Nobody Else Can Do It

HEY!!!!

I hate to start with this as well but at some point of this week I realized that I have about a month left of my mission. I think I’ve mentioned this before but it made me think about Jesus Christ and the last month/week of his life. I imagine that sometimes He felt weary at times, but nonetheless thought, "Well, it’s time to finish strong." I feel like this week I got to take a couple of steps in the Garden of Gethsemane. I’ll talk about that in a sec.

It’s funny that we’re going to Canada on our trip because Elder Comfort and I always joke around and talk about how dumb the United States/Canada is. We argue about how to say words like "bag", "pasta", "tomorrow", and I usually make a comment or two about hockey being the only sport. It’s really all just friendly but I said out loud just now, "What the heck, we’re going to Canada?!?!" Elder Comfort said, "That’s awesome!" At the same time that I said "That sucks!". Good thing we won’t be there for too long. ;) I’m really starting to love the kid. That’s awesome that Mitt Romney is doing so well...to be honest with you nobody ever talks about that here. The big news here this week was who won the soccer match between Real Madrid and Barcelona. Real Madrid won if you guys wanted to know. I haven’t been very inclined to exercise either on my mission but, like you two haha, I’ve been rockin the work out sessions. I don’t know what’s harder...trying to figure out ways to exercise without any kind of weights or doing the actual exercise. (Elder Comfort woke up to me bicep curling two metal chairs once).

Anyways...back to what I mentioned earlier. I read something in Preach My Gosepl this week that really got me. It’s a quote from Dallin H. Oaks, "Nobody else can do it." If I decide to "give up" now that means that nobody else is going to do the work that the Lord wants me to do. So...despite our seemingly fruitless efforts we kept working. Every time we see a family we contact them, and it finally paid off in these last couple days. On Saturday we had an awesome lesson with a family whose handicapped son came and grabbed my hand as we went walking by his house. If that’s not a miracle, I don’t know what is. Just one of God’s angels who by simply leading us to his house may have completed the most important mission he was sent here to do. Another story…. we were walking down one of the main streets in our area...and I remember just being a little down in the dumps because we weren’t finding anyone to teach. We walked past a humble tin house and through the crack between the sheet metal door and a wooden post I saw a young woman quickly glance at us. We walked about 4 more blocks but the woman stayed in my mind. One voice told me..."Go back, this is a prompting from the Spirit." Another told me, "You’re four blocks away already and she probably doesn’t want anything like everyone else that lives here." We turned around and a different lady came to the door. She said that she already went to a church and wasn’t interested and paused..."but my daughter-in-law doesn’t go to any church." We had a lesson with her last night, Ana, and she accepted a baptismal date and is super excited about coming to church. I thought about that afterwards. How many little decisions do we make every day that determine our eternal destiny or the eternal destiny of another person. Lesson learned: make the right decision.

This morning we went to Managua so that I could get my ingrown toenail out (for like the 5th time). We went to Burger King for breakfast right after. Even though I’m finishing my mission, I’m still not too old to ask for a crown from Burger King. I’m super happy here and I know that we’re doing what the Lord wants.

I don’t like to think about this much but I’m just trying to plan a couple things for when you guys come. On Wednesday, I was just thinking that after the changes meeting, which ends at like 12:30pm, President will probably invite us to lunch with the other missionaries that are leaving (like from 1-2:30) and then I thought that it would be easiest to just go visit some converts from my office area since it’s right there. President always invites the missionaries and their families to his house at around 7 for like a little goodbye thing (don’t know if you’d want to go to that or something else). Thursday and Friday are pretty much open. I`d like to go to Masaya, Ciudad Sandino, and possibly Jinotepe to visit people from the areas I served in. I figured that we could maybe do like two or three touristy things like: 1. Cerro Negro 2. Las Isletas de Granada 3. Market in Masaya (that we can do when we go to Masaya) 4. Volcan Masaya 5. Whatever else you can think of. So just be thinking about what you guys want might to do the most or talk to Elder Pace’s family to see what they liked the most...Just let me know what you’re thinking.

Also, we’re doing a presentation and I need a huge favor. I need a couple pictures from when I was younger (I remember one where I have my Easter suit on and the car keys which is awesome) and just pictures of some things I did before the mission. I need them for next Monday.

Anyways....I love you guys a bunch and excited to see you sort of soon. But for now...I’ll be on the Lord’s errand. :)

Love,

Elder Ward

The Good Samaritan

Hey Family!!!

