Letter #65 "do all we can and know that God will take care of the rest." San Isidro, Guatemala

hello

well here i am again and im not really sure what to write....  this was an interesting week.  we worked really hard this week, knowing that if everything went well we would have 4 baptisms the upcoming week.  and we did everything that we can do, but even with that things just arent turning out as we want them do.  to be honest it is very hard to have the humility to accept that we dont understand the will of the Lord and that sometimes things dont turn out like we want.   the only thing i can do is remember what it says in D&C 58:63-4:

 3 Ye cannot behold with your natural eyes, for the present time, the design of your God concerning those things which shall come hereafter, and the glory which shall follow after much tribulation.

 4 For after much tribulation come the blessings. Wherefore the day cometh that ye shall be crowned with much glory; the hour is not yet, but is nigh at hand.

so yeah we just have to do all that we can and then know that God will take care of the rest.  what has also helped me is this video.  i think i shared this in an email but it is worth watching again, here is the youtube link 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wo0mOZ4S7GE

Answers to mom's questions:

 

ummm i think the funniest thing that happened is that on tuesday we had a zone conference in the mountains, and there i got to see a missionary who was in my ward for a long time in brillantes and was also in my district when i was in la blanca and to be able to joke around about the crazy things that had happened during all that time was really funny...  tennis last week was great, i am WAY out of practice and they just had terrible wal mart rackets but i was so happy to be on the court again.  the work with the ward is going ok, there are like 3 or 4 people that are really helping us and for that we are very happy but we need to start working with more people so that we can have more success.  everything is going well with chase.  the scariest thing that happened this week was that on saturday we went to a place that was a little bit far away (30 minutes walking) and we were coming back in the dark and they had told us that this place was dangerous and that just a few days earlier somebody had been robbed there ,but we made it out without problem.  the worst thing i had eaten was dinner on friday, to be honest it was delicious but it made me really sick.... the best lesson i have learned is that we can be happy even if we are exhausted, i was watching some training videos for new missionaries and there was a missionary that i think is great and he said ¨i am tired, i am so tired, i am always tired, but its weird because i am so happy´ and i really think it is the same for me.  the clothes are holding up fine, and i think they will be able to hold up for the rest of the mish.  the best thinkg i have learned from elder godinez is humility.  he recognizes that he doesnt know everything and is very willing to do what i think would be a good idea.  with investigatores we are still so close with hugo but he just keeps making excuses and that is so frustrating!! yenifer is very close also but there is something that is scaring her and we dont know what.  carla is cool and wants to get baptized but we still havent gotten permision from here mom to do it. 

so i think that is about it.  thanks so much for sharing that experience with me!! it is something that helps me out!!

have a wonderful week

love

 

elder meyer

GO HEELS GO AMERICA

Letter #64 - "Good references are like GOLD!!" San Isidro, Guatemala

hello again

this was a pretty normal week; gratefully things just keep going along well.  for a long time our preisent has been saying that working effectively is working with the members.  to be honest it has been something that has been very hard for me to do because in at least my first two areas the members weren't the most helpful.... but when i got to san isidro i set a goal to work more with the members, and finally i think we are doing it!!! and because of it things are going well!!! we are working with our investigators and they are getting so close to baptism (at times it frustrates me  how close they are, because even being that close they still havent accepted it..) but then for the first time in my whole mission i got a lot of references. for usmissionaries, especially good references are like GOLD!! so now we have a lot of work to do and the member are excited to help!! so yeah that is how life is; its great!!  i invite all of you members to give a reference to the missionaries so that together we can make the work of salvation hasten like the Lord wants!!

on a seperate note, here is a foto from a talent night that we had in the ward this week.  elder godinez, our ward mission leader and i did a comedy act where godinez was writing a love letter to his girlfriend, i was writing it, but the ward mission leader was my hands and we had a funny play on words so that while he was saying his letter i had to eat and drink a bunch, but the ward mission leader was my hands and so it spilled all over the place. i dont know if that makes any sense but it was really funny and this is what i looked like after i was done - haha.

