Week 5

Mexico City CCM Week 5 - Meditation?

¡Hola mis amigos!

Only 7 more days left until I´m off to Minnesota! This week went by so fast, but it was great. I am getting more and more excited to enter the mission field!

This week my companion and I prayed that we could have an opportunity to give a Book of Mormon to one of the construction workers in the CCM and share our testimonies with them. On Monday we talked to two workers walking by on the side walk. One was named Pierre from Haiti and the other one we didn´t get his name. We had a small conversation with each of them but they were both already members of the church. So the next day, we were determined to talk to more workers. In the morning during breakfast we saw the lawn mowing crew raking leaves and taking care of the grass so we walked over to them and talked to a few of them. One guy that was raking the leaves, his name was Ceasar, told us he served his mission here in Mexico. And the other worker, Carlos, said he was a member too. So we kept looking and before lunch we walked to our classroom and talked with our janitor friend Adi. We talked with him for a while and he mentioned that almost all of the lawn care workers were members, but the concrete construction workers behind our classroom were mostly non-members and their break was at 1. So we went over there at 1 and we saw this guy walking on the sidewalk and we decided to go up to him and talk to him. We talked with him about his family and work, then we asked him if he knew what the Book of Mormon was. He said he received a copy from another companionship 3 days before and he read a few pages. We were like, “Oh that’s great!” And we were able to share with him our testimonies. I felt like I should share with him a scripture in the Book of Mormon, 2 Nephi 5:27 which says "and they lived after a manner of happiness." We told him how Nephi and his family lived with many struggles and hardships but they still felt so much joy in their lives. We bore testimony of how the Book of Mormon, which helps us understand the gospel of Jesus Christ, helps us obtain that same happiness and peace in our own lives. Then we invited him to read the book every day. It was a really awesome experience and I couldn´t help but smile the whole time I was talking to him because the Book of Mormon truly blesses my life. Even though we didn´t give him a book personally it still felt amazing to share with him the knowledge I have of the truthfulness of the Book of Mormon. I know that, along with the Bible, the Book of Mormon is the word of God.

So later that same day, we were in class after lunch talking as a district. We told everyone what happened and, guess what?! Turns out, that companionship that gave him a Book of Mormon a few days earlier, was our district leaders! And he told me he wanted to share that same scripture 2nd Nephi 5: 27 but never did. So that was really cool to find that out! Then, during gym we went on a run with another companionship in our district and saw more workers who were doing construction on the water treatment plant in the corner of the campus. They were walking to their car to go home but we ran to talk to the two of them. One of them was wearing a sick Denver Broncos hard hat haha. We had a similar experience with them, they told us they had a coworker who already gave them a Book of Mormon and they have been reading a lot and said it was really interesting! We shared with them the same scripture and bore testimony. They seemed like they were in a hurry to get home so we didn´t talk to them for long but it was still awesome. What a day filled with opportunities to bear testimony about the Book of Mormon!

We had an awesome devotional yesterday from an Area Seventy Elder Nicolás Castañeda. He was an amazing speaker, reminded me a lot of how Elder Deiter F. Uchdorf speaks. He spoke on having success as a missionary. He told us if we want to have success in anything we do in life we have to do these three things: 1) Concentrate with all your effort. 2) Always do your best. and 3) Be happy with everything that you do. Success isn´t measured on how many people you baptize, but rather how you grow spiritually and increase your love for the people. Through hard work and always having a positive attitude, we can truly become the person and missionary that Heavenly Father wants us to be. As we sincerely love the people, they will see the light of Christ in our eyes and feel the love of their Father in Heaven. It was a really powerful devotional and made me super motivated and happy to be serving a full time mission and love the people of Minneapolis Minnesota!

So this morning we heard the news that Donald Trump won the election. It was kind of weird to not have any media for 5 weeks and then all of a sudden, Adi tells us that Trump won the election. We were like wow that’s crazy! So my companion Elder Watson brought a Donald Trump tie with him and after hearing the news we went back to our apartment and he changed his tie to his Trump tie haha. I thought it would be fitting to throw on my ´Merica tie as well lol.

Hope all is well back in the states!

~Para siempre Dios esté con vos~

-Elder Bolinder

New address:

Minnesota Minneapolis Mission

5931 West 96th Street

Bloomington, MN 55438

Elder Bolinder and Elder Watson - Mexico City CCM Week 5

Elder Watson and Elder Bolinder - Mexico City CCM  Week 5