keep it rollin'

2/24/14

Well another fun week of getting to know how evrything works here!

Lunes: We had a family night with the lopez family, that was really good, we played a hand of uno and then shared a scripture, we are hoping to get the whole family back active and in church again someday soon here, after that we had them take us to someone who we thought was members but they ended up not being members and they didnt let us into there house, so we met this new dude named pablo that makes fruit salad and he seemed super cool so hopefully we can get back and visit him soon. after that we swung back by the familia lopez house becasue they asked us to and they gave us cake, so that was super good!

Martes: Well today i had to teach my first district meeting. I choose to talk about setting goals and then as a district we set goals and made plans to achieve them. The big one would be two baptisms from each companionship this change. So hopefully we will be able to get that going here soon! afterwards we had lunch with the owner of the house we are renting and although she lives in the other ward she is super nice and could hopefully becaome a member soon. Then we went and met up with some investigators and a little later that night we had a meeting with the bishpo, he let us now he was there to help us and that he had some things he wanted us to do different then the last elders that were here, and we left with a smile happy and ready to help so that was a super awesome meeting. also fun fact he has been bishop for 7 years now! crazy!! then we had a super asweome lesson with this lady who couldnt find out why bad things happen to good people and it is so awesome the answers to life the book of mormon has.. if you dont believe me chapter 5 of preach my gospel.. its loaded of good stuff! then we went to a house close by that has a little bit of everything, less active member, active members, and non members. We taught a kid and his less active uncle and he asked for a blessing at the end. it was super awesome. we called it a night and when we got home a got a call from remansito telling me mariela my first baptism is getting married and that she wanted both me and elder rodriguez to be there for it.. itll be march 12th so hopefully ill get permissoin to go! i also hit 7 months today!! crazy how fast that goes by for reals. As we walked home i got some empanadas and used some of the ranch that mom sent me in the package.. it was heaven.. it tasted sooooooo good!!! i missed that so much!

Miercoles: Today we had a good lunch with a missionary who came home early, and his family, but get this, his sister left for the mission about 6 months ago and went to the same exact mission that he was in! crazy!! Today was hot!! super hot! and alot of walking just to make it a little bit better. and on top of that almost no one let us in for about 3 hours! so that was great, gotta love the praguayan heat! we finally found a guy who seems to be golden. He told us about when he died and came back to life and asked what the significance of some of the things that happened on the other side meant. it was super cool we taught the plan of salvation and he seemed super intrested! afterwords we got two daughters of a member decide they want to get baptized, we just need to get the clearance from the dad. and after that it started to poooooooorrrr!!! luckly i had a poncho, but my comp tried to use my cowboy hat but we both ended up getting preety soaked! so that was fun haha.

Jueves: started the day by changing comps and going on a division with elder Yuaney. it was good, it was hot, and nobody would let us in to teach, but we got a few lessons in and we did find a active family we didnt know yet. we found out that the missionaries have FHE there every tuesday night and that each week it rotates who has lesson and who has to bring food, so when we have to cook it could be a little interesting. we also had a man explain that he doesnt think that there is any thing after this life and we just become dust, and we tried to help him realize the reason we have a natural drive to do things is becuase there is a purpose buthe didnt want to hear too much of it, it was pretty interesting. We did get to teach our best two investigators matías (10 years old) and his grandma (older) which are super awesome! then we called it a day.. a long one at that haha.

Viernes: we ended the division and then me and elder turleyt got some good studying in. after that we went and had homeade pizza for lunch again, and then went back home to do some weekly planning. After that it was super hot! we walked around abunch, and then finnally i got in somewhere.. after that we had a memebr show us some more houses and found a prospective missionary.. he is 18 and plays the harp and the guitar and plays them super well and hopefully we will be able to help him prepare for a mission. We talked to the guy who died and came back to life again and he said he doesnt disagree with anything weve taught so far and accpeted a baptism date.. now we just have to get him to church.after that we went back to the house of the people that have a little bit of each kind of people in there house and the granddad that is a memebr and wuite old asked for for a blessing of health and so i gave him one.. it was good and he plans on coming back soon now as well.. lets just hope it happens. 

