Photos!

Just my goodbye lunch here in Cubulco.  There is a picture of Elder Nombrado and Elder Gomez... Elder nombrado is going to peten with me but he is going to a different area... and Elder Gomez is staying here in Cubulco....

Fotos and the week summary...

Well This week was good and a little bit stressful... We were able to have a pretty good week... mainly because all the baptizms went through successfully.  We baptized a guy named tereso and his family.. it was a pretty great experience.  He is such a great guy and will be a great member here in Cubulco.. Maybe he will be the person to get this place going strong...  So we are super happy about that.

Also as shown is these photos we also helped a less active member to chop down a tree.. so that he would go to church.. so that was pretty great also!  We are just going along pretty smoothly here.  

Also we are now in a trio.. because Elder Barahona ended up going home.. because he had appendicitus and his appendix exploded and that was why he was throwing up blood.. so they did surgery on him last monday and yesterday he went home.  So I am now back with Elder Gomez.. .and his companion Elder Nombrado.  Elder Nombrado is samoan.. he is a super good guy elder nombrado... We get along super well..  So that is pretty fun!  But I think that that is about it for this week...

Love Elder Stuart

Wedding and the baptism!!!!!

Good week!

So this week was a good week!  First off we had to change the place where we were having church which is now coing to be in my house. So that is going to be a little bit interesting.  We are super excitied for that we are hoping that that will help us a little bit now that the church is going to be in a place a little bit more stable.  So we are super excited.  And it showed success because we were able to have 10 investigators in church.  So that was super good. We had a family of a guy that is named Juan Carlos... I dont know if I already explained his situation or not.. but We found  him, me and Elder Gomez, like 3 weeks ago and he had told us that he had been healed by the Elders like 3 years ago... He had some sort of sleeping disease and he hadnt slept in like two weeks, when his mom went to go find the pastor of the Catholic church so that he could give him a blessing.. but it didnt work.. .so the mom went to go find the leader of the Nazareth Church... but it also didnt work... so she was talking to her neighbor (which just so happened to be the only member in Cubulco at the time...) and the neighbor told his mom that the Elders could give him a blessing... so they did, and he was healed!!  How great it is to have the power!  So long story short the Elders had a change after they  healed him, and he couldnt go to Rabinal to go to church... so now that we have found him we are excited for him and he is super excited to get baptized with his family!!  We are hoping that they will be baptized the 18th of April! So that was super great!

Also me and my companion are getting along suprer well so that is good!  I am just hoping to be able to finish strong! 

Love Elder Stuart

(30 Mar 2015)

Another change!

Well this week I dont have a ton of time... but I guess that I will just send you guys a little message.  So this week we had changes, and it turns out that Elder Gomez wont be my companion anymore... but we will still be in Cubulco!  They opened up a new area in Cubulco!  So that is pretty cool we are going to see a branch pretty quickly there now... with 4 missionaries there.  So we are pretty excited for that!  So I will be getting a new companion this week so I am super excited for that!  We are just super excited to see the change here in cubulco with four misisonaries!  So yeah I guess that is all for this week, but I promise to write more next week!

Love elder Stuart

(16 Mar 2015)

Another week gone...

Wow... well we had some interesting things happen this week, but nothing that is too unordinary...  But first one of the funny things.  We have to go to Rabinal every week to do meetings and stuff like that in the church... but in the morning after church got over Elder Brito left the keys in the office and locked them inside... and well that was the only pair of keys... so when I got there we spent like 20 minutes trying to open the window and door by picking the locks (we really didnt think that it was going to work but we didnt want to have to break the door)  but it didnt work... so I finally decided that I was just going to kick the door open...  Remembering that we are in guatemala and everything here is built weakly... so I just kicked the doorknob and... It opened!  So I have officially kicked open a door now.. the only problem is that we kind of ruined the door knob, so we bought a new one today and replaced it... so that was pretty fun...

Also this week was kind of a sad week but also a good week.  Marcos, who is the husband of Lucia, who got baptized in december, had been trying and trying to receive an answer for  quite a bit of time... and finally this week he got his answer!!!!!!!!  So that was super good... he had a dream that he was on a bus with me and Elder Gomez and his family and that we were all going to a place... and a guy came on the bus and asked for our tickets, and Marcos was seated behind all of us, and was watching us give our tickets to the collecter.... but he said that he couldnt find his ticket.  And finally when the collector came to him told him that he had to have a ticket to continue on and that without a ticket he couldnt continue... so he got off the bus and was looking for a way to get a ticket, and a man dressed in white, with a white beard came to him and gave him his ticket to continue on... and so then he got back onto the bus and could go with us to our destination... So that was a pretty cool story to hear...  But now here comes the sad part... Marcos left for the States today!  So he couldnt get baptized before he left, and so we will see if he will follow through with the church there and if he will get baptized there... Luckily I have a way to contact him through email so we will keep in touch... but I hope that he can get baptized!  

And well many other things have happened this week but those were the two experiences that I wanted to share this week!

Love Elder Stuart

Photos!

Looking for a less active and going way out into the middle of nowhere to look for them coming to their house just to figure out that they now all live in the States...  Bummer

My companions birthday (the 8th) and it was on the same day as interviews with president... so we got to eat pretty good... Pizza and Cake....

Another week down!

