June 15, 2011

Picnic area Peru MTC

Elders @ Bedtime Peru MTC

Peru MTC Companion

June 15, 2011

hey everyone!

I hope dad is doing ok, that is terrible about the kidney stones. I´ll pray for him. I attached some pictures, hopefully they worked, this will be easier than sending the sd card. i´ll try to send like 5 or 6 each week. (thats all they let us) and we can only send paper in the mail anyways here. These week was one of the best weeks ever. First off, thanks for all of your letters, I love love love hearing from all of you and i wish I had thirty minutes to just read your letters, rather than read them all fast AND write my letter. My companion is awesome, he grew up in the church. This week was cool, I was reading in our heritage and I came across a paragraph about Zera Pulsipher, I was like that is my great great great great grandpa! It was cool it talked about him going on a mission and stuff. At the MTC we teach a bunch, which is really good practice. We teach 2 to 3 times every day. I went to interpol this week, the driving here is way crazy haha, the cab driver was playing the radio and it was all american stuff. Sundays are always good. I really felt the spirit, Especially in priesthood. We need to just pray when we have a problem about anything or making hard decisions, and rely on the spirit in what you should do. I always do so much on sundays, I think my face is easily approachable or something because I´m always asked to do something. I taught again in sunday school, just at the end (even though I taught the week before too haha) but it is all really good because I´m sure the load will triple in the field. Ok, now for the exciting stuff, on Saturday I got to be a real missionary. Ha but for reals, they take everyone to go contacting and tracting. It was just me and my companion and a teacher that came along, we just had an assigned area and went out. I knocked my first door in peru! These houses are so tiny, I think everyone just home makes their house. but my room at home is probably bigger than there whole house. The whole day was a very humbling experience. The first house we knocked let us in, they turned off their radio, called everyone in, and prepared to listen to our message. It was amazing, these people are so ready for the gospel. We gave them the lesson on the restoration, and I told the Joseph Smith story. They could feel this to good. The grandpa of the home kept saying ¨This is GOOD¨ We committed them to pray about our message and to attend church. Really awesome! They even gave us a referal. Afterwards they offered us some Inca Kola. I swear this family had nothing, and inca kola was the nicest thing they had, and yet they offered it to us. So humble. They didn´t even have a way of communication, cell phone or nothing. but we got there address, after this visit we hand them off to the missionaries in this area. One man answered through the window, didn´t have a shirt on, i think he was sleeping, we asked if we could come back in thirty min. he said we could, but when we did he didn´t answer haha. We committed 3 other families to pray about our message and to attend church. Everyone says they are catholic, but most are not really serious, more of just like a tradition. One guy was literrally driving away when we were at his door (the only car I saw in the whole neighborhood, and it was because it was his job as a taxi driver.) but he parked his car, let us in his house, and let us teach him. I´m so blessed to be called here and I know it´s where I´m supposed to be. The language get´s really frustrating some times, but I would rather be somewhere where people are willing to listen and have to learn a language, then the other way around. After lunch we vistited less'active members. The first lady we talked to was SOO nice. I had a hard time understanding everything, but I shared my favorite scripture and bore testimony. She showed us where other people on our list lived. No one was home though. This time it was just me my companion and another member. They build there houses on the mountain here, like literally all the way up the mountains. We spent like 3 hours walking and hiking trying to find the less active members homes. The organization of houses and address is really crazy hard. We never found another who was actually home, but we ran into some other missionaries that were talking to a lady who´s husband was the member or something like that, but she said she didn´t like the church and she was catholic. but she let us all in here house and we sang and bore our testimonies. Was a really great day. Only have a couple minutes left, but I love all of you. yesterday they let us do TRC (teaching practice to investigators) in english. I didn´t get to teach, but it was SO funny. Because no ones really understands english anyways, but the investigators (teachers) tried to pretend that they understood. but it was funny. There are some people that speak english, but not that I get to talk to. the president is latino but he speaks english. and my branch president speaks both as well, but all the meetings are still in spanish. They try to give us a translater, but I think I could do a better job them him haha. Overall I learned the language is my biggest barrier, I know the gospel, and how to relate to people, just need to do it in spanish. Haha. I love you guys, 20 seconds left. kiss dad and max for me.

Elder hurley