 

 

Answers to mom's questions:

 

we had to drive 3ish hours to the temple. we got to go because for 2 straight months we met our goal as a zone and in july we broke the record for the most baptisms in a month in our zone.  yes we knew we were going for a month but we had to wait because the temple was closed for like 2 or 3 weeks for maintanence.  when we go to the temple we only go with missionaries.  i went to reu tor training becuase i am a trainer (when someone is with a new missionary they are training) and so president wants to be sure that the trainers are doing a good job because bad trainers lead to bad missionaries so he is having a lot of training meetings for trainers.  i know a lot of new missionaries just came in, but i dont know how many, there were also a bunch who left so i dont think the number of missionaries changes that much in the mission.  yes i knew a few of the those that went home like elder segard and elder keller.  no,  have no idea what happened to yener i will call soon to ask about what is going on with him... for pday today we got to go to the house of president in reu and watch a movie with him (forever strong) then we played volleybal and TENNIS!!!!!!!!!! and we just got back.   i havent heard anything about a volcanoe erupting.... we eat lunch with members from tuesday to sunday and a lot of time they invite us to eat dinner with them too.. we are getting SOOOOO CLOSE with hugo and we are also very close with yenifer.  we are now teaching omara the sister of maryuri and emily that got baptized a few weeks ago, and also a lady named carolina and one named alejandra.  things are going good.

it sounds like things are going well back home!! thanks for the quote from that talk and for your testimony. you have always been the best example for me and it is for your example that i am here in the mission today.  

well have a wonderful week

love

elder meyer

GO HEELS GO AMERICA

 

 

 

Letter #63 - "We should always be optimistic..." - San Isidro, Guatemala

well hello again

so it was a really fast week becuase we ending up doing some pretty cool stuff.  on tuesday we got to go to the temple!! and was as always AMAZING!!! i never realized how great of a blessing it was to have a temple so close to me until i got here, so for all of you living close to a temple ENJOY IT!! and take advantage of that wonderful blessing that the Lord has given you.  also on wednesday i had a workshop that i had to go to in reu which is like a 3 hour drive each way but that was fun..... so yea because of that we didnt get as much time to work as would have liked to but things went well.  so  weeks ago we realized that we were in some trouble because we had almost no investigators. so we went into this week knowing that if we wanted to keep seeing miracles and baptisms that we would have to find a lot of people and knowing and having less time to work made for a very very bad combo.  but we just worked hard, talked with a lot of people, prayed a lot and had faith.  even though we didnt find a lot of positive people contacting, somehow we now have a lot of investigators.  we have seen a few poeple that were positive and then didnt want anything have interest again and then we were able to find some people that had had contact with other missionaries before so moral of the story: things are working out well!!! more than anything it hit me how we should always be optimistic because the Lord is on our side.  we have no reason to be afriad or doubt because Jesus Christ is our Savior and He will always help us!!  

 

answers to mom's questions:

 

 hugo is making progress little by little.  an ex stake president in our ward is working with him a lot and we are hoping that everything can happen this month, but please keep praying for him.  yes we have a shower and a toliet in our house.  in the kitchen we have a fridge and a stove.  yenifer is good, and we started to talk to katherine again and thing are looking good there also.  we found a cool lady named brenda this week who says she wants to get bpatized but she has to come to church first.  and we are going to talk with idania again.  the best food of this week was the chicken cordon blue that i ate for lunch today.   everything is great with godinez - i learn so much from him, and this last week i saw a lot of improvement in his ability to teach!! as far as my biggest inspiration on the mission i would say that it would have to be joseph smith for all that he went through and how he just kept obeying and doing what God wanted him to do even though it was hard.  the 3 things biggest ways my mission has changed me is that it has taught me how to have faith, how to love the scriptures, and how to trust in the Lord.  

finally i got dear elders this week - 3 talks from elder holland and one about joseph smith from elder maxwell that was amazing.  speaking of joseph smith he is just so awesome i cannot explain it - i love him and cannot wait to meet him one day!

