Hello Family!
I hope you all are doing great, because I know that I am doing really good! It has been a pretty eventful week so far! The biggest thing was that on monday, we actually went out and went Proselyting! For Reals! Me and Elder Welker were put with another Latino missionary, Elder Rodriguez, and we basically got on a bus, went somewhere in the middle of Guatemala City, were handed a book of mormon each and some pamphlets, and then were basically told ¨Have fun!¨ It was a little nerve wracking at first, because everything we
had done so far was pretend and just working on everything, and if we messed up, it didn´t really matter, but this was for real! Our very first contact was when we were on the bus, and me and Elder Welker started to talk to a guy standing next to us. It was a little hard to understand him, because im so used to teachers who speak slowly and clearly, but this guy didn´t! I could still get the gist of what he was saying, but it was hard to pick it all up! But we did end up giving him a pamphlet and his address, so that we could give it to the MTC to contact him! But that is pretty much what we did for the whole time! We met with all kinds of people, people that wanted to hear what we had to say, some that closed the door right in our faces, a family with a bunch of little kids wanting to marvel at us gringos, a teenage boy about Ryan's age who really wanted to know more about our message, and a lot more! There was even one lady who when she saw us, she said she didn´t want anything to do with us, because we didn´t believe in the bible and we worshipped Joseph Smith! It is crazy to hear what some people know about the church, and how little they actually do know! But we ended up doing pretty well to my standards, we gave away all three of our books of mormon, got about 15 addresses to contact them later, and really just got to meet a lot of the real Guatemalan folk! It was such a neat experience, although not gonna lie, it was a little frustrating because I couldn´t understand most of what they were saying, but I just really need to work on it! So that was really my first time out in the mission field for real! It was so much fun!
on Tuesday we had our first real live devotional with the Area President over Central America, President Martino. We usually just watch other talks given in the Provo MTC, but this time we got to hear it live! And it was weird, because usually, other people have to wear headphones to have the talk translated, but not this time! Us Nortes had to wear the headphones, because it was mainly in Spanish. But the really cool thing was, I didn´t wear the headphones for about 3/4 of the time, because I could understand him for the most part! It was so cool to actually know what he was saying in Spanish! He talked a lot about hard work and obedience, and one thing that he said that I took out of it is that we need to LEARN TO LOVE WORK. I know that is something Dad would say, so I have kind of been used to it already thank goodness! But he was a really good speaker!
We went to the temple again on Thursday at 630 in the morning, so I was a little tired, but still was so cool to go to the Temple again in Guatemala! I don´t think i could ever get old of the temple! After we went to the temple, the distribution center is right next to it, so a bunch of us went and looked around. One quick thing, they say for whoever is going to Quetzaltenenago, like me, will more than likely have to learn Quiche, which is a dilect there. When i was in the distribution center, I thought i might as well ask if they had a Book of Mormon in Quiche. Sadly they didn´t, but they had one in Quetchi, which is what my compainon will be speaking, so he bought it! We Were looking at it, and he said it best when he said it looked like a lawn mower ran over the last half of the dictionary and they just put it together in some random order! It is really so cool to look at though!
So I´ve been told by you guys that I should include some more ordinary stuff so here we go! We get back to our residence at 9:30 getting ready for bed 1030, but a group of us hurry and get ready in about 5 minutes and we tell stories. The best ones are the crazy girlfriend stories, and it seems like most everyone has at least one story to tell about one. The craziest part about one is one Elder, who lives in colorado, was telling about his extremely crazy one, and all of a sudded, another elder who lives in florida started to realize that he home taught her at BYU! How crazy is that?! Someone from Florida knows someones crazy ex girlfriend from colorado! It really is a small world!
Another thing is the food here is great! At Provo, the food wasn´t really the best, becuase they had to mass produce it for about 3500 hungry people, but here, we actually have a real chef who cooks every meal for us about 100 poeple, so it is a lot better here! My district is awesome! I don´t have that much time, so I wont get into much more detail, but i will for sure next week! Im sorry i dont have that much time to talk about you guys, but i love hearing about your lives and what you guys are doing! Keep it up, I love you guys!
