The Little Engine That Could - Feb. 27.2012

The title has nothing to do with difficulties in the week, it's just the keep chugging along no matter what! Half way through the mission. A slowly progressing area. Just got to keep chugging along as the days and weeks and changes go by!

Well, I'm starting to get used to the normal missionary schedule again. IN fact, I'm really enjoying it! I thought it was going to be a lot harder to re-adjust to mission life, but the Lord has blessed me. The only thing is that I got a head cold starting about Monday night, Tuesday morning. In the morning we went out and got a lot of contacts done; about 17 just in the morning. After lunch we visited a women named Herlinda who is less active. I have no idea why she doesn't go, but she doesn't. She is a wonderful old woman who has a granddaughter in Argentina. We shared with her a mission called "He Knows My Name" from the Liahona August 2010. It was a good lesson. At 4 a member named Jorge Sierra came out with us to visit. We stopped by Hna Gloria to share with her a message about Obedience from the May 2010 Liahona. It was a good message.

On Wednesday we had District meeting, nothing out of the ordinary. I talked about contacting and new investigators. I thought it was a good lesson. Now I have to get ready for this week's district meeting. On Wednesday we had another lesson with Julio Arias, who we met our first day. Today we talked about the Plan of Salvation and he was really intrested in the message and you could just see the desire in his eyes to know more about the plan that our Heavenly Father has prepared for him.

Thursday was kind of a rough day. My cold really got to me. I didn't even notice my alarm and woke up at 8:30 just dead. I was just beat, so we spent that day in the house. Talk about an awesome year mark, huh?

Friday was a little bit better. We had a couple members go out with us. We were supposed to have another lesson with Julio Arias, but he didn't show up, who knows why. We had a lesson with this kid named Anner though, who is 20 years old. It was a pretty good lesson. THe missionaries have been visiting him for a while, but he just hasn't prayed to know if what we're teaching him is true, which is kind of a big deal. On Saturday morning we went to a member's house, an elderly woman and her husband named Thelma Ardón. A few weeks ago she did a Family Night commemorating her father and then later one commemorating her mother, and everyone loved it, including the lady who works for her, and this lady decided to do her own. Thelma thought it could be a great way to get some members to have the opportunity to share the gospel with their family members who aren't members of the church. She told us all about the agenda and showed us some of the stuff about her father, Telmo. He was born in Ecuador and when he was 17 years old, a member of the boy scouts, he walked from Ecuador all the way to Guatemala! And had a journal with memories all along the way! In newspapers and all sorts of stuff! He also was a cartoonist and painter and made lots of characters for political cartoons in Guatemala. One painting he made even was made into a stamp in Honduras! He had a very incredible life with a rich history. It could be a great family night for you all back home! Commemorate a family member who is no longer living (For example, Grandma June).

Quick story from Sunday. Church was great, normal. I was asked to speak on the spot, that was lovely. Luckily Elder Henriquez (a.k.a Kike) was informed a week before so his talk lasted about 15 minutes so I only had to kill about 5, but I got the job done! The bishop later thanked for me not saying something like "well, I didn't know that I was going to speak so, uh..." I just got up and spoke. THe other thing is super tacky. Anyways.... on Sunday night, at about 6 o'clock we went to meet this less active member named Mariano. Great guy. Long story that isn't mine to tell. But I just felt a super close bond with this guy right away. I truly love the man (about 24 years old) and I hope that we will be able to help him as he recovers from the pains of the best!

Life here in Las Victorias is great! Doing my best to do my duty, to God and my (adopted) country (and the people I love). The work is true, the book is blue, and Elder LaPray loves all of you!

Love,
Elder Andrew A. LaPray

A few pictures

Here are a few new pictures from Andrew.

February 20, 2012

It is SUPER hard to whitewash an area but Elder Henriquez and I are doing work! It's been super crazy to be out in the mission field again, but I really enjoy it.

 

On Tuesday, as I was leaving the office, I cried, no joke. I passed half o my mission in that building, and it was really worrying to leave it behind, no joke. I was a little overcome with how I was going to handle with being a misisionary and a whole bunch of other stuff that came to mind, but that's gone now. Shocker of change conference... Elder Nelson is the new AP!!! Super cool! I knew  he would do work in the mission! He's a great guy! It was really really hard for me to say goodbye to Elder Barahona. He has honestly become one of my best friends! (Don't worry Brock, you still got number one!) But despite the few  dificulties we had, we became super close and it was really hard to leave him. I am extremely grateful to have been companions with a guy as great as Elder Barahona.

