First P Day

 I woke up at 4 in the morning today to go on a hike up this pretty mountain, and got done at 4 pm. 12 hours of hiking, and I got back about an hour ago, so yeah I have to leave it at that... Let`s just say it was an adventurous day. I have a testimony of prayer also. This week I have prayed for things, and that minute, second, hour, or day it happened. I know prayer works. Out here, the focus is on the people you serve. Losing myself in the service makes the days go by like nothing. This week have been soooo fast. I know it will only get faster too. My companion and I have grown closer, and have had some good times. He is such an example to me. So, this week I had one experience that made my week! We went into the home, or just like a dirt thing in the middle of their house thing with no roof and a few sheet metals around. We were teaching about Christ, and we were supposed to talk about the law of chastisty. I had never seen these people before, but I had the biggest impression to ask them to be baptized. So, I did, and they said yes! Then, my companion went over the law of chastity, and they had already been planning on getting married! So, turns out he had taught them 3 or 4 times before that, so it was perfect! I think I get to write tomorrow for some reason? not any time at all so I have to go bye love you all!!!! 

I Made it!

Hey so, I have even less time here because I write to the president too. so, I will try to write as much as possible! ok, so I can't spell right because I'm writing so fast so sorry. First, we get to Cuzco. It's so much more peaceful and calm. Nothing like Lima. We rode a bus to a chapel where we stayed all day getting trained. Then, we went to a hotel, and stayed the night. Next day we found out who our companions were. It was nerve racking. They called my name, I stood up and they said, Elder Jeffery, you are serving in the Cuzco zone with Elder Matekel. I was like, oh is that a Latino name, but turns out he's white! haha That day, Elder Matekel pronounced Elder          Matt E kel, and I just moved all of our stuff, and some beds and dressers into our apartment. It's an alright size, but our room itself is pretty small. There are two latinos that live with us. I swear they speak english more often than I do. haha My trainer speaks Spanish to me probably 90% of the time. Which is good! It's hard to know what's happening most of the time, but it'll come. Everything is dirty. Our bathroom is barely big enough to fit into, and there's always dirt and stuff on the floor. Ok, the worst part... NOT AN OUNCE OF WARM WATER. It's ice cold. When my friend Elder Quispe from Lima gets in he says, Cowboy up. haha He's getting hold of English way good! Every where we walk is uphill. Actually no, up mountain. I will send some pics next week so you can get a feel of where I really serve. The pics i sent are more pretty parts. We walk up dirt mounds all day, and the people live in literally sheet metal huts. It's crazy! So, one experience I will never forget. I had to go, bad. I haven't been solid in a while, if you know what I mean, and we were up on top of a mountain pretty much, so we found a lady that let me go in her house. I walked into this little room with no roof and cloth and metal covering. I looked and saw a cement platform with two places raised up in the shape of feet. no way. You can only imagine what came next. The dogs here are of satan. There are dogs everywhere. like insane. They run up to you and bark, and I always think they are going to eat me. But, Elder Matekel calmly walks by, and if they get close he sticks his foot out, and if that doesn't work, he pretends to pick up a rock, and the instantly run a way. Hopefully I get used to the dogs. It's not easy being out here. Every morning it's like a bad dream. I wake up, and everyone speaks a different language. I've found that it gets better throughout the day. One lesson on Saturday Elder Matekel told me while we were sitting there that it was my turn to teach. So, I tried. It was horrible. I stumbled over the restoration, probably getting half of what I was trying to say across. It was to two new converts, about 15 years old and 11. That night I got pretty discouraged. But, i looked at the paper you put in my suitcase, and use it all the time since. It says, ``Mistakes are proof that you are trying`` The next day was sunday. I had to bear my testimony in church. I got up there, and remembered that the day before how nervous I was. I decided to be confident. I got up there and bore my testimony exactly how I wanted. It was awesome. After, I decided to talk to as many people as I could. It helps when you apply yourself instead of waiting for something to happen. Then, that night we taught a lesson to a family in their house store apartment thing. They spoke broken Spanish Ketchuan. Ketchuan is a language that some people can speak here. We taught them about the restoration. They were members, but their son was inactive. I took on about half of the lesson, and it was great! I hope God gives me more of these humbling to teach me how to improve my teaching. I eat wayyyy too much food here. Our penicha or we call her mamicha gives us wayyyy too much food. It's insane. I'm constantly full. And, the members always give us bread when we come over, so yeah it's crazy. So, more pictures next week, and more experiences! Spanish is improving fast here, but still have a long way to go! Sorry if I don't get to writing everyone! Tell everyone I love them, and so proud of mariah and angelyn, they will do great in the plays! 

Letter From Mission President

Dear Parents,

As you can see in the attached photo, your son has arrived safely to the Peru Cusco Mission! We are thrilled to have him here! He looks great, a bit tired from the travel, but ready to go! Thank you for allowing us to watch over him for the next two years. He has promised that he will be a missionary we can trust, and we have now given him that trust. As well, you can trust that we will do everything that we can to care for him and to help him to become a successful missionary.

