all the money that she had earned. She is still boxing though ahaha, but anyway when we started talking to her she agreed to listen to the messages. We taught her the plan of salvation and I bawled my eyes out to her for like 20 minutes in my broken Spanish. I testified of the truthfulness of the Resurrection and the Power of the Atonement of Jesus Christ. She then committed to pray and read the book of Mormon and we set up an appointment for the next day. We met with her and she had read 1st Nephi and all of 3rd Nephi. She is already changing. She wanted to know how she could more follow Christ. We committed her to baptism, she accepted, but she wanted more. We committed her to come to church, but she couldn’t cause her sister was coming into town, but she wanted to know how she could more follow Christ. We talked about law of chastity word of wisdom and tithing. She isn't married and doesn’t have a boyfriend, and she only drinks coffee (which is a miracle here in Mexico) and she said she didn’t have money to pay tithing, but she wanted to give us 10 percent of her bread and fruit, that’s all she had. We told her that God knew the intentions of her heart and as soon as she was making more money again that she could pay her tithing. She had a 180-degree turn of heart and desire in 24 hours. This is why I am on the mission cause there are people that need to hear this gospel and have the desire to truly follow Christ.

       How can I find these people and teach them to follow Christ and change their lives if I cant do it myself so I’ve really had to do a 180 degree turn and I’m doing it poco a poco little by little. I can see the fruits and dang do they taste good. Fesssshh I love this gospel and am so stoked to hear about all my friends and family (Ty, Taylor Watkins, Jaleisa Jones, Austin Measels, Austin Birrer, Danielle Eggleston just to name a few, my time is limited sorry family, and friends) Holy crap we have such an amazing group of kids going to some really cool places. All of you have had a major impact and some of you have never known but its happened and thank you and I love you so dang much. Please stay strong we have work to do. And please all of you Kiddy Cats at home that are sitting on the "should I serve a mission" fence fetching jump down and start preparing for a mission. It’s the hardest thing I have ever done hands down, and I’ve had to do some hard crap in my life. This has also been thee most amazing most rewarding time in my life hands down. Nothing comes close and I wish I ‘d been better prepared. You don’t have to be perfect to serve a mission I was far from it. But I was eligible for the spirit and worthy. But not perfect. Nobody is no matter how good they look, or act.

       But anyways that is my final thought for the night. My Mom has always told me to live big. Yet I’ve remained small. I’ve done cool things, but when I go to sleep at night can I say that I lived this day BIG. Here on the mission I feel I am. I feel like I need to do something great and awesome in my life, if the mission is the greatest thing I do in this life, I will be happy, but if there is something even greater then heck yes. “THERE IS ALWAYS ROOM AT THE TOP" I love this quote it was told to me by a straight up angel set in my path by God himself and I have taken it to heart. I will try as hard as I can to live it everyday. I am done living small. I want to be at the top. I want to be remembered not in the eyes of world but in the eyes of God. I do not want to have my name scratched of the wall of great people latter day saints or not. I want to be at the top in whatever I do. Whether that be my mission or business or whatever. I want to be the best I can. And I can only do that through God and Jesus Christ. They are the best! But anyway holy crap I love you all and hope to hear great things from you. Don’t be afraid to do some cool things and live big. I love you all. #prayforgrant cause stealing all my moms 80´s clothes wont make him look cooler than me.  

Love, Elder Rodabough