4-23-12

Good news, i am still alive and kicking.  Today i took alot of pictures. We just climbed the tallest hill in Paraguay, i believe. Lets just say that there was no path and we where balaying and climb vines to get to the top. It was a jungle and we took our machetes to hack our way through.... well most all the way up. Wasn’t the safest thing i have done on my mission but I’m alive and got some cool pics.

But it is really good to hear that everyone is doing good except Braiden... WHAT DID YOU DO!!!! My baby. (Braiden wrecked the car.)  She was a beauty. That’s really cool to hear that it is warming up over there cause here its pretty cool. Dad i want you to know that my wife is going to be so hot!!! I am one hundred percent sure whoever it is, she’ll be a keeper cause i have never walked in so much rain and gotten so wet as this last week. I was in Devin’s coat and that rain just wasn’t having it. We were completely wet from head to toe for about 3 days straight. You always told me the more i walk in rain the better and there was a lightning storm also.. Wow!!!! i thought Paraguay was under attack. The thunder was the loudest thing i have ever heard.  It just shook me to the inner core, and was setting off car alarms everywhere because of the force of the sound. We had a great week all in all and again.. Up until Sunday and then it was kind of a let down. Elder Merrill and I are finding so many new people together. We find so many great people that are miracles and they just wont go to church, I don’t know why. We even have members on them and everything. I think the Lord is teaching me humility cause over the last 6 months of my mission i have had a pretty good amount of success and this area needs a little polishing. Same with the zone. We did interchanges with another area this week and had to lower the cane a little on some elders in our zone that were not being perfectly obedient but really i love the work. Usually when i do interchanges and i go to other areas i don't feel that love that i have in my own area cause i know i will find people and then just leave the next day, but i really felt a love for the people i was finding and teaching in the other elders area. I really think that that is a stepping stone that i am still developing, my charity or outlook for missionary work. They are not numbers but people that need to better their lives.  One family we found, they live out in the boonies but we contacted them and they called us elders and said they went to church before with the sisters but never got baptized and that they love the church. The dad works and will only be able to assist church every other week but they are great. I don’t know why they wont go to church. We have tried everything.  I am very grateful for my chance to serve here in ITA, don’t get me wrong. I love me companion.  He right now is looking at his flight plans.... I’m going to keep him working.  I love you alot and am thankful for the emails. Nicole thank you for the dear elder it is always fun to get letters.   elder shaw

 p.s. dad would you please see if you could apply me for byu Provo? I didn’t do to well on the act but i got straight a´s in byu Idaho before so i should be able to get in for the winter semester.

 p.s.s mothers day is coming up and try and get the 3 way skype working before hand or see what you can do.

4-16-2012

Dear family!



