Week 21: Mission Presidents Can Read Minds

Multizona

Welcome back everybody.

First of all, happy Thanksgiving! It was a little hard being away from the family this time around but luckily we had multizone conference on Thanksgiving! And because my mission president is the best there ever was, we had an almost fully authentic Thanksgiving dinner for lunch.

Being in Honduras has helped me see a whole lot more of the blessings I have in my life. I am so grateful for my family, my friends, my education, my washing machine back at home, but most importantly, my Savior. My life has changed and will continue to change because of Him. And I will never take washing machines for granted ever again.

This week was really hard but also incredible. I've noticed that that kinda has seemed to be the trend ever since I left training. Now, nearly 100% of the time I am focused on the work here and I think that has made the work a lot harder but a whole lot more fulfilling. We had a couple of days this week when not a single soul of the people we were teaching were in their homes. However, almost always at the end of days like this, God gives us a lot of tender mercies and blessings to make it a good day. 

Rebeca did not get baptized but it's totally okay! Her mom just wants her to investigate a little bit longer and learn a little bit more so that she is 100% committed to the Gospel and honestly I can't complain. That's what we want too haha. However, continue to keep her in your prayers so that sometime soon we can help Rebeca make her first covenant with her Heavenly Father.

We are also teaching a 14 year-old named Jorge and we have had some super good and Spirit-filled lessons with him so please pray that he can continue to recognize the Spirit to help grow his faith and confidence in the church.

In addition to the good food, multizone conference was amazing. President somehow knew every way I could improve myself in lessons and obedience and decided to talk about every single one and it was so good to get those reminders to help motivate me in this work. We also talked about yielding our hearts to God. This means doing all we can to align ourselves (actions, thoughts, words) with the will of God. This is important for all people, but especially for missionaries. As we do this, it becomes easier to be a disciple of Christ and it is easier to see the miracles in our lives.

We watched the bus for Copán leave without us after multizone conference which was tragic but a member in the branch who has a van came to our rescue which was awesome. We did not arrive home until 11pm but don't worry we had permission from president.

This week, I have been very focused on teaching about the importance of the Book of Mormon in our conversion. It does not matter if the missionaries found you yesterday or if you have been a member for 70 years– through regular reading of the Book of Mormon, our testimony in all things of the Gospel of Jesus Christ will be strengthened. Joseph Smith said, “I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the most correct of any book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book.” This is one of my favorite quotes and I can testify of its truthfulness. We can always find new things and learn more when we read its pages and no matter what, God will bless us with the Holy Ghost when we show our desire to follow Him. The Book of Mormon is how we progress in this life instead of digress.

Read the Book of Mormon!

Love you all! Keep progressing!

Élder Snyder

Working

My Bride

Posterity of Elder Carlston

Veterens of Copan

Views

More Working

Elder Rios' Birthday

Cake fight 

Side of the Freeway somewhere in Honduras

Week 20: The Hand of God

A very hectic street contact

Hi

Ok this week was actually insane. So it was my first full week of parenthood and it went pretty well but solely thanks to the hand of God in the missionary work here in Copán.

My companion and I are getting along quite well despite the language barrier. We definitely have our differences but every disagreement is an opportunity to exercise patience, humility, and love.

Ok so… miracles. Due to some complicated family circumstances, a 13 year-old girl named Rebeca is now living in the house of some of the most active members in the branch. At church, she approached US before we could and told us she wanted to learn more about our church. A couple days later, we went to her house and started by asking her what she wanted to learn/what were her expectations. She then proceeded to fulfill every missionary's wildest dreams and say “I want to learn about baptism.” My companion and I were like “Yeah we can teach you about that” absolutely flipping out on the inside. Over the next few days we taught her everything and she already has such a strong testimony and desire to follow Jesus Christ in her life. We taught the youth class in church yesterday and she was participating the more than everyone else. We also asked her when she would like to be baptized and she said as soon as possible so we set a date for this Saturday! Her mom who lives in the United States and is not a member is a little hesitant to give permission for her baptism because the process was quite fast so please pray that her heart can be softened so Rebeca can receive all the blessings of baptism soon!

This week we also saw miracles in our other lessons and I honestly don't know if I have felt the Spirit this strong on my mission. Maybe it's because I'm actually really trying to pay attention to every word because I have to now haha but seriously there is so much power in listening and then waiting. Waiting for the Spirit to give you the words and questions that are necessary and also waiting to allow the person to think and recognize the Spirit.

Other stuff:

---Probably had one of the hardest and most frustrating days on the mission this week but it don't matter.

---Drank about 2 liters of Coke yesterday. I'm committing to a soda fast because I'm scared.

---Spanish is improving a ton and I kind of have my personality in Spanish now and it's really fun.

---Don't eat bananas and drink Coke at the same time.

---Played fútbol and I think I missed 8 wide open goals from 5 feet away but it's chill because I always have an excuse because of my skin color!🥳

Missions are an interesting thing. First of all, time absolutely flies. My whole life I've looked ahead to my mission as the time to really become the man I want to be and change. As time keeps ticking, I have realized that I am going to blink and my mission will be over. This thought honestly brought me a lot of fear because I felt like I haven't really changed that much. However, I looked back to the Elder Snyder I was when I first started my mission and the growth I can see from that me to who I am now is incredible. However, the key factor in that change was not the number of baptisms I have had (0 lol) or the leadership assignments I have received. It's Christ and His Atonement. It's the scriptures. It's praying with trust and with complete honesty. It's sweating and trudging through mud and rivers in the street to share this message. The most beautiful thing about this is that all of us can do these things every day (minus the last part) and we will experience change. Change we are proud of and change our Heavenly Father is proud of.