 

2 members, Benjamin and Victor, took us back to our house after change conference to know  our house. They were super helpful and have helped us get to know  the area a little bit. Elder Henriquez and I got semi unpacked and looked for a place to eat an couldn't find anything.  Some of the coolest people we have met in our area so far is the familia Jimenez! They are super sick! (Benjamin, Victor, their sister and their parents). It just so happens that Vicky, their mother, is the aunt of Oscar Azurdia, a less active I was visiting in Martí. It was super shocking but it was cool to be able to talk to someone about him and I wrote him a letter to thank him for letting me share the gospel again with him and share with him another little message. They gave us dinner too, eggs, beans, and bread. Delish! I'm gonna love them!

 

On Thursday at about 7:15, we realized that we had absolutely nothing to do, and we looked through our plans, nothing. So one of us, don't remember who, said, "We should look for Gloria", so that's what we did. When we got there she told us that she prayed that we would stop by and visit her. The day was almost over, but we were able to answer the prayer of a daughter of God.

 

I know it doesn't sound like much, and I had a lot more on my mind, but ultimately I just don't have anything else to write about... I don't know what happened. I had a really great week, and I love my new  area! I'm excited to be a missionary and to start my second year! On Thursday I will complete the year, and next Tuesday it will be exactly 1 year until I'm back home. How's that for super weird? Pretty soon when I say "a year ago" it will now be all in the mission, and when I say "a year from now" it will mean AFTER the mission. It's a super weird landmard in your mission, I'm not gonna lie.

 

Love,

Elder Andrew LaPray

February 11, 2012

Well... this has been my last full week in the office. I found out on Thursday that I will be having a change back into the "real" mission field where I will be a "normal missionary" 24/7 working full-time. It's going to be a hard adjustment, I think, but it'll be good for me. (Unfortunately, I'm staying in the capital for another six weeks, minimum... we'll see if that changes at the end of March).

This week has been SUPER hard to write in my journal... There is a LOT of traffic getting back to our house because of the University on the way and so I haven't been getting home until about 9:30-9:45, and then I have to plan, and take dats, and report dats, and by then it's already 10:20 so my time is pretty much gone all of the time. But, with me being out of the office now I might be able to get a few more minutes in for journal writing, and I'll DEFINITELY be getting a lot more time in for studying. In fact, 3 more hours than I have now. How's that for a big change? I'm SUPER excited to start studying again! On Wednesday I had about an hour to study Preach My Gospel and the Scriptures and it was absolutely incredible! It really gets me excited to start REALLY studying again. It might be a hard adjustment to go from 0 study time to 3 straight hours, but I'm excited either way.

Last Sunday we had the Book of Mormon class like always, but with quite a bit lower of a turn out, unfortunately. They started doing a seminary class on Sunday at 3-4 but, mormon standard time is even WORSE when you mix it with "la hora chapina" which is "the guatemalan hour". Everything starts or ends about, 20 minutes late. So, some of the people coming to BoM are in that Seminary class which didn't end until about 4:30 and then they all had to leave, which stinks.   We had a really awesome lesson with Familia Vega, Julio and Alejandra. They are still waiting on their divorces to be able to get married and then Julio can get baptized, but we're praying for them! Julio has such a strong testimony of the truthfulness of the gospel, and knows almost all of the lessons, so what we did a few weeks ago was we invited him to study a topic and teach US about that subject. He absolutely loved the opportunity to learn more about something that really interested him and he wasn't totally sure of, and found great comfort and knowledge in the scriptures and study tools of the gospel. Elder Barahona said that in that lesson he felt reminded of the conversion of Brigham Young, who converted to the gospel after hearing the simple, down to earth testimony of an uneloquent missionary. Julio's testimony was simple, but powerful because he could truly feel that even though he didn't understand everything, he knew without a doubt that what he was saying was true. It was SUPER cool!

I don't know if you remember me talking about Eddie and Sigrid last week, but we had another visit with them on Wednesday that was great! Eddie was at school, but we were still able to teach Sigrid because her oldest son was there. She has already read all of 1st Nephi in a week. Talk about awesome. She has a sincere desire to learn and she loves to read! We taught her about the Restoration of the gospel, from God is our loving Father, through prophets, dispensations, the ministry of Jesus Christ, the Great Apostasy, and the 1st vision. To her it all seemed to make sense. It wasn't weird or unusual that if God spoke through prophets in olden days there would be prophets today. From what it looks like she believes in the prophets of the Book of Mormon, and if there were prophets in the Bible and in the Book of Mormon, of COURSE there would be a prophet today! The only thing she needs is an answer from God to know for sure that this is true! Tonight we have another cita (appointment) with them, and I'm super stoked about it! Her 11 year old son, Daniel, also listens to us and wants to be baptized as well! Super cool!

