Jack - March 12

Hey guys, I hope everything is going well. I have some news for you. Apparently last week I completed 6 months in the mission!? How crazy, time is flying, we´ve got to make the most of it.

This week was interesting, I don´t remember a ton because I haven´t really taken time to kind of decompress for this week. But anyways there are a couple of experiences I´ll share.

We had to leave one of our investigators this week, a Haitian named Wisner, the one out of our Haitian investigators who understood the most Spanish. We started teaching him out of the Book of Mormon and his brother came over pretending to have a headache and saying he wanted to listen to us to relax a little. Then he pulled out his little pocket Bible. He then went pretty hardcore into bible bashing, and my companion knows the scriptures pretty well so he could´ve refuted and explained it all, but Bible bashing never works. It´s like why I can´t be a lawyer, despite what my parents say. I always used logic to explain and present whatever idea I wanted to them, but something I´ve realized is that even if you´re right, you can´t argue with someone who isn´t willing to listen. Logic won´t matter. Who´s right won´t matter. Anyways, basically later in the week we had to stop teaching him because his brother convinced him that the Book of Mormon is false.

The other crazy experience this week was that we stopped by for some members who are awesome, and just when I was about to share a message with them, the husband stopped me and asked if I could teach what he wanted to hear. I was a little confused until he told me he wanted me to explain what´s a companionship inventory (it´s a mission thing, he´s a return missionary). Basically it´s a meeting to resolve any problems in a relationship. So I was a little freaked out because it´s a pretty delicate topic. That and we were in exchanges so I was with a new missionary who didn´t have any experience. It ended really well though and I got to see the difference we can make when we have charity for other people, when we really care about them. I was able to help them feel the spirit and understand what´s important, as well as resolve little problems. It was an incredible experience.

In other news I taught a huge lesson about the Word of Wisdom yesterday in Creol. My companion and I are going to learn creol now because most of our lessons have been in creol. Nou pral aprann pale Kreyol.

Anyways I´ll end with some pictures of our zone activity last week, I hope everyone is doing well!

Parker - March 12

Hey Everyone!

This week has been pretty good. We've been working pretty hard actually, and we were about to be ready for three people to be baptized this week. BUT then it rained hard sunday morning and only one of them got to church, so we had to push back the other two baptisms. 

But anyway, I'll talk about the kid we're gonna baptize this saturday. His name is E. He's the cousin of a recent convert, who's brothers with that crazy guy who thinks he's Christ. So that's been interesting. But anyway, E's been living in Buenos Aires, and was very worldly and had problems with drugs and robbery and stuff, and he moved here in order to turn around and leave all that stuff behind. His cousin introduced him to us and he got really interested. We've been teaching him for a couple weeks, and he's pretty excited about getting baptized, he really wants to change his life. 

So that's gonna be pretty awesome this week. 

And yeah, apart from that, we had zone conference. Of which, I am including a picture. (sorry I haven't been as good as Jack in taking pics, we're in Tucuman and I'm worried about people stealing my camera.)

But yeah, it was a really good conference. There's only a couple problems I'm starting to see. Back a while, when Elder Bragg visited the mission, he talked about a graph. Where there are four kinds of missions, based on two variables. The first is Expectations and the second is Love. High Love and High expectations, you get a Mission of Miracles. High Love and Low Expectations, you get a Mission of Fraternity (missionaries who are there to just be friends with everyone, but doesn't actually get anything done), Low love and Low expectations is a Mission of Rebellion, and Low love and High expectations is a Mission of Numbers (no one really cares about the people, they just care about results). And something he said was that this mission has no shortage of love, and he really complimented us on that. 

SO, from what I can gather, Mission President has decided that from now on, so that we can become a Mission of Miracles, is to ONLY focus on the expectations. So, things have been croping up which have started to make me a little discouraged. For example, things that have helped me not to get discouraged when a baptism doesn't go through or we're not having too much success is the idea that as long as I am working dilligently, then I am a successful missionary and God is happy with my work. But, now, for example, they've passed out a neat little manual specific for this mission. It's really useful and has a lot of great stuff which answers a lot of the questions a newbie has. And they're handing out this manual to the newbies when they get to the mission. BUT, there's a section where it talks about key things in this mission. Specifically baptisms, and it says "It's not the effort nor the time you put into the work, rather the results." 

And...I don't know, that doesn't encourage me really at all to do well. All it really does is give way for a bunch of lazy baptisms. I understand the difference, and I am working hard. I'm just worried about all the new missionaries coming in with this mindset. 

