Threesome!

Hey Family!

Well, sounds like you have been having a really great time back at home.  The beach sounded like a ton of fun.  As always, it was a treat to hear about Benj and Melinda's kids and how much they're growing.  Thanks for the letters and the constant support.  Well, another week.  Let's see if I can sum up the gist of it. 

Well, for starters, to answer some of your questions mom.  I usually walk everywhere.  It's interesting because you can't really get to any of the houses on the main roads.  They have a ton of these little callejones that are just sidewalks in all of the neighborhoods.  We have 6 distinct neighborhoods that we are in charge of and they are all in one ward.  We have 650 members in the ward and our attendance is about 80 every week.  Tons of inactive members!  From our house to the other end of our area is about 3 and a half miles and we definitely walk a lot.  There are buses in our area that come every once in a while, but we mostly just use those on P-day to get to the Supermarket. 

We do have a ward, but the funny thing is that there's no bishop, just an acting counselor.  The problem with our ward is that most of the people don't want any other church responsibilities other than coming to church on Sunday.  So the few people that do have callings have multiples.  Like our ward mission leader that is also seminary teacher, institute teacher, and stake choir director.  It's definitely hard to get some help with our lessons from the members.  But we do have a couple guys in the ward that are sometimes willing to help us. 

It has been pretty hot this last week.  The funny thing is that it hasn't rained in 6 days.  I heard somewhere that it got up to 98 degrees the other day.  It’s pretty hot when the sheet metal is reflecting the sun in your face.  Hopefully it will rain in the next couple days and we can be cool again.  It's really bad here when it doesn't rain because that's the only water that some people have.  When it does rain everybody's running around like crazy with barrels and buckets trying to get as much as possible. 

Well, the Perez family is still coming along.  The only problem is that they need to be married.  Until they do that we can't even count them as having a baptismal date.  We also need to make sure they're serious and get them to the church before we can give them help getting married.  We passed by yesterday to get them to church and we were yelling BUENOS DIAS but nothing.  Then their neighbors did us the favor of sicking their 3 ravenous pit bulls.  Stinking chuchos.  I was definitely not ready for that.  But we managed to escape from their bites and we continued trying to bring people to church.  We're going to see what happens with the family Perez and we hope that they can get to church soon.  It's a rule that they have to go 3 times before they can be baptized. 

We have another family - the Lopez family - that is going to be some serious baptisms.  Only one of the ladies is a member and is bring her whole family to church.  In total there are like 10 people.  They always receive us in their home and love to talk about the gospel.  One of her daughters has a baptismal date and is really excited to be baptized the 20th of August.  Our goal is to help the others progress and be ready for that day also.  Their problem is that the member lady is married but is with another man and has not been divorced.  She can't take the sacrament so we're thinking they all come late so she doesn't have to be embarrassed in front of her family.  Kind of stinks cause we can't count a Sunday as one for their 3 required for baptism unless they are there before the sacrament.  So, we'll need to talk to her about that and we'll see what happens with that family.

As for our companionship, that's another story.  We got another new elder straight from the MTC so we are now a trio.  It was pretty cool because I got to be his trainer the first day in the mission.  It was great.  We worked so hard that day and had a ton of success.  His name is Elder Aguilar and he's from Quetzaltenango.  He's waiting on his visa so that he can go to Peru for his mission.   All I want is to be obedient and help this new elder start his mission well, knowing what real missionary work is like.  It's definitely been a little rough this week.  I'm trying to stay positive and trying to work hard.  We've been going to a lot of member's houses lately just to talk when we really should be working.  I try to say something, but it doesn't seem to help.  I don't know I'm doing ok.  Sometimes when it gets rough, all I can do is pray, or sing a song or something.  That seems to work most of the time.  Don't worry though, I'm still trying to work hard and teach with the Spirit.  We're going to talk again soon and hopefully all will go well.  As for now, all I can do is try and love him.

Well, the time is up.  I better get going.  I love you guys and hope you have a good week.  Remember to always pray for help through your trials.  Also know that you can find great comfort in the scriptures, which are truly the words of Christ.  Have a great week!