Love you all so much and your prayers are being answered! Thank you!!

Élder Snyder

Sorry took like no pictures this week

Cool lights in the city square

Pretty sure this is the only Porsche in Honduras

Pictures of the Ruins in Copan

 

Week 19: I'm a Teenage Dad

New Copan Crew

Yep. As the title says, I have a child. In mission terms, I'm training!! I still don't know how or why because I just finished my own training 4 days ago but we are trying our best! My new companion is Elder Abarca and he is from Mexico and has such a strong testimony and desire to be the best missionary he can be. It's honestly pretty fun being the one who takes the lead and starts all the contacts and discussions and it is actually crazy to see how real the gift of tongues is. Thank you all so much for your prayers because they are for real being answered. It's kinda funny too. In lessons, I can communicate myself better than I ever have before. But in the house, it's kind of a struggle to communicate and teach my companion what he needs to know about the area and the people. It's hard but my Spanish is improving like crazy because now the only English I speak all day is my personal prayer in the morning and night!🥲 But for real I'm extremely blessed to have this opportunity and to be learning so much. 

So this week Elder Perry left. It was honestly a lot harder for me than I thought to watch his bus drive away because it hit me that time is actually flying by. Miss you Elder Perrito go kill it in Santa Barbara🫡.

Went to the Mayan Ruins here in Copán for Pday last week and holyyyyy they are insane. So huge and there's still so much there. We went into the tunnels that the Mayans built under the temples and it felt like we were in an Indiana Jones movie. It was also just crazy to know that the descendants of those we read so much about in the Book of Mormon built these structures and walked that same ground so many years ago. 

On Wednesday, Elder Evanson and I worked together in here Copan and it was sooo good for us (he is also training another Latino right now). We were able to teach some solid lessons and gain confidence in our ability to lead the area and train. On Thursday, we went to La Entrada because we needed to travel to San Pedro to pick up our kids the next day and the Zone Leaders sent me and Elder Evanson to contact the streets of their area. This was also super good practice for me and now I have basically no fear to start talking to someone in the street. But La Entrada is a little crazy and we'll just leave it at that haha. 

Friday I got my kid and we received an awesome training from the leadership of our mission and it was awesome.

Other than that we are just working and finding new people to teach. I'm honestly pretty stressed because we have some really promising people who Elder Perry connected with really well and I just don't want to mess it up. So, like always, prayers are much appreciated.

One thing that has been on my mind a lot this week is the importance of our efforts. Many of you may know that I have a pretty bad case of perfectionism. I want to do everything perfectly right so then I get perfectly good results. However, that's just not how the mission works. I have come to learn that because I think I have been the furthest from perfect in my life in these last 4 months. But that doesn't matter one bit. What matters is our true desire and our efforts. May we all try to align our desires with those of our Heavenly Father and then try our hardest with our imperfect efforts to do His will. I know we will see blessings, receive strength to keep going, and see immense improvement when we do this. 

The Gospel is true and it is how we change for the better! We don't need to change before we come unto Christ, we need to come unto Christ to change.

Love you all so so so much!

Élder Snyder

Elder Vargas

Angel David and Jorge

Goodbyes with Familia Hernandez

Elder Ebarca, my chiki

Marquitos Birthday

Week 18: All You Need Is Love

Yo yo yo

Shorter email this week but we started off with going to La Entrada for interviews with our mission president and we played a ton of basketball at the church there which was so lit (there are no courts in Copán☹️). Elder Peterson played all through high school Evanson might play college ball after the mission so needless to say it was legit.

We then had interviews the next day and it was awesome to receive training and council from president that was very helpful for me to hear. 

This week, an 11 year-old girl named Karla who has been taught by missionaries for a long time got baptized. Her mom and brother are members and she literally knows everything about the Gospel but was hesitant to get baptized due to very controlling extended family who are a part of a church she was baptized in over a year ago. Here, many people believe it is an unforgivable sin to be baptized more than once, no matter who or how you were baptized. She made the choice to be baptized in the same manner as Jesus Christ and immediately faced extreme opposition and hatred from family members. Please keep her and her family in your prayers. This girl has such a strong testimony and cannot wait to serve a mission and needs all the love you can share through your prayers!

Quick other stuff:

---One of the APs (assistent to the president) asked me if I spoke Spanish before the mission because he was impressed after a practice which was a dope confidence booster because sometimes I feel like my Spanish is absolute trash. 

---Ate 4 dinners in one night this week. Had a very happy stomach that night. 

Played fútbol with a couple of our new amigos and they are ridiculously good so that will be lit. 

---Absolutely destroyed a kitten in 2 staring contests at a member's home. Home boy ended up falling asleep so that is like the ultimate win right?

I want to bare my testimony of the power of the Holy Ghost. It truly is our guide that gives us so much strength and so much direction. And oftentimes, we don't even realize it is the Spirit giving us all of that help. I have seen the power of the Spirit in my missionary work this week and also in the example of Karla receiving the gift of the Holy Ghost and how much strength it is giving her in this hard time. 

I also want to invite you all to find ways you can express love instead of judgement, criticism, and contention. This week I have seen how much contention destroys and how much love fixes. And even if it doesn't fix everything, it is what Christ would do and he will bless you in due time for your efforts.

Much love,

Élder Snyder

Gringos of La Entrada

Me Winning!

Had a friend at church

Baptism of Karla

Interviews

Hermana Isabelle