And yeah, so last Conference they talked about Obediece, and this Conference we talked about Dilligence. So, last district meeting, I taught about Dilligence, and it was very focused on staying encouraged and just working hard, even if there are setbacks and trials. Whereas in the conference, they just  talked about how the results are the only thing that matter, so you just need to get results. 

Eh, those are just my thoughts. Sorry if it sounds like I'm complaining a bit, but don't worry about me, I'ts all good! Only five more months to go. 

Love you guys!

Jack - March 5

¿Sabe qué? We´re back in business! ¡Es Verdad! I just felt like switching back and forth between Spanish and English, though I really should be practicing my CREOL.

That´s right I taught like 4 or 5 lessons this week in Creol/Spanish. 

Bonswa! Koman ou ye? Mwen bien.

This week was a little crazy, we did a ton of stuff. But I want to start off by saying the mission is incredible, but more than that I´m super grateful to be doing the Lord´s work, because when you really devote yourself to His work you find that he´s the one who´s really working on you. Throughout the mission (and I´m sure it´ll continue) you really come to know your own weaknesses, which, I know, doesn´t sound that great. It´s pretty hard too, but once we can realize and accept our weakness and be humbled, God can start to work through us. Our Pride no longer blocks our way. I´ve had a lot of tough days in the mission, but I can testify that the Lord is looking out for me, because he always knows what´s best for us. He knows just how much to push us (sometimes to our limits) to get us to really trust in Him completely and progress personally in His plan of happiness. Then when it seems like you can´t take anymore he starts to carry you through it. It certainly doesn´t sound easy, but we have to know that we´re here on this Earth as a part in His plan, we´re here to progress. So He pushes us to do that, and then when we´ve walked almost to the point of falling over, He carries us. I´ve seen it countless times in my mission: For example my tough time in the MTC with my companion, then a trainer in the field who helped me in a ton of ways. Or even the difference between last week and this week:

I had exchanges with Casa Blanca and there we taught two Haitians, we also learned how to give the lesson in Creol because one of them speaks spanish very well. I also got to play guitar for a couple minutes at the end of the day with some members, it´s been a while since I´ve played, so that was awesome.

Wednesday was crazy! We ended exchanges in the stake center with a zone meeting. Someone else who was called to be in charge of missionary work for the stake showed up and he´s super excited to work with us so that´ll be awesome. Also he´s moving to our ward soon so that´s even better. After the zone meeting we had brownies and cake and ice cream. It was really good. It was also a mistake. Directly afterwards we had lunch in the peruvian restaurant and it ended up being way too much food. But I was really happy because the only dessert I  saw that they had was their chocolate cake, which is super rich and delicious. So after lunch we were stuffed to the brim, it was crazy. Then we had to go help the sister missionaries change apartments, but the other apartment was a little late moving out so we took the priests, teachers, and deacons who showed up to help with us to go visit people. It was awesome, I hope we were able to get the excited to serve a mission. After that we had an awesome Family Home Evening with an investigator and some members and it went really well. Then when we returned to the house the zone leaders called us and told us they´d be sleeping in our house because they had to stay really late helping the sisters move. We played a weird card game that´s pretty complicated but also pretty fun. 

The next day we went looking for the house of one of the Haitians who used to attend the Spanish Classes we have and there we met 5 haitians and started to teach them. They´ve been the main focus of our work this week, also during exchanges my companion met another one who we started teaching. We found 6 new investigators this week! And 4 of them have baptismal dates! It´s going to be a rough couple of weeks trying to find and teach them so that they understand everything and to get them to attend church but we´re really excited. And yes I actually did teach in Creol, I also read in Creol, apparently my pronunciation is pretty good. I read better than some of them in Creol.

So that´s where we´re at this week, it´s been real busy, and I didn´t even say everything we did. Today we have permission to go explore the other zone of Valparaíso so we´re going to go site seeing and shopping all day today.

I hope everyone had a good week! I can´t wait to hear from you next week!

-Elder Blaylock

Parker - March 5

Hey Everyone!

We've had a pretty good week this week. 

We've found some investigators with some pretty good potential, and we had five investigators in Church this week. So we're most likely gonna have a couple baptisms this month. 

The one with the most potential to make it is named E. He's the cousin of a member who's come up from Buenos Aires to turn his life around. His cousin introduced him to us and he went to church and he's really interested. He's really excited to turn his life around. 

Also something interesting. His cousin, the member, has a brother, who's also a member, but....

