Week 53 Ecuador

Family Home Evening...

and you thought it was a Christmas party;)

...just goes to show I CAN plan things, when I want.

Baptisms in the Murillo family! You know the gospel is true and the Atonement is powerful when you see it bring two separating parents together as they strive to come closer to God. Result, kids baptized, happy family. This cracked me up, dad and son looking up (with the picture of the first vision in the background, haha)

Jump-suits are the bomb

Assistants being goofy.

Us, always happy doing weekly numbers!

9/28/15 voice message

Hi family. I hope everyone had a wonderful week. It probably wasn’t as fulfilling as mine though…just sayin’. We had some fun. I got to go out and play basketball a couple mornings. When one of the assistants was here, Elder Ryelch, he’s gonna go play for the University of Utah after, so he’s pretty good. He’s like 6’ 4. I’m about as good, or worse than I ever was at basketball, but you know…I can play around. Everyone says I shoot like a wrestler…ya that’s deserved I guess. My companion, he’s super good at basketball too. He played two years in high school. 

We had the biggest family home evening last Monday I’ve ever seen in my life, because Miguel Penafiel our old mission leader was leaving on the mission. He’s a pretty popular guy it looks like. We gave a message, I think it was pretty good, got some references (not really), but you know we tried. During the rest of the testimonies and things that went on for like 45 minutes, me and Elder Albrecht secretly played checkers behind a table. That was pretty fun. Won two times, lost once. Then we got some food. That’s the fun thing about being a missionary, the people always serve you first, so you never feel left out. 

Mexicans are few and far between here in the mission, but I got to go on my first intercambio with one, Elder Abendano. He’s a pretty cool guy. We ordered in some pizza for the six of us when we were doing the intercambio, and I didn’t get home ’til like 10:30…shhh. Don’t tell anyone, but it was mainly because a returned missionary drove us home in his car, and he was driving suuuper slow with spanish rap music blaring, mainly as a joke. It was kind of funny, but it got old, but whatever, we got home. All you can do is laugh about it. 

Some good things happened as far as the work this week. We found some good new investigators. We’ve got baptisms lined up for each weekend in October. We got to keep finding to fill up the month, but we’re just going to keep the baptismal font full so we can throw them in at any minute. Speaking of that though…keeping the font full. Me and Elder Albrecht forgot to drain the font from our last baptism two weeks ago, and we went to use it again…to clean it out. It was full of four dead cockroaches, and these nasty worms that were dead and floating on top. The water was like green and moldy. It was So disgusting, but when we tried to drain it, we figured out that there’s an electrical problem, and it won’t even drain. So that water is just sitting in the font at the church. It’s so gross. We don’t really know what to do, but hey not our problem I guess…whoops! Luckily we have another baptismal font here in the zone, and if that one just happens to go out then we’re running for the river I suppose. Doing it Jesus and John the Baptist style. I suppose that allows the more open, exposed heavens aspect when you come up out of the water. According to Ecuador, every time you give a baptism talk, they always say “there’s a party in heaven today, we’re so happy for you”…every single time. It just makes me laugh. I haven’t been to many baptisms in the states, but is that like a common thing to say? 

Towards the end of this week we’ve had some special opportunities I guess you could say. An area seventy came, Elder Calderon and his wife. They visited the mission, and shoot, brought the spirit. Poderoso! A few things I learned mostly, I recognized the most powerful teaching comes by personal experiences, our testimonies. We should ask to recognize how the spirit speaks to each one of us. Finally, I learned that faith never looks back, it is based on the hope of the future. My mission is my time to kill the things that can impede me from moving forward in life, and perfecting myself. I am to live out my youth to the fullest, yeah…pretty much that. #foreveryoung. I only have 6 more months of being 19 years old, and then when I hit 20 I feel like that’s when you have to be a man or something. I don’t know, I guess we’ll figure that out when it gets here…ha That’s sure not the case in Bryan I suppose, so maybe I’m good? Just kiddin’ Bryan, you’re a stud. Elder Albrecht just discovered that he’s gaining a widows peak, so it was a tough moment for him. I’m good though. I’ve always known that I have a widows peak…thanks dad;) 