Love,
Elder Lloyd

Lions and Tigers and Bears

Dear Family,

Well, another week.  By the way, just know that people don´t get attacked by lions all the time here.  You may have heard about a missionary in the South Mission that got attacked by two lions.  Well, you should also know that missionaries are protected as they are obedient.  This missionary that got attacked went on his Pday to a zoo on divisions with two sister missionaries..... he then climbed a wall to take a picture of these lions.  That´s when problems happened.  I promise I´ll be obedient.

Anyways, haha, on a happier note, this week was great.  I´m still working with my companion trying to help him get some spunk in the work again.  But, we did have a fantastic week of success.  We had 8 solid new investigators this week.  In order to count a person as a new investigator in this mission you have to have taught them 2 times and have a return visit scheduled.  So it was great.  We also have two investigators with a baptismal date for the 13 of August.  Their names are Indira and Diego Perez.  They are so humble and really want to learn more.  We helped them move a couch 3 weeks ago and we asked them if they wanted to hear our message and they said yes.  So we immediately went back to a member´s house and taught them the first lesson.  We´ve been teaching them in the Rodriguez house ever since.  They don´t want us to come there because they don´t have electricity.  They didn´t come to church but we are going to teach them a lesson on the Sabaath day this week and hopefully get them wanting to come.  He also told us that he doesnt have to work this Sunday.  We´ll take a start any way we can get it.  I hope they keep progressing.  They could be so blessed by the gospel and really need it.  She´s pregnant and really interested in our message about family´s being able to live together forever.  We´ll keep praying. 

We also found a new family, the Soveranes family in our little colony where we live.  It´s a lady with a 20 year old girl and an 18 year old son.  They are so receptive, have great questions, and don´t even affiliate with a different church because they don´t feel they are right.  We have another appointment with them tomorrow night that should be fantastic. 

We have  a lady in our ward that has two daughters that are interested in the church and have been coming every once in awhile to church.  The problem is that we can never get anybody to go with us and there are only women in the house.  I definitely know that the rule that we can´t enter houses where there are only women is definitely for our protection.  So that is one rule that I will not break.  Yesterday, Hna. Lopez brought her daughters, mom, sister, niece, and her 3 kids to church!  It was awesome!  They also asked us if we could come back the same night and teach them all.  We finally got in with a member after 6 weeks of trying!  It was so great.  One of the ladies told us that she was recieving the lessons from the missionaries antes and didn´t feel comfortable putting a date the last time.  She also told us that she thinks this is her time now, and that she needs to join the church.  Que pilas esa patoja!  We also have another appointment with them all tonight!  Sweet.  We are going to try to work with them so hard so that we can help them do what it takes to come unto Christ.

And we have another investigator progressing!  His name is Giovanni and we´ve taught him twice.  We also have a lesson with him tonight and hope that his wife is there to listen to us also.  We´ll see how it goes. 

I looked around at church and noticed that 5 families of less active members that we´ve been teaching were back at church.  The Peña family was there with their mom, who has been extremely inactive.  I think I told you about her.  She also attended the temple prep class with her husband last night.  A man that had killed somebody out of self defense and stopped going to church  was having problems with his wife.  They were sitting in sacrament meeting together, he with his harm around her, super happy.  We taught a lesson to some less active members last night who´s father has had problems with drinking.  He was on the verge of tears because he knew they needed to return to church and prepare to be sealed.  We´ve been so blessed with success this week.  I can feel the Spirit guiding it also.  The Lord knows how important this work is and is helping me all the way.  I love it.

Well, the times up.  Life in Guatemala is awesome.  Definitely different.  We have two showers in the house and I finally got tired of the cold water in the one upstairs so I switched to the heated one downstairs.  But, it shocks like no other!  If you touch your hair to it, you're gettin shocked.  It doesn´t help that it's at my chest.  Haha.  Anyways, I gotta go.  I love you all.  I hope life is go.  If there are other people reading this blog, know that the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints is true.  I know it without a doubt.  I know that through this gospel of Jesus Christ, we can recieve all the blessings in the world.  Have a great week!

