12.16.13 - Getting the hang of things

So this week, was a sweet week. We had a lot of good progress personally, as a companionship, and in the work. I'll highlight just a couple things.

 

Our mission President generated a finding by faith program to replace what missionaries had been doing for the past years.. knocking doors. It prioritizes activities and gives guidance on how to most efficiently handle situations involving members, less active members, non members, investigators, recent converts and so on with an emphasis on finding new families to teach. unfortunately it's not being implemented very effectively throughout the mission.

I did an exchange on Wednesday with Elder Olsen. We stayed in my area, south side San Antonio, and we both had about 2 and a half weeks of experience. Elder Ware took my car (I'm actually not authorized to drive cars yet) so we biked all day. I really like the bikes. When I sit in a car all day I can't talk to all the people that I pass by, but on a bike I can talk to everyone. Way more effective. But it also takes a long time to get from appointment to appointment.

 

Anyway, Elder Olsen and I sat down and began to plan out our day. Then five minutes later we were still staring at empty planners. Elder Olsen and I and our lack of general mission know-how made us very reliant on the guidance of the spirit: which is the founding principle of finding by faith. The result was direct guidance toward 6 families who were all receptive of our message. Three of those families are now progressing and some of those first lessons were all in Spanish. I was really happy about it.

 

On the way to one appointment I drove by a house and thought, "Let's talk to that family."

 

I drove on, but after a minute or so I decided we'd better turn back and we ended up finding a great family.

 

Really quick again, a returning less active asked me, "Why does it have to be hard? I don't want it to be hard." He was referring to the process of becoming like a little child and following Christ. it struck me as odd and I thought of scriptures like Ether 12:6. I did some more reading and I was led to first Nephi and the Lehi's vision. He described a concourse of people all making their way to the tree of life. These people had all kept their first estate. They commenced toward the path leading to the tree but then a dark mist surrounded them. The mist is interpreted to be the temptations of the devil. First peter chapter 1 verse 6 the Greek translation for temptation is affliction and trials. If this applies, then people get lost on their way to Eternal Life by temptations of all sorts and hardship that is prominent in this world.

 

When we as missionaries teach the analogy of Christ's Gospel as a gate that leads to a path which ultimately ends at the Celestial Kingdom. Baptism is the gate and the path is having faith, repenting and persevering to the end. What we don't always talk about and I realized that we should is that there's a rod of Iron all along the path leading to the Kingdom of God. The rod of Iron is that Word of God - his commandments. Ultimately, our being blinded by the mist of darkness in this world forces us to cling firmly to the word of God and to hold tight as we walk with the only thing that gives us direction a vast and blinded world.

 

I've got a rope between myself and the Bar and I'm walking around this vast world grabbing people by the hand and pulling them back to the rod, so they can have that solid support which gives them direction and purpose. A last thought is that the only way we can know if we're moving the right way is if we can feel it. They vast world is filled of dark mist, temptation, affliction and trial, but if we feel grounded in obedience, if we are compelled to do good, if we feel god's love then we know we are moving in the right direction. Nothing we can see will change that. We can't see God's Kingdom and our walking there, but we can feel it.

 

Feel that Iron Rod, and cling to it as you walk to the Mansions on High!

 

I love you!!!

 

Elder Tyler Meidell

12.2.13 - The South San Antonio 5th Ward

Hello Everybody,

The time has actually come. After a lifetime of anticipating what it would be like to be a missionary in the mission field doing missionary things: the wait is over.

I flew into San Antonio on Wednesday and was filled with a sense of belonging. I felt like I'd received an impression that I was in the right place doing the right thing.

We were met be the Mission President, President Slaughter, and his wife and kids. It was a warm reception and we quickly got our stuff loaded into the President's Assistant's van and headed off to the mission home. We had a few meetings about expectations, guidelines, what we needed to be prepared for during the Christmas Season, and everything else we could have a meeting about. They brought us some great barbecue and it was a pretty solid day. That night we slept in the Assistant's Apartment. I got a nice spot of floor to rest for a couple hours. We had to get up at 2am that morning so I was pretty beat, and then the next morning we got up around 4:30 to get everyone ready before the transfer meeting that started at 8. I think the excitement to get to my first area was all that kept me awake.

I was assigned to South San Antonio 5th ward and 10th C. My trainer and companion is Elder Ware from Stansbury Park, Utah. He's rock solid. He's been out 10 months, he's our District Leader, and we're over 5th ward which is Spanish Speaking and a third of 10th ward which is our same area but the English Speakers. I don't use Spanish a ton, but enough that I feel like i'm still getting a little better. We teach in English and Spanish about 50-50, but we usually just talk to each other in English.

