Swimming with the Croc's

Well this week was a rollercoaster week I would have to say. We started out the week really well. We found 17 new investigators in the week, and 5 of them were families. We have a lot of potential of having a lot of baptisms now. We taught 38 lessons in the week, and of course had a baptism and a confirmation. Early in the week, we had to do divisions with the zone leaders to do the interview of Yessica. I was with one of the zone leaders in our area, and my companion with the other in an area called Itá. The next morning we had to go there to end the divisions. There is a lagoon in there area, that has crocodiles in it. There are like parks around it and everything, kind of weird. Anyway, we were sitting there on a bench waiting for my companion and the other Elder, and we saw a weird thing happen. Some guy just went on the dock, took off his shirt and pants (yes he had underwear on fortunately) and he stood up on the railing for a second, and then jumped off. He swam (quite slowly) to the other side of the lagoon, and was just shouting and stuff. He was definitely high on drugs or something, but it made for an interesting day for sure. During the week we found one family that attended church this Sunday. They have a baptismal date for the 28th of May. They still have to be married, and then baptized, but we are really excited for them. We also talked to a somewhat recent convert (Dora) in the ward about the law of Chastity, of which she had no idea. She is currently living with a man(Fabio, the one that beats her), that is the father of one of her children. She asked us what she can do so that she can live the commandments, and we told her she needs to ask God, but that she needs to separate, or get married. It has to be one or the other. She ended up talking to him, and he is actually progressing and that he is going to come to church this next Sunday. We are also teaching the cousin of Liliana still, who used to be very snakish. We taught her, and she has changed completely, and is progressing a lot. She had a baptismal date, but she didn’t come to church, so it fell. We found another family, Santo and Graciela, that are really good. We have only been able to teach them once, but Santo told us on Saturday that he would come to church if it didn’t rain. We were expecting that he would be like all the others that always tell us that, but he actually did end up coming. We talked to him, and he told us that right now his wife is really sick, and needs blood transfusions, and so she couldn’t go. He told us that they want to be baptized, but that we will have to start teaching them the rest once she is better. On Saturday, it was raining in the morning. We had the baptism for the morning, but ended up having to postpone it until the afternoon. When we were about to leave to go do it, it started raining again. We said a prayer that it wouldn’t rain so that we could do the baptism, and once we got up off our knees, it had stopped. On Sunday our branch president didn't come to church, so we had to direct and teach everything. We are having a lot of potential of baptisms in the area. In reality God has blessed us with many miracles while we have been here. I have seen a big change in my own desires lately in this month. I told you about the 40 day fast that I am doing, and it really is making a big difference. I feel the spirit more in my life. i just feel more.... happy. I can't really explain it, but I really jsut feel a greater desire to share the gospel with the people here, and help them in their lives. The mission really is such a great exerience, I can't believe how much different my feelings toward my savior are after just 11 months in the mission. I love you guys, and Am so greatful for your support. I am so thankful to have such great parents that always taught me the right things to do. I am so grateful for the plan of God that allows us to be together forever. Thank you soooo much for all you have done, and are doing for me. I am forever greatful to you as my parents. Love, Elder Griffin