Elder Stuart
Saturday, August 18, 2012
Monday, August 13, 2012
One Month Out!
Well, as of today I have officially been a missionary for a month now! Well, tecnically yesterday, because I got set apart the 10th, but I count it as today! I can´t believe that it has already been a month now! The time sure flies when you are having fun! But seriously, I can´t get enough of this place! We had our first Sunday here, and it was so good! It was fast sunday, but I didn´t mind it that much, because that meant more time for us to learn the Gospel! In Sacrament meeting, we had the opportunity to bear our testimonies in Spanish, and I was thinking about bearing mine, but as soon as they announced the time was ours, about 20 missionaries got up and went straight for the stand, so I figured I would just sit this week out. But I had this nagging feeling throughout the whole meeting, so as about 5 or so of them were done, I just decided that I needed to get up there and bear my testimony, so I did! I know my Spanish wasn´t as good as it could have been, but I felt the Spirit so strongly in just that short two minutes of bearing my testimony! I am so glad that the Spirit was pushing me to get up there, because I was so glad I had the chance to get up there and share what I have experienced!
For our ´devotional´ here, we didn´t have any speakers here of course, so we watched an older clip of Elder Holland in the MTC. Now that I think more about it, he is easily becoming my favorite apostle by far! He is so direct to us missionaries and is not afraid to tell what he really thinks, so that really makes me strive to be the best missionary that I can be and to work as hard as I can. He gave an analogy of what Peter and the other apostles did when Jesus was crucified. In the last part of John, it tells the story of the Apostles not knowing what to do when Jesus left, so they just resorted to going back to what they did best, which was fishing. They weren´t having the best day, and they were getting pretty frustruated by the time night came. Then they saw a man on the shore who told them to cast their nets on the other side. Once they did, they caught so much fish that they couldn´t bring the net back in! Once Peter realized that the man was Jesus Christ, he dove off of the boat and swam as fast as he could to shore. When he got there, Jesus asked him if he loved him more than Peter loved the fish, and Peter answered yes. Jesus continued to ask him three times, and Peter answered yes three times. At the end, Jesus said that they needed to feed his sheep. Elder Holland likened that to us and said that we need to leave our boats, or our distractions back at home and feed his sheep. He continued to tell how much Peter took that to heart, and he became the best apostle he could be. He said how people were traveling night and day just to have the chance to be in the shadow of Peter, becuase he was that good of an apostle. It really puts it into perspective on how good we can be as missionaries! I just thought I should share that story with you guys, because I really liked it!
The MTC here is so much fun! Everyone here is so nice and friendly, especially the Latinos! My roomates are awesome, everyone is just awesome! By the way, if you guys have ever heard of the book ´The message´ by Richardson, look for it, because my roommate Elder Peña knows that family, and said it was one of the best gospel books he has read! On Thursday we had our first chance to go to the Temple! It was such an amazing experience to go to the temple here! Once we got there, we had to wait about 40 minutes because the Temple was so full, so we spent that 40 minutes outside of the temple and talking to some of the members that happened to be at the Temple! We had groups of teenagers that took our pictures, we sang with some little Houndouran children that happened to be there, that definitely added to the experience at the Temple! But we finally got to go in, and I was kind of hoping that everything in the temple would be in Spanish, but they separated us Nortes from the Latinos and we did it in English. But they promised that we would do it in Spanish by the time we leave in a couple weeks, so I am excited for that! But the Spirit was so strong there, and it was so cool to be able to do temple work in another country! It really just shows how widespread the church is and how it can touch so many people! It really just makes me want to go out into the field right now and teach as many people as I can the happiness that i felt on that day! But I know that I need to learn as much as I can and learn the language better, and it will all come with time! But I know I am doing the right thing by being here. If I can do what Peter did and forget all of my distractions and become the best that I can be, I can share that happiness that I have felt in just this month with all of the poeple of Guatemala! I can´t wait to share as much as I can, and can´t wait to get out into the field!
