Lovin It - 05/28/12

For those of you who can understand Spanish, try translating this first paragraph.  Good luck!

Este semana fue una semana buenisimo. Tuvimos algunos desafios encontrando personas, pero Viernes encontramos un hombre que tiene mucho potencial. El se llama Manuel Ulloa. Le encontramos tocando puertas, y la primera cosa que el dijo fue ¨Hola Elderes, entren¨. El estaba orando por direccion de Dios en su vida, y nosotros tocamos su puerta la misma dia. Nosotros enseñamos La Restauracion la primera visita y El Evangelio de Jesucristo la segunda visita. El quiere ser bautizado, pero dijo que primero necesita una respuesta a su oracion. El tenía planes para ir con nosotros a la iglesia, pero el es el dueño de un restaurante y algunos maderos estan dandoles problemas, entonces el se fue al policia, pero espero que este proximo Domingo va a ir a la Iglesia.

I figured I´d send you guys some Spanish. I know it's not perfect, my grammar isn´t the best, but they say I have a good accent for a gringo.

So basically up there it says that we had a really good week. We´re still struggling to find new people to teach, but the good thing is that we found one this week. His name is "M", and he is awesome. He is 22 and he owns his own restaurant, and is pretty successful. He was assisting an evangelico church, but he says it doesn´t satisfy his needs, so he hasn´t gone in about a month or so. He was praying for some help from God, and we knocked on his door. It was pretty funny, because when we knocked he yelled ¨WHO IS IT?¨ I was like, "Oh no, not again!"  My companion and I braced for the foul language that we thought for sure would come, but it didn´t. Instead he said. "Oh, Hi Elders, come on in."

What? Ha ha ha ha ha, it was AWESOME! He´s doing really well, and we taught him Friday and Saturday. He doing great considering we´ve only taught him 2 times, and while he had some things to work out with the police, he should come with us to church this next Sunday.

Other than that, things are pretty chill. We´re planning a ward activity for this Saturday. We´re going to decorate the church to the Plan of Salvation. The different organizations are in charge of decorating a room to one of the 3 Kingdoms of Glory, so it should be pretty cool. I´m excited and stressed, but that's the mission in a nutshell.

Also, the Zone Leaders are moving into our house today. They´re changing areas because a bishop was complaining about his misionaries. He blamed all of the wards problems on them, so now he´s getting the ZL´s. Basically, I´m upset mainly because these two Elders are two of the best Elders in the mission, and we´re really good friends. They´re office elders, so they only work from 5pm and on, but they still manage to teach tons of people and baptize as well. Its just frustrating because they really are two of the best Elders in the mission, but the bishop is convinced that they need to go. Lesson to be learned, don´t complain, and don´t blame your problems on other people.

Also, our bishop decided that its our job to be in charge of hometeaching. So we got assigned 8 pairs of hometeachers and 18 families. Fun stuff. More work! Woo hoo!

I love you guys, and I know that Jesus is our Savior. We show our love to him thru our works, so go out there and do something.

Elder Hansen

Santa Vaca

Here is the latest from Honduras:

Hi guys. Thanks for all the letters. I opened my account and found 11 letters waiting. Needless to say I´ve been a little busy copying, pasting, and printing off so that I could have a few minutes to write you.

Life is really really really good right now. I´m so stinking happy with my companion, Elder A. I´m sending a picture of Elder L, Elder A, and me. I hope you guys like it.

The work is going slowly but surely. We brought 3 investigators to church yesterday, and we´ve got our hopes up high. We had 2 people tell us that they want to be baptized, so now we just have to finish teaching them everything and prepare them for the big commitment that they want to make. We have been rained on every single day this week, but we bought some nice big umbrellas for 4$ that are keeping us nice and dry. They also work as a nice beating stick to keep the dogs away. I like walking around with an umbrella. The only problem is that a lot of times we forget that we have them, and we leave them in our investigators houses, but that's okay.

I´m glad that everything is going well over there in the States. I miss being with you guys, and I´m excited to see you guys again. But I know that this is where I´m supposed to be and that there are people that need me, including my companion. Now I just need to put my shoulder to the wheel and give it all I´ve got.

I love you guys times a trillion. Thanks for everything

Elder Hansen

Mothers Day Skype

 It was so fun to see and talk to Brett via Skype on Sunday. Isn't technology great?!?!?! We really enjoyed seeing and hearing his excitement. He is really enjoying serving the Lord, and it shows in his face. He is a Trainer now, meaning his companion is brand new and Brett has the responsibility of teaching him how to be a good missionary. Here is what he wrote to us:

Hi guys! Long time no see huh? Not much has changed since yesterday. I´m still in Pedregal, and my new companion is Elder A. He´s from El Salvador, he´s 21 years old and we share the same birthday!!! Isn´t that awesome? I was pretty stoked to find out that we have the same birthday, just 1 year apart. He is the only member in his family, and I know it was a huge sacrifice for him to come out here on the mission. He came really prepared, and he knows his stuff. I think my favorite thing about him is his desire to learn. He is very humble and he is always analyzing and pondering on the scriptures and PMG. He can speak English like a gringo, which is pretty fun so we can communicate secretly and I can give him advice in the streets and nobody knows what we´re talking about. Its pretty much the greatest.