Lastly, if one day with Elder Calderon and his wife wasn’t enough, we got another one! In the leadership conference Friday, two back to back meetings…gotta love that:) I pretty much fell asleep traveling both ways, but luckily nobody stole the pouch, all the goodies for the zone. We gained a priceless perspective on the mission and life. In short, the Lord has greatly blessed each one of us with abilities to adapt to our situations, circumstances, and lead in life. Out of love we can feel a true desire to serve by teaching others and upholding his standards, and hope to influence others to do likewise. We should be patient with ourselves and others, and that will truly honor God. Our personal progress is almost imperceptible, yet if we’re obedient it’s certain. Life’s not a race, our greatest enemy’s ourselves, and we should just enjoy the journey. Like people always say, but I really felt that was true as he was speaking to us. After giving us the feel good speech, he brought out four chairs, and every missionary knows what four chairs means…practices. He and his wife sat down, and Elder Albrecht and I had the privilege of volunteering ourselves to go stick our head in the guillotine and get it chopped off in front of everyone. They were like, we want you to teach the doctrine of Christ and we want you to invite us to be baptized. We were like easy enough, that’s our job as missionaries right? Well they stopped us every 30 seconds, and they’re like ok, what could you be saying right now? They analyzed every little thing, and all the missionaries from three zones were smirking, glad that it’s not them up there. Two other pairs of zone leaders went up too, and it was good. It was a good learning experience. It’s helped me and Albrecht perfect our teaching a little more. More and more I’m just realizing that the gospel is just principles that if we apply in our lives, we will see the blessings and we’ll come to love them, and it really is the best way to live. It brings happiness, and joy, and peace. I’m seeing that in the mission, and that’s what I want other people to realize. I only have 19 years of personal experiences, and that’s short in comparison with a lot of other people. I can use those to testify of what I know is true.

Finally, we ended this week…well, not ended it, but Saturday we had two baptisms. 

They were fun, little kids you know. I don’t know how touching they can be, ha. 

Elder Albrecht forgot his baptismal clothes, so we put on some of the wards. The suit was Way to small for him. It was riding up hard, but you know I had my classy jumpsuit. Everyone was super impressed, dad the bishop was diggin’ the jumpsuit. I think we had inspiration honestly…I’m going to wear that thing for my honeymoon…that is going to be my nightly gown;) You can know all is good when the spirit is felt. It will be something they can remember. 

If any of you have the opportunity to select the hymn that you’ll sing this week, maybe in your Noche de Hogar tonight if you get this message in time, my new favorite hymn…well, one of them is Brightly Beams Our Fathers Mercy, Brillan Rayos de Clemencia in spanish. In our hymn book it’s 208, but it’s probably not in yours. Sorry, I got talkin’ there in my spanglish, and Noche de Hogar is Family Home Evening if you guys didn’t catch that drift. 

Anyways, Garrett I’m rootin’ for you. I’m still waiting to hear about that first home run slammer for the year. Your all number one in my heart. Keep going strong. Love you all. Chau, chau.

Week 52 Ecuador

"Day as a missionary" wrapping up...these youth were my crew.

Betty Crocker Brownies

Hair-cuts! It was E' Albrechts first time cutting hair soooo we can say it ended up a lil shorter than we originally intended. No worries, it grows back. Not having to do my hair in the morning has been missed too;)

Crazy Ecuadorian fruit!

This boat-bar was pretty cool, I drank water at it:)

The end of the sector...

where the rice-fields start!

Week 51 Ecuador

Congrats to Radolfo Torrez and Mariana Salvatierra on their wedding...

baptism...

& reception!

9/14/15 voice message

Hi family, how’s life? Well, for the first week solo in our sector I guess you could say that it turned out pretty good. Elder Albrecht and I, we’re learning stuff. We have to call and ask where lunch is every day, but we have eight new investigators…we’re finding, we’re chugging along. 