4 dates set

Alright, sorry I only had a little while earlier in the day to send a quick message, but now I will write the actual email. Well this week has been good. My companion and I are getting a long really well, and don't really have any problems. It's so nice having a companion that actually wants to work and serve the Lord. We have been seeing a lot of success and progress in the branch here with the change that we have already had together, and I know the lord is blessing us for our work here. We have 4 with baptismal dates right now. One is Yessica, the daughter of a less active member that is now attending church. She will be baptized this coming Saturday. We have Roberto and Brigida that have one for the 21, the saturday after that. We have been teaching them for a while, and they are doing really well. They are still a little unsure about the baptism, but they are progressing, and I know that they will feel ready by the 21. We also have another one named Lorena, she is the neice of Liliana, and she has a date for the 4th of June. We have seen a lot of progress in the branch for the most part. We pretty much had to start from nothing when we got here, but for the first time this week we didn't have to give the talks in the sacrament meeting. The members that gave the talks apparently didn't know that we don't ask questions in sacrament talks, so they did exactly that. They asked questions, and the worst part, is that the congregation answered! We still have a lot of work to do. We have three people that actually have callings now, so that is pretty good compared to the 0 when we got here. Liliana and José are doing really well still. They have kept going to church every week without fail. Liliana already has a calling, and we gave José a shirt and tie so now he has been able to pass the sacrament a couple of times. It is really awesome seeing how much they have progressed. I don't know if you remember, but they had been at the point of seperating before the day of their marriage, and now they are both very happily married. It is something that has built my testimony to see what the Gospel does to help families become more happy. I know that the Lord has blessed them for being faithful in the church. As long as they stay faithful for the next year, I will be able to enter in the temple with them for their marriage! I'm so excited to be able to have a convert that will get sealed in the temple. The 200 year aniversary of Paraguay is on the 15th of this month. There are going to be lots of parades and celebrations, but I am outside of asunción, so I doubt we'll see that much here. Here in Paraguay, they have the custom of kissing people on both cheeks to greet each other. When we went to one house the other day, a girl tried to do it to me, which surprisingly was the first time that has happened to me. We shook hands first and then she tried to, so I just stiffened my arm and she backed off before she did it. Fortunately we can't do that as missionaries, but it made for an awkward situation. The singing of the hymns is... not so good. I am literally the only person that knows how to sing (on tune or on beat) in the entire branch. My companion is a little tone deaf, so I pretty much have to sing as loud as I can to keep it a little bit on tune, and at the right beat. I think we definitely beat your guys's ward choir. ;) Well it was so nice to hear and talk with you all again, the 40 minutes just flew by. I can't believe that's already the second time we have talked. The time is passing by way to fast on the mission. I don't feel like I should already be getting to one year in the misison. I still have way too much to learn and mature. Well I'll talk to you next week. Tell Jeni, Taylor and Ali sorry I haven't written them very well. We only have an hour to write the family and the president, so I don't really have enough time to do it. Well I'll talk to you next week. Love you guys tons!!!! Thanks for your love and support. -Elder Ryan Griffin

Mother's Day Call

Well we didn't have changes, me and Elder Watson stayed together. Elder Watson is now the district leader though, so that was the only change that we saw. So we heard something about Osama Bin Ladin being killed. Apparently there is a little bit of danger in some places for the missionaries because of it. We now can't speak in English in the streets, and we can't tell people that we are American. Kind of crazy. I tried some pig liver for the first time this week. Not really a do again. It isn't terrible, but I can definitely see why we don't eat it in the United States. This last week we walked probably 40 kilometers, which would be about 25 miles or so I believe. We have a wierd area, so we have to walk a lot to be able to go find people. We are finding good people though. We have a baptismal date for a girl of 9 years for the 14th, and then of a family on the 21 of this month. Also we are finding more and more people who are ready to be baptized. I've been really amazed to see the difference in the way I feel with a companion that actually uplifts me. I feel so much happier and closer to the spirit now with our companionship, and I feel like I am progressing a lot more now. Well I don't have a lot of time today, because we were trying to figure some stuff out. I'll talk to you on Saturday though, so I will be waiting your call. Love you guys tons! TTYL Elder Griffin

Semana Santa

Well the tradition in Paraguay for Easter is a little bit different than in the US. They celebrate it in a week called "Semana Santa," it's a catholic tradition so unfortunately it is what they all celebrate here in all parts. They pretty much just eat the food they call Chipa. It in the shape of a donut, but is just the flour from mandioca, with Paraguayan cheese. It is actually pretty good, but they’re a little too obsessed with it here. On Tuesday after our district meeting, my companion started feeling sick. We stayed in the house pretty much the entire week. Unfortunately our phone stopped working at the same time, and so we were completely out of contact with everyone. We were in the house Tuesday until Saturday. 5 days of staying inside. It was kind of a frustrating experience, but if my companion isn’t feeling good enough to go outside, I can’t really tell him that we need to go out and work. Needless to say, I got a good amount of studying done. I read the entire April ensign that had arrived that Tuesday. I also am about to finish the new testament…. I’m in Revelations…. And I started the Book of Mormon again, and I’m in 2nd Nephi 20 or so. I also reviewed two chapters in Preach My Gospel. So pretty much it was good to study, but I didn’t have the attention span to be studying the whole time, so I also felt like we just wasted a lot of time. This week was the least lessons that I have taught in the mission, 10 lessons in the whole week… not so great. Well about the lessons that we did teach this week… We were teaching two younger guys that are members of the seventh day Adventists. We had some pretty good lessons with them on last Sunday and on Tuesday as well. On Tuesday we got to their house, and they said that they had read and prayed, and that they didn’t feel anything. We explained the importance of praying with faith, and that we have to have a sincere heart. My companion invited them to do a prayer on their knees, and they accepted. I felt kind of awkward, and was kind of wondering why my companion was doing that since they had already prayed. I was feeling anxious when we started to pray. Then when they prayed, I just felt a feeling of peace come over me, and the thought popped into my head: “¿porqúe no confias en mi?” (why don’t you trust in me?) It was something that kind of surprised me, and I was thinking about it a lot afterwards. I had not put my trust in the promise of the Book of Mormon that anybody can receive a testimony of the book. I had a lack of confidence, and it had been replaced with anxiousness and fear. It really helped me to realize that I have to trust more in the lord. That I have to have a better confidence in the Book of Mormon, if I want others to come to know that it is true. Yesterday we passed again, and they had their brother come out to “listen” as well. They just wanted to argue with us and try to prove us wrong, and of course with both of us having good time in the mission, and both knowing the Bible pretty well just retorted their scriptures with other scriptures in the Bible. We weren’t getting anywhere more than just defending against what they were saying with the scriptures, and so we both started just sharing our testimony, the only thing that they can’t argue with. They still didn’t want to understand, and just couldn’t understand the fact that they can only know if they ask God. I felt such a strong desire to help them understand what we understand of the gospel, but the hardened their hearts and didn’t want to listen to what the spirit wanted. Well changes are coming up again in a week and a half or so. Meaning that I will not be writing again until Thursday. I’m not sure on the whole calling yet, but I’ll let you know when we find out. Love you guys tons, and hope that you have a fantastic week. I’ll talk to you later. Love, Elder Griffin