Pedregal is the same. We have tons of support from the members, but like always, its really hard to find investigators. The ward is really unified, but against the bishop and his family. Its kinda sad, but hopefully we can teach them to start loving and stop gossiping. All in all there needs to be a little bit more humility in the ward, but putting that aside I love this ward. They really are a blessing to us and I´m really lucky to be here.

As far as cool new things... I don´t have any. Just working hard and praying harder. I really like this scripture that I found this morning during my personal study. D&C 121:44

Love you all
Elder Hansen

Happy Mother's Day!

We're looking forward to talking to (and hopefully seeing) Brett on Sunday for Mother's Day. We're going to try to Skype with him, so we'll get to see each other (hopefully!) Kinda sad that he didn't get to spend more time with this companion - they seem to work well together.

Here is his email from today -

First off I´d like to wish all of the mothers out there a happy mothers day! I love you Mom, you´re the best. I´m excited to see you guys.

This week was a pretty good week. It was a hard week, but a good week. Saturday and Sunday we had some pretty awesome experiences. All in all, this past transfer was amazing. I love my companion Elder L., and I´m going to miss him like a fat kid misses cake.

This past transfer has been really fun but really hard to find new people. This area is one of the oldest in Honduras, and its pretty small and concentrated with lots of members. Translation, everyone has heard the Mormons, which makes contacting a little bit more interesting. We've struggled to find people to teach, but on Saturday we had an amazing day. 6 lessons taught, 4 new investigators and many hearts touched by the Holy Ghost. One in particular happened when we were reading 3 Nefi 11 with a woman that told us that she was born catholic and was going to die catholic. After reading the part where Jesus told everyone to go check out his hands and feet, she began to tear up a little bit. We asked her how she would feel if she was there. She couldn't respond. Later in the lesson she said that this passage impacted her soul. She´s having second thoughts about the whole dying catholic thing.

On Sunday I had a meeting with the Stake President and Mission President. Basically we had a meeting on how we could have more success in general in the Stake.  The plan is to baptize more families, and the Stake told us that they will take care of every financial problem. Holy crap, this is one of the greatest blessings we have seen. Money is always on of the biggest stumbling blocks so its nice to not have to worry about where the money is going to come from. Also, President drove me back to our ward building where we found one of our families out in the foyer. Familia R. is super positive and they´re progressing amazingly in all aspects, but their problem is they have absolutely no desire to be married. They stopped smoking, drinking alcohol and café, they read every assignment and have gone to both Church on Sunday and the weekly activities, but they refuse to be married, even though they've lived together for more than 13 years. Strange huh? The sad thing is that this is super common here. Anyways, President Flores talked to them about it. He said You want to be Happy? Get Married. Hahaha, it sounds a little blunt in the email, but in person it was really powerful and really spiritual as well. He talked for another 4 minutes or so, and then we went inside. During the meeting I saw them holding hands. They don´t even sit next to each other in our lessons, but on Sunday they were holding hands. I know the Spirit is working in their hearts and changing them.

Life is good. Wednesday is transfers. I´ll be receiving my new companion on Wednesday. Wish me luck!

Elder Hansen

Refiner's Fire (April 30th)

Here is Brett's email from last week:

Hey guys! I´m glad to hear everything's going well in your lives. I really do enjoy reading about your lives and hearing about you guys.

This week was pretty great! I learned a ton, mostly in humility. So we had an activity this week where we went out and shined shoes for free. I thought it was a strange idea, but our Zone Leaders thought it was the cats pajamas, so I supported it with 100%. We also had a table full of church material, and the 6 of us in our District were out there talking with everyone and trying to shine some shoes. Turns out we only shined 1 pair of shoes, but that's okay. After lots of talking, we ended up with 4 contacts after 2 hours of work. Not the most fruitful activity I've had, but I did learn a lot from it. This week we've had lots of trouble finding people to teach. Its frustrating when you finish the day and every single lesson falls through. You call them 3 times, pass by earlier and leave notes, but when the hour comes for the lesson, they aren't home. Also, we´re not having too much success with contacting, and we´re doing tons of activities as well, but they aren't working as well. But this week I prayed pretty hard, and I felt the comfort of the Holy Ghost that everything is going to be okay.

Jared sent me some conference talks that are really freaking good. Lessons from Liberty Jail, by my good old friend Elder Jeff Holland, probably was one of the best talks I've ever read and was definitely an answer to an aching soul. I highly recommend it to anyone who is having a bad day. The truth is that our afflictions make us better. It is the refiners fire that turns ore into precious metals. Like it says in Ether 12 and Peter 1:7, our faith isn't faith until its tried. We have to be tried in all things so that we can prove that we will endure to the end. I really like the 13 Artículo de Fé, when it says that we believe all things, we  hope all things, we have endured many things and hope to be able to endure all things. Trials are good! Trials are blessings, so put a smile on and enjoy it! Wooo hoo!

I love you guys a lot. Thanks for the love and support.

Elder Hansen