Monday, July 28, 2014

What's Good Family?!?

I can tell you what is good in Texas, MISSIONARY WORK, and the Texas heat and bugs! While working so hard and knocking into some pretty interesting people, we have been so blessed with the opportunity to teach the Restoration. Even if they are not interested in the gospel, everyone has to hear the Restoration at least once in their life time!
 
This week I recieved a phone call from my previous area saying that Lily, the lady that I taught, is going to get married and baptized on the 9th of August! WOOHOO!! She has been taught by SOOO many missionaries, and the elders gave up on her, but when Hermana McDaniel and I got doubled into Dallas, we found her again and now she is going to get baptized! I am so excited to go back to Dallas with Hermana McDaniel. This baptism is going to be the last week of her mission, I am pumped!
 
Heavenly Father loves me so much, and I love him. This week he also let us be wittnesses of another miracle. A lady that we have been teaching for so long, named Concepcion, told us that she was going to be baptized. We have been working with her for almost 3 months now and teaching her has been a cause of a lot of frustration and tears. But this past Friday, we had a lesson with her and a lady from the ward, and we talked about baptism and confirmation. She said that she knows that she is going to be baptized one day and she wants to be baptized before we leave so we can "see the fruits of our labors." Hermana Enriquez and I started to cry after she said this! We are so blessed! She came to church on Sunday and in Relief Society they asked her to give the closing prayer. The ward has been pretty good with accepting her in and making her feel like a member already! The best part is when we first met her she told us that she was going to die a Baptist, but when the Jehova Wittnesses came to her door she told them that she was Mormon!
 
This past week we had Interviews with President Taylor. I don't know why but every interview I have, I just start crying right when I walk in. President Taylor is amazing and knows just how to help every missionary. He gave me some great advice and helped me realize my potential as a missionary. While our companion meets with President Taylor we meet with the Assistants and also get trained by the Zone Leaders! My zone leaders are the best, I think they are my favorite so far, Elder Day and Elder Schaat. I served around both of them in Plano so it has been fun to serve around them again! They gave an amazing training on something called a Belief Window (it was something Elder Day learned from psychology in college) and they related it to missionary work. It was awesome! My companion and I got a lot of questions answered from their training!
Right now we are trying something new with the members! Everytime we have dinner with them, we ask if for the first 10 minutes we can do an activity! We call it the "10 Minute Missionary!" We tell them that we are going to split up and going to knock 5 doors on their street or the next street over and we are going to contact people. Then after the activity, during dinner, we talk about their experiences and what they felt. We then talk about missionary work and share our testimonies of really how we need the members to help us and that we all have a part in this great work! It has been really fun! We always have dinner with a family named the Monsivais! They are my favorite members! They have a son that didn't want to go on a mission but we have been working with him for a little while and out of the blue, he just started asking me questions about the mission. We talked for a little while and he didnt say much, but yesterday he told me that he had an interview witht he bishop about serving a mission! YAY!!
 
Life is so good family! Even if I sweat and come home at night with drenched clothes, there are still people out there waiting for me! I just have to keep working until I find them! I love Jesus Christ and I love this work! Have a great week everyone!
 
Hermana Cattich
 
Come what may and love it!

Monday, July 21, 2014

The good mission life!

Thank you for all your prayers about the weather! This past week it was in the 70's all week, it was perfect! Sadly, starting today, it will be back in the 100's. I don't know why I am complaining, I love being a missionary! This past week, we knocked a lot and also went on exchanges. I was able to go to Grand Prarie,Texas for the day with Hermana Warmbier. It was a really good, successful, learning day!
Exchanges with Hermana Warmbire
 
We were able to find a miracle this week. Her name is Ester and we knocked into her. We shared the first lesson with her and she was crying. She explained how she has been searching for a church but doesn't feel welcome whenever she attends. We took this opportunity to talk about the Restoration and our church/what it was like. We then invited her to be baptized. She accepted, but since then we have not been able to get ahold of her or find her home. This was a miracle that we were able to see, but so many times in this area we see those miracles and then the next day they are gone. They are either not interested anymore, or we can never get ahold of them. Hermana Enriquez and I have been talking about what we are doing wrong, that all these miracles just end up slipping through our fingers, and we are trying to do new things. I know that right now in my mission Heavenly Father is helping me develop the Christ-like attributes of patience and humility. This is just a time in my mission where he wants me to grow, and to show myself my true colors.
 
Every week is like this, a new trial and a new lesson to be learned, but I am so thankful for all the growing that has happened spiritually and mentally! I know that it is not becuase of me that I am growing, but it is because of my Heavenly Father. He is helping me become the person that he wants me to be, and if I do the work his way, and with his guidance, I will be successful. I am thankful for this opportunity to put all my trust and strength in the Lord, I know that without him, nothing would be possible. Without him, there wouldn't be anything! I think this is teaching me a lesson for the future, when I am married and have my own children. The lesson is that I need, at all times, to have my trust in the Lord and realize that he is a valuable and necessary part of my life.
My companion and I. Sorry it is blury!
 
Exchanges were great! Hermana Warmbier is a great example to me and we were able to talk about different attributes of Christ that are in Preach My Gospel. We studied them and selected different ones to work on and we made a plan on how to work on each of them. We were able to teach various lessons and really talk/reflect on our missions. She goes home at the end of this transfer and so it was hard for her to talk about how it was almost the end. I can't believe that this past week I have hit 10 months in my mission. Time is flying faster than I want it too, but I am excited for the summer to be over!
 
