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Calfornia San Fernando Mission, Spanish speaking
April 2010 - October 2011
October 9, 2011
It’s really good to be here again with my family and my friends. Firstly, I would like to thank everyone that has supported me throughout my whole mission. I experienced some challenges during my service. I know that prayers on my behalf and on the behalf of those around me were answered. I have a testimony of prayer. It works. Thank you for all of your support.
I would like to start off by sharing a story that was told to me by my MTC companion, Hermana Kakuschke.
There once was a young man with a heart of gold. All were able to see his heart, and it appeared to be very pure and golden. The young man treasured his heart deeply and eventually arrived to become very prideful of this most beautiful possession. To his advantage, the young man would travel, flaunting it at every opportunity.
“Look at my heart,” he would say, “It is the most beautiful heart in all the land. Wouldn’t you agree?” Many did agree. Upon inspecting it, one would not be able to find a single flaw on the surface. For many years the young man went about showing his heart off to anyone that would pass, becoming more boastful and narcissistic as time went on.
One day, an older man happened to pass by him. The young man leaped at yet another opportunity to show his heart to someone else. Like the other passersby’s, the old man inspects this heart of gold.
“This is very impressive,” he says, “You appear to have a very beautiful heart. I’m sure others have told you that many times.” Handing the heart back to the young man, the old man stops and ponders. He then asks, “Has anyone ever shown you their heart?”
“No, they haven’t,” replied the younger man. In fact, it had never crossed his mind to ask to see someone else’s heart. He had always assumed that there was no heart better than his own.
“Would you care to see mine? I would like to show you,” offered the old man.
A little taken back from this unique offer and also thinking that this poor old man will not have a heart better than his own, the young man agreed.
The old man carefully took out his fragile heart. Upon seeing his heart, the young man is taken back in disgust and fright. In his hands there was something that did not resemble even the littlest bit of the heart of the younger. Was this old man sure this could be a heart at all?
It was a distorted mess of pieces smashed together. Certain places were shriveled. Pieces were missing. It appeared that it was made of different parts that didn’t fit quite right. Many different colors, bright, pastel, grey, and dark shimmered and dulled around it. But nevertheless, it was in perfectly working order. It might have even worked better than the boy’s flawless heart.
The young man finally worked up the courage to comment.
“This cannot be any heart at all. It does not look or feel like one. You must have no heart old man. For this reason you have shown me this thing. You want mine.”
The old man started to smile, “My dear lad. It is indeed a heart. You are correct that it is not like the others.” While he observes his own tender heart tears of memory start to form in his eyes. “While I have lived my life I have come to know a lot of people, a lot more people than you have. They have been dear friends, acquaintances, family, and even enemies. Every time I have met someone I have given them a piece of my heart. Many have given me pieces of their own in return. But also, many have not given me some of theirs and I am left without. I live my life to give of myself. I am left with this in return. It is the most precious thing that I have. There are memories of those I love and those that have helped me in my most desperate times. My heart, I believe, is the most valuable of all.”
Finally understanding, the young man is moved to tears. He breaks a piece of his precious, golden heart and caringly gives it to the wise old man. The old man removes a piece of his fragile heart and gives it to the young man in return.
The past year and a half I have been giving my heart to others as I have tried to serve them. My heart is broken. There are a lot of pieces missing. I have pieces that are very dear to me.
I told this story to many of my other companions. One commented, “It is a commandment for us to offer God a sacrifice of a broken heart. (3 Nephi 9:20) Sometimes I think that our heart doesn’t have to only be broken by sin. I think that in many ways God wants to intentionally break our hearts as we are continually giving pieces of it to others. Christ never sinned, yet he died of a ‘broken heart’. No matter how it is broken, I know that Christ was sent to ‘bind up the broken hearted.’ (Isaiah 61:1)”
I chose to serve a mission for many reasons. Since childhood, it’s something that has been deeply engrained in me. I don’t know why. Now that it is over, I am still trying to figure out why I have always had that desire and why I am still feeling the need to preach the gospel. I believe that it is one of the greatest desire to have. I am so grateful for the opportunity that I had to serve a mission.