We got the zone together to clean an elderly man’s home in our ward. There were eight of us, and we scrubbed walls, furniture, floor, everything. There just cement boxes that they live in, but it took us like two hours. It was good. Hopefully get them excited about service, and maybe train them how to clean their houses a little bit. That’s a big struggle in the mission, elders cleaning their homes. The whole ordeal definitely made me miss home luxuries, like power washers, and shop vacs, and things, but you know Ecuador…livin’ the simple life. 

After that, the next day an assistant to the president Elder Saucedo came out to work with us for two days. He’s really direct with people, almost like he’s in a big hurry. I’m direct with people, but I’m not pushing them. I didn't like the vibe, but hopefully he can teach us something. I learned from him. 

We had to go out to a meeting with Pres. Riggins, and the stake altogether too. Um…shoot, we have a lot of meetings with stake and everything. I think I may begin counting them as lessons;) 

Well, at least we have some good activities coming up this month. We’re doing this casa obierta, and open house of the church, doing kind of a Meet the Mormons type thing. Hopefully we’ll find a lot of people that are interested. 

A couple really cool things happened this week. We had the wedding of Mariana Salvatierra and her husband Radolfo Torrez, and also the baptism which was sweet. After the baptism the church threw a little reception for them in a room, a cake and all that. I got some pictures I’ll send out to you guys. It was fun though. It’s the third family that I’ve married, and baptized, so It’s fun. It’s a big pain in the butt, but it’s worth it in the end. 

We had a new investigator come to church this week too. We met him, he’s the brother of a recent convert. He’s a little bit older, he’s like forty…dad I think he’s your age, but he’s lived a rough life, working on the farm. Now he’s working as a mechanic, but he got into drinking, and he’s getting out of all of it. We gave him a blessing at the end of a lesson, and he came to church. He accepted a baptismal date, and I’m excited to work with him. In the mission I haven’t worked with somebody with an addiction. I don’t want to say he has a hard addiction, but I think the key is when somebody has to leave a bad influence that takes up so much time in their life, you have to replace it with something good. So, we’re going to teach him how to read the scriptures. I know he’s got a good family behind him, and we’ll think of some other stuff to help him out as we go ahead praying and everything. 

Life’s good though. Elder Albrecht and I have a new tradition of eating 10 cent chocolate covered bananas every day with sprinkles. They’re really good actually. I’m kind of a fan…Ecuador thing. Last night, the end of the week, we buy all our food Monday so Sunday night there’s no food, and you can’t buy anything. I ate pancakes and oranges. 

The other elders in the house, they only come here like three days a week because most of the time they’re running around the mission helping other missionaries out. They’re the traveling assistants. Kind of a cool idea. I would maybe like to do it someday. They’ve been playing their EFY church music all morning, and honestly after the mission I will never listen to that again. The cheesy stuff gets old. We’re in a good mood though, we’re in a good mood. Don’t take me on a bad note.

This week we did a day as a missionary activity with the youth. My companion and I gave a presentation before going out to work. It all went pretty good. I’m excited to get some new references to work with. 

We’ll make a quick shout out to 13 months in the mission yesterday! We’re count in up, we’re counting up. If I didn’t mention or make it clear, Elder Albrecht came in the same group as me, so we’re floatin’ in the same boat. It’s cool to be working with him. He’s a really humble guy, but he’s funny. He comes from a family of 10 kids, and his parents. They lived in California before, and now they’re living in Washington. Huge family though, still kind of boggles my mind. 

Anyways, so I got asked to speak this week in church, and I was the final speaker. We had a youth speaker, another lady, and then we sang a hymn, and as we’re all standing singing the hymn, the power goes out right before I give my talk. I go up there, and in a loud firm voice give my talk. I discoursed on stewardship. It was an interesting topic. It was fun to study, and I felt like that’s what the ward needed. It was about 20 minutes, and after my voice hurt. Everyone said they heard me, understood me, got a lot of compliments. I feel like I presented it well. 

