Equador
Buenos Dias, Hola again from North Carolina. I have recieved a new companion, Elder Staheli has finally abandoned me for Duke Country in Durham. While I find myself back in the same city with the same places, people and apartment. First off, my new companion is…Elder Richard Guerrero, from Ecuador! Actually, comes from Chicago (lived there about a year), but was born and raised in Ecuador, Mueyequilla the city (or something like that). He’s been out pretty much the same time I have, we are going home together. He was at the MTC for 2 months, so we were there for the same time, about 3 weeks. He’s pretty cool, knows a lot of english for the time he’s been in the states. But it’s sweet with a native cause he knows everything! So, what we are doing is trading off days..one day is spanish day and the next day is english day, so that we both learn better the language.
As you all know we had a baptism last week, Karen, so Elder Staheli and I were focusing alot of our energy into the baptism, so it kind of left Elder Guerrero and I with not much to do in regard to current investigators. So, we have been working hard to find people everyday and have had a little bit of success. I think the people are less afraid of us because of the factor of having a hispanic in the companionship. With Elder Staheli and I, two big americans trying to speak spanish, it was intimidating sometimes to those little hispanics. But we did have good success, taught alot, 2 baptisms (3 if you count my extra re-baptism). Hopefully, we can get one before I left this area. Right now, I think this is my last transfer…but you never know..
Let’s see..did I have any strange experiences this week…I know they happen everyday, but It’s hard to recall. Oh yeah, I actually had my first bible bash! I know it’s not something to be proud of, but I just couldn’t help to not make a comment. We knocked on this one guy’s door who was talking on the phone, he told us to wait a minute until he got off. When he finished he said something like, “What can I do for you fine young gentlemen today”. Well, we started doing the usual questionaire (trying to gently talk our way into our message) and we found that he was a 70 year old retired Southern Baptist pastor, recently moved from Ohio. Well, for some reason I started talking about what we, namely preach the gospel of Christ (Faith, Repentance, Baptism and the Holy Ghost). And if you all know about the beliefs of Southern Baptists, they basically only believe in the 1st step: Faith. Once you have faith and believe, being born again, you are saved by grace. But you really don’t have to show fruits of your faith…like repentance and baptism. He started jumping at me the first mention of baptism, stating that it wasn’t necessary for salvation and really baptism was just something done to “clean a little dirt”. After he said that, I started to get angry and tried to tell him that Baptism was an essential ordinance, also quoting John 3:5, “If a man is not born again of water and of the spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God“. Well, he promptly told me that I had “misinterpreted” the scripture and that it really meant you have to have a cleansing within to be saved. That is the point, I decided I was wasting my time and we kind of just ending the conversation. Before leaving, he told us that he really admired what we were doing, we just needed to change our message. I just can’t see why people have to be so stubborn…that’s how a lot of the americans are here…hard core southern baptist. But, I’d have to say they do have some good barbaque! Even though, I really haven’t tasted the real stuff, the fast-food barbeque here is soooo good. They actually ship this stuff across the United States. I’ll be sure to order some when I return to Utah, even if it is a little bit expensive.
I guess the Super Bowl was yesterday, I had completely forgot about it, until I talked with the District Leader last night and then someone checked the score this morning. I guess the Steelers won, don’t really care, only that it happened in Detroit was the cool thing. But I have heard that the Pistons are doing great…do I see another NBA Championship coming? If they do, that’ll probably be one of the darkest points of my mission…(hehe), it would really kill me as all you know. When the Astros were in the World Series, my mind was wondering alot. I’m just such a die-hard sports fans, it really is my weakness sometimes and it is hard for me to focus when there is a television on with a sporting event during tracting or some member is talking about sports. Although it’s not nearly as bad on the spanish side of the work cause they only talk about Soccer. Even, Elder Guerrero is a big soccer fan and plays indoor soccer. I guess the World Cup is this year and Ecuador qualified for it, so he is super-excited.
It’s sweet some of you went to check out the “El Salvador” restaurant. I am going to have to tell the Claros family about that, they will be excited. I’m especially exciting about our dinner tonight…they cook sooo good. I am sure going to miss this area when I finally leave, I pretty much know everyone, less-actives, all the members, other missionaries investigators. Although, I can’t speak the language very well, I have established bonds with a lot of the people. I don’t know what I will do when I leave. I heard a lot of missionaries say that they miss their “greeny” area or their first area the most out of all. It’s been fun, stressful (especially this last week when I recieved all of this new responsabilities), most of all rewarding. I really feel good about the work I am doing. And I encourage all of you to do some of your own missionary work, although it is close to impossible in Utah.
Thanks for keeping me in the loop everyone about what’s going on, the other missionaries think that my “Greenie” mail will be running out soon..but I think not! Letters are good, so are e-mails, nice to see what’s going on back home, even if it’s the same boring stuff. Work, School, Work, School. Well, I better be signing off.
Here’s to another week of missionary work!
Elder Hardy