Week 13 Nogoya

Apologies to all those who sent me letters, I don't have quite enough time today, so I will write you next week!

This has been a very rewarding week. After praying fervently in companionship study last Sunday and dedicating ourselves to the Lord, we both also made specific sacrifices this week to show that we were willing to follow the Lord. We were able to find more people than we have found in a while this week, and taught at least one lesson almost every single day. None of them are super prepared to join the church at this point in time, but they are willing to listen, and we hope that with time their hearts will be softened through the power of the Spirit. The Lord truly works miracles, and we have seen these miracles in the doors that have opened to us this week, in a very literal sense. :)

I am coming to love the mission and everything it stands for, and more than the mission, the gospel of Jesus Christ. This gospel is quite literally everything to me, and in the mission we have the wonderful opportunity to live a life where the gospel is incorporated into every little thing that we do. It is the most important thing in this life, and there is nothing that we can do or find or accomplish that can replace or even begin to replicate the joy that comes from keeping the commandments of a loving Heavenly Father and striving to follow each and every day the example of His Son, Jesus Christ.

This week, I have been studying charity and kindness. It is crucial that we develop charity. As Paul teaches us 1 Corinthians 13, without charity, all other attributes profit us nothing. Because of this, we must follow the exhortation of Moroni and "pray unto the Father with all the energy of heart that [we] may be filled with this love, which he has bestowed upon all who are true followers of his Son, Jesus Christ." (Moroni 7:48) Our feelings towards our fellowmen are a measure of our conversion to the gospel, and help us to understand just exactly where we are in our journey of discipleship. As Paul said, "the greatest of these is charity." (1 Cor 13:13)

I love you all, and hope you have wonderful week! Congratulations to all those who are graduating!

Elder Meyers

It's cold!

Elder Marquez cooking some Columbian food for me.  It's not super cultural, but still super good.  It's called salchipapa.  Basically, french fries with fried hot dog pieces, pieces of chicken, salsa rosada or salsa golf (basically fry sauce), cheese, lettuce, tomatoes, onions.  Super delicious, and I'll definitely be making it again with future companions.  

Selfie with the food

Salchipapa

Week 12 Nogoya

¿Que puedo decir? (What can I say?)

Sometimes, it's a little hard to write these letter because I just don't know what to say. You just can't express exactly the feelings that you experience in the mission. They are unique to the work of the Lord, and only through living in His work can we come to understand these feelings. I am incredibly grateful for the influence of the Holy Spirit, an incredible gift that the Lord has given to each and every one of us that have taken upon us His name in the waters of baptism. Listen to His voice, and you will find peace.

The work continues to progress, although not exactly at the pace that we might like. We are still struggling to find and to teach, but we are seeing small miracles, and are continually dedicating ourselves more and more to following the guide of the Holy Spirit. We have realized with every passing day that we cannot do this work without the Lord. Only He knows where His chosen and prepared children are waiting to hear the message of the restored gospel of Jesus Christ, and we will not find them without His help. As I said, we have seen little miracles when we have followed the Spirit. Last night, we felt impressed to go a certain way that passed by a gas station. As we went that direction, Elder Marquez said to me, I need to use the bathroom, let's go to the bathroom really quick. We went in, and as I was waiting outside, lo and behold, Martín, one of our investigators that we had all but lost contact with, comes walking out of the bathroom! I was so excited to see him! We talked to him for a while (my companion came out as well) and were able to reestablish connection with him, and to fix a problem with the number that we had for him. We were able to set a time to pass by and talk to him, and to resume teaching the lessons. It was definitely a tender mercy of the Lord.

I read two quotes this week that I wanted to share as well:

"Mindful of this, and desirous to be a lifelong learner, President Henry B. Eyring, First Counselor in the First Presidency, has said, “I am still a child with lots to learn. Most folks can teach me something.”2 When he extended the call to me to be a General Authority, President Eyring taught me an important lesson. He said that when he hears someone tell a story that he has heard before or use a scripture that he is very familiar with, he asks himself, “Why is the Lord underlining that for me?” and “What have I yet to learn from that story or scripture?” If we wish to increase our spiritual stability, we will be willing to learn and will be sufficiently humble to accept guidance no matter our age and experience." Elder Dale G. Renlund, Liahona April 2016

"If you have not chosen the kingdom of God first, it will in the end make no difference what you have chosen instead." - Neal A. Maxwell, Response to a Call, General Conference April 1974

A couple of fun things that happened this week: We had an amazing asado with the Arrua family! Definitely a blessing of Argentina :) We also did divisiones with the zone leaders again, but in trios this time. It was a little weird contacting in a trio. Definitely prefer a normal companionship. Also, we found a house that has a grand piano!! I haven't seen a grand piano since the MTC! I told my companion that we are going to contact that house si o si this week (we were late for an appointment when we saw the house). Hopefully we can have a successful contact I can maybe possibly play a grand piano. It literally is probably the only grand piano in all of Nogoyá jaja.