I served in the California San Fernando Mission, Spanish speaking from April 2010 to October 2011 under President Jerald Martin. It is a large mission. The boundaries start in Los Angeles in the areas of Burbank and North Hollywood. If you have ever visited Universal Studios, it is part of that mission. The mission continues to extend north-east to Santa Clarita and Lancaster for 4 ½ more hours until you reach Bishop and Mammoth Lakes. Bishop is two hours south of Reno, Nevada.
I had seven absolutely wonderful companions during my mission; K. Kakuschke (MTC), S. Clark (Trainer), L. Kisor, K. Haase, J. Kiewra, G. Walton and L. Clayton. I was with Sister Kierwa the longest for a period of 6 months. Sister Kisor and I were companions two different times. I was blessed with the opportunity to train Sister Clayton who will return home in January of 2013.
I served in two areas which were complete opposites of each other. My first area was Bishop and Mammoth Lakes. Many told me I was being “exiled” because it is very far from the main parts of the mission. When I arrived in California, my Mission President told me that I would have to leave the orientation meeting early to arrive in my area before the next day. After the airplane and then a 5 hour car ride., I was very car sick. I also had no idea where I was.
When I arrived in the area there were four sisters. Between the four of us, we covered about 1/3 of the mission. We did a lot of driving, but we also were able to use bikes.
I was transferred to Los Angeles after 4 ½ months in Bishop. Los Angeles was quite the change. Almost everything about it was the complete opposite of Bishop. I was accustomed to the quiet, small town life. Now I was in the big city- always a police car nearby, usually with the sirens on. Instead of cows mooing there were lots of cars filled with people saying, “Mooove!”. Our area was very small compared to my first. It was one mile by one mile.
Nevertheless, it had more people in it than my first, 35,000 people! I would guess that 90% of those living in our area were Hispanic. Instead of driving, we were biking. There was never a dull moment between the police helicopters circling us to the new graffiti that seemed to appear everyday. There was always plenty of service we could do, picking up trash.
Alma 17 talks about when the Sons of Mosiah were leaving on their missions. They were going to go preach to the Lamanites who were, “a wild and a hardened and a ferocious people; a people who delighted in murdering, robbing and plundering...” Canoga Park is similar to what it describes here. It is kind of a dangerous place. We worked with a lot of people that drank. They had problems with drugs. They sold drugs. There were many that had families back in their countries in South America but yet they were having affairs. There were gangs. There were a lot of bad things going on. Not everyone there was involved in those things, but many were.
I came to have a better understanding of God’s love- the love that he has for all of His children. I came to know the people that did those things. I heard their stories. I watched the spirit work in their lives. I felt the spirit lead us to teach them, find them, love them. I do love them. Through the spirit I have felt the love that God has for them. He loves them just as much as He loves us. He sent missionaries to them, just to them there. He wants them to return to His presence too. Their worth is great. My heart is full of gratitude for the opportunity I had to work with those people. I wouldn’t have had it any other way.
“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest most uninteresting person you talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare. All day long we are, in some degree helping each other to one or the other of these destinations. There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal… it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit - immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.” (C.S. Lewis)
The majority of the people in Canoga Park either came from Mexico, Guatemala or El Salvador. If not, it is likely their parents did. The majority crossed the United States border illegally by swimming the river. They did so to obtain a better life in this country. Some escaped war, some poor circumstances. Many were single men that left behind their wives and children so they could support them by working here.
This morning I reported to the High Council on my mission. One asked me a question, “When an illegal resident wants to be baptized, what is the church’s policy?” They are able to be baptized without any limitations. They will be required to have the missionary discussions and have the baptismal interview like anyone else. There are no questions about residency. The baptismal questions are the same for them as they are for other people. The only thing that matters to God is worthiness. The blessings are available to them too.
