Week 25 Taught Some Gringos

Taught Some Gringos 

Elder Quispe popped my soccer ball this week...ya thats all. I thought about calling Papi Fortuna (nickname for the mission pres.) and asking for emergency transfers but I kept my kool. Ya for real though he popped my soccer ball which sucks. Then the next day he fell out of my hammock which was probably one the funniest things that has ever happened. He legit cried for like 20 minutes and for those of you that know me well I don't have a whole lot of sympathy lol. 

We are working with 5 different families right now and it is insane. The way the mission works ( or at least here) is that in the afternoon you are just walking around and talking to ladies that are making tortillas and what not. Or kids that are super poor and aren't in school. Then after like 5 everyone is in their house and you are running from house to house and bus to bus to try and talk to everyone you need to talk with. 

We are going to baptize this family that has been meeting with missionaries for 15 years! Not sure what changed or why they started coming to church. We had a lesson with them last night and the husband told me he will do anything to enter the temple with his wife. I had no words after he said this. Caught me so off guard. So grateful for every day here in Honduras and the people I get to teach.

Other family we found lives in the middle of no where and we woke up at 5 and walked there to take them to church. Realized more in that morning about life and what is important then I think I have in any other single day in my life. 

Going to start taking some more pictures. Found a monkey that lives in our area. This picture is where I wait for the bus everyday and my house is off the the right but you cant see it. 

 

Oh lol and the title. Ya these baptist kids where here this week building a house and I taught them about the Book of Mormon in english (: it was like 25 kids that all were around my age and I was soooo dang nervous and my english was sooo shaky i couldn't remember like any of the english words for gospel stuff at all.

Elder Thorn

Week 24 Two Families One Change

Two Families One Change

If you don't read this please just look at this picture of a dog in a diaper.

Typing this in orange because this week was fresh (like an orange) lol. Finished my first change with Elder Quispe this week. A change here in the mission is 6 weeks so I have 6 more with Elder Quispe and then I will be leaving Germania. Really love it here and it has really started to become a second home to me. Elder Quispe and I had a ton of fun this week. We took all these random jumping photos one night. He is really starting to come out of his shell. Annddd he is a lil cocky. lol he thinks he knows everything. Well kind of. The other day he was trying to tell me that I shouldn't use the microwave more than two times in one week or I'm going to have colon cancer. I legit started laughing and ya wasn't a joke.... he got kinda pissed. I hope I have latino comps for my whole mish. No joke, they really are so funny and so different and teach so much about the real world.

We had the baptism of Jose Hernandez this week. But the Jose Hernandes that lives in Germania next to the water tank, km 9 last house on the bottom. LoL at least that is what I put on the baptism record. His wife was baptized 2 years ago along with 3 of their kids. I had the opportunity of baptizing him. I have baptized all of my converts and I'm not really sure why. But I had a special experience during the baptism that I want to share real fast. As I was sitting in my chair singing spanish hymns I looked at my feet that have close to 30 misquote bites right now (long story short we left the door open to our house the other night) and I realized how real a baptism really is. We all have agency and we all have the opportunity to choose in this life. I truly believe no matter where you are, who you are, or what you circumstances are you still have agency. We can achieve more and essentially become more by exercising our agency through the ordinances God has given us. 

Love all you guys and I hope everyone is loving life. 

This dude is massive his name is troches. he lived in new york for 15 years and is suuuper rich the other day he pulled out 2000 dollars in limps and was like ya brah. Painted his house the other day which was sweet. 