Anyways, I love you all! Have a fantastic week full of the Spirit of the Lord!

Elder Meyers

Divisiones with Elder Rocha from Bolivia (Lider de Zona). First time I've worked in a trio here in the mission.  Not going to lie, it was a little bit weird.

A wonderful selfie with the beautiful half dead trees outside our apartment

We had an amazing asado with the Arrua family today!  It's been at least 3 months since I've eaten asado.  It was at least 1000 times better than our typical meal of something with rice or noodles jaja.

Me and Hermano Arrua cooking the asado

Me, Elder McKell, Elder Marquez, and Elder Gomez enjoying the asado!

Week 11 Nogoya

Hola familia y amigos!

After talking with my family yesterday, I realized that it is harder to speak in English than I thought. I only have four months in the mission, so we'll see what happens in December. Hopefully I'll still be able to communicate in English jaja.

This week was a week of contacting again. My companion and I realized that we hadn't been as diligent as we could have been in finding new investigators in the past couple of weeks and that we had spent a little too much time with less actives and trying to find then-current investigators. Going forward we have set goals to open our mouths and share the gospel in every moment, and to remember that even when we are on our way to an appointment, there are still people we can find on the way. We have found some promising new potential investigators, so hopefully there will be some more news next week on that.

As far as a spiritual thought, I realized this week that the blessings that the Lord has given us are not for us. The Lord does not bless people with lots of money so that they can be rich and have 7 cars, but so that they can bless the lives of others with the excess that the Lord has given them. The Lord doesn't bless someone with extraordinary talent playing the violin so they can be better than everyone else, but so they can uplift and inspire others. The Lord doesn't give us testimony just so we can know, but so that we can share it with others as well. I've come to realize that if we keep our blessings to ourselves, they aren't really blessings at all. But if we give what we have, we will receive even more.

Until next week! Sean fieles! (Be Faithful!)
Elder Meyers

Skyping on Mother's Day!  Everyone is SO happy!

Elder Meyers on Mother's Day!

Our Skype station in the capilla

Me washing my clothes

Elder Gonzalez (ZL) and I in divisiones with sandwiches de milanesa (super ricos)

Week 10 Nogoya

Happy 13TH Birthday to my little bro David!

Fa what a week! This was definitely an interesting week for sure. Also, it is starting to become a little more difficult for me to write in English, which is a good thing I guess. So hopefully everything makes sense gramatically.

My companion and the companion of Elder Gomez (Elder Mckell) had tramites basically all of this week. Elder Mckell had a problem with his passport and had to go to the U.S: Embassy in Buenos Aires, and Elder Marquez had to go to Santa Fe and then Rosario for tramites with his DNI (it's like your national ID in Argentina). So Elder Gomez and I were in divisiones for almost 4 days (Tuesday to Friday). We had to split time between our areas, and we went back and forth between pensions sleeping and eating. It was a grand adventure jaja. Also, the stake asked Nogoyá to make the ward choir for stake conference in the beginning of June, so they chose me to be the choir director, and I am now learning how to teach singing lessons to Argentines in castellano. It´s super fun. Hna Arrua told me when she heard that they had to do a choir for stake conference, she almost had a heart attack, and that she was going to call Presidente Perez and make sure that I'm not transferred this transfer so that I'm here for stake conference (transfers are the Monday before). She was mostly joking, but it is highly possible that I'll be here for another transfer in Nogoyá. Woot!

We are again without any real investigators. The people here are a little hard, because they've all lived their entire lives in the exact same way their whole life, and aren't really looking to change. Our two programados heard bad things about the church from a menos activo, and we lost contact with them all week. So this week we have to go find them again and help them resolve their doubts. We will also be doing a lot of contacting and finding this week, so hopefully we will have more people to teach this week. Our bright spot was that we had our very first investigator come to church yesterday! Sonia came without her spouse, and we've been teaching them both, but her spouse couldn't come, as he had some things to do. But Sonia came and it was fantastic! There is nothing better than seeing an investigator keep a commitment. It makes us as missionaries super happy. However, we are passing that couple to the hermanas, as they recently moved into their area. My companion and I joke with the hermanas that we do all the finding and they do all the teaching, since we have already passed multiple investigators to them for various reasons.

Other exciting things from the week: We have been helping the Arrua this week with cleaning their roof, as there was a bunch of old wood and iron. It was a great time, and I felt like one of the chimney sweeps from Mary Poppins, because people go on their roofs all the time in Argentina, so Hno Arrua was just chatting with his neighbors across the way who were on their roof as well. It was great fun. We also all received flu shots this week! Hna Perez told all the missionaries that they need to get flu shots, so we went to Victoria on Friday and all got vaccinated.