The zone stresses me out a little bit. Our companionship, the two district leaders, are doing good, but the other four elders are in training. One of them is struggling with obedience, the other is kind of timid. Then we have the four hermanas. They didn't find a single new investigator this week. They didn’t have anybody in church, so it’s like struggle, struggle, struggle. They don’t know how to make goals, so this week we need to sit down in a meeting with them and make goals with them, and make plans to how we can accomplish them. It’s hard. It stresses me out a little, but it’s all good, because I’m just here to help other missionaries be successful. I’ll do the best I can. I can’t really hold their hand, especially with the hermanas;) I can teach them what I know, and hope that they apply it. Anyways, we’re going to get together with the zone this morning and play some soccer. That will build some unity.

Excited to talk to you guys later. Have a good week. Love you. Bye

Week 50 Ecuador

Crazy good fruit I forgot the name of...

Houses on concrete columns, over a rice swamp. haha Ecuadorians are so creative! Too bad I didn't get a pic of the houses ON the river yet.

Out with the old (Elder Alguera)

The Zone

In with the new (Elder Albrecht from Oregon)!

Sept 6, 2015

Ring, ring…Hello?  Um, hello?  Oh! Hi Family! How are you? Well, wouldn’t I like to know.  I guess I’ll find out tomorrow but I am doing wonderful. We officially sold $93 worth of Jell-O with cream and strawberries for our investigator Mariana Salvatierra.  Whose going to get married Friday and baptized Saturday the 12^th.  Yeah!  It was cool.  We got a few members to drive us around in cars to sell it.  When they couldn't help us out, we had a three wheeled trike/bicycle thing with a big cart up front that my companion sat in and I peddled around Babahoyo.  So that’s fun.  No, between that and lessons, leadership meetings and zone meeting we’ve stayed pretty busy this week.  Not that we’re not always busy but serious, I’m tired.  Its Sunday night 10 o'clock I don't even want to watch the 7 new church videos that I have on my pin drive.  Pretty awesome, huh?  God keeps helping us.  Really, every day.  Except for the two chess games I won the other day at lunch.  That was all me.  I won myself a free lunch.  Having cebollado for winning too, on a bet.  That’s good stuff.  It’s like fish soup with vegetables and chifles.  It’s really good.  It sounds really disgusting but, Tiffie, you might have tried it. It’s really good.  I’m gonna bring the recipe home and we’re gonna make it for Sunday night dinner, for everyone.  Not that we could ever replace chili or grandmas chicken noodle soup.  But, you know, a good addition.  Mix it up.

I'm actually glad to have my voice back.  I lost it a little bit like Tuesday. I think I wore it out and then Wednesday I had a really weak voice.  So I drank a bunch of herbal tea thinking it would help and, I don't know, I think it did.  But I realized that it is delicious and now I'm hooked on herbal tea. I make like a litter of it and then I just let it stay in the fridge and drink it little by little.  I think I’ve drunk like 3 liters of tea!

The zones doing really well.  It keeps us super busy with five new missionaries in training. Me and my companion have to go around and do verifications with them.  Whoo.  And they’re mew sp there’s a lot of checking in.  We’ve really been trying to help them with a bunch of references that we are passing over to them. But shoot, half of them haven’t even contacted these great people that I’m getting them to go and teach.  It’s frustrating.  There’s a couple of frustrating things about it but they’re learning little by little.  Two of them are super afraid to invite people to be baptized or read their scriptures and stuff.  They’re just timid.  Just stuff that they’ve got to overcome.  We have a goal 17 baptism this month as a zone, so…start inviting!  

It’s good.  I had two interviews that were really good this week.  One interview was with a mom that had just recently separated from her husband.  It was kind of rough.  We also met with her older daughter, she's like 20.  I feel bad for this girl because she’s pretty but she has like really masculine features.  Really bad.  She’s hairy and she has like a beard and chest hair.  I don’t even have that.  But she was super nice.  We had a great conversation.  The mom was like all nervous when she had a chance to come talk with me.  I love the trust that the Spirit can create between people.  Just like, in a minute and it’s right there.   It’s always enlightening to meet new, sincere people that truly want to do good and just do what's right.