I love you all. I don´t have much time, but I love how much fun you guys are having at home! I love you all so much, and thank you so much for the support!
Love, Elder Stuart
For our ´devotional´ here, we didn´t have any speakers here of course, so we watched an older clip of Elder Holland in the MTC. Now that I think more about it, he is easily becoming my favorite apostle by far! He is so direct to us missionaries and is not afraid to tell what he really thinks, so that really makes me strive to be the best missionary that I can be and to work as hard as I can. He gave an analogy of what Peter and the other apostles did when Jesus was crucified. In the last part of John, it tells the story of the Apostles not knowing what to do when Jesus left, so they just resorted to going back to what they did best, which was fishing. They weren´t having the best day, and they were getting pretty frustruated by the time night came. Then they saw a man on the shore who told them to cast their nets on the other side. Once they did, they caught so much fish that they couldn´t bring the net back in! Once Peter realized that the man was Jesus Christ, he dove off of the boat and swam as fast as he could to shore. When he got there, Jesus asked him if he loved him more than Peter loved the fish, and Peter answered yes. Jesus continued to ask him three times, and Peter answered yes three times. At the end, Jesus said that they needed to feed his sheep. Elder Holland likened that to us and said that we need to leave our boats, or our distractions back at home and feed his sheep. He continued to tell how much Peter took that to heart, and he became the best apostle he could be. He said how people were traveling night and day just to have the chance to be in the shadow of Peter, becuase he was that good of an apostle. It really puts it into perspective on how good we can be as missionaries! I just thought I should share that story with you guys, because I really liked it!
The MTC here is so much fun! Everyone here is so nice and friendly, especially the Latinos! My roomates are awesome, everyone is just awesome! By the way, if you guys have ever heard of the book ´The message´ by Richardson, look for it, because my roommate Elder Peña knows that family, and said it was one of the best gospel books he has read! On Thursday we had our first chance to go to the Temple! It was such an amazing experience to go to the temple here! Once we got there, we had to wait about 40 minutes because the Temple was so full, so we spent that 40 minutes outside of the temple and talking to some of the members that happened to be at the Temple! We had groups of teenagers that took our pictures, we sang with some little Houndouran children that happened to be there, that definitely added to the experience at the Temple! But we finally got to go in, and I was kind of hoping that everything in the temple would be in Spanish, but they separated us Nortes from the Latinos and we did it in English. But they promised that we would do it in Spanish by the time we leave in a couple weeks, so I am excited for that! But the Spirit was so strong there, and it was so cool to be able to do temple work in another country! It really just shows how widespread the church is and how it can touch so many people! It really just makes me want to go out into the field right now and teach as many people as I can the happiness that i felt on that day! But I know that I need to learn as much as I can and learn the language better, and it will all come with time! But I know I am doing the right thing by being here. If I can do what Peter did and forget all of my distractions and become the best that I can be, I can share that happiness that I have felt in just this month with all of the poeple of Guatemala! I can´t wait to share as much as I can, and can´t wait to get out into the field!
I love you all. I don´t have much time, but I love how much fun you guys are having at home! I love you all so much, and thank you so much for the support!
Love, Elder Stuart
Saturday, August 4, 2012
P-Day is Saturday at the CCM
Dear Family,
Well, my P-Day is today on Saturdays, so be looking for letters from me today! First off, those pictures of Jace are so freaking cute! He is like perfect in every way! I love all the pictures!!! It is crazy to think that I am about 2000 miles away from you guys! Before it didn´t really hit me that I was on a mission, because I was still in Provo, and knew exactly where I was. Not anymore! I am in a place as good as it gets: Guatemala!!!!! We got off of the airplane in Guatemala City, and the City is actually a lot more advanced than I first thought! But, it is the city after all, I won´t be serving there! I´ll be up in the mountains and jungles with all the natives, and I can't wait! When we exited the airport, we put all of our luggage in a yellow school bus (classy, I know) and got in said bus and took it all the way to the MTC. I got a window seat thank goodness, so I could look outside of the window the whole time and just take in how beautiful Guatemala is! But we finally got the the MTC! The MTC, or CCM as they call it here is great! It was a little rough at first, I´ll admit, but it has gotten a lot better! I´m thinking that it was just because we were all exhausted from our 12 hour day at the airport and not getting any sleep! But it really has been great! We are learning a lot of Spanish here, becuase about half of the 100 missionaries here are Latino, so it really helps to talk to them and to listen to them! I feel like my Spanish has gotten a lot better, even after 3 and a half days! I have still got a very long way to go however, but it will come with time!