The first few days was just a mental overload. I was trying to figure out how to teach, how to act, what I should be thinking about, I was trying to memorize 2 ward rosters and all of the different processes we go through to plan our days, weeks, plan lessons, and then trying to understand all of the relationships and ties between investigators, less-actives, members and what they know and still need to know, and just everything to the smallest detail.  Elder Ware was cool about it. He wasn't forcing it down my throat and he didn't leave me to fend for myself either. He kept his distance, and while we were doing weekly planning he was nice enough to answer the questions I asked 4 times in a collected voice while I tried to get a mental map of the situation I was walking in to. We've since had a few very productive conversations about what our goals are for ourselves and this area over the course of the transfer and I think we've got a solid game plan mapped out.

Thanksgiving Day was my first day in the field and we had 2 dinner appointments. Love that. We ate with a family that just knows missionaries but has never heard a lesson. Then we ate dinner #2 with some recent converts, the Sanchez's. It was a little tough having nice thanksgiving dinner chatter in Spanish, but It was lively and fun!

The people here are awesome. The wards are pretty small, but the members really love the missionaries. They really like to feed us, even if they don't have anything to feed us. We stopped by a less active family, the Garcia's (No idea how many times i'm going to use that name, haha) and they are getting by just by running a little day care in their living room. Not a whole lot there, but they saw us and the wife ran out to get 2 pizzas to serve us while we sat and talked. It was really nice. I think we had pizza 3 times that day.

We have a few investigator families we're working with presently. One little boy, Brandon, is 9 and his family is becoming active again. He will be baptized this week! The Rodellar family just set a date to be married and baptized in the next 3 weeks! We stopped by one lady's house just as we were finishing up Saturday night because some of the missionaries who were here 2 years ago had she said she was very nice and would be willing to listen later...soo 2 years later we showed up and sat down to share the message of the restoration. It was an amazing lesson. I only say that because I spirit was potent as we spoke and bore testimony. I look forward to seeing how she progresses. There are many more families and individuals preparing but those are our guys with baptismal dates right now.

The work is moving, and it's picking up speed. I can't stress enough the critical nature of member participation in the work. But I'll save that conversation for another time.

A fun little thing i've come to learn about San Antonio residents. They do not leave. I went to a birthday party and in getting to know the people there it was divulged that half of the people in the neighborhood went to 1st grade together! and their parents went to 1st grade together! It blows my mind. They just pick a house and do their thing and wait till their kids can pick a house down the street. It's like the street is a collection of Spanish cousins. It's cool. Different and cool.

I'd like to share a quick thing about faith. I had wanted to understand why faith was a necessary part of our life here on earth. I know that this time is a time to prepare to meet God, and that all we learn here will be an advantage to us in the world to come as we continue to progress to fulfill our Eternal Purpose to be like God in his omniscience and omnipotence. So learning, having love, becoming pure, all of these things very directly help us become like our Father in Heaven, and then why faith? Among it's many uses here, one thing I learned in regard to learning is in Alma 32. We plant good seeds (word of God) in our fertile and willing hearts, wherein we experiment our faith by testing the principle to see if it will swell in our breasts and enlighten our understanding and lead to fruit (Good works), we then identify the nature of the seed, good or bad, based on whether good or bad results come of it. Then, as it grows, we can begin to have faith in that once principle  in a continual process of experimenting, identifying, and enjoying the product of good works and an increase of faith until eventually our knowledge become perfect and our faith dormant. Faith being the absence of knowledge but the action based on a hope of truth. Faith is a preliminary step in the Universal process of gaining perfect knowledge.

Perhaps you all knew that, but it was new for me to think faith is what prepared and led us to have perfect knowledge.

There is so much more to write, but I think I'll need to stop for this week. I love you all very much. I miss you dearly. I hope you're praying for me like i'm praying for you!

With all my love,

Elder Meidell

11.26.13 - Casarme?

So like I said before, Elder Loosle lived in Mexico City, Guatemala and El Salvador. He was our go to when we needed to understand a word or some grammar principle. He also taught us a lot of slang the teachers said we definitely shouldn't use and some jokes that were popular in his schools in Central America. The one that stuck to us the most was Piñota. Piñota just means big pineapple. Which is what you yell at someone after they've been tricked into looking at something that isn't there. So for example, we're sitting in the cafeteria and someone nonchalantly waves to a fake person behind another Elder. The poor Elder will either wave back awkwardly and/or look behind himself to see who was being greeted and find no one there. Then everyone in on the joke will yell "Piñota!" I don't know, i don't really get it. But i've Piñota'd and been Piñota'd enough for one life time. It was a good joke we had within our district.