Con Gran Amor,

Presidente y Hermana Harbertson

Elder Richman

Secretario Ejecutivo

Telf: 084-260810

Cel: 984-503851

RPM: #623531

Keep Going

Hey, tell Teran and the family I say Hi and I love them!! So, this week I have grown to love my teacher here named Hermano Velasquez. We acted out the story of nephi and the brass plates in spanish.  I decided to speak to my teacher a ton more trying to learn spanish. Ít¨s helping a lot! I´ve been having a hard time feeling the spirit while teaching invesigators becasue I have to focus so much on my Spanish. I told my teacher, and he said to speak with my heart, and not with my mind. I took his advice in our next lesson with our "investigator" and felt I should ask Alonzo if he wanted to get baptized. He said yes, and it gave me more confidence in my spanish and being able to feel the spirit. So, all the peruvians here call me "futbol soccer Jeffery" haha It´s a blast playing out on the field every day. It´s probably one of the few things I´m going to miss about this place! haha I can´t wait to get out to the field!! I know it will be so much harder, but I´m ready for anything! Hermano Velasquez bears his testimony and shows us clips of prophets and apostles speaking to missionaries. Those meetings are where I have felt the strongest spirit of my life. I want to share one of the quotes with you. It´s from Spencer W. Kimball. It says, "If only you could see the vision I have. I wish I had your bodies to do this work. I would run form house to house telling everyone the gospel, and after I lost strength to run I would begin to walk, and afterI collapsed from walking, I would begin to crawl, and after my knees were so bloody that I could not use them, I would use my arms to drag myself, and once my muscle in my body was gone I would begin to yell... oh, only if you could see the vision that I have." I want that drive. I ´want to be able to keep going no matter what happens. Dang, sorry I wish I had more time on this thing. I wanna write you all but idk if i have time. It´s crazy.  Tell everyone that is leaving I say hi and good luck and to write!!! I love you mom!!!

To Dad

So, this week my friend Elder Jentzen cut my hair, and I was really scared he would mess it up, and it remimded me of when I tried to cut my own hair haah. But, he actually did a super good job!!! he has a haircut called a "part" and it look super cool and he gave me one, so now I have a part too!

Folleto

So, I had tons of ups and downs with Spanish this week. I had a few Latino Elders laugh at me the whole time I tried to teach them a lesson. I admitt it was a pretty rocky lesson for me, but it made me pretty discouraged about it. So, the next day I decided I would forget that day, and move on. I did, and I ended up having an awesome day, teaching a lesson, and getting a compliment from the teacher we taught. Every time I feel like I´m doing bad, God finds a way to keep me going. One of the highlights of this week was going out teaching on the street. So, I ended up going to the same area I did last time. I got lucky again, and had a companion that speaks English and Spanish. The only Latino in the CCM that could speak both. It was his first time. So, while we were out there, I recognized one of the guys I had seen on the street last time! We had breifly shared him a message, and gave him a pamphlet the first time we met him. He recognized me, and came over. He told us that he had met with the missionaries because we gave him the folleto, and wanted to know more!!! It´s was awesome to see someone take our invitation to meet with the missionaries! On Sunday Elder Day and I were assigned to be Zone Leaders. We officially start today, and will stay over our zone until we leave. I honestly don´t know exactly what I do yet, but hey, if they want me to do it, I´m game! We did introduce ourselves to everyone last night, and told them that we´ll come around at 10:30 to make sure everyone´s lights are out and going to bed. Now I´ll tell you some of the random fun stuff we did so you know that this place isn´t just a serious no fun gospel prison camp. So, this kid named elder whitlock fell asleep in our classroom, and we started whispering in his ear different things. We told him a story and he actually moved his hand and feet when we told him to. It was so wierd!!! We told him after, and he laughed way hard. He also remembered the story we told him. Me and Elder Day were upstairs getting something in our room, and noticed all the guys that left for the field left their pamplets here. So, we collected about 250, and got 105 Castidad folletos and put them in this giant display in the new kids rooms. Everyone came in to see the work of art. haha they came in last night saw it, and laughed. It was great. I officially have a Peruvian Visa now, so I´m not coming back to North America for quite a while!! One thing that really stuck out to me this week was humility. Christ was considered the least among some people. Even killed out of hatred. But none the less, Christ was and did the greatest thing for us all. He was the greatest example yet, was treated like the least. Every soul has potential. Potential to literally be a God. The trick is to trust in God more than yourself. Because only then can we be living our full potential. Alma 26:12 still pops into my mind every day telling me to trust in the lord and never fear. I love you Mom, you and the family are in all of my thoughts and prayers!! I love and hate writing these emails and reading!! so hard, but so neccessary!! Love you all!

Elder Jeffery
To Angelyn
Well, Lima is a dump. I mean it´s big and lots of people, but there´s trash everywhere, and stray dogs and on the mountains, It´s just houses made of sheet metal stacked all the way up the mountain. They make buildings on the side of mountain sides. Like drill out rock and stick it on there. And every single house has electric fence or spikes on top. Even the MTC looks like a prison because the walls are so high with spikes on top.

