Happy Holidays

Dear Friends and Family,



I hope everyone had a Merry Christmas full of remembrance as to why we really celebrate it and also remember to not just think of Christ during Christmas but all year round. The best part was we got to sleep in clear til 8:00. Of course my internal clock still had to wake me up at 6:30, but it was nice just to lay there and do nothing. We opened our presents the night before, which actually turned out being good because that's when the other Hispanics open their gifts.



We taught a lesson using 3 Nephi 18, to teach "OLA" translated is CPR (church, prayer, read your scriptures) It's when Christ is instituting the Sacrament amongst the Nephites, basically I love it because it talks about why it's so important to go to church in verse 22. It says to meet together oft, why? To partake of the Sacrament. Prayer: Verse 20-21. How do we learn these things? Through reading the scriptures! We also shared some cool scriptures about going to church. Moroni 6:5-6, 9 and Mosiah 18-25. Read them :)



On Wednesday we were feeling really discouraged because all of the people we were talking to weren't interested and lots of our appointments fell through, but we felt like we should go to these certain apartments to check up on an old investigator. We discovered that he had moved and there was a lady fro El Salvador living there. She had received a copy of the Book of Mormon before but never learned. We were so stinkin happy after that cause we knew that it didn't happen just by accident. And there's more....as we were leaving we sat an appointment with this guy outside. We showed up on Christmas Eve to teach him but he's not home, we start talking to this guy in the hall and randomly decide to sing him a Christmas song. His roommate hears and comes out and tells us that he was just reading the Bible and he's so confused about why there are so many churches. Enter: Missionaries. We taught him a little bit and sat a return appointment. It's a long story but the point is there were a long string of events that had to take place to get us to that situation and I know that none of them were by accident.



When I first got on my mission, I was afraid to talk to everyone I saw, but now there is no fear because I know that if I talk to every single person that I can, Heavenly Father will trust me to put the people who are ready to accept the gospel in my path because He knows I'll talk to them. I may not be perfect at it but I'm willing. It's so hard but I love it so much and I've learned so much!!!!!



Our Zone Leaders are really fun and we went Zone Christmas Caroling. Basically on the 23rd we went out from 7-9 and there were about 12 of us. We knocked on the door and started singing and not to toot my own horn, but we sounded really GOOD! When the people would open their door, they had great big smiles on their faces. After we were done we would offer them a Book of Mormon because the Zone Leaders want to flood Des Moines with the Book of Mormon. One lady had just come home from the hospital, her daughter has some rare disease with her chromosomes and is having weird kinds of seizures. It's sad but the lady was crying and was really touched by our singing/the spirit. One of my favorite Christmas memories probably, Well, that's all for now. Thank you for all the love and support you give me!

Love Hermana Hepworth



This is Jilyn's mom. She sent some pictures that I am going to attempt to post. I am not very good at this but I do my best.

Some of the pictures of of Jose, who is a recent convert that just moved back to Mexico to be with his wife and children for the rest of the winter. One of these pictures are of Hermana Hepworth cutting Jose's hair outside in the rain. One is a couple of less active that are being reactivated. One is of Jilyn and her two companions Hermana Hancock and Hermana McGuire. One of Hector and Jilyn. He is a recent convert And a picture of Jilyn Carlos and Martin at the Thanksgiving party. They are investigators. Enjoy the pictures, that is if I can get them posted.

