1.20.14 - Keep a Prayer in Your Heart

Hey sweet family,

We're getting really excited for a baptism scheduled next Sunday. I've been trying to make some fancy invitations and programs for the service but Morgan scooped all of the family's creative genes for herself. I guess I can't give her 5 dollars to do my art projects any more ...
 

So a few pretty sweet things happened this week. We ran into a lady trying to contact a man on the ward roster and then saw her again at HEB (like a Costco) and she waved at us. That doesn't happen every gosh darned day, so we stopped by her house again and are now teaching her family.

 

Another man was invited to church yesterday by a friend, so he drove himself there, introduced himself to us and said he's known about the Mormons for a while and would like to be baptized.

A young couple, like my age, just moved  down to San Antonio at the request of his Dad who promised them work and a place to stay. When they arrived he dropped them off at a Wal-Mart and said figure it out. They are homeless and are now trying to get on their feet. She's a member and he's been hoping to be able to go to church for a while. The ward has been good about getting them around and helping them out as they've needed food and rides. He hopes to be ready for baptism in the next few weeks.
 

I do this thing when I hike trails where I put my head down and hike hard until... I've reached the top. I won't look around at all the beauty I'm passing by on the side of the mountain or even on the sides of the trails. In this missionary work I'm making an effort to stop and enjoy the little things. Working hard makes me feel so good, but I can usually see the top of the mountain ... Haha, with basically the whole 2 years left, I need a new tactic. Since I can't bite this all off at once, we're going one day and week at a time and I need to do more of an endurance pace. Taking a breather and some water as needed, but always with all my heart might mind and strength.
 

Elder Bednar told us something funny and profound the other week. He said an Apostle was visiting a stake and was staying with the Stake President's family for the weekend. When he was going to bed the Stake President's kids crept over by his door and listened quietly to see how an apostle prayed.

 

They heard, "Dear Heavenly Father, I'm tired, I'm going to sleep, Amen."

 

Sac-religious? No. This man lived his prayers, and so his praying never stopped. He lived with a prayer in his heart and so the prayer to end his day way just a quick check in before he fell asleep. Lately, I've been focusing more on what I say in my prayers in the morning and all during the day and then keeping those things in my mind. As I work to fulfill the things that I've asked for, the power and likelihood of an answer is enhanced.

 

If I say, "Help me to find those people who are ready to receive me," you better believe I'll be diligently searching them out.

 

If I say, "Help me to live according to the power and authority of my calling," again, that effort to do so should be evident thereafter in order for that prayer to become effective.

 

I've seen the difference, I don't know why I never focused on it before.
 

I love you very much!
 

Stay salty my friends,

Elder Tyler Meidell

1.13.14 - Go Be Salty!

Man oh man,

 

A lot to say but not enough time! My new companion is Elder Reasch from Vernal, Utah. He's been out a little under 18 months, and I wish I had more to say about him. We've been hard at work since he got here and we haven't really had a lot of time to get to know each other. It's been a little bit of trial and error these past few days and some growing pains as I've tried to plan our lessons, days, and weeks while not only emphasizing the most effective activities, balancing 2 wards, but in the most fuel efficient route in an area i'm still trying to figure out. It's been trying and successful, we've started teaching 3 new investigators over the weekend, but It worked me for a while. Elder Reasch is getting his footing and we're starting to be able to split the work load. Whew! I know I can't keep all of this going by myself, and this week taught me a little about what it means to trust in the power of the Lord.

 

The awesome contrast to the stress was a visit to the mission from the Apostle David A. Bednar! Not just to the mission, but to my stake! We had a 3 hour Q and A with an emphasis on learning by faith and then we attended stake conference where he and elder Southcross of the 70 spoke again. There's so much I learned, but I think one of my biggest take aways was that the Gospel and God emphasize increasing people's agencies; or magnifying the gift god has given us. So now when I meet people I'm sure to give them as many opportunities to choose for themselves those things that are right. The definition of agency is almost entirely "Choose the Right" which gives that small simple phrase so much more meaning. We invited everyone we knew to go hear him speak and the turn out was very impressive. It was such a good weekend.

 

The Lord is preparing people. A guy about my age dropped out of high school, has been in and out of jail, and when faced with 2 years fell on his knees in his cell and pleaded to God saying, "If you get me out of here, I will dedicate my life to you." 2 days later he was released without much of an explanation. Another week and he found himself on a couch across from me and Elder Reasch. Boom.

