Mission Week 10, Cucuta Week 4, "Working with Families"

A lot went on this week, but sadly I do not have time to explain haha SO I have lots of adventures and cool pics :).

Elder Horton and my companion Elder Quinonez

Working Hard in our District

Cucuta Family Birthday

Cucuta Family

Cucuta Members

Hanging with a Cucuta Member Family

More Family

AND MORE FAMILY!

Mission Week 9, Cucuta Week 3, "MultiZone Meetings with Mission President"

Hi Family and Friends!

Another great week! Full of the Spirit! This week we had a Multizone meeting with the President of our mission (President Laney). We had our personal interviews with him for him to see how we are doing. Intercambios were also this week. Intercambios is when you switch who your companion is for the day. Then once again we had another two baptisms!

The Multizone meeting was so cool! I was able to meet every missionary in Cucuta. We had an inspiring lesson by President Laney on how to find more people to teach. Which is through references! References come mainly through members which means! MEMBERS please please help your ward missionaries out and give them referrals for a friend or even someone you just met but you think theyre cool and would love to hear our message, and even if you think they don't want to just tell us anyway! haha. We came back the next day on Wednesday for interviews. President Laney truly has love for each and every one of his missionaries!

Having a different companion for the day made me realize how long Im actually with Elder Quinonez haha. I actually had one of the Zone Leaders as my companion for the day his name is Elder Sanchez. He is from Mexico and learned to speak English on his mission! He wanted me to help him so we spoke in English as we walked around proselyting. One experience I loved with Elder Sanchez is when we were trying to find an address and he would go up to people and ask them if they knew where the place was. This one lady stopped us just as we were about to leave and continue on after receiving directions from here, but she stopped us and asked us who we were! I was so surprised! But she looked at me and was waiting for a response so I just started using any Spanish word that would come to my head. I told her that we were missionaries from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter day Saints, and that we bring a message centered on Jesus Christ. That seemed to get her attention so i kept going. I asked her if there was a time that we could stop by and share our message with her and she said yes!!!! This was my first successful contact ever! It was so simple but it worked. This just helped me to realize that the Lord has prepared people for us to find and teach.

The two baptisms we had for Wendy Sourdis and Luisa Angarita! Its so great to see people change and start their journey back to our Heavenly Father! You can see the happiness it brought these two. Wendy and Luisa are both 14 years old and received an answer that the church is true. Every day I continue to learn how the Lord works in many different ways to help us find certain people at certain times or to ask and make promises to people at specific times. I know the Holy Ghost is our guide throughout each lesson and I know that Its him that testifies that our message is true!

I love you all!

Elder Horton

Impressions of Cucuta:
There are small Churches everywhere here, its fun to see the different types of people and beliefs and even sometimes the clothes they wear :)

Multi Zone Meetings

with my first comp Elder Quinonez 

Mission Week 8, Cucuta Week 2, "My First Baptism"

¡Buenas tardes!

Days are flying here! I wanna get right into some of the highlights of the week!

First! We had two baptisms this Saturday, for Jose Sourdis and Yurley Gonzalez(you have to say her name in Spanish, its not yurrrleeeeyyy its JJJJuuurrrrlllllaaaayyyyy :)) These two were ready for this step in their lives. They have strong testimonies and truly strive to live Gods commandments.

Something that surprised me during our lesson with Jose is that he asked me if I would baptize him! I was shocked mostly because everyone (his family) started looking at me waiting for a response, and then they all started laughing because they realized I didn't understand. Once it hit me, I raised my hands in the air and shouted ¡Si!

The baptism of Jose was really special for me not just because it was my FIRST baptism ever! But because when I saw the look on his face when he came out of the water, its hard for me to describe, but there was a Heavenly Joy and the face of Jose. Seeing someone change their life and come unto Christ is one the most satisfying feelings of peace. That night I thought about the feelings I had and the feelings that Jose had, and it put a fire inside of me to want to bring more and more people to the fount!

We had the chance to give service at the Gonzalez home! They needed me, Elder Quinonez, Elder Gutierez, and Elder Souza to chop down a jungle that was growing in their backyard. When I saw Hermana Gonzalez bring out the machetes you're darn right I got pumped up. My ninja skills we're tested once again. But don't worry mom this time I didn't hurt anything :). We were able to clear it all out for the family and they gave us some lemonade to drink after.

Missionary work is the greatest work!

I love you all and pray for you always!

Love, Elder Horton

Impressions of Cucuta:
1. Everyone here owns a machete
2. Theres a bread shop on every corner of town SUPER YUMMY
3. There are police in every shop in this City guarding each door

Jose Sourdis

​Yurley Gonzalez!

Atalaya ward

​Disrtict meeting with Elderes y Hermanas

Serving at the Gonzalez house

Serving using Macehettes!

Mission Week 7, Cucuta Week 1, Serving in my First Area, "Cucuta"

I am not dead! almost, but like, not really hehe! Alright! ENTONCES my first Area is called Cucuta, and its literally right next to Venezuela. Which is actually pretty cool because Venezuela is in a really bad state right now with a corrupt government. That means everyone is trying to flee the country! and guess where they're going? Thats right, Cucuta!

My first companion is Elder Quinonez. He's a great missionary and has a strong testimony. He's from Guatemala and barley speaks English. That was a weird thing for me this week because this is my first true week where i didn't have English. It actually went pretty great!

It is so dang hot here! Literally I think its worse than my brother Brennens mission. Its super humid which means your hot and sticky allllll day. What I thought was funny is when I got in the shower to cool off. That didn't work. When you hop out of the shower you get hit with a heat wave and straight back to sticky.

The city! its so cool here! Since its so hot everyone here is always outside. There are little shops everywhere that people set up to try and sell stuff. The people here are super friendly and love to talk. Whenever my companion and I see someone we yell Buenas!! which just means hi have a good day.

Teaching is actually going pretty great! I always participate in lessons and bear my testimony as mush as possible. One of my favorite families in Patri, Jesus, and their son Daniel. They are recent converts and and love the church! My first visit with them they thought it was so cool that I was learning Spanish and that I could speak English. I decided to give them an English Book of Mormon and Patri's face lit up! She explained to me that her son was learning English and that this book would be perfect for him. Jesus makes pants for a living and sells them whenever he can. They live in a very humble house and don't have much so we offer what help we can to them.

I love you all and am always praying for you, I LOVE BEING A MISSIONARY!

With Love, Elder Horton

Impressions of Cucuta:
1. Water and milk here are in bags
2. when people drive they drive in zig zags becuase there are pot hols eveywhere
3. every fast food place here is completely decked out and looks like a five star hotel

My Trainer and First Comp: Elder Quinonez from Guatemala

We went to Domino's for P-Day!