Eternity is the Goal

Notice: The following word-spit has not been read over, grammar checked, or edited in anyway.  If it seems repetitive and/or doesn't make sense, I am sorry.  I had a thought in my head and I wanted to write it but I didn't have time to write it good.

Hello everyone!

So, being here a little while I've heard had the chance to talk to a few of the young single adults here in the ward I'm in.  Many of them are really really cool people and the question that comes up is: Why the heck are these people single?

Some of the girls have told me it's because there aren't guys with high enough standards, and that most of the guys here aren't hard workers.

The guys told me that the girls here are crazy and aren't in it for the long run, divorce in very probable in the next year or so.

WHO-K, My advice to everyone is to go watch the old fashoned Jhonny Lingo and take notes.

What I've been seeing here, and what I've also seen in the states; is that we've been seeing a big drop in standards and respect.  Thinking about this problem, I've noticed it's because people don't have acknowledge of or have lost the eternal prospective of marriage.  We need to raise our standards and be the kind of person who's ready for eternity because half a lifetime doesn't cut it.

Guys, we got to pull our heads our of the dirt and start respecting girls, and be respectable ourselves. Work hard, have good standards, treat every girl like an eight cow woman (doesn't sound bad if you've seen Jhonny Lingo) and you will have an eight cow woman.
Girls, keep looking for prince charming, and keep your personal standards high as well, if you think of yourself as someone amazing than others will think of you as amazing too.

Eternity it the goal.  We need to be ready to be partners worthy and ready for eternity; marrage isn't something you can do half-hearted. We can prepare ourselfs to be an eternal companion through the gospel of Jesus Christ.  through his teachings, we can perfect ourselves and prepare ourselves for this task. Again, remember that the goal is eternity, if we can remember that we're off for a good start and we make the calculations and decisions that we need to to make to reach that goal.
In this there is happiness.

ANYWAYS

Hey there!

Everything here is great.  We've been working hard every week to better find people and teach people by the spirit.  through doing this we've had incredible results. My health has been good, I bought a bunch of spinich for smoothies this week, I'm making goals to eat good to have more energy because walking in the sun every week is kicking my butt. I hope everything is going well back home.

I love you all!

~Cameron

Earthquake!

Hello everyone!

Last tuesday (28 de Abril) was pretty eventful.  I got the package from you guys and now we're dancing to the music from "mission Africa" in the house thanks to the new pen-drive you sent.  Thanks!
Also on Tuesday, I woke up at 6:20 instead of 6:30 because my bed was rudely shaken.  I sat up and looked around and realized that it wasn't only my bed the was shaking, everyone's beds were shaking! Guayaquil had a nice little 10 second earthquake. I, knowing exactly what to do in those types of situations, quickly took my position:

They tell me that it was a 5.3, it was a little more dramatic than that ones I felt in Mexico.  Instead of a "Whoa, the ground is moving bro!"  it was more of a "WHOA! CRAP! EVERYTHING'S SHAKING!"Everything was alright though.

Things here have been pretty good, we're still waiting for the hard rains to stop...

They should be done soon.

Really though, everything here is normal.  Nothing to report apart from all that.
My health is good and the work is going on as is ought.  This Sunday I'll be calling home.

Thanks!

I need to go now.   Love you all!

~Cameron

Law of the Fridge

Hello,

I actually don't have much to report this week... things have been going slowly as far as La Obra Misional is concerned.  We've been hitting a who bunch of walls and doing a whole lot more walking than teaching, which isn't too fun.

Most of the time, I get home dead tired and look something like this:

This was just after getting back from an appointment where our investigator said: "I see dead people"

The nutty thing is that she probably isn't crazy.  D&C 50 is very interesting...

The week has been very interesting in this sense, we talked to another guy with Hindu beliefs who thinks that he can punch ghosts through meditation -He doesn't have doubts that Jesus visited the Americas though!

All in all I've been doing alright.  We got a greenie living with us in the house in place of Elder Maturano now.  We just got done explaining that the fridge isn't established under the law of consecration and Elder Howell's cheese and Elder Sanchez's bread isn't up from grabs. (Matt 25:9) We were nice about explaining it, however, if it happens again we will chop hands off.

Things here are normal, I really don't have much to report.  I'll talk to you all next week!

~Cameron

Little Miracles

Hello everyone!

It's still rain season but legally it's supposed to end at the end of this month which is great because things are supposed to cool down a few degrees and we wont get our books wet anymore.  It's been terribly hot, it'll be mice to have a little change in that.

This week has been a average normal week in the mission here in Ecuador.  We've found a few new people to teach and we've lost a few people too.  There are some moments when we don't know what God's plan is for us until a situation presents itself:

Like one night we were standing in a park one night looking at our planners because all our plans fell through for the night and were didn't know exactly where we should go. As we were doing this, an 11 year old boy stopped us and asked "excuse me, do you know God?"  We said yes and he asked if we could help him.  After asking that he started crying.  We noticed that his shirt was wet from him crying before.  We sat on the swing set and talked to him for awhile.

He had a lot of faith, he and his family were very religious, however, he discovered that his dad did...bad things with women and his mind basically got destroyed.  He said that he was praying for help and comfort and that when he looked up he saw us. We didn't know what we were going to do that night, but God did.  We talked to the little boy for awhile and comforted him the best we could.  We know that God hears and answers the prayers of ALL of his children.

Things here are going good. I hope the same applies back home. :)

Love you all!

~Cameron

P.S.  Here's a picture to satisfy mom:

We knock ALL the doors.  It doesn't matter who the people are, God loves all his chideren -even Darth Vader.

One Year Mark

Hello!