 

I studied a little about salt this week. I was getting real tired of reading Christ's words, "You are the salt of the earth" and not understanding what that meant. 2 Chronicles 13:5 The kingdrom of Israel was given to David by a covenant of Salt. Mathew 5:13 footnotes, The Salt is a token of the Covenant. Without getting into all of my notes, the salt of the earth are God's Covenant people. Image for yourself all of the implications of salt, and then imagine how if the covenant people could be like that for the whole earth. A scripture closely realted with the salt is 3 Nephi 12: 13-16. Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and Glorify your Father who is in Heaven (sorry if that's not word for word). Now i know why the levites used to dump salt all over their sacrifices; it's like saying, In the name of Jesus Chrst.

 

I love you and I miss you. Go be salty.

 

Livin' Salty,

 

Elder Tyler Meidell

1.6.2013 - Brighter Countenances

Hey great family,

 

It was a standard week but a whole lot happened!

 

We just got transfer calls yesterday. I'm staying in the south side of the south zone in San Antonio and Elder Ware is riding off on a white horse to... we'll find out at transfer meeting on Thursday. It was a long six weeks, a ton happened, but I could hardly keep track of time. I doesn't feel like I got here that long ago. Anyways, my training is still in progress. I should have 12 weeks with Elder Ware, but inspiration has led me to a new trainer for the second 6 who i'll need to teach about the area and all that. It'll be sweet. I love a little extra challenge.
 

One family is making leaping strides toward baptism and we're really proud of the faith they've exercised up to this point. The mom of the family stopped us outside yesterday as we left and thanked us for stopping by and talking to her family. She said she could really notice a change in how everyone treated each other, and in how happy her girls were. Everything she said was true! Her family literally has a brighter countenance. There is more smiling, more laughing, and a brighter spirit dwells with them. It's been inspiring to see how the Gospel has worked miracles in that family.

 

The mother of the boy we baptized a month back has been going to church for 14 years and has never been baptized. She says she's still Catholic, but she knows everything about the church. We call her type dry Mormons. They have not quite made it to the waters of baptism, but might as well be Mormon. She's been blowing off Elders for years and this week finally ceded to being taught. She hasn't ever had any great experiences in the church because she speaks primarily spanish and attends an english ward with her family. Normally, she gets really cross when we address questions to her directly because she is determined to not be converted. She will begin taking lessons from us though, and keeps stressing how she will not be baptized. A quote from the one and only Laif Meidell comes to mind, "if you gotta say it, you don't got it." Meaning if you have to talk about how good you are, you're probably not that good. In this case, if she has to stress to us and herself how she will not believe what we share with her...she might already believe it. Only time will tell!
 

A little inspiring story. A woman was getting closer to baptism and has hit the word of wisdom. She's grew up in Mexico and started drinking black coffee at age 5. She is now drinking 4-5 cups a day to get up and make it through the day. She has in just under 2 weeks gone down to 0-1 cups a day and her husband went cold-turkey on alcohol. Boom! They just don't really feel like drinking it anymore. I love it.
 

I mustered all of my cooking abilities the other day (aside from preparing myself cereal) to create this burger. I toasted bread; I made Bacon; I cooked some ground beef with onion and seasoning into patties; and I friend an egg. It was glorious.
 

A very serious invitation: Whoever reads what I write is invited to write me an email and tell me about the best, most fun, or most inspiring FHE (family home evening) They've ever been apart of. I will try and recreate it as we start having family home evenings with recently baptized families.
 

Thank you for all of your love and support!

 

I love you and I miss you,

Elder Tyler Meidell

12.23 - 12.30.13 - Holidays & the Machete Man

Boom! Awesome Week!

 

Christmas Eve was spent very quietly updating the area book and shining our shoes. A lady we believe will be baptized soon gave us Christmas sweaters (see attached)
 

 We woke up and went to the Baiza's for some breakfast Taco's. We headed back to the apartment, opened our presents, and I was so spoiled. Just so ridiculously spoiled. I got some sweet ties, a GPS, some nice cards, knick knacks, and just a heinous amount candy. (see attached) We spent a little bit of Christmas calculating the calories sitting on our counter, granted some of it we had prior to Christmas, but there were 37,000 calories of junk on our counter, by the end of that day. Since then, the amount has grown and we've barely made a dent. For anyone into Biomechanics, I believe the conversion from calories to human body fat is 2200 calories to 1lb,
someone can check me on that. SO, if that is the case, I'm looking at an additional 17 pounds added to my body in the next few weeks. That's awesome. I'm getting ready for hibernation.

Elder Ware's parents have a tradition of frosting Christmas cookies, so they sent us a big tub of unfrosted sugar cookies which we frosted together and handed out to a few families during the day.

 

We then spent a good part of the day with the Garcia family, eating Tamales and playing lotarea, or Mexican Bingo. There were so many people in that house! (see attached) In addition to what's in the picture there where three adults directly about my person and 4 more lining the right wall. It was sweet, and that room was probably just larger than my bedroom at home.