Week 23 Interchanges with Elder Holt

Interchanges with Elder Holt

Got to teach with the best missionary in the mission this week. Elder Holt is one of my zone leaders right now and he is about to finish his mission. He was the assistant to the president for 5 months and the mission had its all time highest numbers when he was there. That all being said he is a perfect example of the missionary that knows how to not only work hard but effective as well. Zone leaders only have interchanges with district leaders to help them learn more about how to be a good leader and how to motivate the district. I jokingly asked him the other week to have interchanges so I could  learn more about how he teaches and how to be a good missionary. Then to my surprise he called me Tuesday and was like hey bro want to have interchanges tomorrow. Kind of rambling right now but more than anything the talk I had with him that night had a huge impact on me. He had to return to his house when he only had 4 months in the mission and he was in his house for 7 more months. He shared his testimony with me about the change the mission has had on him and the power of the atonement. He gave me a lot more advice about what to do and what not to do in the mission. 

This is a photo of him because I don't think I have any others. Super short time to write today because we are going to go play soccer with the other zone (:

Also got a package from my friend Jenna this week and opened it with Elder Quispe and was just super funny to try and explain all the things that we have in the sates.

Elder Thorn.

Elder Quispe

Elder Holt

Week 22 Elder Alonso of the 70

Elder Alonso of the 70

Started singing Spanish songs in the shower this week and Elder Quipse thinks its pretty chill. Hope that is a little indicator to how the comp is. No the real Elder Quispe is progressing unreal fast. The way he teaches is months better than I was teaching in my first month. So weird to think I already have a month with Elder Quispe and am going on five months in the mission. That being said I am really getting in the groove of things. Something I am super proud of, and was one of my goals before the mission, is that I have woke up at 6:30 (or earlier on weird days) for every single day in the mission. And I haven’t taken a nap a single day. For those of you that were around me before the mission, know this is legit the complete opposite of what I did before the mission. Little things like that, small acts of obedience, are what help us become more like Christ. 

Elder Alonso came and spoke to the whole mission this week. They split it in half, so he spoke to half the mission one day and the other half a different day.  In reality the meeting was sooooo long. He spoke in the morning then we had lunch and then he spoke again. The first meeting was horrible. The questions that we missionaries were asking were just stupid and obvious. The second however has helped me in both my studies and my personal prayers. For most of my life when I pray I do what most of us do; I say I am grateful for this or for that and then ask for things I need help with. Elder Alonso spoke of the way he prays. He tells our Heavenly Father what he is going to do in the day, what his plan is. Then asks for help with that plan and to have the Spirit with him when he speaks. Then at night he tells our Heavenly Father how the plan went. HOW DIFFERENT: how interesting this is to me. I have been applying this, this week and it has changed my view on the day. It helps us realize that goals and plans are the way of the Lord. 

Last thing this week and I am sad I forgot to bring my study journal. It’s in 3 Nephi chapter 17 or so when Christ prays with the Nephites. I imagine all of my family and everyone I know all kneeling with Christ in the center as He pray for us. Then after he blesses all the kids "one by one" He weeps. This is the part that really got me. He weeps. This isn’t used very often in English and the word doesn’t exist in Spanish (only to cry). Reading this I can know that my Savior Jesus Christ knows me personally and " weeps" with me when things are hard. 

Elder Thorn

Week 21 Area Split & Elder Quispe

Area Spilt and More About Elder Quispe

Super weird and difficult week this week. They gave a part of our area that's called Santa Rosa to the other Elders because they weren't having any success. It really rubbed me the wrong way and thus made for a hard week. Almost all of our new investigators were in Santa Rosa. So all of our last weeks work kind of went to waste. Well it went to the other Elders. Elder Quispe and I were forced to work super close to our house which is a pretty small area and its had missionaries since like 1990 or something nuts. We spent almost all week contacting and trying to find new people again. 

Elder Quispe is a dancer lol its freaking awesome. Ya so he was like on a dance team and traveled all over the place Brazil, Argentina and ya all over South America. He knows all these weird dances and its soo dang funny I make him show me them in the morning and just try not to laugh. He gets suuuuper suuper homesick sometimes and I'm just like homes stop reading your letter from your girlfriend and he doesn't like that too much. I really love training though. The way he teaches or rather his ability to teach clearly and powerfully is really coming a long. We read the book of Mormon in english every morning which is awesome. Going to put some photos of us in here. He doesn't have a blanket because ya he is just new. So he freezes at night so the other night he like got all wrapped up in his towel and gloves. I don't have a blanket or I would give it to him. I get so dang hot at night with just my sheet. 