I let slip to Familia Gonzales that my one year mark was the 9th of April, as a result of me telling them that, I found them like this when we came to visit them.

I love these guys, they made me a cake and sandwiches! I hope I get to see them baptized one day, they're fantastic and work hard every day to live and understand the gospel. However, the transfer cycle is next Monday and I have more time in this ward than the other missionaries.  It's possible that I'll be leaving my beloved ward here in Albonor soon.  However, these things can never be predicted.

I can use knife?




I'm gonna send a couple pictures because I've really been slacking, that, and I don't know what I should write...I had an idea, but I lost it. hmm...
Oh well!  On with pictures!

This last week we had an activity where they youth in the stake got to put on a future missionary name-tag and go out contacting with all the missionaries.   Some of our girls got to have doors slammed in their faces and our boys got a sermon taught to them by on old catholic man.  But all and all we all had a good time and the youth learned a lot about the missionary experience.  At the end of the day we all got together at the church and wrote our testimonies of the restored gospel on the little paper and sent them away on balloons.  It was a really cool idea... but it poured rain not long after.  Oh well...

Me eating a odd fruit that I can't remember the name of.  It's very yummy and sweet.

Raining. Pouring.

I hope you all had a great easter.  Easter here as a missionary means that everyone is out of town seeing relatives or at the beach, however in a wider perspective its a fantastic time to remember Jesus Christ and all that he did for us.  We also had the great oportunity to share the video Because He Lives with everyone.  If you haven't seen it, REPENT.

www.mormon.org/easter

I got to see all the sessions in Spanish, which is still not as good as seeing them in english because its not exactly the same if it isnt their voices.  However the two talks in spanish were great! no translation needed.  We saw four sessions and a half.  The Priesthood session got cut when the power went out due to the rain.  We're probably going to download it and listen to it in English in the mornings while we're getting ready, along with all the other sessions, the sessions that are in Spanish we're going to leave as they are.  Conference talks are best in their original language, and as long as we understand them it's better without a translator.

We're still in rain season. the other week we were walking in one of the further parts of our aria on our way to a dinner that a member invited us to.  It was raining pretty hard.  We took a turn at El Colegio Albonor to go down a familiar street- however, the street had been replaced with waters of the Red Sea...  We weren't sure where all the water came from, but it sure as heck wasn't going to get between us and food.  the water was a little higher than my knees, it didn't stop the bus 85 though.  the bus plowed right through making very large waves the we climbed up windows to avoid.  I was a whole lot of fun.

The other week it was raining so we went to the church to get dry for a little bit.  When we left, was witnessed a car take a sharp turn and lodge itself onto a divider in an intersection.  He got enough speed onto that thing to get is front tires up in the air making it so that he couldn't back the car off.  Despite the hard rain we went over to help them out.  A Motorcycle Cop showed up about the same time we did, and together we pushed the car off the divider and they were able to drive away.  The cop then said "Hey Elders! Have you had dinner yet?" We said no.  He said "Well if you aren't busy meet me at that restaurant down the road and I'll buy dinner" We said "well......OK!"
We found out that he's a member from Santo Domingo (which is a city out by Buena Fe) and that he just recently got reactivated buy the Elders out there.  However, due to his job he hasn't been able to talk to them lately.  We invited him to the General Conference and he gave us his number and told us to call him if we needed anything.

Other rain stories are just us getting a wole bunch of wet.

We've been working pretty hard.  We're been staying as healthy a possible.

To answer moms question from the other week: We do not take anything for paracites.  But we do drink Coke, which I like to think helps.

I got my camera to come back alive, I wont buy a new one until it dies completely.  The good news is that I recovered my pictures from 2014.  The bad news is that I think I lost all my pictures from 2015 in the process... I just can't win.  I'm going to use a little cash from home to buy a pendrive because I don't trust my pictures on the card.

Everything here is going great!  It's not easy but I've discovered that I've gotten used to that.  I hope all is well back home.  I'll keep you posted.

Love you all!


~Cameron

 Dad sent Cameron the Golden Easter Egg this year... so we couldn't find it! Rude.

What a surprise!! (not)

Questions & Concerns

One time in Buena Fe me and my companion were finishing a lession, At the end of the lession my companion asked the investigator if she had any questions, and she said no.  I then asked if she had any concerns and my companion cut me off and said questions and concerns are the same thing.

I've lately come to believe to that is more or less a lie. Over the last couple weeks I've found a couple of things in the doctrine that don't make complete sense to me.  This hasn't been the first time that I've come across things that don't make sense to me and I am certain that it wont be the last.

There are lots of people who come across these types of things and see it as a reason to not believe that the church true and to not join or leave the church. This is sad, because I've come to learn that these things always had answers:

With all the things that I've come across, I've taken them to be questions rather than concerns.  And as questions, I looked for the answers through study and asking the people around me, and I've found some incredible answers that have helped me understand the plan that our father in heaven has for us a whole lot better.

If I were to take these questions as concerns or doubts, the doubt would do nothing but wear a hole in my testimony and probably spawn more doubts. As a missionary I would never be able to help anyone understand this thing that I myself don't understand if I let that thing personally become a concern.

Concerns are different than questions, but it's true that they're similar.
However, if someone DOES have a concern about the doctrine of the Church of Jesus Christ, I encourage them to turn that concern into a question and take that question to scripture study and friend.  Try to find the answer.  The cool thing about the church is that the doctrine is perfect and there is always an answer to the questions that we have.

It's true that some things are hard to find, not understandable, or hidden from us.  But what we need to understand is that God's plan is perfect and has no fault.  Morely, the Church is true everybody, that too is very important.  :)

Cameron