We got set into our districts, and I am in district Marcos, or Mark in English. My district is cool, but so far it is not nearly as fun as my district back in Provo! But maybe that is a blessing in disguise, because I really need to buckle down and learn as much as I can, because I am going to out in the field in a month and a half! Crazy! I can´t even explain how excited I am to get going though! I just want to go out and have all of these adventures that i can, get to know the people of Guatemala, teach them everything that I know about the Gospel, just
everything! But, everything has it´s due time, and it will come soon enough, I just need to prepare for a little longer! I can´t stop talking about Guatemala though! It seriously is so awesome! The weather is perfect too! For instance, we went out and played gym outside, and it was around 75 degrees the whole time, and they say that it never wavers from that! perfect! And, while we were out there, it started to downpour on us! We were about to go inside because we thought we had to, but they said we could keep on playing in the rain! So a couple of us went out and played some more basketball in the pouring rain! It was such a cool experience! Like I have said before, the MTC here is really small, only about 100 people and two zones, so I pretty much know everyone here already, only after 3 days! I bet when I am getting ready to leave that I will know pretty much everyone here!
Guatemala is a lot different than the US though! We went and walked around the Temple that is just a block away, and while we walked we saw cops everywhere, holding shotguns and rifles to help protect the people! It was so crazy to see how they were just casually holding a gun out in the open and no one even seemed to care! Also, we have guards that walk around our building, so it is like we have our own security protection! It is really crazy how different it is here. I haven´t really experienced culture shock yet, because I haven´t really been out in the field yet, but I know as soon as I get out in the open, I will experience a lot of adventures!! I can´t wait to serve the Lord with all that I am, and I know that we will all recieve blessings from it. i know it will be hard, and I feel like I can take it. I will strive to do my best the whole time so that I don´t look back and say "man, I wish I did this and this and that" and so on. I´ve just got to buckle down and do the best that I can!
Now onto family stuff! I cant believe how cute Jace is! All those pictures that you sent are so adorable, especially the one with his clothes on, his face is priceless in that! I hope that you all are doing great and getting ready for school and such. I can´t wait to hear all about your lives and how everyone is! I love hearing from you guys! And I hope that the mail works well enough that you can receive all the mail that I will send! I love you all, and thanks for your continuing support!
Elder Jonathan Stuart
P.S. When you put this on the blog, please fix all the mistakes and paragraphs and such. I´m using a Spanish keyboard, so it is really hard, but i make do! Thanks for all you guys do! I love you!!!!!!
Well, my P-Day is today on Saturdays, so be looking for letters from me today! First off, those pictures of Jace are so freaking cute! He is like perfect in every way! I love all the pictures!!! It is crazy to think that I am about 2000 miles away from you guys! Before it didn´t really hit me that I was on a mission, because I was still in Provo, and knew exactly where I was. Not anymore! I am in a place as good as it gets: Guatemala!!!!! We got off of the airplane in Guatemala City, and the City is actually a lot more advanced than I first thought! But, it is the city after all, I won´t be serving there! I´ll be up in the mountains and jungles with all the natives, and I can't wait! When we exited the airport, we put all of our luggage in a yellow school bus (classy, I know) and got in said bus and took it all the way to the MTC. I got a window seat thank goodness, so I could look outside of the window the whole time and just take in how beautiful Guatemala is! But we finally got the the MTC! The MTC, or CCM as they call it here is great! It was a little rough at first, I´ll admit, but it has gotten a lot better! I´m thinking that it was just because we were all exhausted from our 12 hour day at the airport and not getting any sleep! But it really has been great! We are learning a lot of Spanish here, becuase about half of the 100 missionaries here are Latino, so it really helps to talk to them and to listen to them! I feel like my Spanish has gotten a lot better, even after 3 and a half days! I have still got a very long way to go however, but it will come with time!