Please  take a moment and laugh at Elder Quispe's face in this photo. Oh painted the other Elders house this week too. Legit painted their house and then they were like oh and p.s. we are taking half your area..

Elder Thorn

Week 20 Temple and 30 Nuevos

Temple and 30 nuevos

Went through the temple for my first time here in the mission, and only my second time in my life. Can't believe I didn't utilize the temple when I was at home. I think living in Utah we see temples so much and we forget how important they really are. We went through he temple with he whole zone, close to 40 kids all serving the Lord in a foreign country. As I sat in the temple looking at all the young men and young women around me every thing was so clear. When we are in temple it's so easy to see that this, the Scriptures, praying, church, prophets, all that is so real and its not just for this life. When we aren't regularly attending the temple it's so hard to have a true grasp on what eternity means. But when we are in the Lord´s House it becomes as clear as it possibly can in this life. 

All this being said I was extremely motivated after the temple. I felt that it truly didn't matter in the slightest what I said or what i did as long as i was trying my hardest to peach this gospel. A direct result of this was that we found a ridiculous amount of new people and new families. Our zone set the record of new investigators for the mission at 245 new people in one week. Elder Quispe and I had 30 new people with 7 new families. That's 30 people that have never had the chance to hear the gospel like you all have. I wanted to write a little about why we don't share the gospel with those around us, and there are a lot of reasons. We are scared, we don't have time and this can go on and on. But really all of these reasons "become as stubble" when we are doing the things we need to be doing. Im referring to daily prayer, daily studying of our scriptures, having our family home evening, and regularly attending the temple. When we are doing all these things we feel the need of sharing this beautiful gospel

"Regarding ones testimony, remember, that which one willingly shares he keeps. while that which he selfishly keeps he loses.. Teach and testify. There is no better combination"

- Thomas S. Monson 

Elder Quispe

Week 19 Bucket Showers and Weddings

Bucket Showers and Weddings

Spent way to much time writing family and friends today so this is going to be short.

Had the wedding and the baptism of Familia Gutierrez esta semana (this week). Really was a long time in the making and it finally paid off. A few crazy things happened this week that made it so I was pretty much in charge of it all and I almost peed my pants. Our Bishop randomly decided to visit his family in Nicaragua this week and didn't answer his phone all week. Our ward mission leader has a little baby and has been in the hospital because he is super sick ( the baby). I hadn't been able to talk to either one all week and was like uhhh well I hope the lawyer shows up and all the papers I have are right. Went over Saturday and picked David and Julia (familia gutierrez) literally walked across a river with them while she was in her big white wedding dress it was freaking awesome! The wedding went all good even thought the lawyer was 30 minutes late. Then we had to do the interviews after the wedding and the whoooolllee family just left. The buses only run so late so they had to go. I thought David and Julia would be super sad but they didn't care in the slightest. Then the baptism robe didn't have this zipper and haha its was great. All in all it was awesome and I got to be part of it. Affect a family for eternity. Days in the mission are really hard sometimes, when no one wants to talk to you or investigators don't come to church. But when you find someone that is ready to hear the gospel those days seem way more important then the others. 

My new comp is from Bolivia and is the most humble kid alive. Taught him how to use a microwave his first day. He cooks weird food it's awesome. I'm learning a ton of spanish from him. He is kinda shy and his knowledge about the gospel is interesting. We have had a lot of success already though and I was so hyped to have a baptism of a family for him his first week. 

Elder Thorn

P.S. We didn't get water for like two weeks it suckkkkeeeddd. We couldn't wash clothes or take showers. So we were taking water from this other pila and showering with a bowl out of a big five gallon bucket. lol sucked suuucked. and it was my comps first week and ya just super funny.

The birthday cake Elder Holt bought for me.