Jordan: if you have read no other letter read this one!!! my last letter 5/20/2013

If you have read no other letter read this one!!!

From: Jordan Schouten <jordan.schouten@myldsmail.net

Well, i figured that i´d give you all a rundown of a typical day here in the Misson Paraguay Asuncion. All of the things that i say don´t necessarly happen everyday, but they´re things that happen often. So, this is basically a summary of the last 2 years of my life.

It´s 6:30 am  and the alarm goes off. You feel like your head is going to explode, but, you get up anyways.

it´s 6:31 am and you turn the air conditioner in your bedroom off..... and you start sweating.

it´s 6:35 am and you´re in the bathroom with crazy bad diarreah because of the weird food that a family gave you last night.

Then, you go to the main room of your apartment to exercise and you sit down to do sit ups and you do 1 situp and it kills your back because there is no carpet within 10000 miles of you. Everything is tile or cement or dirt. But, you exercise anyways because if you don´t, your head will hurt all day long. 

Then, it´s 7:10 and you´re in the shower. You´re already sweating like crazy because it´s already 90 degrees and you´ve just been exercising. So, you go in the shower, and after 2 minutes there, the water runs out. You´re still covered in soap and there´s no way to get it off because there´s no water. So, you just towel off all the soap. 

Then, you get out of the shower to get dressed. By the time you get your shirt on, you´re sweating like crazy again. So, after getting dressed, you go and sit down in font of a fan, because it´s the only way to no sweat constantly. You´re hungry, but you don´t want to get up to eat anything because you know that if you move away from the fan, you´ll start sweating like crazy again.So, you just don´t eat. 

Then, you study for 2 hours, one alone, another with your comp. you´re trying to focus and be a good missionary but it´s just so hot that you can´t even think straight. But, you do it anyways.

Then, at 10:30 you´re out in the street, preaching the gospel. You see a guy sitting down outside his house, so you go over to say hi and talk to him about the gospel. You start talking to him and after about 15 seconds, you realize that you don´t understand a word the guy is saying, because he´s not speaking spanish. he´s speaking Guarani and he speaks no spanish. So, you´re toast. There´s nothing you can do because you literally understand nothing. So, you give him a pamphlet and go on your way.

Then, after wandering around for 1.5 hours in the morning because nobody is home because everyone is working, you go to a members´ house for lunch. It´s about 105 degrees at this point and you sit down at the table and they put a plate of steaming hot pasta in front of your face. It´s so hot that you have absolutely NO desire to eat hot food, but you have to do it anyways because you don´t want to offend the members and you´ll have nothing else to eat. So, you start eating the pasta, and you realized that all it is is pasta with cooking oil poured on top. Not kidding. Noodles with oil. It´s disgusting, but, you eat it anyways and by the end of the plate, you kind of actually like it. 

Then, at 1pm, you´re back in the streets and at this point, it´s 110 degrees and your clothes are literally soaking wet, because you´re sweating so much. And from 1pm to 4pm, you don´t teach anyone, because EVERYONE in the country is sleeping. From 1 to 4pm, everyone sleeps to try aviod the heat. So, you just walk around and sweat. 

You talk wtih everyone you see, but all of them say that they´re busy. So, you ask them if you can come back to their house another day to talk with them. And everyone says "Otro día (another day)" you say "Cuando (When?)" they say "No te quiero mentir (i don´t want to lie to you)" you say"Bueno, a qué hora viene de su trabajo (what time do you get home from work?" they say "no sé. No me quiero comprometer con ustedes (i don´t know. I don´t want to commit myself to anything with you guys" So, you just throw your hands in the air because literally EVERY PARAGUAYAN says that. So, you just leave and look for someone else.

Then, you contact a guy that actually seems to have interest in the gospel. You´re really excited because he wants you to come over and teach him. So, you ask him, "where do you live?" And, he gives you this as the answer... "okay, from here, 4 blocks towards the north, there is a store called San Juan. You need to go there and trun left. Then, after 3 blocks, you´ll see 3 really big mango trees. From the 3 mangos, you need to turn left again and the 3rd house on the left is my mother-in-law´s house. You just need to go there and ask her where i live. It´s too hard for me to explain from here, but if you can get to my mother in law´s house, she´ll be able to tell you where i live." And, you just kinda shake your head because it´s almost impossible, because paraguayans have no idea how to count how many blocks it really is and there are mango trees on EVERY BLOCK. But, you still write it down in your planner because you have to try.