The first thing that we usually teach someone is the message of the restoration. The first principle that we share as part of that message is that God is our loving Heavenly Father. We are his children. You are a child of God. A lot of people don’t know that about themselves. The central figure of our message is Christ; how He loves each one of us enough to give us this gospel so that one day we can return to live with our Father in Heaven. “Christ died just for you. If you were the only person to ever live here on earth, He would have done it just for you.”
Missionaries can’t do anything by themselves. We’re just people. We cannot convert anybody. It is the Spirit. The Spirit is the single most important element in missionary work. It’s the reason why missionaries have certain rules. It is why they study the gospel every morning. It is the Holy Ghost that testifies to people of what they are saying is true. Some don’t believe that they’re a literal son or daughter of God. They might say to themselves, “It doesn’t make sense. Why did he put me in this situation? I had travel so many days, sleepless nights to come here. I saw my friends die on the way, He doesn’t care. If He cared about me I’d have been put in different circumstances.” If you have the spirit and you testify of their worth, they feel it. They feel something telling them that it’s true.
President J. Reuben Clark Jr said, “We get nearer to the Lord through music than perhaps through any other thing except prayer.” Sometimes we went hymn tracting. Once someone opened the door to us we introduced ourselves and went on to ask if we could sing them a short hymn from our Church. We wanted to help them feel the spirit as soon as possible so we would be able to teach them.
One of these times my companion made me lead us in front as we were riding bikes. I disliked being in front because I am naturally shy and no good at starting up conversations with strangers. I said to myself, “Okay, fine, I’m going to talk to the first person that we see so I can get this over with.” We turned the first street corner we came to. Out of the corner of my eye I saw a man crouching down on the sidewalk outside of his apartment building smoking a cigarette. “That one,” I thought. I was probably going a little too fast on the bike which caused me to slam on my breaks right in front of him. He was startled, and I was put in an awkward situation. The first thing I said was, “Could we sing you a song?” He was a little taken back. I can imagine why. We suddenly had him cornered between the wall and our bikes. Nevertheless he agreed. This was around Christmas time so we sang him a verse of Silent Night. Afterwards, we asked if we could come back later to share a message with him. Luckily, he agreed again.
His name was Jorge Bernal, from Mexico. He had a history of drugs, and was addicted to tobacco. He was baptized a month later. Unfortunately a few months afterwards he was deported back to Mexico. But he had the opportunity to hear and accept the gospel. The whole experience with him was amazing to me. I think that is when we started singing more. We saw how much of an affect music had on the people.
Another time we went to go find a less active member named Venidicto. We had gone there several times before but he was never home. This particular time we went back and knocked. A young man answered the door. He told us that Venidicto wasn’t there. He was working. We were about to walk away but the thought came to sing for him. “Could we sing you a song?” I asked. He didn’t really know what to say but he agreed. After we sang he accepted us the invitation to be taught.
His name was Daniel Lopez from Guatemala. He was 21 at the time. He was baptized two months later.
The Sunday after he was baptized he shared his testimony during fast and testimony meeting. He said the following: “I’ve left a lot of things behind that have happened in the past. I know that I am a new person thanks to the grace of God. I know that the church is true. I want to be a light to my family. My comfort is that God is always with me. I believe in Him.” I was filled with such undescribable joy when I heard him share that.
One of my favorite things about being in my 2nd area for so long, is that was able to meet a lot of people and see the change that occurred in their lives during that time. When I arrived in Canoga Park, the area had been opened for just a few months. I saw it change over the course of those months. The difference I felt when I left that area, and the people… They would always call us “las gueras” which means “white girls.” We would pass they and would always yell, “Gueras, gueras come over here I want to talk to you.” It was so great. The people that were outside most of the day knew us. We knew them.