Feliz Navidad

We had our Christmas Zone Conference, which included a talent show and decorated cookies. It was lots of fun!
We also had to say goodbye to Jose, our recent convert who mostly just drove us crazy because he would tell us that he didn't believe the Book of Mormon was true even though he really did. He told us that on Friday and the next Sunday was Fast Sunday, during Sacrement meeting I wondered "Where's Jose?" Well I didn't have to wonder for very long because he appeared on the stand and bore his testimony. I'm not gonna lie, I was freaking out a little because he was BEARING his TESTIMONY. He said that he knew that the Book of Mormon was true. Honestly though I'm really going to miss him, he sent us a million texts a day saying things like "Watcha doin?" (he knows some English) we'd always think..."What are we doing????? Missionary work, like always Jose" Oh and at night we'd get ones that said "You're the best!" He called me Hermana Gatuvela, which means Catwoman, like from Batman. He knows that I like cats a lot. So now he is in Mexico until the Spring but it's good because his wife and 2 children are there and they need him. I really really really hope he finds his ward there!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We had a Branch Christmas party on Saturday. It was soooooo much fun. Gladis and Eder (investigators) came. I love them soooo much! Eder has changed a lot since the missionaries started teaching him. In the beginning he didn't even want to talk to us, but now he listens and sincerely wants to know if it's true. He asked us to give him homework about the topic we were going to teach on our next visit (which is what we've been doing all along, he just didn't realize it!) Okay Eder I guess we can give you homework if you really want it, sheesh, JK. So back to the party. I was dancing with the members and it was really fun.
But it wasn't apostate because I was dancing with the women and singing hymn lyrics to the music. I also cut Esmereld's hair that morning. I'm getting lots of business here. I'm going to be cutting the Zone Leaders hair later today.

I translated for the first time in chruch and it was kinda a tramatic experience...no not really But it was really hard. Me and Hermana McGuire tooks turns. And when I got flustered she wouldn't even save me. This is one of the lines I said "something about prayer." It's hard cause you got to listen and talk and translate it in your brain at the same time.

Well, I hope I didn't bore you and I hope everyone has a super fun Christmas and remembers the true meaning!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! The birth of our Saviour Jesus Christ Mas means more so I like to say Christ (MAS)
Love
Hermana Hepworth

Yes, I'm Still Alive!

Dear Family and Friends,

So much has happened since I last sent a blog message to my mother! We had our Thanksgiving Party, that was super fun. It was a pretty random group of people who showed up. Investigators and Less actives came, recent converts and of course members who don't have much family living close by. It was the strangest food I've had for a Thanksgiving dinner. Of course these was turkey, potatoes, yams, rolls, ham and pie, but I'll bet none of you have ever had rice, beans or tortillas at your Thanksgiving party. It was fun to see everyone interacting with each other and after we had all eaten we played a game of musical chairs. Whenever someone got out they had to say what they were grateful for. People started aplauding after each person, it was so cute!

Missionary work has been pretty good. We started teaching the daughter of a less active wo has MS. We helped her bathe and I braided her hair. She's 32 but she can't do anything for herself. We want to keep seeing her and helping her but her mom makes excuses to not let us in. For this transfere we need lots of miracles. We're teaching lots of really cool couples who have children but aren't married so we're going to need to have lots of weddings. Esmerelda is like the mose amazing member missionary who ever was! She helps us out so much when we need a woman to come with us to a single mans house. She came with us to Ana and Aldo's lesson and became their best friend and even started planning their wedding! We've also started teaching a less active man named Jesus, he hadn't been to church for about 8 months so we stopped by on Saturday and invited him to church and the next day he was there with his (nonmember) wife.........turns out all he needed was an invitation. So we've started teacher her too! (Marta) She's awesome, in a week she has already read the first 7 chapters in the Book of Mormon.

Hermana Murphy went home so I have a new companion now.....well kind of. I'm still in Des Moines with Hermana Hancock and my trainer (Hermana McGuire) is here now. So I'm still in a trio.

It finally snowed yesterday so I got to break out my boots, even though the snow is annoying I'm kinda glad it's here now. I mean c'mon, it would't be winter/Christmas without snow. Yesterday the weather got to single digits and soon it will be below 0. They cancelled our ward yesterday but we were able to go to a later ward and it was in English....weird!

Oh, and I tried shrimp for the first time. I's good! It was a really strange visit, our first lesson with a referral from the English Elders named Fransisco (who reminds me EXACTLY) of Kendall (Empey) the laugh and facial features and everything. you should tell him that if you ever see him. Once again Esmerelda helped us with the appointment, we had to teach him in his bedroom, which had knives laying around everywhere. (It really scared Hermana Hancock) We ate shrimp and this tasty fruit that lokks like a tomato. But we're not going to teach him again because he likes to worship his Saints and doesn't want to change. That's a problem we run into a lot with the Spanish people, they're mostly all Catholic and like to worship the Saints and don't understand why it's not okay.

til next time,

Hermana Hepworth