Sabado: Today we started the morning off by doing a little bit of service... we helped the first councilor lay down cement for his walk way.. it was pretty sweet! and then they gave us a little bit of lunch and after they took us to bishops house for the real time big super good lunch. that was cool, we got to know bishop a little better and his family and they are great! he did ask me to give a talk in church tomorrow on testimonies so that was a fun assignment to get. then we had a lesson with a guy who is super awesome! but he jsut isnt going to church, he sadi he could go back at any moment but then wont go, we told him about how we have to keep the commandments if we want to live with god again, and he just couldnt understand it, he said he will hopefully be back in church before the end of march, but we were able to put the gal of the 23rd.. it always helps to have a specific date, i really hope he is able to return becauswe he is awesome. after we had a fake lesson, that the FHE family for tuesdays set up with me when i was on the division. it was all there idea but they wanted to pretend to be crazy investigators, and so i sadi i would play along. we got there and the dad had a machete and looked super angry, but then let us teach him and his family. They also had gotten beer bottles and filled them with water and him and his daughter drank three "beers" while we were there and kept shoving them in our face. at the end they said they might come to church tomorrow and they left it at that. It was kinda funny.. my comp had no idea.. until sunday haha. Then we taught matías and his grandma and they coooked us little steak shikabobs. it was super good and they said they would show us how to do it some time soon! 

Domingo: Well the joke came to an end when the dad of the family came into preisthood (by the way he is on the high council) and pulled out his liahona.... it was funny and my comp was confused and all, but in the end he was pretty cool about it.. ive heard of way worst things that people have done to there comps.. plus this one was all on the family. But somethign that theyll alwasy be able to remmeber him by. We had a good day in church 65 poeple 3 less actives and 2 investigators.. matías and his grandma! it was super awesome!i gave my talk on testimonies and invited everyon to bear there testimony next week for fast sunday and not be afriad to shareit with there friends. after that we went home.. did some studying and then got lunch brought to us again.. that was cool. it was super hot and there was a lot of work today, but overall the week ended up being a pretty decent one!

Lunes: today i played basketball with people from my last zone. It was awesome! except for elder worsham ripped one of my favorite soccer jerseys.. so ill have to buy a new one and gift that one to a memebr or somehting. other than that nothing to exciting for today... i have zone meeting again tomorrow so that should be fun.. itll be the same as the last one i had. 

Well hope all is well with all you guys!!!

Love you all so much!

Elder Jace Gummersall

 

 

Laurelty

2/17/14

Well i made it too my new area after a long search.. but the week didnt start there so here it goes....

Lunes: Well we got pack home after writting you guys a little early and so i started packing until 6, then we headed out to teach. We taught Maraia Belen from the familia villalba and i said my goodbyes to them, and then we went to see arial and mercedes, but they werent there and we ended up meeting a really cool less active family.. which is awesome since im headewd out of here.. hahah but it was really good and hopefully elder worsham and elder luke (an elder that came with me that knows sister lake!! hes super cool) are able to reactivate them!

Martes: We had a district meeting in Mariano and said goodbyes to those leaving the zone, it was a good little meeting. Afterwrods we went and had lunch with hermana roman and i was able to say good bye to there family as well and then elder worsham felt realy sick, which was kind of frustrating because it looked like i wasnt going to be able to say bye to anyone else, we went home and i started packing while he slept. i finsihed packing and then he slept an extra hour, and then he was able to feel good enough to go out. We went fast a i snapped a lot of photos, hopefully ill be able to get them all to you guys today but if not ill keep them coming in next week. we visited about 17 people or families and i caught almost everyone i had planned to see, all exceot for 3 so hopefully ill be ableto swing back by while im in luarelty and catch them some day! tough to say goodbye, but i know ill swing mçbye before i end the mission. It was a weird feeling my last ight in remansit, but like always i just went to bed.. because i had an early morning and a long day ahead of me the next day.