 

so yeah to be honest i think that is all i have for this week, i know it is kinda short but thats all i got...  so have a wonderful week

love

elder meyer

GO HEELS GO AMERICA

 

 

 

 

 

 

Letter #62 - "Today I got my shoe package!" - San Isidro, Guatemala

hola

so it has been another week here in san isidro and it has gone well.  we are still working hard and finally after a month of hard work we have had a couple baptisms!! it was such a struggle to have these two baptisms.  it was 2 youth that got baptized - one was named maryori and the other is emily.  they are sisters and are awesome!! they love the church and already have very strong testimonies, and have already been going to seminary, mutual, and all the other church activities.  for a couple weeks they have been wanting to get baptized but i have never seen so many scheduling problems in my entire life haha!  their dad (who is member of the church who has been less active for almost 20 years) wanted to be there, but had a work emergency and was out of town for a week. they wanted a brother of theirs who is a member but lives 2 hours away to baptize them and he had problems finding a way to come.  there was a stake youth activity that also got in the way.  so basically a bunch of logistics that dont seem like a problem ended up being a big problem and a lot of stress, but the best news is that they got baptized.  while we were dealing with this whole big problem i was thinking, why are all these little things becoming such a big problem? and then i got my answer.  satan does not want people to get baptized, i have never seen it more in my mission than i have seen it this last month. but at the same time i know that God will always beat satan.  so yeah satan looks for whatever he can find to try and get us to not do the right thing, if that is puting doubts in our minds, or creating a logistical nightmare he does everything he can but if we are trying our hardest to obey we will win.  it makes me think about a scripture that i read this week in alma 61

 14 Therefore, my beloved brother, Moroni, let us resist evil, and whatsoever evil we cannot resist with our words, yea, such as rebellions and dissensions, let us resist them with our swords, that we may retain our freedom, that we may rejoice in the great privilege of our church, and in the cause of our Redeemer and our God.

so yeah we need to resist evil and satan however possible.  

 

 

answers to mom's questions:

yes today i got my shoe package thank you so much!!!  things with godinez (his companion) are going well  -we are leaning together and things are going well.  the weather here is always hot in the morning, usually at 3 or 4 it starts raining and it rains for an hour or 2 and then it isnt too hot- if i doesn't rain it is miserably hot....  we can see a volcano very well from our house and see its smoke, but it is far away...  we are working a lot right now with a man named hugo he is amazing and has come to church a lot of times. he wants to get baptized, but he doesnt want to marry his ¨wife¨and so for that still hasnt been baptized.  we are gonna work a lot with him and i hope that we can get him in the water in a short amount of time! we are also working with this girl named jennifer and she is very cool.  the best miracles of the weeks were: the 2 sisters' baptizsms and the other was that a cool family that i was working with in la blanca called me this week to tell me thanks for teaching them and that they were going to get baptized and they did this week so that was way way cool!! i am in zone malacatan -  the ward is doing good.  we are visiting together,  but they dont want to help us find more people and that is a problem because right now we only have a few investigators,..  we will be working hard on that next week.

i love that quote from pres. Coolidge!

here are fotos of the house and of the baptism.

have a wonderful week

 

love

elder meyer 

GO HEELS GO AMERICA

 

 

 

Letter #61 - "OTRA VEZ?!?!" - San Isidro, Guatemala

hello

so i guess i should start witht he big news.  so on monday night we got some big news, the other 2 missionaries that were living with us were being taken out of the area and we would be left with the whole area.  this is something that rarely happens in the mission but now it has happened to me three times..... so yeah that made this week very stressful.  we were basicallly running from one part of our area to other trying to get to all of the appointments that we had and that the other elders left us.  so yeah im still not really sure how we made it through the week but we did, but it was probably the most exhausting week of my entire mission.  but yeah it was good we are looking to have at least two possible more baptisms this week.  

this month as a zone we have seen a lot of miracles and things here are just going wonderful.  i think there is one scripture that explains why we are seeing this success it is in d and c 103