 

Another good one for me was just after finishing a lesson with a substitute teacher. Her profile was very interested in Eternal Families and so that was the emphasis of our lesson. She came up to me after the lesson and said she was very grateful for the power of the spirit we taught with because she received personal revelation during the lesson. Sweet! Then she started getting really really excited and starting talking really really fast and honestly I started getting pretty lost. Then she ended her sentence with "casarme." A new word I'd just studied. Casar.. to marry.. if its reflexive and has me at the end then the action is being directed toward myself or in this case herself... Marry..me.. "marry me?!" It clicked in my head at the same time as Elder Paddock's and we stared wide eyed at each other for a moment. Then I looked down at her to find her with big eyes and a huge smile staring back up at me...

 

I said something to the effect of "umm.. excuse me?" 

 

She then realized what i thought she said and just started busting up: I thought she was gonna cry, or die, she was laughing so hard. Then i got a little offended, like what, you wouldn't want to marry me? Anyways, "casarme" is more like to give myself in marriage. My bad, I'm an idiot. Although strike the wedding bells because my substitute teacher wants to marry her boyfriend. Haha, and not me. Whew!
 

Another little joke I like is something Elder Ogan taught me. He goes up to the new Elders and says, "Oh man I love your tie! Let me just fluff it up a little." He then kind of rubs his thumbs up the tie, and as he works his way up his fingers are expertly unbuttoning the Elders white shirt without him feeling a thing. Hahahaha, then like a minute later they'll realize or someone will tell them their shirt is completely unbuttoned. Haha, it gets me every time. I don't know how he mastered this skill, but it's a good one. I've practiced a little, and i get in these awkward situations where I get a few buttons in and they'll catch me. Then i'm standing in front of another man unbuttoning his shirt... Agh, Some moments I'd like to erase from my memory. Haha.

 

Attached is a picture of my newest teacher Hermano Salvador. Super cool guy, love him to death. There's also attached a picture of two (of the 6 i've had) other Districts in my diminishing zone which i am no longer in charge of. The hand gesture i'm making doesn't mean anything, It was just what we did when we said "provecho" which  means enjoy your meal; and our District was dumb and we used it to say enjoy (with the hand gesture) to bug our teachers - pretty frequently.

 

I leave tomorrow morning, so i'll talk to y'all again when i'm state side!
 

Much Love,

Elder Meidell

 

 

11.25.13 - Just about out of here

 

Hey loved ones,

 

I felt like my emails have been pretty unbalanced up till this point. I've said a lot about what i've learned and felt while I was here, but not so much about all the fun i've had. I blame the little timer that's set on my computer and counts down from 60 minutes every time I pull up my inbox. I didn't want to leave out any of the good doctrinal stuff, but now I have some time to kill before I leave for Texas and I'll try and catch you up on some of the stuff that makes me laugh real hard here. In the future, i'll try and make a point to note these things as they occur too.

 

The first thing is, when we got here, the glass door in front of the dorm toilet had had a whole the size of a large dinner plate scratched out of the filament which had rendered it opaque. Now, it's just glass. I'm sure you can see from the picture that the location of the hole gives everyone who walks by a horrendously surprising view. To rectify this obvious blunder we taped a piece of paper up over the hole and made it a rule that you had to bring a pen in when you went to.. use the bathroom. Now people make excuses to... use the bathroom so they can see everyone else's art and notes. Ha!

 

Last week when Elder Paddock and I were still on some hard drugs and had to wake up at 3 to take our perscriptions, my alarm went off and for whatever reason we both just coulnd't remember why we were supposed to get up. Elder Paddock heard the alarm and rolled off his bed to start praying, and I was so confused as to why I was up I just followed suit and started praying too. When in doubt, pray. Then i realized it was 3 am and fell back asleep. I got up later to blow my nose at 5, and Elder Paddock heard me get up and tried to start praying again! so I just grabbed him and pushed him back into bed, and he fell asleep with a little sleepy smile. Hahaha.

 

There was this girl here who was a week ahead of us who was real attractive. We can't talk to girls, but we built her up in our minds to be this amazing human being because... well what else are we gonna do. We called her G-Swag which stands for "Grandma Swag" becasue she thought she was such a hipster and straight up dressed like a frumpy old lady. Then finally, one Elder happened to walk by her (He lived in San Salvador, Guatemala, and Mexico City for half his life and is very nearly fluent in Spanish) and he said "buenas!" which is just a really quick way to wish someone well in passing, and then this girl who thought she was just too hot busts up laughing with her companion and said, "Haha! he forgot to say Noches!"... It turns out, G-Swag is an idiot. Hahaha. I don't know why that rocked our world, but we laughed for a good 20 minutes.

 

I will have a little more time to write some other stories tomorrow.

 

Lots of love,

 

Elder Meidell