One of these people was Ricardo. When I had first got to the area he was living on the streets and he was doing drugs. After a long period of not seeing him around we ran into him again. He came up to us and said, “I want to thank you. I’m going to a church. I’m off the streets. I stopped doing drugs because of you. I don’t drink anymore. Because, I know that you’re good church girls. You’re angels. Just by knowing you, you made me want to go back to church. You have helped me so much.” When I heard that, I was amazed. I had no idea we had had that effect on him. We were never able to teach him the lessons. One day, it will be so great to hear of other people that have changed from the example that we gave.
Roberto is another person that I taught very recently. He is from El Salvador. Roberto approached us two weeks after he had stopped selling drugs. He had been considered one of the drug lords in the area. He came up to us drunk and he was crying. He was desperately seeking someone that could help him change. He saw us and knew that we could help him.
Roberto was amazing. He read the assigned chapters the Book of Mormon when we asked him to. He prayed. The way the spirit works is quite remarkable. It is humbling to see it work in people’s lives.
Yosi Velazquez started investigating the church a little over a year ago. He is from Guatemala. (We taught a lot of Guatemalans.) We had taught him all of the lessons several times. He was keeping his commitments but he had a problem. He could not understand the spirit. He was missing the “umph”. We taught him about it several times. We did everything we could to help him recognize it. He told us he knew the church was true, which testimony comes from the spirit, but he was convinced that he couldn’t feel it.
About 7 or 8 months after I had first started teaching him, my companion and I were discussing what we could do to help him. We prayed and felt the impression that we should give him a challenge to read the Book of Mormon in 40 days. We made him a calendar to follow. We went over to his house and told him, “Okay, Yosi, we’re going to read the Book of Mormon with you right now. We are going to start from the beginning. We want you to continue to read and finish it in 40 days. You’ll have to read a lot everyday as you can see on the calendar, but it will be worth it. Will you do it?” He was up for the challenge.
There’s power in the Book of Mormon. There is absolute power in it. I can’t even begin to describe to you how amazing it was. He couldn’t feel the spirit at all before. He finished the Book of Mormon a little over 40 days. He recently started reading it again. We challenged him to read it again before his baptism which will be January 1, 2012. (He’s being very stubborn. He will not get baptized until January 1st. He wants a new year with a new life.) Right now he’s in 2nd Nephi.
When I spoke before I was about to leave for my mission, I mentioned a girl from Singapore named Alison. She came across my YouTube page a few years ago. On my page I have some information about the church and invite all to learn more. She began to email me and ask questions about what we believe. We went on emailing back and forth and the missionaries in Singapore started teaching her. She loved everything about the church. She was not able to get baptized until she was 21. While I was on my mission she had her 21st birthday. I received an email from her this past June. I would like to read you a little bit of the email she sent me because it describes so well some of the emotions that are felt at a baptism. It is such a wonderful experience for all.
“I was baptized on the 11th of June, 2011 - exactly two weeks ago - and it was the most amazing thing that's ever, ever happened to me. I can't even begin to explain to you how beautiful the entire experience was… I was crying throughout that night after my baptism; and especially after my Confirmation the next morning. I couldn't stop the tears from flowing thereafter. It was so, so emotionally nerve-wrecking - but in a profoundly positive way. I couldn't stop smiling - it's made me truly appreciate the long wait so much more; having waited for three long years; to finally become a member of the Church! My testimony and faith have definitely grown alongside my years of being a mere 'investigator' - it's been a tough three years for me - but I know the wait was absolutely worth it all in the end!... I couldn't stop crying inside (even though the tears that streamed down my face were that of extreme joy; an absolute peace in knowing that all was finally okay - well, maybe not perfect - but still okay). I know this Church is - without a doubt - true; and as real as it can get. It completes me.”
In August I received another email from her. Her mom and her sister were baptized too. Again, I started crying because of the joy I felt. It is undescribable.