Highlight of the day was talking a phone call home for a little under an hour.
 

Several families are progressing toward the waters of baptism and are making big and bold strides. I'm so proud and inspired by the faith their showing.
 

Yesterday I gave a 10 minute talk in Spanish. I wish I was fluent enough to ad-lib it but I spent 10 minutes with my head down reading my talk like an idiot. But it was comprehensible! So improvements are being made.
 

I learned a little about what it means for this time to be a time of probation and a time to prepare to meet God. I liked how in Jacob 5:27 Christ asks his father for more time to prune and dig about the vineyard. It made me realize the additional time we have to change and repent here is a blessing directly from Christ who truly is our advocate before the Father.
 

A follow-up on suffering, Christ became perfect through suffering (Hebrews 5:8) and we have been called to follow his example in all things (1 Peter 2:20-21).
 

A follow-up on the mists of darkness of the world. (Helaman 5:41-47) These people overcame their could of darkness by crying repentance until they had faith in Christ. Then they found themselves in pillars of fire. I like that that God's glory didn't come upon them once they repented, instead once they'd become worthy of seeing it, they found that they had the fire about them the whole time and just couldn't see it because the darkness surrounding them was too thick.
 

An unnamed man's wife was LDS for 7 years and then became inactive. We visited their house and he called us over to his side gate so he could yell at us a little bit. When we'd warmly greeted him and shaken his hand we asked him his name. He glared at us and retorted, "Nope." 

"Nope what?"
 

"Nope."
 

"You won't tell us your name? (He was a mechanic and it was embroidered on his shirt)

 

"Nope"

 

"Do you want to talk to us?"
 

"Nope."
 

"This is a great house you have here, how long have you lived here?"
 

We talked to him for 10 minutes and left on really good terms. These people are great.
 

I love you and I miss you!
 

Elder Tyler Meidell


12.23.13

Hey Sweet Family,

I love you guys and I miss you a whole lot. I'll catch you up on my week real quick. We had a tri-zone meeting with the traveling assistants and they introduced a new language program for the mission. It's smart, it gives me some good ideas for how to direct my language study these next few transfers. President Slaughter interviewed all the missionaries in the mission this week so i spent 10 minutes chatting with him, I didn't have any pressing concerns so it was pretty brief. Then we had Christmas Conference, whoo! I wish i would've taken my camera, but I didn't so i'm sorry about that. A lot of Elders spent the time catching up the Elder's they'd served with, but since I only know 10 people it wasn't a huge event for me. We had a great devotional in the morning about angels and the story of Christ's birth, and then we had some rockin barbeque, and spent the final 4 hours listening to .. musical talents.. from within the ward. Some of it was so legit, and some if it was kinda like.. you're mom said you we're really good didn't she?
 

So after all that this week we didn't get quite as much missionary work done, but it was really fun! 

 

It's fluctuating between 45 and 65 degrees here so people are breaking out their scarves, haha this is a joke of a winter.
 

A few little stories from serving in south side San Antonio, our number one investigator was nearly deported 2 weeks prior to baptism, so that was real scary, but the family is staying! Woo!
 

A man yelled at me from across the street the other day, "Hey! Are you Religious?" haha, so that's probably the easiest way to start a conversation with me right now. i walked across the street and shook his hand and began talking to him. He just started back with this big yellow smile and some crazy eyes. I asked him his name and ye replied, "Machete." I rephrased my question 3 times and got the same answer. Then finally he whipped off his cowboy hat and big black trench coat and revealed a machete in his belt which he then whipped out at me. I sorta jumped back and he starts busting up maniacally. He then told about his machete for 5 minutes. He was a little crazy but totally harmless.. and he loves his machete.
 

A man asked me again about why it's hard to change and to do the right thing. I started to study more about repentance and deliverance. I learned that many times in the scriptures God gives men physical power to overcome their obstacles. Nephi breaking the ropes on his wrists while his family suffered on the ship in the storming sea, Samson tearing apart a lion with his bare hands, and Alma and Amulek escaping from prison. God shows his strength to deliver men so that men will trust in his ability so save them. of all the things on earth that can bind us, the most prevalent is sin. It takes away our agency, one of the most precious gifts from our father in heaven, it ultimately halts our eternal progression. We know God can save us from earthly bondage, and this is so we can have faith in his ability to save us from eternal bondage. Everything points back to the atoning sacrifice of Jesus Christ. We repent of our sins and we are delivered, we can shake off the chains of sin that fetter us while we strive to progress toward becoming perfect like our father in heaven who is perfect.
 

There is a lot to say and not a lot of time. I hope that gets you thinking and studying.
 

I love you guys, I can't wait to talk to you Christmas Day!
 

Elder Tyler Meidell