Man...sometimes it’s a lot to take in when you guys write me: volleyball tryouts, funny stories, spiritual counsel, car crashes, you name it...More than anything I want to thank you for your spiritual counsel. I was asked to speak in church on Sunday and I actually
used that same quote:

“If you do not magnify your callings, God will hold you responsible for those whom you might have saved had you done your duty”

It was basically about the importance of "rescuing" inactive members since it’s a big problem here. I also talked a little about Eddie Aikau (Dad might appreciate that). I’ve thought about that quote and the quote that you sent me, Dad. Honestly, I feel like we’ve worked hard these last two weeks but that we haven’t made much progress. It may be the week that I’ve gotten rejected the most in my mission. I feel like what the Lord really might be doing is testing if I really will push through all the way. One big success is that Elder Comfort is coming along pretty well. When you’re in the service of the Lord you can’t really lose because if nothing else we’re coming out better people than we were when we started.

All right, enough crying on my part. Here’s a funny story told in scripture form because that’s how Elder Comfort and I thought of it:

28 And he said unto him, Thou hast answered right: this do, and thou shalt live.

29 But he, willing to justify himself, said unto Jesus, And who is my neighbour?

30 And Jesus answering said, A certain drunk man went down from Jerusalem to Jinotepe, and fell down in the middle of the street, which stripped him of his raiment, and wounded him, and departed, leaving him half dead.

31 And by chance there came down a certain man selling bread that way: and when he saw him, he passed by on the other side.

32 And likewise a taxi driver, who almost ran him over, came and looked on him, and passed by on the other side.

33 But two certain missionaries, as they journeyed, came where he was: and when they saw him, they had ^bcompassion on him, and said, "Dude, Elder Comfort...this drunk guy is gonna get rocked by a car...let´s move him to the side of the road!"

34 And they went to him, and tried to wake him up, when suddenly he woke up kicking and punching the air violently...saying every kind of obscenity that you could ever imagine, causing all of the neighbors to come out of their houses. Then, without further hesitation...the two missionaries departed saying amongst themselves..."So much for the Good Samaritan."

Anyway, that’s my story for the week. We’re working hard to find some new families to teach and going strong with the one investigator that we have. He has a baptismal date for the 8th so we’re going to do all that we can to get him there. By the way, we didn’t feel any earthquake or anything. This week a missionary came home from the Panama, Panama City mission. It was cool being able to tell him that I know President Ward. Anyway...not much else from me...love you guys and be good!

Love,

Elder Ward

The Gospel Blesses Families

Oye quates!

It’s good to hear from you guys! Dad, I’m pretty impressed by the yard work you did. It reminds me of an example that I used in our district meeting this week. We talked about how in a harvest it’s better to use a harvesting machine rather than a lousy sickle and compared it to the work we do by ourselves and our work combined with the members.

This week was awesome, but in a different way haha. Tuesday was our first full day and I remember being super excited for our first full day to get out and kick some butt in the new area. Well...I think we might have contacted over 20 people that day and not one of them wanted anything to do with us or our message. There are a lot of churches here and a lot of very deep Catholic roots. In the mission this zone is known as the "zona de castigo", or the punishment zone, because nobody gets baptized here. I realized pretty quickly that Elder Comfort was going to need lots of help with his Spanish since he is a brand new missionary, and I felt a little overwhelmed by all of this. I thought a lot about that talk that I sent you guys and I’ve been trying to have the faith to make things happen. So, we approached things from a different direction. We started visiting all of the members that live in our area and to get them excited about doing missionary work. Many of them were shocked that we were even visiting them and lots of them are working with people that will eventually be referrals. I’ve had to have extra patience and humility this week, giving Elder Comfort opportunities to learn and teach, and it’s awesome to see how much he’s grown in just this week.

Wednesday we had a meeting in Managua and it was kinda weird seeing all the office elders and President and his wife. I missed them a lot and it seems like I left the office so long ago.

There are a bunch of other people living where we do and there is a family there that we’ve started talking to a lot. Since day one I’ve felt the need to share the gospel with them and this week little miracles have happened. The other day I was talking to Marcela, the wife, and she got to talking about marriage and families and stuff. She explained how she feels like she can never find true happiness in her family as tears welled up in her eyes. It felt good to bear my testimony of how the gospel blesses our families and to be able to talk about my family and the blessings we’ve received. As we were walking out last night her husband called us back and asked us for a pamphlet. We have an appt. with them tomorrow morning. I think I was sent here to baptize that family :)

Yesterday was pretty funny. We have one of those automatic pianos in our chapel where if you just touch the keys it plays the hymns. Well, Elder Comfort doesn’t know anything about playing piano but he can touch the keys with a decent rhythm (or so I thought). We couldn’t help but laugh as the members sang about 4 seconds ahead or behind the piano. I’m really starting to love this area, even with its difficulties, and I don’t even want to think about leaving it yet haha. Don’t worry, I’ll keep going strong and yes, time is going way to fast. Love you guys a bunch!