Miécoles: Well got up at 5 and left in the taxi at 6 and we made our way to the office. I was able to catch up with alotof other elders there, and then made my way into the trainers meeting with elder bristol.. an elder who came with me who was doing the same thing except staying in his area.  it was a good meeting and then after that the new missionaries came in. We had a little more of meeting and then got to meet our new comps. My new Comp is ELDER TURLEY, from newport beach california! He is awesome, we ate lunch got to know eachother, and then took the longest time leaving the office because there were so manythings that i had to make sure were in line before i headed out.. including finding my package that you guys had sent me!! wooooo! then we finaly got out of there and after a long, difficult, and confusing taxi ride, we were able to finally find our house! we got in unpacked and then headed out and founf a grocery store to get some food, came back and then spent some time going through the area book, only to realize that it hadnt been updated in over a year or two.. so that was super fun. Looks like some hard work and good fun ahead.

Jueves: We got up got our studies in, and then some other elders nearby that knew our area a littl ebit took us to the family who would be feeding us lunch. It was great the lady claims to be the mom of all missionaires that come through there but it was good to get to know them, the dad went inactive about two years ago becaue of work, but still has a strong testimony of teh church, and they overall seem like a really solid family. The also told us that they let missionaries kill there goats when they have birthdays to celebrate.. so that could get real intresting real fast.. i watched a video on there camera of an elder doing it and me and my comp both dont know if we can do it.. so we will see what happens.. my comps birthday is the 8th of march... after lunch we got a little tour of the town by there 14 year old son gaspar, that was good and helped me get the mental map down a little bit. then we parted ways and go to know the area our selves a little bit. It hasnt been hot here since i got here so that could be a nice change of pace... there are way more trees and a lopt more shade, and the roads and houses are all way nicer than remansito.. not to mention the house has bountiful amounts of water!!! por fin!!! hahah. We ended up getting to met some members and that was good and we were able to get some good work into, but lots of walking.. thats for sure.

Viernes: We got homemade pizza for lunch today! it wasnt that good, but it was a nice reminder of the goodstuff. after that we got to work big time walking down what felt like almost every single street!! but it wasnt bad becasuse it still hasnt been hot yet.. actually really pleasent and super beautiful. we had a nice lesson with a 16 year old atheist that actually went really well, and the church has activity nighs!!! it was awesome we got to meet some youth and watch them play soccer.. there werent that many people because there was a stake activity that night, but it was good to see a ward function like it should be.. something i had kind of forgoten about hahah. after me and my comp celebrated valentines day by buying a nice hamburger and soda and eating it at home.. about as romantic as it gets haha. but that was our friday getting to know everything!

Sabado: Last night i woke up to someone reightnext store just blaring music.. which from what the members told me is something the last elders used to complain about. so that might be a struggle to deal with here.. but im just greatful i have water! I also got a call this morning that the baptism that was supposed to happen in remansito this last saturday got shut down by the kids mom.. who is already a member, and said he could get baptized, and was supporting it at one point.. i dont know all the details but its really sad that that one wasnt able to happen... we also didnt get lunch today, we normally eat it with the bishop and he called and cancelled, so i cooked us some pasta and that tasted alright.. after we awalked again almost everystreet talking to tons of people and getting rejected by more but it was alright becuase thats why were here. we did find one refrence the last missionaries left us. They left us a piece of papaer that had the lunch schedule and about three names and the phone numbers of people they were working with. we found this 10 year old kid named matías and also founf out his grandma isnt a member, but his mom is. So that was cool and we got a little lesson in there and invited them to church so that was super coolwe have been lucky enough to get 7 for 7 each day so far so we may be able to pull off a change of 7 for 7 the whole time which would be super cool!! 

Domingo: Today we had church which went well. We started with preisthood, which we dont have that many of, and then had sunday school, which was good, and then sacrament meeting with 63 people there and our boy matías!! so that was super awesome! me and my comp both shared our testimonies and than we had a youth speaker give a talk, and we had a high councilmen speak... i forgot that they existed... crazy!! after we got lunch brought to us by members and that was good did some studying and headed out again. we went and vistied Matías and his grndma and the grandma said that the last time we were there when we shared with her she felt the spirit super strong, like god was right beside her, and she said she will be at church next week for sure and that she quite the part of her sunday job.. so that was super cool! we put the goal with them to be baptized the 15th of march! so hopefully we are able to get that in there! we went and taught the atheiest kid again who was able to ask some really good quwstions and hopefully he will make some progress soon. and just like that we ended our first week here in laurelty and it ended up being a pretty good one! looking forward to the future here!