You gotta love life, to answer some of the question you asked, first yes i get along very well with my companion, we will continue working hard we are going to see many miracles.  I wrote a while ago back in Pilar that I had already gone to the temple so yes.  And there is no such thing as junior zone leaders we are co-companions it's called.  I got the package you sent and thank you very much it's what I needed.  We have the for strength of youth but... it's not really put in practice here... maybe we could use that to try and convince some of the parents to parent better. And Dad ya I totally chose soccer of basketball it is so much fun we played this morning with a lot of people and it was fantastic! but I am so out of shape.
Sounds like Caleb got killed!!!!! Tyler is playing ball?
With a lot of respect to every Elder that has passed through this area... me and my comp are doing a lot of cleaning up here, the list of members is a disaster, and there are very many less active.  It's kind of difficult to progress in the work here due to the situation that the elders have left our area in.  We are working very hard and little by little seeing the fruits of our labors!!  One crazy miracle that we saw this week was, I was looking through the area book and the member list and discovered a hidden colony that you can only get to by bus that had quite a few members out there.  We decided to go check it out and this last week we found the family Sanchez... which consists of 6 families out there.  And actived the whole colony.  Yesterday in church almost all of them came!!! It was such a cool miracle when we get the rest of them active it will be like 15 people more in our branch! Here in ITA it is very easy to find new people and have them listen but impossible to get them to church.. I don't know why.  We had over 25 people committed with a yes to go to church and 2 went.  Don't get me wrong I put in practice alma 29:2 I think it is and I am very grateful for what God is giving us but I want to be better and have more. 
We had interviews with president this last week to... I LOVE THAT MAN.  He read me like a book, I didn't even say anything and he called me out on my weakness' and wrong doings. I feel like I have become a better person in my mission but he warned me in not to plateau.  But he gave me a very great compliment.  He told me that he put me in the zone to raise it up and animate everyone because it is struggling worse than any other zone in the mission.... and wow the numbers last night that we received were really bad!  So I believe we will be doing interchanges this week a lot! I love the mission.  I'm not perfect and far from it.  I want to be a better person. Something funny this week, we were walking home after the day was over and we saw 2 completely wasted men that were laughing and dancing in the street. One of them bumped in to the other and got angry and they instantly turned enemies.  They started fist fighting and it was the funniest thing to watch we just sat there and watched it for a while towards the end the both fell over on top of each other and started laughing and were best friends again. Ha I love the drunks, they are like little children. Forgive and forget.   Oh and I found out today that my favorite guy in Pilar that me and elder Snow taught everything,  he was 30 and named Gorge. But he got baptized last Saturday!!!!!!!!!!!  I love that guy I am so going to write him. He will be a great leader!  But here in ITA we have got some work to do before we will see much fruit! I love you family and thank you for the letters! Keep being awesome and write me.  

Elder Shaw

4-9-2012

Happy Easter!!
Sounds like a awesome traditional Easter back home!, I always loved the huge chocolate Easter bunny when eating them with peanut butter! Speaking of peanut butter i will now be able to buy that in the store that is in my new area. It is huge this super store. In Pilar we had to buy our food out of despensas that was smaller then the scripture room. Yes i got a change.  I am no longer in Pilar. The new city that i am in is called Ita. I don’t know if president thinks i smell bad or if he trusts me being far away, but i am still not in Asuncion. I have been in every zone outside of Asuncion, which is very very weird. Ita is very beautiful. It is probably the richest area i have been in yet and more like a city. It is kind of like Encarnacion, my first area. It is really green and there are lots of trees everywhere. There are lots of busses and cars here with the rich people. The Catholic Church is very strong here compared to Pilar where almost everybody was Evangelical. I am again in a branch. I have only been in one ward in my whole mission. It has an existence of about 50 people but give us 3 months and it will be at 70!!!!!!!! My new comp`s name is Elder Merrill. He is from Utah, Longan i think. We are going to work very hard so he can stay focused and not get truncky cause he only has 5 more weeks in his mission.... ha ya. We really have to help this zone cause they struggle here and don’t baptize very much. We are trying to think of some things that we can do to help them out! This last week elder Merrill and I work aful!!!! and i have never had so many lessons in one week and so many new investigadores in one week. We almost had 60 lessons and 45 new investigadores.. But get this, the sad part is out of the many people that committed to go to church not one investigador went. My comp was telling me that this has been his hardest area to get people in church. But next week i know we will have a few news in church.  Elder merrill  and I get along very well. To describe him perfectly just think Gunner C. short, funny, outgoing, likes the same kind of music. Ha there are alot of very ignorant Catholics here that he likes to make fun of in the contacts, its very funny but we have to be careful not to burn bridges. 
Easter here is about 400 times bigger then there in the states cause every body has ``God on there lips`` :) so they try, but it is called the holy week here and Friday is a national holiday being the death of Christ. THERE WAS SO MUCH CHIPA!!! i don’t know if you remember the salty yellow biscuit looking thing Devin made for us in Pittsburgh that one time. It’s kind of like that but not so salty and with funny Paraguayan cheese.  The TVs only shows movies of Christ all week long! It was very easy to get in to a house to preach because the people accepted anything about Christ that is why we had some many new investigadores. Probably the biggest struggle here is going to be working with the members (i am all about working completely with the members) and the branch is spilt in two areas and there are 4 elders here and almost all the members live in the other area so we are going to have to be creative. We don’t have any baptisms in the near future but in a little yes or yes we will have some! I have found a new favorite chapter for now in the Book of Mormon. I have defiantly read over it before but for some reason in my personal study the other day the chapter really hit me hard. It is about Christ and his life and suffering for us and the charity that he had. It is very powerful scripture if you let it be. I love Christ and the lessons that he has taught me on my mission.  I know that he is molding me today so that tomorrow i can be a better person and better father. Its cool to see the changes in missionaries as you see them have more and more time in the mission. I am just very grateful that i lack a lot of time i love you all and family but I’m not ready to go home. Neither is my comp. I wont let him go so easy. He will be leaving out the door running! 
I know that Christ lives and that his hands are in everything. EVERYTHING is for our benefit even though we cant see it sometimes. I think as a missionary it made me see the good in alot of things. Yes dad. I am a diehard fan of soccer. I love it now. I want to play all the time. Sorry for never sending to many pictures. I am taking more then I send. But i can still take more. Ill do that. Its more the journal that has struggled.
elder shaw