Love,

Elder Ward

The Good News and The Bad News

Dudes!!!

Honestly, this letter couldn’t describe what could be the most eventful week of my mission, but I will make an attempt. I will try to write it in a way so that you can feel a little bit of what I did. This week Elder Chacaj and I worked like I have never worked on my mission. I found out pretty quickly that there weren’t really any investigators...so we got to work. We started out teaching short, powerful lessons to the members and many of them gave us referrals of their friends, family, and neighbors. We talked with EVERYONE. On Tuesday morning a miracle occurred. We prayed hard in companionship study for a family that was ready to be baptized and within a half hour the phone rang. It was one of the leaders of the Church in another city who said that his nephew and his wife had just moved to La Estación, Granada, that they had gone to church various times, and were already married. Few times in my mission have I felt so strongly that we had to go visit a family. It was tough to find them, but we did, and they were so happy to see us. They accepted the invitation to be baptized and were committed to read the BOM.

Other story...we were walking along and saw a bulky, young bald guy with his wife sitting out in front of their upper-class home. My first thought was...hmmm, probably not interested, but the Spirit told us otherwise. They happily agreed for us to return and that first lesson was amazing. The wife, Karen, explained that she had gone to so many churches but felt that she hadn’t found the truth. She also had a fond memory of when she visited a temple in the United States. The Spirit was super strong and I think that we all felt it was true.

We had a FHE with an awesome member family and the referral that they gave us. They’ve had a lot of tough problems in their marriage and are thinking of splitting up. We also talked about the Atonement and forgiveness. Really...I’m glad that we have an obligation to forgive others and that Christ makes forgiveness possible.

On Saturday night, I couldn’t help but smile as I thought about the awesome week we had had when the phone rang...AP´s: "Dude, I’ve got good news and bad news." (It’s never good to hear from the AP.) "Bad news: You’ve got emergency changes again. Good news: You’ll be training." So...long story short, my first Sunday in Granada was my last and I’m now here in the beautiful Jinotepe with Elder Comfort, a gringo from Canada. I wasn’t really disappointed but just asked myself why...then I remembered the story of a new untrained missionary (myself) whose first month of the mission was pretty miserable and how his "step dad" [second companion] changed everything around. I’m super happy to be here with him, and yes, it’s going to be an opportunity to grow. He is struggling with the language and his companion basically just taught him a lot of patience. It feels good knowing that I could make a difference in Granada though and I’m really starting to realize that sometimes the Lord needs us for very exact purposes. That’s why we’ve got to "Be the man He wants us to be." My comp’s name is Connor and he is about Connor’s age...I’m already starting to see him as a brother and I know that the Lord will bless us with success. I’m also the district leader of four sisters....WOO HOO! Haha jk, that’s bad...It’s going to be fine.

I love my mission more than ever. I feel like I am a completely different man than the one I came as and I love the Lord. Pray for us :) and have fun with all my friends :) hahaha.

Love,

Elder Ward

CHANGES!!

Hey!

I know this probably seems really weird that you have an e-mail from your missionary son on a Monday afternoon. Well, the unthinkable happened. I had changes! It basically just came out of nowhere. I was about to go to bed on Saturday night when the two APs, Elder Payne and Elder Cabrera come running into the room yelling, "Dude! It’s what we’ve all been waiting for!" I was super confused. They went on to show me a text message from President that said I would have changes the next day (on Sunday). I honestly didn’t believe it. I didn’t think it would be so hard to leave that area. On Sunday morning, I spent time saying goodbye to all of the amazing people that had changed my life in one way or another. I don’t think I could have asked for a better farewell because I was leaving right after sacrament meeting and it was fast and testimony meeting. The tears started coming as I looked out over the congregation and saw the faces of many of the people that I could baptize as I bore my last testimony to them. I felt so happy and so blessed for the opportunity that I had had to be there, but most of all I just felt a deep love for them and for the gospel.

And now....I’M IN GRANADA!!!!!!!!!! Seriously if there was one zone that I wanted to come to before my mission ended, it was this one. Granada is super beautiful. My companion’s name is Elder Chacaj from Guatemala. He’s a short, quiet, hard-working, happy missionary and I already love him. I’ve got a lot of adapting to do though. 1. It’s much hotter than an air-conditioned car or office. 2. No more McDonald’s every day. 3. Working the WHOLE day. 4. Not having any assignment like district leader, zone leader, etc. 5. Not living in a house with eight people. Honestly though, it’s all worth it. I’m so excited to just be able to focus on baptizing a ton of families for the last two months of my mission. Well, don’t really have much more to write, but you guys can write me on Monday next week, just a heads-up. This is Christ’s true church and it is the only way to have true happiness in this life.

Love,

Elder Ward