10-20-2019

From Jordan to all:

Spiders and Crabs and Monkeys OH MY!

Hello all! This week has been tough for sure but definitely ten times easier than last week. I have officially been spit on! We were biking through a small barangay (town) and looking for an investigator family, when a 4 or 5 year old girl singled me out of the crowd and spat on my leg as I biked by. I was taken back but just took it and moved on. I know that some people hate the missionaries, and some people love them. Just because we are ridiculed and spat upon does not mean we will give up. We are persistent. We continue to share his message with unwavering faith. Our happiness cannot be crushed because we though we are in this world we are not of it. The world will see our happiness and ask why. The reason why is Christ. As I have focused on Christ this last week, I have nbeen able to stay happy and keep an eternal perspective. I am happy because I have Christ in my life, because I am a vessel through which his message can be carried to his people. I am happy because I can share just a little bit of the joy that I have experienced in the gospel with others who do not have that joy. Through Christ we can find an unending joy.

 As missionaries and members our charge is to as 2 Nephi 25:26 states so well

26 And we talk of Christ, we rejoice in Christ, we preach of Christ, we prophesy of Christ, and we write according to our prophecies, that our children may know to what source they may look for a remission of their sins.

I know as I and as you do this we will see more blessings in our lives from it.

He loves you and he knows your pains and sorrows. 

My favorite line from a hymn named be still my soul reads "Through thorny ways leads to a joyful end"

That is the biggest message I got from conference this week is if we endure our pains and our afflictions with happiness we will find unending joy through Christ and through his gospel.

This week was good. The good news is my butt does not hurt as much from biking 24/7. The bad news is there are spiders here as large as my hand that are poisonous. There are crabs in people's houses ( I saw one in my branch president's house as we ate dinner last night). I almost got strangled by a monkey yesterday. I saw a pet monkey on a chain and took a picture by him. Right after I took the picture he lunged the length of his chain for me, growling ferosciously. It was quite scary. 

I love this place. I love this people. I love and miss you all. Most of all the lord knows and loves you all.

Until next week amigos.

Pictures

1) The monkey

2) Me posing in front of the killer monkey (moments after this picture was taken he lunged)

3) A stellar picture taken by a stellar photographer.

His letter to me:

I miss you guys a lot, but I am doing much better than last week. You guys look cold in the pictures. My companion is nice, I don't hate him, sometimes I am not sure if he loves me or not, little things like he always takes the best seat or sets his bag in the chair next to him or doesn't sit next to me all of the time. Sometimes I can't tell if he doesn't know the language or doesn't want to tell me the word. I feel like he gets frustrated with me sometimes so that stresses me out. He is awesome, a really cool guy, I want to be best friends but I don't know if he wants that. He is also slower than me on  the bike which bugs me because I want to go places quickly and sit on the seat as little as possible. I am excited for zone conference to see my friends and I am excited to get your package. I will never take anything we have in America for granted ever again. The people here are so poor, they have so little but they are so happy so that is a huge example for me. The area here is pretty. I eat rice and fish almost every night. I am a ninja. We killed a rat a couple of days ago we caught in our apartment. We can always here them scuttling in the vents upstairs. I miss you all and love you all so much.