Love,

Elder Lloyd

Tamales

Well, another week here in Guatemala.  Interesting week.  But, before anything else, let me tell you about my mission president.  I keep forgetting.  He came about 2 weeks ago and he's ready to get going.  The second day he was here, he had interviews with everybody in our zone.  It was a quick little interview but it was really nice to be able to get to know him and his wife.  They're super excited and you can tell that they really love us.  It was hard to tell much about them because the interview was only 5 minutes with each one of them.  But, I do know they're going to be great and Sister Watts had already told President Watts all about me.  Man, she has got some an awkwardly long handshake/handhold.  Ha-ha.

Let’s see, what are some things I can tell you about life in Guatemala?  Well, it's hottttttt!  And it rains a ton.  As you can see from the picture of my boots, there's lots of mud.  The pictures of the buildings is a part of my area.  The hill is a little bit of Santa Faz, the poorest part of our area.  The houses in the pictures are made of cement but a lot of the houses our just sheet metal.  Pretty sketchy.  Let’s see, the other pictures... Wiener!  There's a less active family with this wiener dog named Canela or Cinnamon in English.  She hates me and I'm super surprised that she let me hold her.  The other cool pet of a member family is the iguana.  I didn't hold it but it was pretty cool.  We went to a member's house, the Rodriguez family, and made tamales.  Those are all the pictures of the food.  The meat....... Chicken feet..... SWEET!  Ha-ha.  They weren't bad.  It was a little bit gross that there were flies buzzing all over them while we were putting them in our tamales.  What was worse though was the water that we boiled them.  It was black and had chunks of food in it, and the worst, a worm.  Bleh!  But, they tasted good and everything was cooked.  And we had to eat it.  It was a lot of fun to get to make something and we also have been teaching their family and trying to get some of their kids back to church.  Also, they're helping us teach an investigator couple, Diego and Indira Perez. 

As for our Mamita, I wish!  No mamita for us.  We cook everything ourselves.  We have a lot of spaghetti, beans, rice, and corn flakes.  Sometimes for dinner at 9:00 we just eat jalapenos with tortillas.  Those never have settled well in my stomach.  Last night I got a little fancy with the spices and made some onion rings.  Oh my goo'ness, oh, my goo'ness.  Sooooo good.  The other missionaries really liked me for that last night.  All and all I'm eating pretty well.  Every once in awhile we'll get a pizza.  We do have a lady in the Zone Leader´s area that washes our clothes sometimes.  The thing is that when she washes them they come back full of fleas.  Kind of gross.  I try to keep it under control with Permethrin.  They only start to bite when I go out into the sun.  I think they just get a little annoyed with me.  After a little while they get used to it and leave me alone pretty much for the rest of the day.  =)

We haven’t seen too much animals since I've been here.  We did however see some monsterous rats today.  They're like the size of cats and there is this river where everybody dumps their garbage where they like to hang out.  Some of the members and investigators have smaller rats in their houses too.  So nasty.  We have been doing a lot of service lately.  On Saturday we went to the clinic and did a stake service project of cleaning up around the building.  I machetied the grass for 4 and a half hours straight.  Needless to say, I'm got a bit burnt and some huge blisters on my hands.  But it did feel good to serve.  Right after that we went over to the Peña family.  We were over there helping them from 2:30 to about 8:30.  That was the picture of us with shovels.  They have a son coming home from the mission tomorrow and were trying to turn all their dirt floors into cement before he gets home.  We first had to move everything out and then dig up the hard dirt and pack it down and then mix all the cement and smooth it out.  Pretty long process but it looks great.  I worked so hard that day and by the end smelled horrible.  Oh well, it was great.  Their family is like the strongest family in the ward, but they have one problem.  Their mom is completely inactive.  2 of their kids didn’t come from the father of the family.  It's so sad because everybody is so great and she doesn’t have anything to do with the church.  We've been working so hard with them to try and get her active over these past 5 weeks.  Finally last night, she asked my companion and me if we could start teaching her as if she were a new investigator.  She wants to go to church again, learn how to study the scriptures and eventually go to the temple with her husband.  Man, super awesome.  I'm so excited for this family and hope we can really help them out. 