That's pretty much it for stories though. A cool little thing about my last week in the office is that yesterday I got to go and deliver 3 refrigerators to some areas in the capital. One of the areas is REALLY far away though, and it's not really the capital. It was super cool to be driving around in a DIESEL FORD F-250. Ya, I got to go around in one of those in Guatemala. Not exactly a common car here. It was pretty cool and definitely not something most people do in their missions. For all of you people who email me, you can keep emailing me on Friday if you want, so that you don't forget when Monday comes around... but my Pday will once again be on Mondays... my next Pday will be on the 20th of February, so you have some time to write me. I'll let you know how my first week goes with my new companion!

Love,

Elder Andrew A. LaPray

February 4, 2012 - Time Keeps on Slipping,Slipping, Slipping

My subject today is NOT about being baggy or time in the mission. It's just that my email time is slipping away and I am just BARELY starting my weekly blog email/email to the family. Sorry! It's been a REALLY good week though!!!

 

To make it easier... I'm just going to copy my journal. Hope that's okay...

 

"I'm a fan of Sundays. Wake up early to get ready to go to church, a nice breakfast, and some time to read the scriptures. Sacrament meeting wasn't too bad. We had 2 investigators there. THe only down side were the 2 "apostate" talks. THey didn't say anything out of harmony with the church's teachings, but they used visual aids, which is a definite don't do. Good content in the talks though. Our Book of Mormon class continues to be a success. Franklin Peeples came today! He's really the teacher, but he hasn't come for a few weeks. I was glad to see him there! We had 2 appointments to go to at 6 so we did divisions with the pouch elders. Elder Welch and I visited Lester and Marelin Garcìa. Marelin is still recovering from her appendecotmy, but we talke dto Lester and watched a video called "Only a Stonecutter" about a man who made huge sacrifices to fulfill the commandments of God. I hope it will help them to read or come to church."

 

"On Monday the 30th we had a really good lesson with Hna Cotero, Javier's mom. She's kind of had some rough patches in the 5 months I've known her, but I have honestly seen a HUGE change in her, and it all started with a desire, and it isn't easy by any means, but it has made a difference in her life. I don't remember how the conversation started, but she wanted to know more about baptisms for the dead because she was never able to do them before she stepped away from the church. But like I said, she's changed a lot, and although she's not perfect, there's a desire to change, and that is where it all starts. With a desire, you slowly let it grow. You feed that desire with ideas and plans and your desire grows stronger, and when your desire is strong enough, it automatically moves you to act to achieve your desire. So just make sure you have the right desires."

 

"I'm sure you've noticed that I don't really talk about the office anymore. It's not because nothing happens anymore, it's just that I've already talked about most of the stuff we do and it's probably pretty boring in the first place, let's be honest. I don't think I mentioned this on Sunday, but there were 2 people at church we had never seen before. One of them I recognized as a member when I saw his scripture cases. When sacrament meeting was over I started talking to them and they are a couple, Eddie Lopez and Sigrid, who is not a member. So on Sunday we set up an appointment for Today, Tuesday the 31st. Just for starters, Sigrid is a pilas investigator. Eddie is 31 years old and served his mission in El Salvador, back around 2000. He told us that he's kind of pulled away from the church, but he wants to come back and he's trying to do all he can, even bringing Sigrid so that she has the opportunity to know and have the joy and happiness that we have. He's helping us out a lot and I think she will see the small changes in him and the happiness the gospel brings to him. Sigrid has a lot of great questions for us and is extremely interested in learning more about all of our beliefs. Cool side note, Eddie even took her to the temple open house in Quetzaltenango! Just that brings on a whole set of uestions. Long story short, Sigrid is super prepared to hear the message of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ. In our first visit with her we mostly just wanted to get to know them, find out about her religious background, and what she expects from us. In turn, we let her know what our purpose is in meeting with her. We also had the opportunity to introduce her to the Book of Mormon. Eddie had already given her a brief overview of what the Book of Mormon is but wanted us to share as well. We explained to her about the coming of Christ to the AMericas as well and for her it sounds very logical and could very possibly have happened. She committed to read the Book of Mormon and I think that she is definitely going to read. After the lesson they invited us to a cup of coffee (made from grains, not agains the Word of Wisdom) with bread and cookies. I wish I weren't likely leaving so soon:"

 

My time is up... but I know that we didn't find them by accident. The Lord has prepared people to learn about the gospel throughout the world, and He does it through YOU. Alma 13:24 says that angels are preparing the world to hear the gospel. You can be someones angel!