Well, he's a little crazy, and he thinks he's Jesus Christ. My companion told me that a few months ago after he was baptised, he started to think he was Jesus, and he was serious about it. He went around to other churches and stood in front of the congregations to announce that he is jesus christ and that if they didn't believe in him, they would perish. Supposedley he's calmed down about it, but I met him last night. And he's still a little crazy, cuz he wears all white and keeps his hair and beard in Jesus' style. He also just goes around preaching to people, and baptizing, even though he has no authority to do so, (he never received the priesthood). But, I did receive kind of a confirmation when I was talking to him. He was talking to me about some of the things he preaches, (he was trying to preach to me) and I was able to counter and correct his doctrinal mistakes. I wasn't bible-bashing, but it was a confirmation of the promise that the servants of the Lord will not be confounded before the world. 

And I've also realized something extremely important for everyone who wishes to attack the Church and those who believe in God and things like that. There is one thing that they can't deny: That those who live the principles of the Gospel are just happier. Just think about it. The people who spend their time attacking people's belief in God, or the Church, or certain  Church practices, they're just miserable people. They think that they're smarter and that they're not "fools who believe in such nonsense," but they just lead miserable lives. 

I myself have fallen prey to this type of thinking before. Maybe not with the Gospel, but with other things. Cynical people, even though they think that they are smarter than others because they can see the holes, just lead miserable lives. A cynical person just isn't a happy person. So I've decided to try and be less cynical from now on. And just try to be happy about life, and try and be grateful for the things God has given me. 

With regards to what we've done in the week. Not much, we're just working hard. Some funny excerpts include my companion buying a weight-loss thing and it turning out to just be the equivalent of like Six laxatives. It was kinda funny. And one day I left to go out to work putting on sunscreen and had to come back to the apartment within the hour to put on a rain coat.

I also got my package!!!!! Which you may have noticed from the video I sent. Thank you so much family! I know it wasn't much, but it means a lot, it really does. 

I think that's all I really had to say this week, I love you all!

Elder Blaylock

Mom edit: We mailed that package in November! I can't believe he actually got it. Very happy. :)

Jack - February 26

Ugggh Life is hard.

Super long week this week, but I don´t have a lot to write about. We went quite a few days this week without teaching anybody, which is pretty disheartening as a missionary. And the other days were very empty as well. My legs hurt a bit from all the walking because we walked all day every day looking for our investigators or members or new people to teach and nothing really resulted from it. But here we are at the start of a new week, so let´s get back to work! 

This was only the first week of the transfer so let´s hope things start to change from here on out. I feel a little bad that I don´t have much to tell you guys, so you´ll all have to tell me how your week went instead!

I hope that everyone had a good week, and I can´t wait to hear how it goes!

OH I guess one good thing happened, we were invited to a birthday party for the  2 year old who lives next door to us. He basically runs the place its hilarious. Whenever we´re in the house, sometimes we can hear him outside shouting "Elders! Elders!" It´s so cute, he absolutely loves the missionaries.

-Elder Blaylock

Parker - February 26

Hey Everybody!

So yeah, getting to know my new area. It's actually a pretty good area. It's not too big, and we have a lot of help from the members, we also live next to the chapel, which is nice. 

So far the only real problems I'm seeing is getting investigators to come to church on their own. Because my comp says that if we don't go by and pick up the investigators, they don't go to church. But if we keep doing that, then when they're members they're not gonna go to church on their own cuz they're used to having someone pick them up. 

Other than that though, we've got a fairly good amount of people to work with. The district's pretty cool. 

My comp's name is Elder P.  He likes to talk, likes the sound of his own voice. But so far, everything's been going pretty chill between us. 

And yeah, I don't know. I'm starting to feel old as a missionary. Or at least I keep answering the same questions over and over again. Where are you from, how do you pronounce your last name, how long in the mission, what areas have you been in, who was your companion in such and such area.

It's just weird. I'm starting to feel the weight of the time in the mission affect me. And how little I have left. What adds to this is the fact that I'm back in the city of Tucuman, and I was here a year ago. It's just so bizarre. 

But, I'd like to end this email with a spiritual thought, and how I learned more about the Atonement of Christ.

In Moses chapter 7 Verse 26

26 And he beheld Satan; and he had a great chain in his hand, and it veiled the whole face of the earth with darkness; and he looked up and laughed, and his angels rejoiced.

We are all lashed down by the chains of sin. Satan and his Angels are pulling down on those chains, causing us to stumble and to fall. 

What I realized is that the Atonement of Christ is not just there to help us not fall, and then kick back in once we find our own way back. He's there to give us the strength to get back up and keep walking. There's a big difference here, between the man who gets pulled down, stands up, and then waits for the chain to pull him again, knowing he can stand back up, and the man who is constantly struggling against the chains, always moving forward, fighting for every inch. The second is the one who will enter into the kingdom of God, who will eventually break his chains. 

I love you all, and I hope you're all fighting for every inch, that you never give up and just wait for the inevitable fall.

Elder Blaylock