Three Nephites Sightings

 Ok, so this week went by so fast. The coolest thing that happened was something our teacher told us. Hermano Velasques is the coolest guy ever. He was bearing his testimony to us about his mission, and he said, "su mision es difacil, su vida ser facil, pero su mision es facil, su vida ser difacil." that problably didn´t translate exactly, but I understood it when he said it! haha pretty much, he said, "If your mission is difficult, your life will be easy. But if your mission is easy, your life will be difficult." He went on to tell us some incredible mission stories of his. One of them was of a time he was tracting, and they got to this lady´s house. She opened the door, and said, oh hi are you here to teach another lesson? They were confused and said they had never been there before. She said yes you have, but there were three of you last time, and they were big and strong. He told us a few more stories with different apperances of three other strong men, and bore his testimony about the three nephites. It was incredible, and the spirt was so strong. I bought a fanny pack from the temple store for carrying things more securely? (I can´t spell anymore uhhhhh seguridad?) it has the temple sewn into it, and it is sooooo me you have to see it. I can´t send pictures anymore because the last group that came through broke a few rules making it not allowed anymore. I wen´t to the temple this morning, that´s why I´m not on at my normal time, but oh man was it cool. It was in spanish, and I had a headset on, but some things we had to say in spanish which was awesome!! So, yesterday about half of the whole CCM went down with the runs. One kid was in el baño for almost 6 hours. I had it yesterday pretty bad, but I feel totally fine today. But, instead of soccer I just chilled and played ping pong. So, Elder Day and I were reading for personal study outside and I was in Jacob 5, and was kinda just skimming through because it seemed impossible to understand. I had a prompting to ask Elder Day about it (him being a smart dude) but just went on. It came again, so I just asked if he knew what it was saying. He said he just finished it and was wondering the same thing. So, we read it out loud to each other, and figured it out. It was such a great spiritual experience, and turns out, it has a lot of cool stuff in the chapter! So, we have a fruit here called grenedias (idk spelling) and you cut it in half, and inside there are seeds and goop that literally looks like fish eggs and boogers. No joke. And the inside has little spikes that look like sea earchen things or something. They are sooooo good though!!!! When we were out on the street shopping I saw some school kids playing soccer, and went over to them while everyone was taking pictures by the temple. I started passing and juggling, and they were amazed that this gringo could play. haha. I love the people here. My room is right next to a Latino room, and one started knocking on the wall right where I sleep. So, I knocked back. They all wanted to try so they all started knocking at me. It was almost time for bed, so I went into their room and pointed at all of them like I was mad, and they all pointed at each other. And one yelled No mi estudiar!! haha so, I pointed with two fingers at my eyes and then at each ones eyes and they all burst out laughing. So, we´re all good friends now, and they are trying to teach me this Latin pop song that they all love haha it´s great. So, did you email this week mom? Cause if you did it did´t come through... Alright I love all of you, and dad I can´t wait till I can write you in Spanish without taking half of my tiempo trying. haha love you guys so much and can´t wait to hear from you all!!!

Spanglish

 District CUSCO TOPIA

 Elder Day and Elder Jeffery first companion

 Arriving in Lima 4:00am

CCM AKA MTC
 I´m so glad everyone is doing great and life is great!! So, my district of 12 missionaries have come so close. We all weird and crazy. It´s a great time. My english is getting worse already I can tell. I speak spanglish now. Every time I say an English word a spanish one pops into my head. I feel like I am in the twighlight zone here in the CCM. Every day goes by so crazy fast. I´m almost half way done here. So, the best part about this last week was teaching people on the street. It was a blast. I went with a kid named Elder Naranjo. He´s fluent in both English and Spanish. Which was a huge blessing. I bore my testimony a few times, but one man we met was from New York and spoke english. So, I got to teach him a mini lesson about our church. It was great. Then we happened upon an inactive member of the church that let us into their house. I was impressed to bear my testimony to them, but I couldn´t say what I wanted to in spanish. So, I did it in english. It was a great spiritual experience. We have so many spiritual experiences here. So, fast sunday I was worried too because they don´t even give you any option of food to eat. Turned out though, I wasn´t even hungry the whole day! When you fast for a real purpose, with real intent, the Lord honestly picks up the rest. Just throw yourself into the gospel and he will bless you. Sundays here are super sundays. It´s so spiritual. It´s so much more meaningful when it applies to you that much more. I´ve already gain so much more of a testimony about the church. I´ve learned a lot about the great apostasy. The church just makes sense. Everyday I get a stronger testimony in my mind and in my heart. It makes soooo much sense. I don´t understand how you can see this gospel not be true. Everything is a testimony of it. There is so much truth to it. I will take picture of the market today for you guys so you can see what lima acuallly looks like. It´s huge, and crazy. I love you guys so much and miss you all!!!! Mom, you´re the best!!! Love you, and love hearing your stories so please keep it up!!

At the Lima Temple