 

Love,

Elder Andrew A. LaPray

January 28, 2012

"Dios es lindo"

TO: You + 5 More

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You'll never guess what I did this week... I got caught up in my journal!!! After a MONTH of being behind, I am finally up to date. I doubt it will stay that way, but at least I'm up to date, right?

Dan, Steph, and kids, thank you for the package, it is GREATLY appreciated! I love getting to open stuff like it's Christmas! I'll see if I share with my companions ;) JK I definitely will, and already have. A little...

 

I didn't write a lot in my journal from the beginning of the week, because there was a lot, so I'll give you the quick run down... "On Monday, the 23rd, I hit 11 months. Crazy. On Tuesday the 24th Elder Barahona and I had a lesson with familia Valle. I've never mentioned them before because they are investigators of the assistants whom they found about 3 weeks ago. However, since the assistants are gone a lot of the time with conferences, interviews, divisions, and what not, they passed them on to us. They are what we would call in Guatemala, a "pilas family" or in English, "Golden Investigators". In the assistants first visit with them, they put a baptismal date. I have now taught them twice as well, once with Elder Cantillo and today was my second visit with them (written on Tuesday). They are a super prepared family. Their biggest challenge, however, is coming to church. But they definitely have a desire to follow Jesus Christ. After our lesson with them we met up with a member named Omner to go contact a reference he had for us. He reminds me a little of my late uncle Dave McCulloch, I think that's what I like about Omner. On Wednesday the 25th we had district meeting. We started with hangman which spelled out : "RREECCNOO LA REEPTASUS which is nothing in Spanish, or English. In english it's "RGCZIEONE HTE SRAWNE". So it comes out to be "RECONOCER LA RESPUESTA" in Spanish which is "RECOGNIZE THE SNAWRE" in English. Now the point was to put it in a scrambled order, and no one guessed it right off the bat, which was the point. Sometimes we don't recognize God's answers in our life because we aren't prepared for what's coming (i.e. no one had ever told us what it might be like, just like I didn't explain the letters would be jumbled), the answer didn't come how we expected it (everyone expected me to put the letters in word order) or perhaps we're just not accustomed to seeing that way. We must prepare ourselves and our investigators (or families) for the revelation that our Heavenly Father gives to us, and with practice it becomes easier and easiter to RECOGNIZE God working in our lives on even a daily basis."  

 

Now, speaking of Heavenly Father working in our lives on a daily basis, I have a story to tell that isn't even two hours old. On Pdays, we usually come to Zone 4 in Plaza Cuatro. However, when we get here at about, 11:30 we usually use internet first and then go to eat. Also, we usually never carry hand out copies of the Book of Mormon, sometimes nothing at all (I know, super well-prepared missionaries, thanks). Anyways... today we decided to go upstairs to eat lunch first... as we were walking towards the food court, a man stopped Elder Cantillo and Elder Welch and asked them if either of them had a copy of the Book of Mormon they could give to him. Oops. Looks like today was the day to bring that. They didn't have a copy. Luckily, Elder Barahona and I had stopped, noticing that Elder Cantillo and Elder Welch weren't with us and they yelled to us "Do you have a Book of Mormon". Now, I did have one. In English. My personal copy. That doesn't help 99% of Guatemalans. However, Elder Barahona did. Like I said, no one ever carries around a hand out copy of the Book of Mormon, and Elder Barahona almost grabbed his personal triple, but he thought to himself "No, what if someone wants one?" and grabbed good ol' blue. So, it just so happens that this man, Juan Ramon, is a member of the church (studied and graduated from BYU) told a friend months ago that he would get him a copy of the Book of Mormon and never did. A few days ago this friend, Freddy, said to Juan, "You never gave me that Book of Mormon". Well... it just so happens that of all the places to meet up in the world, Juan and Freddy met up today, here, in Plaza Cuatro, and it just so happens that WE were here and that SOMEONE had received and followed the prompting to carry a hand out copy of the Book of Mormon, and Freddy now has his Book of Mormon. But wait, it gets even better. As we ended lunch, we went to say goodbye to Juan and Freddy for a few minutes. As we were walking towards internet this young man inside a story looks at us and gives us the Guatemala sign for "What are you doing here?" and then says "Elders". Now, none of us knew this young man, but he stopped us, said hi, and we said, hello. Now, I thought that Elder Welch knew this kid. Nope. So we said, what's your name "Nefi"... go figure, it's a member of the church. So, Nefi, where do you live? Zone 12. Really? Do you want to try and guess where Freddy lives? Freddy had just given us his direction and lives in Zone 12, the same ward where Nefi attends. We gave Nefi Freddy's address to pass along to the missionaries. It just so happens that Freddy lives in the Central Mission of Guatemala.