36 All victory and glory is brought to pass unto you through your diligence, faithfulness, and prayers of faith.

so yeah i really really like that scripture and we should always be praying diligently so that God will keep blessing us

answers to mom's questions:

 

things in the ward are going better, i told everyone in the ward that we lost 2 missionaries because we werent getting the support we should (which isnt exactly true, but at the same time its not a lie...) so now they are gonna work more with us, now we just need to find the way to have them give us references.  the best thing i ate this week was my bday cake that and this really really goood chicken fried stake.  we taught 27 lessons this week to investigators and like 6 more to less actives.   this month we had one baptism so far but we are looking to end the month with 4 or 5.  investigators: maryuri and emily will be baptized this week, mario, is a special case and we are waiting on approval from the Prophet to baptism him, jennifer is super cool and will be baptized in the upcoming 2 or 3 weeks, hugo is super cool and loves the church he just doesnt want to get married.  gary is awesome, knows the church is true, just cant get permission from his dad to go to church or get bpatized.  im sorry i forgot to take pics of the house, the good news is we cleaned it today so i will be able to take them today and send them next week.  but it is kinda lonely with only two... being a dad is great it is hard some times because there are things that i know my son (companion) needs to improve  but i dont want to sound mean and I dont know how to help him.  where we live is like starting in the foothills then we go up the the mountains.  very green, it was rain foresty before people came.  still no word on the shoe package but maybe this week.. 

 

thanks so much for all that you do to help me.  im working with my comp to give the money to the family  -we are just gonna put it in an envelope and then leave it in their house

i hope you all  have a wonderful week

love

elder meyer

 

 

 

Letter # 60 - "thanks for all the birthday wishes!" - San Isidro, Guatemala

hello again

 

well first of all i would like to say thank you for all of the happy birthday wishes!! it means so much to me, and im also glad that you havent forgotten about me haha.  so yeah this week was good, but a little bit frustrating.  we have 3 very cool investigators that are very close to getting baptized but they just havent wanted to commit to a date to do it.  its kind of frustrating but we just got to keep it up with them.  the collest thing that happened this week was an activity that we had.  we have an activity called the iron rod.  we set up a rope that went around the church and had a bunch of obstacles.  then we blindfolded everyone and told them to follow the rope.  then me and the other missionaries ran around telling the people not to follow the rope and we tried whatever we could so that they would let go of the rope.  if they let go we took them off the rope and took off the blindfold and told them that they had lost.  those who made it to the end won.  then of couse we talked about Lehis dream and the iron rod and that we have to always use the iron rod so that we dont fall in temptation.  when i was preparing to give the message i found a scripture that i really liked in mosiah 4 it say this:

 

29 And finally, I cannot tell you all the things whereby ye may commit sin; for there are divers ways and means, even so many that I cannot number them.

 30 But this much I can tell you, that if ye do not watch yourselves, and your thoughts, and your words, and your deeds, and observe the commandments of God, and continue in the faith of what ye have heard concerning the coming of our Lord, even unto the end of your lives, ye must perish. And now, O man, remember, and perish not.

 

 so yeah we have to be careful because there are so many ways we can fall in temptation but with the help of God, prayer and the scriptures we can always do the right thing.

 

 

answers to moms questions:

everything is still great with elder godinez.  he is learning a lot and things are just going well.  the hardest thing this week was finding time to work.  wednesday we had to go to retalhuleu for a training meeting and then thursday we had our iron rod activity and then friday we had another activity so we didnt have enough time to work.  the thing i enjoyed the most this week was the iron rod activity.  our house is the first level of a 2 level house.  it has 4 rooms its pretty big but ugly, if i remember i will send pic of the house next week.  as far as i know erik morel is preparing preparing to go to the temple, i havent been able to talk to him but i have talked with someone else from brillantes and they told me that he is doing great and maria also is doing great.  in the ward here they have monthly visits to the temple.  this week i only worked out twice because they were a few days when i was a little bit sick and i didnt want to work out.  for pday we went to the waterfalls.  mario is ready for baptism and will have his interview this week.  if everything is good in  the interview he will be baptized this week.  katherine is doing well just having a few little problems.   and idania and zoyli and doing great.  tonight we are going to eat chicken with this great member form the ward and then  tomorrow i am going to buy a cake and pizza to celebrate with that same family. ( im doing it tomorrow because the pizza will be a lot cheaper tomorrow)

so i think that is about it.  thanks so much for the email and for always helping me out.   once again thanks for the bday wishes and i hope you all have a wonderful week