Then, from 5 to 9pm you go to all your appointments that you have set up. You have about 4 or 5 appointments, and you go to every single one and in 4 of the 5 houses, you see the people inside the house, but the open up the curtain on their window a little bit and when they see you, the just shake their pointer finger at you like your 2 years old and they refuse to leave their house. And it´s a bummer because all 4 of these people accepted a baptism date in the first lesson and seemed really really interested in the gospel and now, they refuse to talk to you and treat you like a 2 year old kid. 

then, you go to the 5th appointment. You´re pretty discouraged because everything has gone wrong but you have faith that the last appointment will turn out ok. You go and clap outside of their gate and you invest comes out of the house, with his BoM in his hand. He comes to you and you start talking and he tells you that he wants to give the book back. He tells you "i´m catholic and my family doesn´t want me to change" You try to get him to realized that he should listen to God before his family, but he´s blocked off his mind. He doesn´t listen at all, just because he´s scared. You do everything that you can to try to get him to listen and reconsider his decision, but, he´s closed off and there´s no hope. He´s blocked his heart from the Spirit. So, at this point, you go back home because it´s already 9pm and it´s time to go home and plan.

Then, you go home to plan the next day, and you literally have NOTHING to do the next day, because all of your invest. have dropped you and don´t want to listen anymore. So, you plan until 10:12 pm and then, you change you clothes and go to bed, and tomorrow, you do the same thing all over again.

BUT

You love every second of it. Because, of all the hundreds of thousands of people that you talk to in you mission, every once in a while, you find someone like Ever Medina (the kid i talked about last week). You find someone like him that the Lord has been preparing for years and years to recieve the gospel. In all of 8 days, he went from not knowing even the name of the church to knowing and feeling that is the true church and he took the decision to be baptized. On saturday (my last saturday in the mission) i have the privilege to baptize him. He´d known about the church for barely more than a week, but, he knew it was true and wanted to follow Jesus Christ and be baptized. The Lord made everything happen that needed to happen. It truly was a miracle. And the miracles is what makes the mission worth it. As many bad and frustrating things that happen, it doesn´t compare in the slightest to the joy and happiness that comes from someone acepting the gospel in their lives and deciding to follow Jesus Christ. Every moment of everyday, you´re bearing your testimony of Jesus Christ and you feel it growing and becoming part of you. And even though things may be difficult, it doesn´t really matter, because you feel the Spirit everyday and you know that God is pleased with what you are doing. And that, makes it all worth it. 

Yo sé que La Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Últimos Días es la iglesia verdadera. Yo no tengo ninguna duda de eso. Cuando vine a la misión, sabía que la iglesia era verdadera. Tenía un testimonio, pero, era muy débil. Pero, al testificar de la verdad cada día durante 2 años, mi vida ha cambiado. Ahora, no puedo negar la veracidad del Evangelio. Sé que estoy en la verdad. Sé que José Smith en verdad vio una luz y que en medio de esa luz estaban Dios el Padre y Jesucristo, el Hijo. Sé que los vio. Sé que en aquel momento la iglesia verdadera no se encontraba en la tierra. Pero, sé que Dios, en Su amor, escogió a otro profeta, José Smith, para que nosotros tuviéramos la verdad hoy en día. Sé que José fue y es un profeta de Dios. Sé que el sacerdocio fue restaurado. Sé que únicamente por ese poder podemos recibir las ordenanzas de la salvación. Sé por el poder del Espíritu Santo que el Libro de Mormón es la palabra de Dios. Ese libro ha cambiado mi vida. Lo leo cada día y cada día me hace cambiar. Me encanta leerlo. Seguiré leyéndolo a lo largo de mi vida. Sé que tenemos un profeta hoy día, Tomas S. Monson. Sé que recibe revelación de Dios que nos mantendrá en el camino de Dios si le escuchamos a él. Sé que Dios me ama y que me conoce. Sé que Él me envió a Paraguay no porque quería que fracasara sino que quería que fuera exitoso en toda mi misión. Sé que Él me dio cada compañero, cada área, cada miembro, cada investigador, cada desafío, y cada converso porque Él sabía que era lo que yo necesitaba para progresar y llegar a ser la persona que Él quiere que sea. La misión me ha hecho cambiar. Nunca seré lo mismo. Me he cambiado por completo. Seguiré siendo fiel al Evangelio para siempre. Sé que las familias pueden ser eternas. Sé que viviremos juntos para siempre. ¡Que felicidad y gozo me trae ese conocimiento! Amo al Señor y amo el ser misionero. Pero, la cosa más importante que sé y que aprendí en la misión es que Jesús vive. Él es mi Salvador y Redentor. Lo sé. Lo siento cada día. Sé que Él sufrió en Getsemaní por mis pecados, y que después fue muerto en la cruz por mí. Pero, sé que resucitó al tercer día. Sé que Él venció la muerte. Sé que por Él, yo puedo ser limpio de mis pecados. Sé que viviré en su presencia. Lo amo a Él con todo mi corazón. 

Estoy muy animado para verlos de nuevo. Han sido los mejores dos años de mi vida. Les quiero demasiado.

Con amor, 

Elder Jordan Twitchell Schouten 

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