So anyway, are the sister missionaries still coming over to eat every once in a while? Well, if they are and they offer to do a service for you, just give them something to do because I'm so sick of getting rejected by people.  I always have to ask if they need anything or if I can do anything for them.  Honestly I want to help.  I want to do something.  I mean, it’s not like I don’t have anything to do but, you know, just give them something to do so they feel like they’re fulfilling their purpose of helping people.  But don't make them wash the windows.  That’s awful.  Honestly you can save that for when I get home.  It’ll be for your birthday or Mother's Day, mom.  Something, I don't know.  I would mow the lawn though.  That sounds fun.  Or blow snow.  I'm in like the greenest part of the world but there's no lawns or snow.  

Anyway, I’m getting out of line.  Ha, ha.  Anyway, the bishop did ask us to do something this week.  He asked us to help all of the elders quorum do their home teaching visits because no one does them.  Like none of the men do anything here.  So I was reading one of probably my favorite chapters in the book of Mormon for this week and it made me smile thinking about all of these men.  It’s when Pahoran?  Pahorun?  Shoot, I can’t even say names in English anymore.  Anyway, he was the chief judge in the time that Captain Moroni was kicking Lamanite butt out in the battle field.  Anyways, the Kingmen, or what we would in modern language call, the liberals who wanted more government, more programs and a King.  They were really lazy and they didn't want to defend their country or their liberty.  Well they took over the kingdom and kicked out Pahoran, the buddy of Moroni.  Well Moroni stopped receiving food and soldiers and everything to fortify the cities that they were conquering.  So Moroni started writing some strongly worded letter's back home and he finally received one back that said they had been overthrown by the rebels or the Kingmen.  So Moroni leaves his army and takes a few of his best men and they march towards the land of Gideon where the government was.  And it said, he raised the standard of liberty in whatsoever place he did enter and gained whatsoever force he could as he marched toward the land of Gideon.  At it came to pass that thousands did flock unto his standard and did take up their swords in defense of their freedom that they might not come into bondage. So, anyway, he ends up showing up and there’s a battle and he ends up destroying them. After that, they all had their trial for the prisoners that were taken.  And it says that whosoever would not take up arms in the defense of their country but would fight against it were put to death.  So he put things right in order.  And he leaves us with these words. Behold, I am Moroni, your chief captain. I seek not for power but to pull it down. I seek not for honor of the world but for the glory of my God and the freedom and welfare of my country. Powerful stuff.  Makes me want to just give a little bit of justice to all of these guys down here. But we have to remember that everyone in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day are all volunteers.  Nobody gets paid.  And so, we just have to treat them with a lot of patience and love.  We will all be rewarded one day according to our own efforts, works and desires.  So we’ll just keep doing our part and hold out for the justice of God to come.

To do a complete flip flop though.  Finishing things up here.  I do want you guys to know that I'm trying to love the people here, missionaries and Ecuadorianos alike. I was listening to some final testimonies of missionaries going home this week in the leadership conference.  They were talking about the atonement and pondering on it.  Everything that God did, His sacrifice, was in love. Love for all of us.  He died and paid for the sins of even the people that would hours later crucify Him.  So, I’ve really come to think and set the goal that I will understand the atonement more fully when I learn to love all people or maybe better said, learn to show love to all people through kindness, service and accepting them.  Trying to see them all a little more how God does.  So that goals gonna take me a good 11 months so I think we are set for long term goals.  Anyways, always wishing the best for all of you.  Have a wonderful week.  I love you. Take care. 

Week 49 Ecuador

8/31/15 (voice recording)

Hi family, one week down in Babahoyo, and I want you all to know that I’m super happy. The members here, everyone’s received me really well. This week (I love it when this happens, only the second time honestly), but I met a friend of Tiffie who served in Quito with her. Tiffie was actually ending her mission as the mission nurse when she came. Her name is Carina Cornejo, and she cooks delicious food. I’m really excited to go eat lunch with her again next Wednesday:) She’s really cool though, and seeing that, it makes me really excited to have some friendships when I get home too that will last a while; connect with people from the mission, and other things. 

The Ponce Familia are also one of my favorites. He spent 5 years in New York when he was younger, in his 20’s, and then came back for family/girls and everything. He now has an awesome family. His girls/daughters try speaking English; they do alright. He still speaks it really well, and the bonus is they gave me lasagna my first night. I love and miss lasagna very much. It’s one of my favorites here, but it’s rare. 