This week I am learning yet again how vitally important it is to be humble. Without humility, we cannot change and we cannot improve. If we have any bit of pride, that pride will always inhibit our growth because it will always tell us that we are already good enough. That is why the scriptures calll pride the great stumbling block. I believe that pride truly is our greatest enemy, as it inhibits our ability to use the Atonement. Without humility, we cannot repent, we cannot improve, we cannot progress, and we cannot be saved. Humility is key to salvation.

I love you all so much! Have a great week!
Elder Meyers

We made a huge lunch for pday today and it was super good (I realized that I send a lot of pictures of food, but that's because here in Nogoyá there is literally nothing to do for pday besides make food jaja)

Elder Gomez and I in divisiones with super rica tarta that we bought for lunch

Elder Gomez on the phone after a day in divisiones

Helping on the roof with the Arrura's.

Me and Elder Marquez

I lent a purple tie to Elder Marquez for fast Sunday

Week 9 Nogoya

Another week in the field... ¡Vamos!

We were blessed with a new investigator this week, and we also were able to set a baptismal date for two of our investigators! It was a little sad, though, because neither of them were able to attend church yesterday. We still haven't had a single investigator attend church here in Nogoyá, so that's is our big goal right now. The branch here is growing, and it is such a privilege to be a part of the work here. The other elders had another baptism on Saturday, and it was so full of the Spirit. I was also able to sing Savior, Redeemer of My Soul in Spanish for the service, and it felt wonderful to bear my testimony through song again. We had two other investigators there in the service, and they were able to feel something special throughout the whole thing. The wife is ready to be baptized, but the husband is pretty hardcore Catholic. We are praying that his heart will be softened and he will be able to feel the veracity of our message.

Other than that, pretty normal week of teaching, finding, contacting, and visiting menos activos. I was thinking this last week about the mission, and what I'm doing each day, and I realized more than ever that the Lord knows so much better than we do how to be happy. We think that we know how to be happy, and where we can find it, but the truth is the Lord knows so much better. If we will give our lives to Him, turn our will over to Him and do what He asks us to do, we will always have more joy, more peace, more comfort, more confidence, and more love in our lives. There is no better way to be happy than to do the Lord's will. He knows best.

Hasta la próxima semana!
Elder Meyers

So...There's a super oferta in Grido right now, a kilo of ice cream is 2 for 1, so we definitely had to take advantage of that.  Here I am deciding which to try first jaja

A great picture of me eating breakfast that my companion took

My companion "milkeando" (sucking milk through an alfajor so it gets super full of milk)

Broke out the OHS choir sweatshirt for p-day today.  Unfortunately I can't wear it to proselyte, so only p-days and at nighttime.

Joseph Smith movie for p-day!

We finally put our mirror up in the bathroom with the help of Hmo. Arrua.  It's great having to hold the mirror while trying to shave or do your hair, so great that it deserves a picture.

Week 8 Nogoya

Transfers were this week! And.... our district all stayed the same. So no changes for us. But it's all good, because Elder Marquez and I are getting along super well, and we're having a great time together. They did transfer Elder Maynard, which is sad, but he became one of the new asistentes, which is awesome. Starting this transfer we now have four asistentes, so that should be fun.

This last week was super rainy, just like the week before. It rains all day every day, and if it's not raining it's cloudy, or there's this thing called llovizna, which is basically where it's misting from the sky. It's kind of weird, and I've never seen anything like it, but it happens all the time, so we're basically always wet. We also continue to walk in mud every day. It's a great adventure. Also, when it's not raining, it's ridiculously humid, and everything is always sticky or wet no matter what you do. You get out of the shower, and no matter how many times you dry off, you're still wet. It's awesome haha.

Unfortunately this last week we had to drop some investigators due to reasons beyond our control. One had their spouse get angry with them and prohibit them from listening to the missionaries, another moved, another we had to pass to the hermanas because her spouse didn't want to continue receiving lessons, and we can't teach women without another adult male present. So that was a bit of a bummer. However, on the bright side, we continue to find new people to teach through our menos activo friend Miguel. Every time we go to visit him he seems to have a new friend over, and we always invite his friends to listen to our lesson. We are starting to plan big group lessons now this week, with Miguel and his friends, and we hope to be able to progress from there. We are also starting to develop better relationships with the few members who are here and hope to involve them more in missionary work this transfer.

