Photos of the Missionaries in the Mision Cuernavaca

Quick Note This Week

Hey mom! Sounds like a fun thanksgiving, I LOVED that video of Wes driving the toy car and almost crashing into the palm tree! I had a good Thanksgiving, we just ordered some tacos hahaha. I´m so excited to talk to you guys soon! Love you

I enter into the 4th quarter of my mission this week!!!! Here´s some pics of me rn.

Élder Tucker

Photos and a quick letter

I asked Scott about his favorite memories of Youth Conferences:

"I always loved all the youth conferences I went to. The best part was always the classes given by couples in the ward or stake. So spiritual. Like one time Chris and Karen Zaharis gave a class at a youth conference and they talked about their heli skiing trip in Alaska! Another youth conference at the Bawdens cabin, The Allreds, The Stratfords, and The Bawdens all gave great classes as well about various topics. And there´s always gotta be a dance. My biggest advice would be to get the oldest youth as involved as possible because they get everyone else excited to do stuff if they are. Also making sure they all share their testimony at some point. You have a great calling!

Love you so much mom! Oscar looks like a good pup. 

CDMX, Acapulco y La Conferencia de Área

Hola Familia!

Sorry for not writing for a while, but it´s been pretty good out here in good ol´ Mexico.

Last Monday I had to travel to Acapulco and Iguala to get some pictures and signatures of missionaries that are renewing their temporal residencies and it was awesome! I took some sweet pictures at this tourist place called ´La Quebrada´ and got to hang with some ZL homies. I gotta convince Presi to send me there once I get out of the offices. I LOVE Acapulco. Its burning hot and nothing but stares, perfect for losing some lbs., and its got the costera buses that just blast regatón music all day, AND its got the beach and the best tacos of the mish, what more could an elder ask for? 

Also, a couple weeks ago, I had to go to CDMX to drop off the missionaries going home and we made a quick stop by El Ángel de Independencia which is this famous statue in the middle of a ton of skyscrapers in the middle of Mexico City. It was during Día de Muertos celebrations so there were this cool, decorated skulls everywhere in the streets between the Zócalo and a big cemetery. Mexico has some of the coolest traditions.

Yesterday for church we had an area conference with the entire country, there was a huge turnout in the stake center, overflowing with gente. The area president spake, some setentas, and Élder Rasband. It was interesting listening to white general authorities speak with worse spanish than my own, but their talks were very good. My favorite was about the importance of having a vigente recomendacion para el templo. The speaker shared the story of this one member that was about to die in the hospital who asked to be interviewed by her priesthood leaders one last time to renew her temple recommend. Not because she thought she would need it or use it, sino because she wanted that extra self confirmation that she was lista to return to Padre Celestial. Temple recommends really are they best way of showing if we are worthy to return to God´s presence. It´s kinda like the parable of the ten virgins, our lamp is a current temple recommend and the oil comes from diligently spending time in the Lord´s house.

The works been kinda slow and hard lately because we´ve been so busy in the office. I´m getting kinda excited to get outta here soon and return to being a normal missionary again, but it´s all good. I still like it and am happy out here. Can´t believe christmas is coming up!

Love you all so much! Keep writin´! I love reading emails.

Love,

Élder Tucker

¡Aventuras, nuevo compañero Elder Vakapuna!

Hola Familia!

Wow, what a great week in the Mexico Cuernavaca Mission! Arturo Flores was baptized and confirmed this weekend!!! The baptismal program went great, and I had the privilege of performing the ordinance.

One of the reasons that this baptism was so special was because it was one of the few times that I had gone through the entire process of finding, teaching, and baptizing with the same companion. Elder Bonilla and I have been stoked! It was also cool because it was so fast, hahaha. Arturo is 57 years old and had never really been very religious before we found him. He also even used to struggle with the word of wisdom. But after a member family invited him to a noche de hogar that we had in their house one night, he started listening to us, believing, and making the necessary changes in his life to be able to be right with God. This and other experiences that I have had with converts in the mission has increased my faith that they are many amazing children of our Heavenly Father ready to accept the Gospel, we just need to find them. So many of the mexican people have the extraordinary gift of being able have faith in their Savior Jesus Christ. Maybe for that Mexico is the country with the second most members in the whole world!

In other news, I got a new companion, Elder Vakapuna! His family currently lives in West Valley, Utah, but he is originally from Tonga. Finally! I've always wanted a Tongan comp. He´s the most easy going, cool guy you've ever met. I´m excited to be working with him hear in the offices. Elder Bonilla is currently training him to be the finance secretary right now and then he´ll be headed off to a new area.