My First baptism

Well, this has been a good week here in Acahay. We had the baptism of Mirta, and it was the first time I have performed a baptism. It was pretty cool to be able to have my first time baptizing in a little river here. She was baptized and confirmed this week. She is the one that doesn’t talk, or hear, or read. I’m sure you can imagine how hard it was to try and teach her and interview her. Anyway, she left her boyfriend, and drinking so that she could be baptized, and has been coming to church every Sunday. It is amazing to see the faith of somebody like that. She can’t hear anything, but most important is that she can feel the spirit. It really was uplifting to me to learn that sometimes we don’t have to hear to be able to feel the spirit, and be edified as a person. Also this week, we had our priesthood and relief society class for the first time in this ward. We had to new people ordained to the priesthood. One being José that we recently baptized, and the other was a young man that is 16 years old. We now have 4 others in the priesthood, so it is really awesome seeing the improvement in the branch here were we are serving. On Monday my companion and I got our hair cut. It was a one dollar haircut (5 mil guarani), and quite possibly one of the worst haircuts I’ve had. Although, I think my companion got even worse. Luckily my hair doesn’t look all the bad when I put gel in it, but his is like a bowl cut. I got a package from Dana and Court. Tell them thanks for me! I’ll try to write them a letter, but it will take a couple weeks, so if you can tell them thanks for me it would be faster. On Sunday, we had a really good day. We found 8 new investigators, and taught 10 lessons. We found a lot of people that were really prepared by the lord, and we are really excited to be able to keep teaching them more, and see their progress in the gospel. I sent you some pictures of them, but as you can see, we found a lot of spider in this week. One night when we were opening up the door, I found that tarantula that you can see on the ground. The other tarantula was in our house, my companion threw some poison on it, but it ran behind a thing in our house that we can’t move, so we’re not sure if it actually died. Our house has a lot of little holes that bugs can come into, so we have a lot of crickets. Just about every night one of us wakes up and has to go cricket hunting so that we can actually sleep. Oh and don't worry, it's not our pet monkey. I am now feeling a lot better with my health. It’s really nice to get better from a sickness and all the sudden feel like I have a ton more energy. It makes it a lot easier to work the whole day, and not get so tired. Well, I love you guys tons. Thanks for all your support and advice, and love. I hope everything goes well with you guys, and that you always have the protection from the lord. My prayers are always with you. Love, Elder Griffin