Lunes: Today has been a good pday, we started by going to the office to get some stuff that the house was missing and we got about half of it.. then we went to the chinesebuffet place with the assistants and what ended up being a bunch of other missionaires.. so that was fun! then we madeour way back to good old laurelty.. its been a basic pday... but a good one

Well that was my fun week and change.. cool thing is that my comp is a celebrity he was a basketball playerin highschool musical three and apparently you can see him on the bench for a scene or two so thats pretty cool. Excitied for the things we are going to see here in laruelty!!

Love you all so much hope all is well with everyone!

Love

Elder Jace Gummersall

 

 

¡bye bye Remansito!

2/10/14

Big time changes this week, and one of the best weeks of the mission... but here we go..

Lunes: After we wrote you we ran to the grocery store really quick and then got to wait for 45 minutes until a colectivopassed by for us, but we made it home and got some really good work in for a monday, we had two lessons with part member families, and both of the kids that arent members we were teaching want to be baptized, and atleast part of the families we are teaching want to make a return. so that was a super great way to start the week.

Martes: Started the day with a district meeting in mariano, so that was good. Then we came back enjoyed a good lunch and went home to get in some language study. Afterwards we got to work. We went and visited lorena and found out her husband said he wasnt sure if he would be able to go this weekend and so that wont happen whlie im here but hopefully soon, because her husband is going to take a vacation from work for a month here on the 15th. after we had a good lesson witha a part member family, follwed by a lesson with our next baptism, Angel Silguero he is 11 and is the little brother of Mercedes, the girl who got married two or three weeks ago, so thats really exciting! After we were walking and this guy came up to us and asked if he could talk to us a little bit. He told us he was a member and was married in the church a while ago but had been kicked out of his house and his family woulodnt talk to him anymore, he also told us that he was going to commit sucide tonight if he couldnt talk with his wife. So after a while we got him to take us to his wife and then they both stood there and screamed at us about eachother until the point where both of them walked there seperate ways, they wouldnt let us say a single word. (but my comp saw the guy in mariano the next day so we helped him with one thing.) that was a crazy moment. Afte rwe had a good leson with a recent convert named gustavo and then we started a division, i stayed her in remansito and my comp went to mariano., I was here with elder Silva, and elder who came with me to the mission that is super awesome! so that was cool.

Miercoles: Today was a super awesome day!!! 6 of the 7 lessons we had were with memebrs so that was super awesome!!! we also still dont have water.. so make that a week! hah alot of remansito doesnt have water rgith now and its becoming a bigger problem for the city each day. we are getting really good and finding part member families that are ready to come back to church and the siblings are ready to get baptized, so it appears that htis area will explode soon! after a full day of visiting people we switched back, came back to remansito, enjoyed a nice little dinner, and then switched again.. yup thats right two divisions back to back. I stayed in remansito again with elder sanchez this time and elder worsham went back to mariano. so thats super cool!

Jueves: We started with a meeting in the church with the ward mission leader, the church is right next to the place where people pay for water, and there was a little proteset happening outside of it.. so hopefully we get some water soon haha. WE had a real good meeting and more than anyhing came away with our mission leader telling us he would be able to go on a coupl visits next week. so thats super awesome! then we got to work and visited lorena who is reading the book of mormon so much and you can see her testimony growing because of it. We also searched for elder sanchez´s family history. He said that his grandparents had a relative that moved to paraguay and owned a big chunck of land (an estate) and in our area and on our map, there was a big chunck of land and it was called lloret which is the last name of his relatives, so we set out and actual got into this big estate, where there are a couple different houses now, but fouind out the owner lives in villa hayas now and elder snachez got his irections. So that was pretty cool!we also got a lewsson with the family vera in, and got to meet with the husband for the first time, which was super awesome. then we went and visited ariel and had a good little lesson over there and made the swith back.