I also had to do a couple tramites this week in migracion for some foreign missionaries but the changed places to this private airport in the middle of nowhere hahaha. It´s in this place called Temixco. I didn't even know there was an airport in the mission. And it´s kinda in the middle of the jungle lol. anyway, good times.

Hope everyone´s good, enjoy the pictures and have a good week!


Love,
Élder Tucker

 

Una buena semana y la Conferencia General

Hola Familia!

Sorry I haven´t had a good group letter in a while, but it was a good week topped off with a GREAT conference weekend! How ´bout that conference, eh?

My favorite talks were definitely Elder Neil L. Anderson's, M Joseph Brough's about going through hard things, Shayne M. Bowen's powerful testimony of the Book of Mormon, and of course, Elder Holland's just made me feel wonderful hahaha. If you haven´t had the chance to hear one of those talks yet, I highly suggest doing it. I also know that we will all benefit more from conference as we continue to study all of the talks for the next 6 months.

I think the changes to the Sunday block schedule starting in January are definitely inspired of God and will help us to be more active students and livers of the Gospel throughout the week with our families.

I´m also taking on President Nelson´s challenge to finish the Book of Mormon before the end of the year and I´m super excited!

Arturo passed his baptismal interview this week and is going to be baptized this weekend! Can´t wait to tell you all about it, he is so good.

Anyway, not much else to talk about this week. Hope you´re all well!

Love,

Élder Tucker

fotos- 

1, vacas en Cuernavaca jajaja

2, cute baby

Catching Up with Elder Tucker! Mi Semana en la Mision Mexico

September 17, 2018

Hola Familia!

Wow, finally get a little time to write. This week´s been crazy.

Monday was transfer day in the mission and I had to plan all the logistics for eveyone switching companions/areas. I also went to the Mexico City airport to pick up two elders coming from the Provo MTC and one from Colombia.

Tuesday I took a big group of missionaries to immigration here in Morelos to renew their temporal residency.

Wednesday I headed back to the airport to drop off all the missionaries that had finished their missions. It was actually the group that I was originally set to go home with, so I got to say goodbye to my CCM comps, Elder Stevens and Elder Contreras.

Then came the highlight of the week: early Thursday morning, we had to be back in the airport to receive Elder Amarilla coming in from Argentina so my companion Elder Bonilla and I got permission to stay wednesday night at the dorms at the Mexico City temple!!! It was so cool, we even got to do a session! Then we met the secretaries for the Mexico City East Mission who are all senior couples, and there´s six of them, hahaha! All doing the same job that us four elders do half-day here in the offices.

And then yesterday, I had to make yet another trip to CDMX to drop off an Elder who had to go home for medical reasons, unfortunately.

Anyway, it was an interesting and a bit stressful week. Needless to say, I´m starting to get to know Mexico City pretty well. All part of being executive secretary of the mission.

Arturo, Katia, and Isaac all attended church on sunday and are progressing!Also last week I went on divisions with my old companion, Elder Pacheco, to visit another one of our investigators, Magda. I actually met Magda when I was in the Iguala zone, but she´s now moved up to Cuernavaca with her family. I feel like it means that God really wants me to baptize her, haha. But she accepted the commitment to get married before the end of the month which was the only thing keeping her from being baptized before! So, we decided to be nice and get her copies of the Bible as well as the triple (BOM, D&C, and POGP)! I have a great feeling about how things are going!

Well, I hope everyone is well. Thanks for the emails and support, love you all.

September 24, 2019: Monday

Hey mom! Ya it was pretty cool visiting with Tara yesterday. She showed me her dad´s high school freshman yearbook that had a bunch of pictures with Grandpa Tucker! She also gave my companion and I a couple of cookies so that was nice. Ya I think it would be perfect to stay at that place when you guys come down here to pick me up, I didn´t realize how close it was to where I am. That's cool that you´re in Georgia, did you go with anyone else?

But ya, I´m super excited for General Conference. I think everyone´s expecting something big to happen just like last time. hahaha

Thanks for the pics you sent me of Wes! She's so cute. And super exciting for John and B to be having another one! I can´t think of any good girl names right now, but I´m sure John´s already had one planned out for a couple months now.

Thanks for the email and constant love and support and motivation! Love you too! ps, could you send me the pics that Tara sent you yesterday?

Élder Tucker


September 27, 2019: Corbatas!

Hey Mom, Thanks for sending the ties.  They just got here!  Love,
Elder Tucker