Hey Family!
 
Well this week went flying by... it seems like they are passing faster and faster. This week was good but honestly nothing that big or amazing happened, just a normal good week of work. Actually, come to think of it, the week was really full of different little things to do. Then on Friday we had a multi-zone conference that was really good but it went all day! Again this week we have interviews with the boss, mission council, another muti-zone with a new Area Seventy that will be coming down. It will be another full but great week. 
 
Unfortunately, of all of the new people that we have had and of the people that we really wanted to go to church with us this week none of them came! That usually seems to be how it goes, although we do have high hopes for this Sunday. We are continuing to work with references and also finding new people to teach through our own efforts, but we are also trying to work with the list of all of the less active members that are registered in the ward to see if we can re-activate them, and also be able to get references from them. This week should be really good.
 
For the multi-zone conference President Shumway had us all study a talk that President Nelson gave a few years back that had to do with how to have more of the spirit and guidance of the spirit in our lives. All of the talk was amazing but there was one part that really stuck out to me, I do not have the talk here with me and so I will paraphrase what it said. It said something like, when He sees that our biggest desire is to have the influence of His spirit, and when we stretch spiritually farther then we have ever stretched before, then we will truly have His spirit that really guides us. 
 
I love you all so much and hope that this week is an amazing week!
 
Love,
Elder Marks

Hello Family,
 
I hope that this email finds everyone doing well and being happy. I hope that through this last week you were each able to find time to remember to smile and feel of God’s love that He has towards everyone of us.
 
The week here was good, fairly normal, and passed super fast. Our finding efforts continue with faith. We are continuing to work with recent converts and members to be able to get more and more references. We did get another reference from Maria Colon this week also. It was for her son, Nelson. When we went and talked with him he told us that he had commented to his mom that he really wanted to change and had interest in being able to go to church with her. We met with him on the Sunday that just passed and he told us that in the morning that Maria had invited him to go to church and he said that he told her that it would be better to go next week. He told us that the minute that she left to go to church he regretted his decision to not go and that all day he was feeling kind of empty inside. It was truly perfect timing for two missionaries to show up knocking at your door. :)
 
We did some service yesterday as a zone and we got to use the yellow helping hand shirts; unfortunately we did not get to keep them :). The service was painting a mural in Guatemala City so that was kind of cool. I’ll add some pictures down below.
 
There is a particular story from the Bible that I really like. Right now I cannot remember the reference for the life of me so instead of putting the exact scriptures I will just tell you how it goes. There was a blind man and there was Christ and his Apostles. The blind man knew that Jesus was close and made sure that he was in his way so that he could have his vision restored. When Christ came to the man it was obvious that he was blind and wanted Christ to restore his vision. But instead of just doing the miracle Christ asked him, in affect, what do you want me to do for you. So the man told him that he wanted to be able to see again. After the man asked with a lot of faith Christ restored his sight. 
 
From this small story we can really see the importance of asking with faith. It would have been so easy for Christ to just heal the man without asking what it is that he wanted. I think God and Christ know what we want... being an all knowing God. With everybody’s individual efforts, remember that Christ knows us and wants the best for us. Keep exercising the faith! I know that we are all aware of the importance of our own actions. Keep working and diligently pleading for the blessings that are needed and they will come. 
 
I love you all and wish you all a great week!
 
Love,
Elder Marks

Good day my family, 
 
I hope this email finds you all doing well and happy. This last week was a good week, not a lot of things happened, but it was still good. Things are still going well with Elder Ulloa, he is a bit a goof ball so it makes it easy to be able to get along with him. Although he likes to joke and mess around, he also wants to work and when it is time to focus in on something he does. Over all things are going really well between us. 
 
More than anything this week we got to know a bit of the area and some of the members and people interested in the church. This last week we went with Maria and Jaime to be able to teach them the five lessons again and also to ask for references. Within about 5 minutes of talking to Maria about other people who she knows who we can visit she gave us 5 references: a friend and her daughter, her daughter-in-law, and also two of her sisters. She then said, "vamos les muestro las casas ahorita." or in English, l
“Lets go I’ll show you guys the houses right now” Then we went and she showed us the houses and also joined us with one of the visits and shared her testimony and invited her daughter-in-law, Paula, to go to church with her this Sunday. We are going to continue working with them to be able to get even more references, five in five minutes, we know they know a lot more people that we can teach.
 
The teaching pool is a little dry right now so we do not have a lot of people who we are teaching who are really progressing. They people who we do have to teach are Angel and Manuel Muralles, who are the brothers of Sara; who got baptized about a month and a half ago. There are also Enma, and her two daughters, but they cannot really progress right now because her "husband" still has to get divorced to be able to get married to her. In Guatemala there is a law that after being divorced you have to wait 6 months to be able to get married again, and you have to pay a bunch of money to get a statement printed in the newspaper. There are a couple of other people who are still like sprouts who we aren’t really sure if they are going to progress or not. 
 