As a spiritual thought, this last week I was studying in the war chapters in Alma, and I realized as I was reading Alma that the whole chapter, which is about Amalickiah gaining power over the Lamanites, is an exact description of Satan and how he works with us. Lehonti and his men were on the mount, and would not come down, and as long as they didn't come down, no matter how many times Amalickiah sent a message to them, he couldn't do anything to them. However, once Lehonti came down just a tiny little bit, even though it seemed safe because he had his guards with him, Amalickiah began to have power over him, and eventually ended up killing Lehonti. We must not descend from the mount, even a little bit. Even the tiniest descension leaves room for Satan to begin working with us and bringing us lower and lower, until without realizing it, he's brought us all the way down the mount and begun to poison us. Stay strong on the mount, and don't descend!

I love you all!
Elder Meyers

Sweater weather!

Making a cake and experimenting with adding pudding powder

Our experiment turned out kind of interesting...We added too much milk so it was just like cooked pudding in the middle.  But it was still good. 

Had to take a "Dad is great, gives us chocolate cake" photo.

A funny picture of Elder Marquez

Us with the package of tootsie rolls (which by the way my companion loves them too now)

A cool sunrise (our one day of sunshine this week)

We also made a ton of torta frita (like scones kind of) because my companion loves it and it's tradition here to make torta frita when it rains.

Week 7 Nogoya

Hola familia y amigos!

This week was a week of miracles! After 6 weeks of lots and lots of contacting with very minimal results, the Lord blessed me and Elder Marquez with some fruits to our labors. We were able to put a new baptismal date for Maria Ines, our main investigator, and we were able to find 6 new investigators, 5 of which are couples or families! We have a lot of hope for the coming weeks as we work closely with each one to help them progress in their knowledge of the Savior, of God's plan for them, and how they can receive true happiness.

The theme for us has been to follow the promptings of the Spirit. Earlier this week, when my companion and I had a little extra time during siesta, we decided to watch the bio video of President Monson, On the Lord's Errand. After that, we decided that we were going to do everything we could to follow each prompting and thought we had while proselyting, no matter how small, to show the Lord our willingness to serve Him and do His will. Later, as we were out tracting, we were headed to the house of one of the contacts we had done the previous week, to try and set a date, and I had the thought that we needed to pass by a menos activo, Miguel Ceballos, a young adult (about 28) that we had been visiting and teaching and who had been showing lots of interest in returning to activity in the church. It was very small, and I almost threw it away, as we were planning to visit him later in the week, and because he lives super far away, and on top of it all, it was raining, and he lives in the villa, where all the roads are dirt, and my companion and I were already super tired of walking in mud. But I remembered the goal we had set, and I said to my companion, Let's go visit Miguel. He looked at me and said, Seriously? In this weather? I reminded him of our goal, and he immediately said ¡Vamos! (he's a great companion). We walked about half an hour to his house, only to find that he wasn't there. However, his friend Ramón of about the same age was watching the house, and after a short chat, agreed to receive our message. Fast forward two days. We went to the house of Ramón to teach him, and he wasn't there (that always seems to happen). We felt yet again that we needed to go visit Miguel. We followed the prompting and went to the house of Miguel, where we found him with his family. We began teaching the Plan of Salvation to Miguel when lo and behold, Ramón shows up! He sat down with us and Miguel, and we had a fantastic lesson with the four of them. We have plans to continue teaching both of them, and they both want to come to church together. My companion and I were super excited, and hope we can continue to help them. I have such a testimony of the Holy Spirit, and how when we do the littlest things to follow the Spirit, the Lord will bless us. Even if it was just a thought, if it was good, and you were trying to follow the Spirit, the Lord will bless you and help you to recognize the Spirit more in your life.

As far as other things go, I'm starting to realize that my pants are getting a little tighter... This Argentine diet is starting to get to me. All the breads and pastas all the time don't help you maintain your weight. This week we bought more vegetables and fruits, so hopefully that will help. Also, it has been raining all week long, and we can't quite remember what dry dirt looks like. I've given up on cleaning my shoes because they just get muddy and dirty every day jaja. Other than that, everything is going great! Remember your Savior Jesus Christ, who gave everything for you!

Elder Meyers

These two pictures were after a super rainy day when we got caught in a downpour and were absolutely soaked.  The streets were literally rivers.  It was great.

Soaked!!!

Conference with the three gringos in the branch president's office

Priesthood session with Hmo Arrua at his house

Our Conference breakfast (with facturas of course)

All the missionaries with la familia Arrua, and the mom of Hermana Arrua, Hermana Farias, in the house of Hermana Farias for Conference lunch on Sunday

Other picture from lunch (with jello with whipped cream!  It's been so long since I've seen whipped cream!)

Pday especial in Victoria with all the missionaries in our Zone (minus the hermanas from Nogoya who couldn't come)

All the Elders in Zona Parana Sur

Divisions with Elder Maynard!  He wanted a selfie with the Goldfish jaja

Making milkshakes with Elder Maynard

Purple tie for fast Sunday

The other Elders had a baptism this last weekend!  It was awesome!