Viernes: Today was super hot!!!! it got up to 120 degrees this week and has been one of the hottest weeks of my life!!! thankfully the wind has blown a little stronger then normal, butin remansito that also means you get covered in way more dust. today was a solid friday and we got a lot of good lessons in but nothing too exicting to report about the day.. but at night it got better. There was tornedos in chlorinda argentina.. right next to us and the power went out for about 4 hours, in all of asuncion mariano, us and villa hayas, from what i heard, and so that ended our day when the sun went down because nobody wanted to share until the light came back. it made us walk all over the place trying to find some one who would let us in but finnally the time hit 9 and we called it a night. we got to our house and at about 10 our zone leader called us to see how we were doing. we said good. Then he called us at 10:20 and said he couldnt get ahold of the other remansito elders al night and he wanted us to go check on them. (this is after we got home to a super hot house, and then the power came back on) so we went over to there house to find them getting ready for bed and there phone just without cell service. So that was fun.

Sabado: Super awesome day today!!! we taught 11 lessons which is a really big day!! Angel our next baptize is more ready each time we teach him and he really wants to get baptized. We also visited lorena today and out of nowhere heer husband came and joined us, we got to teach him the first lesson, and he said he would come to church tomorrow, so that was an incredible blesing! we taught a couple other lessons and then called it a day, but it was a super good day for teaching, and a lot of people were home!

Domingo: intresting morning, but then we got to church and things got going good. we had 51 people in church today. 6 less actvies and 3 investigatirs!! ive never had three in one sunday before!! Angel, Maria Belen, and victor lorenas husband!! it was so awesome!! i also had to give a talk in church today and kind of ended it by saying thanks and good bye to everyone because imn pretty sure im out of here. after church we went to lunch and celebrated the birthday of hermana pineda and ate the best paraguayn cake ive had here... still not as good as american cake.  after words we were ble to but a baptism date with maria belen a 14 year old girl who seems like she really wants to be baptized. We had a really good day of teaching again, and everyone wants to know if im going, and it seems like they are going to miss me.. i hope they do hahah. we called it a day and totaled up our number to find out we had taught 45 lessons this week, and 30 of them where with members!! it was honestely the most succesful numerical week ive had in all of my mission and felt real good. 

Lunes: Well today took forever to find out the changes!!! and we had to clean the house while we waited. We got two people to give us fake changes, our zone leader called us and told me i was staying in remansito and going up as zone leader and the elder worsham was out, then our district leader came over to inspect our clean house and faked a phone call and told me i was going to some place in luque as a district leader and that elder worsham was staying here. And then, por fin our zone leader cllled us again and gave us the real changes.. as the title says im leaving remansito. Im going to a place in luque called laurelpy and will be training a new guy, and become district leader. My area was closed down a couple weeks ago, so i get to reopen it and get to know it and train, and learn how to be district leader all at the same time.. should be a fun couple weeks ahead of me... wish me luck!! we did just eat lunch at burger king with elder silva and elder ellefson and that was really good, but a little hard to fathom still the big change that im about to have... kinda stinks ill miss these next couple baptisms, but the work goes on!!

Well next week should be full of goodbye remansito pictures and hello luque, im pretty sure ill be in a ward and part of a stake so that should be a really fun change and hopefully we will be able to work with the members even more there!

Love you all so much and hope everything is well with you guys!! stay warm ;)

Elder Jace Gummersall

 
 

change is just around the corner

2/3/14

Im pretty sure this is my last full week in remansito but i wont know until next monday.. crazy to think about... but heres what happened last week...

Lunes: im pretty sure i already told you what happenend today in the last one... so...

Martes: today we went on a division.. kinda we left the house as a thresssome, with one of the zone leaders... he had to go take care of some stuff for the zone on the computers and that is when we were able to write you guys.. his name is elder Zilm.. he is the man. After our compouter time we headed out and we were able to see the our zone leader doesnt take no for an answer.. he is very striaht foreward and he almost walked into someones house, telling them that he wouldnt lave until they shared with us or told us they were coming to church, they even told us that there life is between them and god and his answer was.. well you got three representatives of jesus christ on the earth today right here how can we help you... it was crazy and a learning expierence to learn how to work with the stubborn ones.. i don think ill be picking up that style as a habbit though.. time will tell. we also were able to get ariel and mercedes ar newly weeds to start reading so that was great, after that we ate some noodles at our house with the other remansito elders and called it a nigh, we got zone meeting tomorrow and interviews with president so that should be a fun one!

