Life is good

God blessed us a lot this week as far as finding cool new families goes. We're hoping that they can progress more this week. 

Next week is transfers and my companion goes home. I want to train my last 2 changes. I feel like that would be awesome. We'll see though what happens. About 1/2 of the mission goes home in the next 3 changes. So there will be a lot of new people and President says that a lot of the leaders will be training while the rest will stay.

 

Life's good here, I am now very use to the heat.  I think I'm going to die of the cold in Utah.

No te precupes. Ten FE. 

Hermana Merrill

Reflecting

June 9th letter:

This week I was going through a few letters from the beginning of my mission and reflecting on how well God know us. I know he cares about us and loves us and puts us with the right people and in the right places to help us grow exactly how he wants us to grow. I know he put me here in Nicaragua for such a specific purpose. I hope that I can and have been an instrument in His hands to help his children here in Nicaragua. But if I haven't done that, I know for sure he has made me who He needs me to be. I know I have been touched by Nicaragua, by my mission President and the responsibilities he has given me, by the missionaries here, by the people I have met. I hope I can find those He needs me to help and that I can have the love and faith to help them.

I love you all and I know this is is the true church of God. I am saddened by those who chose to go away from it and those who choose not to listen. But God didn't send us here on earth to be condemned but to progress. Jesus Christ died for our sins and imperfections. That means we can move on and progress after we sin. I love this gospel. Living the gospel is a commitment for our whole lives. Find a friend. Teach them the joy in living the gospel. 

Love you all lots!

Hermana Merrill

Wedding Week

Monday June 2nd letter

I got to do divisiones with Hermana Rayond this week I know God put us in this mission together for a reason. She is such a true friend. And always motivates me to be better. Blessing from God!

I was jealous of Nate and Allie's wedding so we had a little wedding of our own... (= Mercedes and Isidro! They got married and he got baptized this week! They are so special! Lots of Mercedes' family came to the wedding and now we're teaching them as well. Pictures coming. Miracles happen in LEON! WE went to Leon this morning to renew the ID (cedula) of my companion so that she can leave the country, and now we're back in Leon and headed to Managua again tommorrow! (there's another leader's council) Lots of traveling (= 

It's supposed to be raining a lot right now, but it's not, just one time this week.

Love you all lots!

Hermana Merrill

May's Happenings

This week there were definitely miracles in Leon. We have been working with a sister named Ana and she got baptized this week!  

Ana- She is a single mom. Her little girl is 3 years old and this past week Ana lost her job because she had to take care of her sister's baby all week long and her boss doesn't let kids be at work. (she just left him with her). She didn't have money to even feed her girl. She was, earlier in her life, an alcoholic and just hung out on the street. But one day she made a promise with God that she wouldn't drink again and would start taking care of her girl. She started looking for a job, and mercifully she found one. Then we found her and God has really helped her life. She started going to church and then got baptized. We promised her that if she obeyed the commandments and trusted in God, followed-through with her baptism and always went to church, God would never let her girl go hungry. Right after her baptism the second counselor gave her work making tortillas, and another lady in the ward gave her clothes for her girl. We didn't even ask. The relief society president had visited her with us the week before and knew her circumstance, but didn't know that we had promised her that as missionaries. God is a very loving God, who works miracles when we show faith.

Rudy FINALLY got confirmed. (thanks to the support of the ward! I love our ward)

Two families came to church! One of them, Myra and Jaime are going to get baptized this following week (if we can somehow get the mom to come to Leon or Managua for the marriage- because Myra is 17 and her mom needs to sign because she's underage). So pray for a miracle! The mom lives quite far away!

I love you all! 

Hermana Merrill

Well this week was just crazy. We went to Managua and then for the next 4 days we did divisions. Two divisions 2 days in a row and then the Hermana Assistants came and did surprise divisions with us from Saturday until Sunday night. Crazy. (=

The mom of Maria couldn't come this week so Maria and Jaime couldn't get married and baptized, but she says she's coming this Thursday so cool!

This might be a short letter. Sorry, I really don't know what happened this week. I blinked and it was gone!

We went and took pictures on top of the cathedral today!  Hermana Raymond gave me the red glasses and Hermana Tarax the Headband (=
Thanks for all your birthday wishes!

Hermana Merrill

It was really good to see you all this week, I love you all lots! 

This week we had an event in all of Nicaragua put on be the stakes called la semana de las familias, or The family week. BUT... we found out about it on Thursday of this week. I knew that every stake in Nicaragua was going to do it, and I had been asking our bishop what we were going to do for it for 3ish weeks back, but he told me that the stake hadn't told him anything about it. So I thought we weren't going to do anything for it. The activities were supposed to start on Monday, but on Thursday they called an emergency meeting to plan for the rest of the week. (= 

So, we frantically started to help spread the word on Friday. The catch is that on Saturday we had a dinner planned with Hermana Isidro and Mercedes to help pay for their marriage the next week. Basically all the members had already bought tickets to the dinner. We decided just to move the time from 6 to 5, letting people eat and then go to the devotional at 7. Better attendance at the devotional. BUT the dinner didn't finish at 7 as everyone was still eating.  So for the dinner that I planned, the devotional got postponed... (= hahaha I hope the stake President and I are still friends.

Mercedes and Isidro are so cool. They're in love and so excited to get married, and him to get baptized. He reads the Book of Mormon between every visit AND goes every week to church!

Anyways besides that Miracles do happen every week and I love you family

Hermana Merrill

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