During a bit of my personal study this week I had a scripture that jumped out at a bit that I had not really noticed before. It is found in Alma 36:3. It says, "Whosoever shall put their trust in God shall be supported in their trials, and their troubles, and their afflictions, and shall be lifted up at the last day." I really like this scripture because it shows that God is literally going to support us all in whatever challenges or trials that we may have. I think that sometimes it is easy as imperfect people to think that maybe God does not give liberally to all of his children, but we have the promise that He gives all of His goodness when we put our trust in God and we are willing to live by faith. Elder Bednar once said, "Faith and Hope invite into our lives the sweet peace of conscience for which we all yearn." 2 Nephi 26:28 says, "Behold, hath the Lord commanded any that they should not partake of his goodness? Behold I say unto you, Nay; but all men are privileged the one like unto the other, and none are forbidden." To me this last scripture illustrates a point that is essential, that of agency. Every one of us has an equal chance to receive the blessings of God.

I know that God loves us and is truly anxious to be able to bless us with the peace and joy that everyone of us desires in our heart. We just have to be willing to take small steps of faith that will lead us back to Him. It is kinda like Indiana Jones, to get the Holy Grail he had to take that first step of faith onto the invisible bridge, that step was the hardest, he had to continue walking by faith, overcoming obstacles along the way to be able to achieve his end goal. 
 
I love you all so much!
Elder Marks

Hello Family,

Change week was this last week, though yesterday actually was the day that we got our new companions. Elder Ribeiro left the area to go and actually be in the office for his second time in the mission. I am still here in Boca del Monte 2, and my new companion’s name is Elder Ulloa. He is 20 and is from Nicaragua and has 16 months in the mission. Obviously we have not had that much time together but I think things are going to be good. Last night we were talking about the zone a bit, preparing for a zone meeting that we had this morning and it was really nice to be able to have a real conversation in which we shared ideas and desires for this change. Finally, somebody else who really has the desire to work hard and brings ideas to the table on how to do it. Who knows, maybe next week my tone about the whole thing will be different, but for now I’m content.

The baptism for Maria and Jaime went great. The ward really did not support us that much which was really frustrating, having to be calling people like the bishop and his councilors to see if at least one of them would be there and all of them saying no, when previously they had all said yes. Then the bishop finally showing up about 35 minutes late dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. Also, nobody from the Elders Quorum presidency was there. Setting all of that aside, it was a great success. Sunday they were confirmed and seem to be happy. We are going to be working with them a lot to be able to try to get some references from them. Just a casual invitation...
 
You should all pray and try to come up with a least one person to share the gospel, include the missionaries and constantly invite them to church. How great the joy will be for the Lord and for you guys.

This week I was doing some reflecting on how it is that we can show our love to God. I came to the conclusion that it is something that we can really only do through our actions. Things we do and do not do. In a couple of different places in the scriptures we are taught, "…if ye love me, keep my commandments." As I have learned from Dad’s Ward Conference talk, God really wants our will, He wants us to be consecrated to Him. It is something that is absolutely essential, being consecrated is not just being worthy, but also making our life something sacredly dedicated to the Lord. Just like parents on earth, God wants children who are obedient, who always communicate with him through constant prayer, and who want to come back home in the end.

I love you all and hope that you have a great week, with a big focus in the things that really matter most, and that we let the little things of no value or concern go their way.


Love,
Elder Marks

Hello Family!
 
This last week also went very quick, and changes are coming up rapidly... :) This Sunday we are going to be getting the call for the changes, I am looking forward to see what the future will bring. I really have enjoyed the three months that I have had with Elder Ribeiro, but as you know I am also looking forward to being able to move on. We are good friends but to live together 24/7 can get a little old. I think that my new companion will be one of the North Americans that are coming over from the east mission. We lost over 100 missionaries and we are getting about 32 or 34. 
 
Maria and Jaime are still on track for this Saturday, which is great! They were married on Saturday, not a lot of people showed up, but at least the important ones did: Maria, Jaime, and their family. It was really basic but we did decorate the gym a little, so things looked kinda cool. The baptism will take place this Saturday at 6:00 in the evening.
 
Honestly, this week we almost were not able to teach many people. My companion lost the phone, so that made it kinda hard because we lost all of the contacts of all of the members and also all of the people interested in the church. We were only able to talk with Ovidio in the street. Really not much happened to be able to talk about this week in the email. Hopefully this week will be more productive but we will see how everything turns out, next week when I write I will have a new companion. 
 
While I was studying a talk from the Prophet this week, the following paragraphs are a couple of that stuck out to me.
 
Recently I have found myself drawn to the Lord’s instruction given through the Prophet Joseph Smith: “Say nothing but repentance unto this generation.” This declaration is often repeated throughout scripture. It prompts an obvious question: “Does everyone need to repent?” The answer is yes. 
 
The word for repentance in the Greek New Testament is metanoeo. The prefix meta- means “change.” The suffix -noeo is related to Greek words that mean “mind,” “knowledge,” “spirit,” and “breath.”5  
 
To only speak repentance to the people in interesting because it really shows the need for everyone to repent. And constantly. This is what I have been trying to do. Look for ways to be able to change everyday, to change the mind, knowledge, spirit and breath. This is the invitation that the prophet gave to everyone, to be able to repent everyday, to be able to do the will of the Lord.
 
I love you all, and hope that you all have a great week!
 
Love,
Elder Marks