Things with my companion are ok.  I think he may have put on a good show for me the first couple weeks, working really hard and doing everything right.  Now, he just doesn't seem to have much of a drive to do anything.  Last week we didn’t leave the house until 6:00 one night.  That wasn’t the greatest and our stats of really fallen.  I think it’s been about 2 weeks since we studied together and sometimes it's hard.  I guess all I can do is keep studying hard and helping him out, encouraging him every day.  It's kind of like i have turned out to be the trainer.  But it's fine.  I think this week will be better.  We found out that our area in Santa Faz is about 3 times bigger than we thought.  Also, this area hasn’t had missionaries visit in about 3 years.  So, the field is white and we're going to start spending at least 2 hours a day there contacting trying to find some new people.  I feel so good about this new little bit of area and hope it leads to some success and some souls in the Iglesia. 

I'm glad to have my Heavenly Father with me every step of the way.  Sometimes its hard but other times it's fantastic.  Oh yes, 5 new investigators came to church last Sunday and we're thinking that 2 of them are ready to make a date for baptism.  We just have a really hard time getting in to teach because they’re all women and we can’t get into the house unless we have a member male with us.  So hopefully we get in this week and help them progress a little more.  All in all, things are going good.  I know if I keep working hard and trying new ways to find and teach people, the Lord will provide a way for those prepared to receive the truth. 

Well, it's that time.  Have a great week.  I'm always praying for your success and progression.  Always remember what's truly important.  Love you guys

Love,
Elder Lloyd

A Churazco

Well, it's been another week here in Barrio Colombia.  This week we worked soooooooooo hard.  We didn’t really have as much success as we would have wanted but we still did see a little bit of fruit for our labors.  Bad news about our investigator Carlos that had a baptismal date.  Apparently he really has a bad problem with lying.  He was living with his aunt and drinking and threatened to kill his aunt and all of her kids.  He then moved out and has been trying to avoid us.  We found where he lives on Sunday morning and he said that he was getting ready for church and that if we came back in about 15 minutes he would be waiting for us and that he was excited to go.  Well, apparently while we were gone, he ran for it.  His nephew had no idea where he was and so, ya.  Not too sure what happened with that.  We might try one other time to get a hold of him but we're thinking he might be bad news.  Good thing is that we know his aunt's family and also his other uncle's family really well and have return visits with them.  His aunt seems very interested and has two little kids.  So, maybe we'll see some success there.  

We had a family home evening with a member family on Monday of last week and while we were in their house, another family came in that was buying a couch from them.  So we helped them out moving it to another house.  By the way, I've never smelt such nasty dog smell before in my life, all over my shirt.  =) Anyways, we helped them out and they came back over to the house of the members and we taught them the message of the restoration.  They were so interested and we have a return appointment with them tomorrow with the member family also.  They don't have lights so they said it might be better at the Rodriguez house.  They are Diego and Indira Perez.  Hopefully they receive our message and feel the desire to go to church and learn more.  

We had another menos activo family that we taught yesterday that got married and never went back to church again.  They are the Castillo family and we taught them a lesson about eternal marriage in the temple and about work for the dead.  They were super interested and really want to be sealed for eternity with their son.  They said they'll go back to church and maybe even attend the temple prep class that the ward is having.  Ojala.  

Ohhhhhhh man, we had a churazco on Friday.  So simple but sooooo good.  It was with the high priests and my companion and I.  So there were about 8 people and about 10 pounds of meat.  My stomach has never felt so happy.  We just had a big pile of BBQed meat, 100 tortillas, and a big ol pot of beans.  Happy day, all was well.  I'm pretty sure any protein deficiency that I had was eliminated in that night.  

My companion and I got our full allotment of money for food this month, so we are eating well again.  Our zone had an activity today.  We went bowling and to a mall.  It was a little weird, but pretty fun to bowl.  For the hour it cost about 3 bucks.  If only it were that cheap at atomic bowl!  I bowled a 122, not too great, but it was nice to loosen up a little bit from the hard work of the week.  Then we went somewhere really weird.  Wal-Mart!?!  Who knew they had a full on Wal-Mart here in Guatemala?  And apparently they have a couple here in the capitol.  It definitely wasn't very cheap though.  American food is expensive.  

Well, I'm sorry my letter isn't very long but we didn’t have too much time to write today, we got back pretty late from the Zone activity.  Sounds like you guys are having such a great weekend.  Make sure and eat a brat for me. Man, those are good.  =)  I really love you and am praying every day for ya.  Stay strong and love the Lord.  I promise I'll keep working hard.  Have a good'un.

Love, 
Elder Lloyd