Weeding Paraguayan style

Hola familia, Well this has been an interesting week here in Acahay. Well on Tuesday, my birthday, our cell phone stopped working in our district meeting. We had divisions, and the district leader came to our area with me. On the way to our area in the bus, an American started talking to me. It is a guy named Cameron, who is from Las Angeles. He is in the Peace Corps, and has been here for 6 months. He also is a member of the church, but hasn’t been able to attend church very well. He lives in our area, but about 2 or 3 hours from the chapel. Later, we had the interview of José and it went well. We had to make some calls, so we had to go to a cabin to make some calls and figure out everything with the matrimony on Friday. Later we finally got all that figured out and I went back with my companion. On Thursday, the day before the marriage, we went and did service with José. We went and weeded…. Paraguayan style. We used machetes to cut down the weeds and stuff, it was pretty tough in the heat, but pretty fun. After that we figured out that they had to renew their stuff to get married, so we went to make a call and then returned. When we returned, Liliana, the member was crying. She tried to tell us what happened, but we couldn’t understand her. We took José aside and found out that he had been cutting more, and was tired, so he laid down in some shade. Then she came to look for him, and thought that he was waiting for someone. Anyway, they got in a big argument, and neither one wanted to get married. We talked to José, and had him do a prayer to see if he felt like he needed to get married. He did the prayer, and said that he felt like he did. We then talked to Liliana, and did the same, and she said the same. We then talked to the both of them, and we had them do a “companionship inventory” like what we do here in the mission. It worked really well, and they decided that they would get married. On Friday, at 12 we had the marriage, and then on Saturday José was baptized in the little river in our area. It was quite the stressful baptism, but it went all well in the end. On Sunday, he was confirmed a member of the church. Also on Sunday, I got fevered, and when we went to our house to eat afterwards, I collapsed on the bed and fell asleep. I felt bad the whole day, so we couldn’t go out and work or anything the whole day. After sleeping so much, I feel a ton better now.

Are there any good men in Paraguay?

Well this has been a good week, a little interesting, but pretty good. To explain to you about the meat.... well pretty much all the good meat in paraguay, they export, and then sell the crap for a higher price. So in other words, there is no possible way to get really good meat here in Paraguay, and since my area is in the middle of nowhere, it is even worse. First off, we got a real map of our whole area, instead of just the city of Acahay. It is about 90 kilometers from side to side, in other words we have to take a bus just to get to another part of our area. The area is doing well, we have found a lot of future elders, and familes that we are now teaching. On Wednesday night, we got a call from our district leader telling us that we had interviews in Asunción the next morning at 8. We live a little bit outside of Asunción, so we had to wake up at 3 in the morning, get ready and take the first bus at 4. We got to the office at 8, and had our interviews. The president talked to me about my old companion, and understood everything that had happened there. It was a really good interview, and he helped me a lot with what he said to me about opening our area and everything. We have a lot of work to do with making it so that the ward actually has some families and preisthood holders instead of just women and children. Then on Saturday we went to a city called Paraguarí for the conference. I watched the first two in English and then the last 3 in Spanish. I learned a ton from all the talks. There seemed to be a couple themes that they focused on a little bit more. I feel like I got everything out of it that I was needing. I saw that it had snowed when they showed outside the conference center. On Saturday we went to pull out our money, usually 750.000, and could only pull out 700.000 because apparently the dollar dropped a bunch. The last time I looked it was 4200 guarani to a dollar, when I got here it was 5000 to a dollar. How is the economy over there? It seems like Barack Obama is doing quite well as president.... We had one investigator that came on Sunday to the conference. It was José, the one that is going to be married this Friday, and then baptized Saturday. If they both stay fatihful in the church, I'll be able to enter into the temple with them in a year or so. We have one member in our ward that has 5 children.... all from different fathers. A couple days ago we passed by her house the day after her now x-boyfriend abused her. He had punched her and beat up on her pretty badly, and almost killed her. We were guided there the next day, and talked with her for a while while she told us all the happened. I felt impressed to turn to Doctine and Covenants 121 and explained to her that sometimes we ask god: where art thou? that sometimes we feel alone and lost like Joseph Smith did. She said that she had asked that same exact question the night before, and so I asked her can you read your response from god then? I gave her the book, and slowly and sobbingly she read the two verses that I firmly believe in that time were a direct response to her prayers. We talked a little bit more with her, and helped her feel a lot better, and have more hope. She went to the conference, and seemed to be doing a lot better. After conference, a man stopped us and started talking to us about her. I asked him his name, and it was the same man (if you can call him that) that had beat on the sister. It was hard trying to talk to someone like that when I knew what he had done some nights before. It's really just a sad situation here, the women here in Paraguay just have such a hard time actually finding a decent man that doesn't have problems. Well, anyway, I'm doing well. I'm learning a lot more guarani now, I will probably be able to speak it by the end of my mission. We are having good success in our area, and everything is going well. We fixed our oven, and bought some things to be able to use the microwave. We are eating a lot better than we did the first week here. Well i hope everything is going well with you all. I love you tons. I'll talk to you next week! -Elder Ryan Griffin