The members have a lot of trust is us here. Probably because there’s always been zone leaders here, and they’re a little more responsible. I don’t know, but the stake president called us and asked us to go out with him and do visits. That’s the first time that a member’s asked me to go out with them, so that was awesome. We had some really cool visits/experiences. There was one lady, Mariana, that has been inactive for a long time. She’s a good friend of his, and we went to see her. She explained that she got offended in the church because all the members think that Joseph Smith is a God, and she thinks he was a prophet. She was so, so confused...all bitter and everything. We said a prayer, and we taught the lesson. I know the spirit was there, and I hate saying doubts, but I guess we resolved her doubts, and taught her just like the simple doctrine. What we need to do, how we can act, and we got her to kneel down and say a prayer, and make some commitments. It was a super good lesson. I love it when the spirit is present in lessons and people feel it, and it touches their heart, and they change!

There were some fun lessons this week. We came to a man studying his scriptures in the street. I guess he was a less active member, I don’t know, everyone’s new here for me. He wanted to know everything about the millennium. Questions, questions, and they were legit. It was a fun conversation studying with him, and so it kind of left me thinking...so when does Jesus come anyway? Nobody knows...

We put some baptismal dates this week, and we got a lot of good goals lined up for September, so that’s really good. We have to marry one family. This week we’re selling food in the ward and getting money built up so we can go pay for their marriage. 

I love the trust that the people are giving us here. They trust you with everything, depend on you, and they ask for your help. They expect help from you, they want your help, it’s really great; I’ve never been so busy in my mission, and I love that aspect of it. There’s not a whole lot of time for yourself, but what do I need to do? We could clean the house, but that’s getting put off a little longer because today we have to go to a zone meeting, and then I have to go renew my Visa, and I have to give some Latinos an English exam/test (verbal) in Guayaquil, and then we have to sleep down there, and then we have a meeting with President tomorrow, and then tomorrow night we got invited by the stake president here to go to a leadership conference from the stake. That’s pretty dope. So, there’s a lot of way cool opportunities that I’m getting. I’m gonna get the inside scoop on all the church stuff so I can be a good leader someday:) 

Elder Alguera’s really good too. He’s a great companion, really humble. He gives me a lot of opportunities to teach, and I do really well with that. I love teaching. He was looking at a bunch of pictures of me that you guys have sent from a year ago, and he was telling me how much bigger I was. So I guess maybe I’m getting a little skinnier. I think I weigh 172#, about the same, but I don’t know I haven’t checked in a little while. 

One more funny story before I forget. I was teaching at a new investigators house. It’s like a concrete foundation, and then there’s a second floor, but it’s just wood so there’s cracks, and a little puppy peed through the cracks in the wooden floor in the loft onto my shoulder, and the couch. It was disgusting, but you know, Ecuador will never run out of surprises. That’s a certainty. 

The zone’s doing really good. I had the opportunity to go out with a lot of them this week...work a little bit. Elder Clark, he’s from Missouri, he’s a brother, he’s way sweet. A family out there when we were on an exchange took us out to eat Chinese food. It was delicious. The zone’s doing really well. We had 19 baptisms for the month. That was the highest zone for this month. I can’t take much credit because I got here a week ago, but we have great plans to do it again this coming month. I’m already learning patience, patience, because missionaries call you with everything. Hey Elder I’m sick, I can’t go out, then you have to verify and call everyone else. Or hey Elder, this happened, or that happened, or they don’t send you all your numbers and you have to send like 5 texts just to get the information that you want, and they won’t answer the phone...So frustrating. But, we’ve been listening to a lot of conference talks and things, and something I’ve picked up out of one of Elder Uchtdorf’s talks was...he said, “Humility doesn’t require that we think less of ourselves, simply less about ourselves”, and that’s true, that’s true. 

Well, I know that when we are obedient the Lord blesses us, and I’m really grateful for the experiences that I’m having. I thank you all again for allowing me to be here, for supporting me, for your love, and I love you all very much. Missing you...