 

love

 

elder meyer

 

GO HEELS GO AMERICA

 

ps we went to some pretty cool waterfalls today and that is what is going on in the pics

 

Letter #59 - "So there was a big earthquake..." - San Isidro, Guatemala

hello again,

so i guess some of you heard about the big earthquake.... dont worry we are all ok but wow that was crazy!  haha at about 5:30 this morning everything started shaking.  at first i didnt think much of it but then it started shaking more than the other 2 or 3 times that i have felt earthquakes here.  so i got out of bed and ran outside and then like 45 seconds later everything stopped.  the center of the earthquake is in Mexico but only like 20 or 30 minutes from us so we felt it pretty strong, but dont worry everything is ok.  so yeah that was exiciting, besides the earthquake this morning we had a good week.  the biggest news is that on saturday yelmer was baptized.  so i guess ill tell you all his story.  a little over 2months ago osman and siria (his parents) were baptized, but none of their children were willing to listen to the missionaries or go to church.  when i arrived in san isidro i really wanted to work with this family and help the kids get baptized.  for a while i felt like the work was in vain because none of the kids would listen to us.  then a few weeks ago we were walking in the street and i saw yelmer, son of osman and siria, and i started talking to him.  i asked him when he was going to go to church with us and he said, sunday.  and then he was there on sunday!! after that we started working with him a lot and almost had him baptized a few weeks ago but then he told us he didnt feel like he was ready and that he needed to learn more before being baptized.  we kept visiting him and then a week ago we shared with him a great story in acts 8.  after reading the story we challenged him for baptism and he said yes.  later the missionary who did the baptismal interview told me that yelmer told him that he said yes because he felt the spirit as we read the scriptures together.  so moral of the story is that behind the scriptures there is a lot of power.  also that prayers are answered. osman and siria were so happy that finally their prayers were in part answered as now one of their four kids have been batpized.  so yeah that is what i learned this week.  it was a great week and we are looking to have a wonderful month. 

 

 

answers to mom's questions:

 

i love my new comp - he has to be one of my favoite companions that i have had in my whole mission.  being a trainer is way fun especially because godinez wants to learn and wants to work.  godinez is 19 lives 1 hour outside of the capital of honduras and all of his family are members.  i have emailed galvez a couple of times and everything with him is good. he is loving the world cup and just waiting for his brother to get home from his mission.  update on investigators:  mario needs to come to church one more time.  idania is super cool and will be baptized soon.  zoyli is also coming along,  she will follow idania.  we also have a girl who lived in the states with her family for about their whole life and just recently came to guatemala come to church with us.  so if everything goes well all of those people should be baptized this month.    at church the only job i have right now is to play the piano.  in our house we have a fridge, a stove and a blender.  that is it....  i want the netherlands to win the world cup.  favorite study things from the week is that of aplying the scripotures.  in my reading of the book of mormon i started the war chapters and i have decided to find something from every chapter that i could use with an investigator, and that has been way cool. 

 

i cannot belive that aaron jensen is home!  tell him i say hi.  as far what i have thought for when i get home i was thinking about being an efy counselor, i think that would be like the greatest thing ever.  i know they dont make great money.  but free food, houseing, feeling the spirit all summer long, and have the oppportunity to impact the lives of a bunch of youth i think that would be amamzing.  that and still have a few weeks to travel with you guys (remember you  owe me not one but TWO BIG TRIPS!!!) i think chase is just gonna go to summer term but im not sure....

i love that quote from pres uchtdorf, i read that talk this week and i love it!!

 

 

i hope all is well back home and that you have a great week

love

elder meyer

GO HEELS GO AMERICA