 

Now, if you think that there is such thing as coincidence... think again. God exists. He loves us. He is concious of EVERY SINGLE child of His, and He wants us to be happy and successful in this life. If there was ever a doubt in your mind, let this be a testimony to you that Heavenly Father influences your life for good, and he puts you in the right place, at the right time, so that He can bless you and bless others. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

 

Love,

Elder Andrew A. LaPray

January 21, 2012

Another week not writing in my Journal

TO: You + 5 More

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It's really hard to write in my journal now! First it was the holiday season, and now it's being District Leader. Every night we get home, plan, and then I have to take dats for the district and then give the dats to the Zone Leaders and then I need something to eat, and then I talk to the other missionaries in the house for like, 5 minutes, and then it's time to get ready for bed. There is NO time! But, I'm trying to get better. I did some catching up this week, but I'm still behind. Maybe once I leave the office things will calm down a little bit and I'll be able to keep things a little more up to date.

 

Seeing as I don't write in my journal, it makes it really hard to give good emails, I'm sorry. But I'm sure you guys don't really like hearing play-by-plays anyways, right?

 

I'll start with what I can remember. Last night as we were on our way to the area we called the assistants to ask for permission to leave the mission. How often does someone get to do that, right? The Elders Quorum in our ward lives literally on the other side of the street of our mission. Supposedly they chagned the ward boundries so that he would still be part of the ward, but I don't know if that's 100% true or not. Either way, the APs gave us permission to go see them. They haven't been to church since The last Sunday in October. That's three months. Last night when we went to see them, President Garcìa (name changed) told us that since he and his family haven't been to church not a single member, the bishopric included, has called to talk to them or even passed by. I felt absolutely terrible. I would have passed by a while ago, but since he lived out of the mission I couldn't before... They have had such a hard time in the last year and a half and I can't really explain the whole situation, but it was a wonderful opportunity for us and for him to just be able to talk. I know there are a lot of things he's been thinking about and he has just needed someone to talk to besides his family and last night he got that opportunity. After that we went and saw Lester and Marelin Garcìa and kind of gave them a little bit of cincho (chastisement...). We talked about faith using Ether 12 and how we don't recieve a testimony until after the trial of our faith and asking them if they really had tested their faith and shown Heavenly Father that they really will do what it takes to get an answer. Marelin just got out of the hospital on Thursday from an apendectomy though. Which is rough in Guatemala. Anyways, it was a good lesson and I think it really helped them. Like the missionary saying, you have to give cincho with love :) Afterwards we helped them put covers on their kids' books for school and then they gave us dinner. Scrambled eggs with hotdogs and tortillas with cheese to go with them. SUPER good. Oh, and to drink, arroz con leche. Rice with milk. It sounds weird, but you have to try it. It was a good day.

 

I guess I could talk about my birthday, huh? It wasn't anything special, but not bad at the same time. I'll give you the brief rundown as said to another friend... As far as my birthday goes... I woke up, got ready for church, got told happy birthday by my companions, went to church (no one knew at church), came home for church and waited for like an hour before anyone gave up a spot in the kitchen to make my lunch (which was delicious, FYI) and then after we ate lunch and studied, back out to work. hooray. We had our english Book of Mormon class and at the end, we played hangman and I spelled out "Happy Birthday Elder LaPray" (fishing for compliments too much?) but, what the heck, it was worth it. After the class we did divisions with some of the youth and knocked out a couple lessons and got to know some houses of some inactives, which is always good. And then some members who found out it was my birthday invited us over at 7:30 for some food. They didn't know beforehand so they gave my comp and I some how and cheese sandwiches but put some candles in there to make it special. It was a super nice gesture and I great appreciated it :) and then I went home and had to take dats... hooray! That's your typical missionary birthday on a Sunday in Guatemala. I don't mean to make it sound negative, if that's how it comes off. It really was a good, productive day.

 

I think that's pretty much it for stories for the week. I wish I had some other awesome story, but I don't. I'm still reading the Book of Mormon in English marking every time there is a r eference to Heavenly Father or Jesus Christ and I am on page 264, Alma 22 or 23 and there are only 6 pages so far that don't make any mention at all. Crazy! The Book of Mormon truly does testify of Jesus Christ, that He is the Savior and Redeemer of the world. It's easy to see why Joseph Smith said that a man would draw nearer to God by following the precepts set forth in this book than in any other book. It's true. I know it.

 

Love,

Elder Andrew A LaPray