3-2-2012

 LOVE MEN THAT TALK WITH GOD!
  The conference was great, was it not? Luckily I am in a place big enough to have received the conference because there were some Elders in our zone that did not have the privilege.  I loved it! It's so apparent that those men are prophets seers and revelators!  This last week was filled with miracles that I could not justify by circumstance or luck, but I know that God hears my prayers and answers them! 
This whole last week was great. The weather has cooled down significantly to the point of where I wake up a little bit cold!  We found many people to teach, including one woman and her child named Yudy. She is so very intelligent but we are not sure if she got baptized in our church or in the Jehovah Witnesses. She doesn't remember but she knows she got baptized somewhere.  There is another man that is named Jorge.  He is thirty years old and we started teaching him because he fell in love with a returned missionary sister here.  Turns out that he loves the church. Our lessons are so powerful with him.  He keeps telling us that he knows that God is answering his prayers to find the right path in this life through us and it really makes a missionary feel good when someone says that to you!  But really the amazing part of this week was the weekend. I absolutely loved the talks, all of them.  Elder Holland is a stud.  And his closing line stirred up quite a few people over here ``Repent, ITS GETTING LATE``. To me there was a big focus on the activation of the less actives, to reach a hand out to strengthen our brothers that have partaken of the tree of life but strayed away. Also I liked how a lot of talks focused on the way we treat others, including the relations in the family, avoid judging, serve, love, and resolve all contentions! I forgot who said it but a quote that really hit me was ``our Heavenly Father did not put us in this life to fail, but to succeed gloriously``!  Another was the story of the scholar that came to know the Book of Mormon was true through reasoning and scientific conclusions, but in order to have lasting testimony you absolutely have to have a spiritual confirmation.  I think that applies to all people, how we cannot rely on the testimony of your parents you have to ask god!  I remember one investigator I had in Cuidad del Este named Diego! I loved him and he was going to get baptized but then his mother in law beat me on the head and they fell away, but he was going to get baptized because he was so smart.  He always told us yes your message makes sense... but every time we asked him how he felt in his prayer he never received the confirmation. That is one of my biggest regrets I wish I could go back and baptize him! We just had to focus on the spiritual confirmation and not the reasoning of this message, even though it makes perfect sense!
Some of the miracles, the first 3 sessions we did not have one person, not one new investigator in church... AGAIN, so I was praying like crazy for the last session to get at least one person because we were working so hard and had lots of people committed to go. The last session started and nobody was there I said a prayer for someone to come and within 5 minutes we got 7 new people in church to listen to the conference! It was such a blessing.  My prayer was answered instantly.  And many other miracles happened this week but I know that God hears our prayers. Yes this week is changes and we should be getting the call in a couple hours to know whose going. I will let know next week!
I love you all,  
elder shaw