We are back for another week of writing!  Well this week was an interesting week here in Cubulco!  Church this week was a pretty good week!  We were able to have quite a few people in church which was pretty good... but the only problem is that all the investigators and less actives that had been going for like 2 or 3 weeks decided to not go last week... and all the new people that we found went... so we were still missing a lot of people which is kind of a good thing.. which means there is a lot of room to progress... but a little sad because we could have had a lot more than the 27 people that we had in church!  But we are hoping for a good week next week too!

As for me and Elder Gomez... we are doing great!  We are getting along pretty well.. and he is starting to break out of his shyness.. still isnt quite there.. but he is doing a lot better than he was when he started the mission!  So we are doing good with that!  

And lastly I have really come to recognize the importance of goals in life!  I absolutly love putting goals now!  It is something that if you dont do it right now... you should because it really helps!  But anyways that is all...

Love Elder Stuart

New Year!!!!!!!

This week was a pretty good week here in Guatemala.  We were able to have a good attendance in Sacrament meeting!  We had 23 people there!!!!!!  We are growing so quickly here in Cubulco!  We are looking to have at least 6 potential melchezidek preisthood holders before april so that we can become a branch!  We have just got 3 to go!  And we have dates set for baptism for 2 of them and another one who is almost reactivated! It will probably just take him like 3 or 4 more weeks to get reactivated and 3 or 4 weeks to baptize them!  So we are looking pretty good!  We will have the goals met by march so that we have a month of consistancy and then we are going to present the group to the area to see if they let us be a branch!!!  I am so happy to see the progress of the group!  When I was here in Rabinal last year there wasnt a single member active in Cubulco.. and when I got here this year there were 4!  So I am super happy to see the progress of my area!  It is super great!!!!!

then also as for the other parts of the work it is all going smoothly!  So me and Elder Gomez are doing good!  Not many problems as of right now!  

Love Elder Stuart

Photos!

Jeffrey's camera has been broken, and after a few attempts of getting a new one to him, he finally just went and bought his own, so we now have pictures again!

Our Christmas party as a District...  In one of those pictures you can find Elder Gomez.  But yeah that is it...  

2 of the houses that we visited and there are some of the pictures of the food we ate.. and those are the people that we ate with... that man is and Investigator... 

And the other group is basilio, Erika, and Luki (our baptism from 3 weeks ago)...  and also where the picture is with Basilio is where we have church!  so that is the capital!

Christmas night at a members house!  We opened presents and everything!

Us walking out to the baptism.. and we walked a long way... and all those people walking are the members from Cubulco!  We walked about 1 hour into the mountains... to find this river looking thing to baptize her!  There is me her, and my companion!  

Photos!

Sorry for the bad quality but I just figured that i would take some pictures with the phone to let you guys know what is up... but yeah that is me and my companion, Elder Gomez, then there is a picture of the baptismal font... and lastly the bus on the way to the party.. I went standing right where I took the picture the whole time!  It was a full bus!

HEYO!!!!!

Well this week has been a pretty good one!!!!!!  I just love this area of cubulco!!!!  The members are awesome... the investigators are awesome... the climate is awesome...  IT IS JUST GREAT!!!!!!!

But anyways... this week was full of stuff so I am going to go by day by day...

Monday:  We went to coban to get rid of Elder Tello... he was a good companion, so I am going to miss him... but that was kind of a boring day...

Tuesday:  I got my new companion... His name is Elder Gomez!!  He is from the Domincan Republic, and well lets just say that he is still getting used to the mission... he is new.. .this is his first week, and he is a little bit weird, but he remind me of me... He doesnt talk AT ALL!!!  I have had like 4 or 5 people ask me this week if he knows spanish... and well of course he does, but he just doesnt talk... so we are just getting used to that!

Wednesday:  We got to cubulco and had the first day of work with elder Gomez and it was a pretty great day!  We were able to meet with luki and prepare her for her baptism on friday... and all was well and we put the plan to have the interview on thursday!

Thursday:  Luki had her interview and she passed with flying colors!!!  She knos a ton about the gospel, and now she hardly has friends, because she accepted the church, but she loves life now better than before, because she recognized what is the correct thing to do!  So she is great!

Friday:  In the morning we had the baptism of Luki and I baptized her!  And well all is well with her she is doing good... and we did it in a waterfall!!  It was pretty cool!  Then after we baptized her we went to the District Christmas party for all of Baja Verapaz... which is like the stake here where I am at but its not a stake it is a District, and we were able to take 11 investigators to that... and it was in Salama which is 2 hours away!!!!!  So that was just fantastic!!!!  All the people loved it!!!

Saturday:  Saturday was just a day to prepare for sunday.. .so we just visited some people and we taught them a little bit to get them to go to church on sunday...

Sunday:  This was probably the biggest week!  We were able to have church in the morning and we confirmed Luki and I did it again because my companion didnt want to.. because he was scared to do it in front of the people... so yeah got to work on that, but yeah church was good...  Although sunday was a very long day... I have to direct and preside the church meetings... then I had to talk because the people that were going to talk didnt show up... and then I had to give the sunday school class, because we still dont have a teacher for that... then after church from we went to go visit one of our investigators named Edwin and he decided that he is going to get baptized the 17th of January which is good... then after him we had to go to our house to do tithing settlement from like 2:30 until 9:00... so that was kind of a bummer because we couldnt work but it was kind of fun to do interviews with the members!  So today I am super tired... because last week was just full of stuff, and this week we are going to have even more things!!!!

Cant wait until next week!

Love you All

Elder Stuart