 
I was reading in the Book of Mormon this week about Alma and Amulek and their missionary work. They suffered a whole lot more than I ever have and probably ever will but in the end, after their trials, Heavenly Father freed them from the jail, and they were able to convert hundreds of people. This shows me that Heavenly Father is with us always and no matter how many trials we have, in the end he will help us. Our righteous desires and prayers will be granted. I am thankful for all the examples of missionaries in the scriptures and I love hearing their stories and realizing that I am right along with them, changing the hearts of many and bringing the gospel to those that need it! I hope everyone knows that I love them, and that I hope everyone has a great week and is enjoying their summer vacation
 
Love you all,
Les quiero muchisimo!
 
Hermana Cattich
 
COME WHAT MAY AND LOVE IT!  

Monday, July 14, 2014

Dios estara con tigo donde quiera que vayas!

Hello family! Seems like just yesterday that I was writing my last email to y'all. These weeks are just going faster and faster! This week I hit my 10 month mark and I will just skip all the cliche things that I could say but really time is just flying! This week was hot, as usual! I think it is just hard for me because everyday is 95+, there really is no break at all! When we wake up it is already 80 degrees outside and our car is like a sauna, but I am so thankful that we have a car and that we aren't on bikes. The poor elder that are in our area! Our area is pretty small so whenever we see them we give them the ice cold water that we have in our car.
Missionary Sports on Preparation Day!
 
We had a really hard week, there just really is not a lot of friendly people and no one wants to open the door when it is so hot outside. We tried contacting at a local water park and we ran into some members from a different stake. They were some cute moms that gave us water and some snacks to eat! I love running into members, they are always so nice to us! We are continuing to work with the familia Valdez-Flores and we taught them the book of Mormon. We brought this cute new couple in our ward with us. The couple met on their missions and she is from Bolivia and he is from New Zeland. They served in the Washington DC Spanish mission and the man actually served with/ around Dallin Calvert. Fun to make that connection, but they are great and since they have served a mission, they really have that missionary fire!
 
I think that is another reason why Heavenly Father lowered the mission age is so that more people would be returned missionaries and have that fire to want to share the gospel becuase they have served missions too and they know/remember what it was like. Literally this work goes no where without the members, we need their help so much!
 
All the water you drink in a week in Texas!
On Saturday morning, one of the Hermanas texted us from the ward and asked me to give a talk the next day in sacrament meeting....oh goodness. The topic was "Standing in Holy Places." I think I did alright only having one day to prepare a talk in Spanish, but I read a ton of scriptures about the topic and my favorite is in Joshua 1:9. I think most people have heard/ read this scripture, but it says, "Be strong and of a good courage, be not afraid neither be thou dismayed for the lord thy god is with thee withersoever thou goest." I love this scripture so much! Some times it is hard to remember that we are not alone and that we always have someone supporting us from our Heavenly home! In my talk, I talked about how the home can be a holy place if we just allow it to be. If we use our home to proclaim our faith, if we invite the spirit of love and happiness and if we work together as a family, our home can be a holy place where we can stand!
 
Life is good everyone! I hope we never forget to realize all the blessings that we have everyday! Love you all!
 
Hermana Cattich
 
COME WHAT MAY AND LOVE IT! 

Monday, July 7, 2014

Lift where you stand!

Well this week was for sure a re-vamp for my companion and I. These past few weeks have been hard and it has just been a whole new kind of missionary work, but with the start of a new transfer, we are ready to go! We recieved transfer calls on Saturday and we are staying together for one more! Woohoo, I am actually going to have some stability with my companions. All of my companions I have just had for one, so I am excited! I think we work really well together!
 
This week we got to meet our new mission President and let me just say, HE IS AMAZING! I am so excited! We had a combined meeting with some of the zones in the mission on Friday where we got to meet President Taylor and his family and also talk about the mission vision for the next 3 years. It was probably one of my favorite missionary meetings that we have had. The assistants, Elder Williams and Elder Larsen did a training about "Daytons Legs" and how we need to change missionary work in our areas. The Zone Leaders all did an open discussion about new things to try and new ways to improve our areas. After the meeting, Hermana Enriquez and I were talking and the meeting was an answer to ALL of our questions about are area. It was wonderful! Sister Taylor, his wife, is so sweet and just gave all of the sister missionaries a hug bear hug! Felt good! They also showed us the video of them opening their mission call to come to Texas and it was quite funny!
 
On Saturday night, we finally met the family that we have been praying for all transfer, la familia Flores-Vasquez. They are wonderful. After countless lessons of Bible bashing and people just arguing and telling us that everyting is wrong, we finally taught a lesson where the spirit was so strong and the family was so receptive! The mom and dad are confused about religion and want to know how they can find the true church. After a powerful lesson of bearing our testimonies and sharing the Restoration of the Gospel, I was just smiling so big inside. I couldn't believe it! After the lesson, we walked out of the apartment, towards our car and I just gave Hermana Enriquez the biggest hug. We turned around and the wife was there standing, watching us, smiling and waving at us! AH it felt so good!
 
Yesterday in church was testimony meeting and all of the missionaries bore their testimonies. Hermana Enriquez and I wrote little thank you notes to all the ward members that bore their testimonies! It was fun to hand them about after church and see the smiles on the members faces! After the "re-vamp" missionary meeting, all 10 missionaries that are serving in this ward, are ready to get the ball rolling in this ward and start seeing more succes!
 
I hope everyone has a great week and I want you all to watch this video! It is so good! Its called Dayton's Legs and we related it to missionary work and about how we can all be someones legs in times of difficulty but also to realize the people that have been our legs when we needed support the most!
 
http://www.mormonchannel.org/come-follow-me-christlike-attributes?v=911161826001
 
I love you all!
 
Hermana Cattich
 
COME WHAT MAY AND LOVE IT!