Miercoles: started the day today with a different style of zone meeting. we had three differeent stations we went to to learn different things, and the interview with president. It was a good one ecspeacially my interview. The main thing that we talked about was the recent convert lorena that we baptized. I told him that she has a computer and that we want to show her how to do family history work, but the rule book says we need his permission to do so. So i asked and he said it would be better, and that he would allow us to go with her and her husband to the temple, take a little tour of the outside, adn the go to the family history center with them so that the whole family could do it. Talk about one of the greatest ideas ever!!!! so that should be fun. then we got out of there and headed back to remansito.. i did also get to take some money out.. i shouldnt need to take anything out for a while. our lunch got cancelled and changed to a dinner so we ate some empanadas and then headed out to teach. super hot today! but we were able to get some good lessons in... the highlight would be how serious one of the reactivating families is about going to the templ.. all are on board, and only the husband has one foot in.. so we are gonna keep working with him but we are feeling good about it, then we taught some other people and headed to dinner, it was hamburgers and i ate three! they were awesome!! we went back home stuffed and called it a night. 

Jueves:  i wole aup at about 5 and heard my comp throwing up in the bathroom.. when he came back in the room i asked if he was ok and if i could help and he said that he was gonna try to sleep it off but he would let me know.. so i had a lonely morning until about 10 oclcok. then he woke up and called the mission nurse and deceide that we wouldnt be eaving that day because he was to sick. so i took adavantage of the situation and i got some studying in.. i read some of the book of mormon, jesus the christ, and all of genisis in the spanish bible.. that was fun.. we did get visited by the other remansito elders twice because we needed mediine and my comp couldnt make it to the pharmacy.. so that was fun.. one of the longer days of the mission. 

Viernes: almost a carbon copy of thursday... my comp woke up not feeling much better.. so back to the books.. i read from the same collection but this time read all of exodus and half of leviticus.. its so crazy the law of moises in the bible!! i like the book of mormon a little more.. not so strict persay hahah. but nothing exctining to report....

Sabado: Today there was a spark of hope.. we did our studies left the house.. visited lorena and presented the temple plan who told us that she wants to do iut but that her husband wouldnt be home until monday and that she would ask him then.. so fingers crossed there. Then we ent to lunch and ate good. The two daughters there had just gotten back from there EFy things they had in paraguay.. its a week long too. and they said it was the best thing ever, so that was cool to here about.. the one expirince ill share with you that they had was that a 14 year old girl started dancing with a fan because she claimed the holy ghost told her to, and her hair got causght in it and they had to cut her hair off.. then a little latter in the week the same girl said to her male conselor that the holy ghost told her that whe has to marry him.. sounds like a lot of the spirit there right hahah.. thought you guys would enjoy those stories!! after lunch we went hoe and elder worsham did not feel good.. so we called it a day.. ui started y fast and then finsihed leviticus and read some more form the other church books. Also i thought id let you know we are on three days without water so thats just super fun!

Domingo: well worsham s starting to feel better but we went to church like normal.. we had 61 people there, i helped pass the sacrament.. mom you would love the sizeof bread (hot dog buns) they break down here haha. we had 5 less actives there and 1 investigator.. a huge blessing for how little we were ablew to leave the house! after we were able to get some good work in too. We taught a less active girl and her boyfriend, and he looks pretty promising, we also finnaly got through to a couple that needs to get married and the lady needs to get baptized.. so that was super awesome.. it is a littl tough that these little success are coming right at the end of changes because im almost certain that im out of remansito.. no garauntee, but i can just feel it... we ended the week good, and our numbers werent bad due to the circumstances we had.

Lunes: to day has been a good one.. i got my self my tapa for my little hymn book and i love it! its also the 5th day with out water.. so i smell delish!! other than that we went and ate lo mito arabe for lunch with a bunch of elders and then swung by the office so that was super good, then we came to the ciber to write you guys!! 

Well thats been my week.. a little stressful because i wanted to head out and work, but i did get some good rest and reading in while my comp recovered so theres not much i can do about it.. im pretty sure this is my last full week here.. ill let you know whats happening next week... also this internet cafe has been playing bruno mars the whole time ive been here... 

Love you all so much, hope all is well and that you guys are doing great!!

Love ya 

Elder Jace Gummersall