We got set into our districts, and I am in district Marcos, or Mark in English. My district is cool, but so far it is not nearly as fun as my district back in Provo! But maybe that is a blessing in disguise, because I really need to buckle down and learn as much as I can, because I am going to out in the field in a month and a half! Crazy! I can´t even explain how excited I am to get going though! I just want to go out and have all of these adventures that i can, get to know the people of Guatemala, teach them everything that I know about the Gospel, just
everything! But, everything has it´s due time, and it will come soon enough, I just need to prepare for a little longer! I can´t stop talking about Guatemala though! It seriously is so awesome! The weather is perfect too! For instance, we went out and played gym outside, and it was around 75 degrees the whole time, and they say that it never wavers from that! perfect! And, while we were out there, it started to downpour on us! We were about to go inside because we thought we had to, but they said we could keep on playing in the rain! So a couple of us went out and played some more basketball in the pouring rain! It was such a cool experience! Like I have said before, the MTC here is really small, only about 100 people and two zones, so I pretty much know everyone here already, only after 3 days! I bet when I am getting ready to leave that I will know pretty much everyone here!
Guatemala is a lot different than the US though! We went and walked around the Temple that is just a block away, and while we walked we saw cops everywhere, holding shotguns and rifles to help protect the people! It was so crazy to see how they were just casually holding a gun out in the open and no one even seemed to care! Also, we have guards that walk around our building, so it is like we have our own security protection! It is really crazy how different it is here. I haven´t really experienced culture shock yet, because I haven´t really been out in the field yet, but I know as soon as I get out in the open, I will experience a lot of adventures!! I can´t wait to serve the Lord with all that I am, and I know that we will all recieve blessings from it. i know it will be hard, and I feel like I can take it. I will strive to do my best the whole time so that I don´t look back and say "man, I wish I did this and this and that" and so on. I´ve just got to buckle down and do the best that I can!
Now onto family stuff! I cant believe how cute Jace is! All those pictures that you sent are so adorable, especially the one with his clothes on, his face is priceless in that! I hope that you all are doing great and getting ready for school and such. I can´t wait to hear all about your lives and how everyone is! I love hearing from you guys! And I hope that the mail works well enough that you can receive all the mail that I will send! I love you all, and thanks for your continuing support!
Elder Jonathan Stuart
P.S. When you put this on the blog, please fix all the mistakes and paragraphs and such. I´m using a Spanish keyboard, so it is really hard, but i make do! Thanks for all you guys do! I love you!!!!!!
Wednesday, August 1, 2012
Finally in Guatemala!
Hi Family! Sorry I didnt have the chance to call you once I got to LA, but I made it into Guatemala safe and sound! I don´t have much time here, I only have ten minutes to let you know that I made it here safely, but I should get my time to email later on in the week. But Guatemala is seriously so cool! I love it here already! We got off of the plane in Guatemala, and it was seriously so cool when we landed. We were landing at about 5:30 in the morning, so it was right about when the sun was coming out, so it was way cool to see Guatemala City all lit up! The MTC here is awesome! It is a lot more personable becuase there are only about 100 missionaries as opposed to about 3500, so I feel like we are going to learn a lot more here! And it´s all in Spanish! So I´m going to have to learn it quick, but I´m sure that I will be able to! The Temple is just across the street too, so I will be sure to make use of that! The country here is seriously so beautiful, I can´t wait until I can get to Quetzaltenango! I am super excited to be in another county! It is going to be weird not being home in the US for two years, but it is going to be a great experience for sure! I love you all, and will be sure to write a longer email later in the week, probably Saturday. So look for it then! Love you!
Elder Stuart
Elder Stuart
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