Week of Conferences!

Hey family! We had a lot going on this week and it went by really
fast. We had an amazing zone conference with President Taggart on
Wednesday. We mainly reviewed all of the training that we received in
the specialized leadership training with the brethren from Salt Lake.
It was really good and there is so much that I feel like we will be
using that training we received for the rest of the trainings this
year. I really love it! It really is helping us teach simply and to
their understanding.

This week I got to go on exchanges with a new elder in the
district, Elder Valenzuela. He is sooo awesome! He just came from
Guatemala three weeks ago and it was so much fun being with a native.
He has great english because his school growing up is a bilingual
school, but he hasn't had to speak it in much conversation so it's a
lot of fun to help him learn, but I learned way more Spanish than he
probably learned English. My Spanish has come a long way. But he is a
great missionary and had prepared a lot with his two older returned
missionary brothers and dad so he already knows a lot of great
teaching and finding techniques. Plus he is contagiously happy and so
it was a really fun exchange. We taught a part member family, found
some families, saw the spirit work on a guy during a door contact that
was really great, and just taught with Elder Valenzuela and his
"greeny fire" for missionary work.

I also met one of the happiest kids I have met in my life this
week. Two weeks ago we heard a mom and daughter arguing about cleaning
the back porch so we poked our heads over a fence and asked if we
could help. They declined but said if we came back the next week they
would find something for us to do and that they would be interested in
listening to our message. So we went back and the daughter and her
little brother Jaime were waiting for us to come. They had finished
their project already but the kids knew we were coming so they had a
bag of trash ready for us so that we could take it out. They were
awesome! The whole time Jaime just had the biggest smile and he had so
many questions. It just made me so happy teaching them and I can't
wait to teach their whole family this week.

On Saturday and Sunday we had stake conference and had the
privilege of one of the seventy named Elder Packer to speak to us. He
still has very good Spanish from serving a Spanish speaking mission.
We also had the temple president, our mission president, Elder
Acosta(the area 70 in our ward), and another leader that spoke. All,
except for Elder Acosta, being very white and it was very interested
to hear them all speak Spanish. They did great though! Also all of
their wives spoke and some of them had never said a word in Spanish
before. I really loved it! Hearing them was amazing and at one point
he had all of us missionaries stand up and made us a promise that came
completely from the spirit. Elder Packer is an amazing speaker and it
was powerful when he testified of how the Book of Mormon came from
their ancestors. A young couple about to get married also spoke, and a
recent convert in our ward that has a rock solid testimony. We also
hear from a loving bold stake president that really knows the people
in the stake. He is an inspired man. What a great week and weekend to
hear from such wonderful leaders and members from the stake. It really
strengthened my testimony to hear so much testimony being shared. I
think there were only about 4 scriptures shared in the 4 hours that we
attended, and that shows how much was pure testimony sharing. I almost
felt like it was a stake fast and testimony meeting.

In the spirit of sharing testimony I would like to share mine about
Jesus Christ. I know that He is our perfect example, He did everything
that our Father in Heaven asked of Him. I know that He suffered a
perfect Atonement so that we could not only return to live with Him
but that we could also receive strength and help throughout our
journey here on this earth. I know that He gives us the power to
change and become clean when we accept Him into our lives. He gives us
peace in a world of trouble and hope in even the hardest of times. He
will always lead you to where you need to go. I love you all, have a
blessed week.

Love,
Elder Hyde

Menudo....

I finally ate menudo! I have heard a lot about this dish but I have
never had the pleasure of eating it. Menudo is a wonderful soup with
cow stomach, intestines, and hoof. It was surprisingly tasty and my
favorite part was the intestine. The hoof just didn't please my throat
going down. Now I wouldn't eat menudo from just anybody but it was
made from our loving Ward mission leaders wife. (You met them on the
Skype call on Christmas) So I trusted it because she is a really good
cook.

Now to some missionary work. :) This week we had a surprise 2 hour
district leaders meeting and it went really well. We are having some
changes in the way we conduct our district meetings which I really
like. We come up everything we share every single week. They used to
sometimes give us outlines but those will stop. Which is really good,
it makes us rely on the spirit while we plan and conduct the meetings
in stead of following an outline.

I would like to close by sharing a personal insight from my study
this week. I was reading in Mosiah 26 and thought it was amazing what
alma did when he was confronted with a problem. He wasn't sure how to
deal with discipline in the church and went to king Mosiah for the
answer. In verse 13 it says "And now the spirit of Alma was again
troubled; and he went and inquired of the Lord what he should do
concerning this matter, for he feared that he should do wrong in the
sight of God." Alma was confronted with a problem so he went to the
Lord. He ended up receiving a huge answer from the Lord from verses
15-32 but before he received an answer he did something really
important in verse 14 it says that he "poured out his whole soul to
God" I know that that is a key to receiving personal revelation. If we
really want God to speak to us and help us we must pray pouring out
out whole souls to God. That has been a huge blessing on the mission.
The prayers when I have poured out my whole heart have been some of
the most spiritually uplifting experiences in the mission. I know that
God loves us and will answer our prayers. Maybe we won't be faced with
how to lead the church like alma was but we are faced with other
challenges like how to lead our families, or give guidance and correct
to our children, family and friends. We may even face trials that we
don't feel strong enough to bear. But I know that if can pour out our
whole souls unto God in prayer, service, and sharing the gospel we
will find the happiness and direction that we are searching for. You
are all loved and prayed for every day!

Love,
Elder Hyde

In case you want to read more :D
http://www.lds.org/scriptures/bofm/mosiah/26?lang=eng

Happy Groundhog Day!

Hola familia!

Well things are quite different from last week. Last week was transfers and Elder Gardner and I get another transfer together! :) I am really excited about that! Another area opened up in our Ward and so now we have a van and get to travel around us 6 elders everywhere. It takes a really long time to go anywhere and so I don't have much time today.

This week was a little difficult because we had to drop(stop visiting) a big chunk of our investigators. They just haven't been willing to act on the message and so they need some time. Because of that we had a lot of time to visit some of our other investigators and we had a some great lessons. One guy named Ricardo is really sincere. We brought this awesome newly returned missionary with us and we all were just so happy after the lesson I couldn't stop smiling the whole night. The gospel really makes me happy, and seeing others accept it makes me even more happy.

We are still serving at the soup kitchen and are getting to know the people now. The volunteers love us and the homeless people love to tell us stories and jokes and tell us all the "deep Mormon doctrine" they have heard before. It's a blast. Service can cure any sadness and really helps me feel the Saviors love. So go find someone to serve! :D

Love,

Elder Hyde