Jordan: 1/21/2013

From: Mike Schouten [mailto:mikesphotomm@gmail.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 22, 2013 12:58 PM
To: Mike Schouten
Subject: Jordan: 1/21/2013

well, this week was awesome!!!!!!!!! But at the same time, it was kinda rough. But, the good stuff first.... On saturday, we had the wedding and the baptism!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it was awesome! It was an experience that really is impossible to put into words. I don´t really know why, but it was just undescribable. I think it was because the missionaries have been working with this family for 9 months, trying to get them married and they finally did it. I´ve been working with them ever since i got here, and it was just amazing to finish the job. The best part was the husband, Luis. He was really stubborn and was the reason they didn´t get married beforehand. He still was saying the day of his wedding that he didn´t want to get married, but when the marriage actually happend, he was more excited than his wife, and she´s wanted to get married for the last 9 months. And them, after the wedding, Luis came up to us to thank us. And that was the most amazing part. When he thanked us, there were tears in his eyes, which was something that i never expected from him. He´s a "toughguy" but when i saw him teary eyed, it was amazing and the spirit his me so hard and it made all the time and energy we´ve spent working on Luis worth it. it was just amazing, i really can´t describe it.

Other than the wedding and baptism, our week was really really bad. We had the worst numbers this week than i´ve had in the last 9 months. I know numbers aren´t the only thing, but if your numbers are zero´s (and a lot of our numbers were zero´s) that means that you don´t have people. You can have numbers and not have really people. They can just be numbers, but when your numbers are zero´s, that means you don´t have anything. So, we´re going to find a lot of people to teach this week. My companion goes home on wednesday morning, he´s finishing his misison, and he´s not trunky, but he´s not exactly 100% either. The hard thing is that finding new investigators isn´t really important for him, because he´s not going to be around to teach them, so, that´s our struggle right now, but, on wednesday morning, i´ll have a new comp and i imagine that he´s going to have less time than me in the mission, so, he shouldn´t be trunky or anything. So, we´ll see what happens.

We do have one guy that we´re teaching that´s progressing pretty well. His name is Crispin. He´s come to church the last 3 sundays in a row, so technically, he can get baptized this saturday, but there are 2 pretty major problems. 1. we haven´t taught him any of the commandments yet, so we don´t know how well he´s going to take them. and 2. he was in jail about 8 months ago. It´s a big long messy story, but really, in the end, he didn´t do anything. he almost did something really bad, but he didn´t do it in the end. So, we´ve talked with the Assistants about it and they said they´re going to talk to Pres. today, and we´ll see what happens. but, he can get baptized this saturday, we just need a miracle.

Other than that, not much happend.  We have some good investigators, but we´re having problems finding them in their houses to be able to teach them. And then, the other people that we are teaching, none of them came to church and they´re not answering the phones so we don´t know if they´re trying to avoid us, or if they´re really had an emergency or something that kept them from coming to church, so, we´ll see.

Mom- i´m glad you had a good, decently calm week. Those are always good. (Well, i think they were good. In the mission, you never have a calm week, or even a calm moment, especially as a zone leader. We probably get 15 phone calls per day from the missionaries in our zone so, being calm and relaxing doesn´t exist for us.) But, i´m glad you enjoyed the holiday weekend. Also, it was a bummer to hear about all the bad stuff that´s happening in the ward. and you said that Brother Rigby has cancer. Which Brother Rigby, Dee or Bill? I imagine it is Bill, but i´m not sure. Tell everyone to get better, i´ll be praying for them. Also, Jarom Allen is going on a mission already? I thought he was Austin´s age. Is he 19 or is he one of the first to go at 18? That was weird. That totally caught me off guard that he´s old enough for the mission.

Dad- i´m glad you enjoyed skiing. i´m excited to go again in about a year from now. 

John- 1st off... i did not appreciate your comment about how many transfers i have left. You were right, but i did not appreciate it at all. Your life sound pretty boring. You should baptize someone, or get married. Either one of the two would be okay and probably a lot more interesting than just working everyday.

Austin. Hi are you alive?

Tasha- sounds to me like your patriaracial ( i butchered that spelling) blessing was a pretty cool experience. be sure to study your blessing a lot. It will help you. I wish i had gotten my blessing when i was as young as you, but i waited until i was 16. You chose well.

Shaylee- how are things? what did you do for your vacation from school?

Well, i´m out of time. I know the church it true. The BoM is the word of God. All we have to do is keep the commandments and the lord will bless us and make us happy. I was ready in Jacob this morning and in verse 21 (i think) it says that God created us for a purpose and the purpose is that 1. we keep the commandments and 2. that we gorify the name of God forever. i like that a lot. All were supposed to do is be obedient and help other come unto Christ, because that is how we glorify his name. I love the gospel and i love sharing it. I love paraguay and all the people here. 

Love you all, 

Elder Jordan Schouten