In Doctrine in Covenants we read that the gospel is to be preached by the weak and simple. During my mission, for a quite a while I thought my “sub-purpose” was to be weak. Most of the time, I felt like I could not do anything right. I couldn’t speak the language very well. I was trying to tell people the best news that one could hear, and it seemed like an impossible task to me. I finally gave up and accepted what the adversary was telling me- that I couldn’t do it.
In the Book of Mormon, when Ammon, one of the sons of Mosiah, arrives in the mission field he gets captured by the Lamanites. Can you imagine that? You leave for your mission and once you arrive you are thrown in jail. He becomes a servant of the King. He was still a set apart missionary, but unexpectedly he was given another task to complete. I’m sure a lot of his preaching was to the animals he was feeding.
Through his other “sub-purpose” as a servant of the King, God was able to help Ammon fulfill his missionary purpose. He ended up helping the King immensely by the power of God, and converted many people.
I pondered upon this story a lot. I came to the realization that my “sub-purpose” was not to be weak. I being weak was not helping to move the work forward. My weaknesses were there to make me humble. I could then have the power to turn them into strengths. Then I could accomplish the task I needed to complete. There is a difference between being humble and being weak. God cannot help us when we are only weak. We need to be humble enough to accept His help. Everything He does is to help us, so if he gives us our weaknesses, it is so that we can be strong. (Ether 12:27)
After I realized those things is when I became the missionary God wanted me to be. After my crutch was gone, I had to find a way to overcome those weaknesses. That’s when I became successful. There is a turning point with everyone when you can choose to remain how you are, or you can choose to change it. (2 Nephi 2:26-30) Missionaries work with people that are choosing with path to take everyday. They can accept that they’ve been involved with drugs for years and years and nothing is going to change it. Or they can try and come to Christ. He can change anyone if they just let Him.
The scripture I chose for my missionary plaque was D&C 84:88. “And whoso receiveth you, there I will be also, for I will go before your face. I will be on your right hand and on your left, and my Spirit shall be in your hearts, and mine angels round about you, to bear you up.” I didn’t realize how prophetic that scripture would be when I chose it.
It is true. There are angels with missionaries. We felt them. There are angels. There are angels all around us. Not only heavenly messengers, but they were also my dear, sweet companions, my family members, my friends, my investigators, and even the drunk on the street that would say hi every time we passed.
“When suffering we may in fact be nearer to God than we’ve ever been in our entire lives. That knowledge can turn every situation into a would be temple. Regarding our earthly journey, the Lord has promised, ‘I will go before your face, I will be on your right hand and on your left, and mine angels round about you to bear you up.’ That is an everlasting declaration of God’s love and care for us; including, and perhaps especially in times of trouble.” (Elder Jeffrey R. Holland)
My “would be temple” is Canoga Park, California. Because, that is where I learned how much God loves me and how much he loves each of his children. I have never suffered before like I have on the mission emotionally, physically, mentally and even spiritually. But I have also never felt so much peace, joy, happiness, and fulfillment after I made it through. I have never felt so close to the Lord in my life.
I am so grateful for the opportunity I had to serve a mission. I would do it again in a heartbeat.
Yo sé que Dios es nuestro Padre Celestial. Que, El ama a todos de sus hijos. Yo sé que Jesucristo es nuestro Salvador y el Redentor del mundo. Cristo tiene el poder para cambiar las vidas de cualquier persona, si escucha a los sururros del Espíritu. (Mosíah 3:19) La expiación de Jesucristo es infinita y eterna. Sé que la obra misional es una obra muy divina desde arriba. Yo sé que El Libro de Mormon es la palabra de Dios. Lo he leido. He sentido al Espíritu testificarme a mi de la veracidad de ello mientras mis estudios. Tambien testifico del amor del Padre. Yo sé que solamente por medio de Jesucristo nos podemos cambiar . Testifico de estas cosas en el nombre sagrado de Jesucristo, amen.
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