Saturday, November 22, 2014

Semana de sesenta y uno!

Week 61 of 101 (11/10-11/16)

Wada goin on?

This week was great, it also flew straight on by. Last Monday, after we finished writing, Elder Tello and I went to the beach (Haha, yeah!) and we hunted crabs off the side of the dock. It was a ton of fun, even though we only caught one for a couple seconds before it tried to snap off Elder Tellos finger. Then, that night we had a great lesson with a young married couple. She is from Guatemala and he is from Orange Walk, here in Belize. She has family that are member, and even a brother who is in one of the other missions in El Salvador. They were super excepting, the only problem is that they seem to travel back and forth from Guatemala a lot.

Tuesday we went and met the man in the wheel chair. We tried to teach him but it was a difficult situation and it didn't go very well. However, we did find a less active family while looking for him, which is great.

This Sunday was the baptism of Alejandra! It was a great service and she got to feel the Spirit super strong. She was so happy afterwards, as was Carlos. I am so excited for the family and I am so anxious for Carlos to make the steps necessary for baptism so he can become a priesthood holder and go to the temple with his family.

Today we went to some Mayan ruins 30 miles away from Belize city. Incredible. You really feel like you are connecting yourself to the Book of Mormon.

I Love Belize, enough said!

Elder Vierkant

Semana de sesenta!

Week 60 of 101 (11/03-11/09)

My Friends,

I think part of the reason that we get time to write home every week, in addition to letting everyone at home know we are okay, is to allow us, as missionaries, to reflect on our week and appreciate the miracles we have seen and the lessons that we have learned through out the week.

First things first, I forgot to mention that Elder Ford, who lived with me in Sonzacate for 18 weeks, came to the island and now we live together again. If we stay together these next two changes, we will have been living in the same house for almost a third of our missions. The best part, though, is to be able to see the changes that can happen to someone in just 2 changes.

This week we had a multizone with all of Belize. It was incredible. I love being able to listen to President and Sister Hintze. The interesting thing here, is that (1) There are senior couples and they talk too and (2) the multizone are in English I am not going to lie, I think the spirit is stronger in English. Who knows why.

Carlos and Alejandra were going to get baptized this week but they decided that it would be better to wait until next week. I am so excited for them. They have been so prepared by the Lord. Their lives have changed so much. Carlos started to tell me about the many struggles with addictions and other things that have plagued his life, all of which have been changed by living the gospel. Now their focus is not just getting baptized, but hopefully someday entering the temple!

This Sunday was interesting. In between the two sessions of church, we found a man in a broken wheel chair who needed help getting home. We wheeled him to his house and carried him up the stairs and we began to talk with him. He is from Spain and moved here 40 years ago. There was pretty much nothing on the island at the time. He got in an accident a few years ago and now he can't walk and his family all live very far away. We asked him if he wanted to go to church, he said yes, and we were able to take him to church. I know the gospel will bless his life, because he has a lot of problems.

In church we had two people that were contacted in the street who came to church. Talk about miracles. I don't think I have ever seen that any where else.

Be grateful for all you have, the Lord loves you. Never feel abandoned or not good enough, the Lord loves you. Have charity, just as the Lord loves you.

Elder Vierkant

Semana de cincuenta y nueve!

Week 59 of 101 (10/27/20-11/02)

What am I grateful for this week?

First off, I am so very grateful to the Aldens for letting us come and spend our Monday with them in their condo. I am grateful for the food that they gave us and the nice conversation we had.

I am also extremely grateful for the time that Elder Lee and I had together and the lessons that I learned while we were together. I am grateful for a great new companion, Elder Tello from Guatemala. He speaks English really well, He is very patient and super fun to talk to.

I am grateful for the members on the island who work with us and help us find people, especially Omar.  He is a returned missionary and he LOVES the work of the Lord! It is incredible. He has helped us find many new investigators, by showing us where they live and just through his example. To illustrate this, we were walking down the beach (haha, yeah!) and a man stopped us. He asked us how he could get into the church and we invited him to church on Sunday. He said that he had been to a lot of churches and felt like they taught by the principle of "Do as I say, not as I do." But he had seen the great example of Omar, who refused to drink alcohol and smoke when it was offered to him. So now the man, whose name is David, wants to go to church and learn a lot more about the gospel.

I am also grateful that I could go on interchanges with Elder Christensen after Zone meeting. He is from Utah and played all the same sports that I did, so we had a lot to talk about. He is a great example of diligence, which was great. I learned a lot from the interchange.

I am grateful for the power of the Spirit. We were teaching Christian, the son of some recent converts. He knows more about the Book of Mormon and Doctrine and Covenants than most of the branch but hasn't been baptized yet. We were able to have a great lesson with him where we were able to help him recognize that he had already received the response from the Holy Ghost to his prayers and He now wants to get baptized.

I am grateful for the example of Jesus Christ for us. We have been teaching for a while. We taught them the attributes of Christ to help them over come their struggles and now they have the desire to get married and baptized soon.

I am so grateful to be a missionary. I am grateful for the opportunity that I have to see the many blessings that occur in my life.

Adios,

Elder Vierkant

Sunday, November 2, 2014

Semana de cincuenta y ocho!

Week 58 of 101 (10/20-10/26)


Hello,

Another great week. What is not to love when you are a missionary that also happens to be in Belize?

This week had some notable experiences. First of all, we have been able to start visiting Alejandra and Carlos a lot more this week. They are awesome. They are from El Salvador. They had met some missionaries in El Salvador but had moved to Belize. We got introduced to them by the Lee family (who have no relation to my companion.)

Carlos is struggling with several strong addictions, but this man is fighting like a lion. He is great. He really understands that the Lord is working in his life and he is willing to work along side the Lord to make the changes necessary in his life. He is so willing to do the Lords will even if it is hard. To give you an example, during third hour, we had a combined class between all of the adults and they were talking about assignments to clean the chapel. This man stood up  and offered of his talents and his time to help out in the church, on only his second Sunday there. He is a shining example for everyone.

A lot of amazing things happened this week but I will have to be short. This week we ended up having to go to Belize City twice, once to start getting my work permit and a second time to go to Belmopan, the capital, so that Elder Lee can get his papers ready to go back to El Salvador. Yes, Elder Lee is leaving me, but it has been a great change, though short. We also got a tour of a lot of Belize because we were in the car with the senior couple as they took care of other things.

I love Belize. I love the Gospel. I love the Lord.

Elder Vierkant


Golden Coral...Belize style!


Early morning boat ride to Belize City.

Awesome red bird! Is there an ornithologist out there that can identify the species?