Buenas Cosas Vendrán

This past week was pretty rough.  We didn´t get many lessons, our investigator only came to one hour of church, none of the less actives came, and the District leaders and Zone Leaders are giving us a bunch of flak because we haven´t had any new investigators in four weeks.  On top of that.  It is hot and the soles in my shoes have melted.  We walked a ton this week and my feet have taken the beating and are just destroyed with blisters. In the Mornings, for our 30 minutes of exercise, I jog in place and do plyometrics and whatnot (it sounds a little goofy, but hey, you gotta work with what you´ve got) But lately I haven´t been able to. I can´t stand on the palms of my feet because of how blistered they are. When I get up to stand, I wince just about every time. I´m not telling you this as result of complaining or discouragement, only to build the context of an experience that really helped me personally.  Like I said, things aren´t going in our favor right now.

In one of our lessons this week, we shared a Mormon Message with a less active family. It was called "Buenas Cosas Vendrán" (Good things will come) and it is taking from a talk from Elder Holland.  In the video, towards the end, he says, with watery eyes "Don´t you quit, you keep walking, you keep trying, trust in God and in Good things to come." That statement just hit me like a ton of bricks and went strait to my heart. "You keep walking." It gave me the courage to keep going on the blistered feet and melted soles. How grateful I am for the Lord and the abundance of blessings he has given me! Good things can come, and they will! Maybe not now, maybe not in a long time, but with putting all your trust in the Lord, everything will work out. No, things aren´t working out for us right now, we are getting rejected left and right, the members get offended especially easy and go inactive, and we spend hour after hour in the 100+ Sevillian sun. But I know with all my heart that with trust in the lord, things will work out.  The truth is restored on the Earth, how much reason we have to rejoice!

I have the amazing chance to see daily miracles and see myself learn and grow. I am so grateful to be here in Alcalá. If missionary work didn´t push you to your limits, then I don´t believe it would feel rewarding at all. We all have our own personal challenges that will push us to our limits and truly test us, but I can testify without doubt that buenas cosas vendrán.

Os Quiro,
Jason

Nothing Too Crazy This Week…

Elder Barney and I are doing great. We have a good relationship and we are getting a lot of work done.  Like I´ve mentioned, we teach a ton of less actives and not gonna lie, it gets to be very frustrating.  We have taught them all many many times and they still just don´t go to church! I see clearly now how important it is that we do the small things that matter most.  As we talk with these less actives and figure out the moment they stopped going to church, it always seems to be the same moment they stopped praying, reading and going to church meetings.  I firmly believe that if you do those 3 small things, you will always live worthily before God because with reading, praying, and going to church, you will find the desire to serve and be faithful!

I can´t say that anything too crazy has happened this week.  We´ve come in contact with tons of drunks, beggars, punk youth in the street that all just have it in for us for some reason.

This past week, we went to go teach a recent convert and she lives out in the country and its about a 35 minute drive.  We got there and taught the lesson and it was fine but the thing about Spain, Spain has about 4 hours where nothing happens, from 2-6pm it is just dead here.  We finished our lesson at 1:30 and went to catch the bus, but the buses weren´t running! AH! the last one left at 1 and the next one came at 6! So there we were, out in the desert, (see previous sent pictures to view the desert that we walked through) without a bus. So we walked. It took us about an hour and a forty-five minutes to walk back.  It was so hot and dusty, but we finally made it back!  We got home, drank some water and just died on our sofas.

But all in all, it was a good week and I am so grateful to be here in Alcalá and working with the people here.

Lots of Love,
Os Quiro,
Elder Jason Hunt

"Elder Hunt and the Allegory of the Olive Tree"

Some Things Never Change

For my week,

Alcalá is a pretty fun little town. It is very interesting.

The lord has blest me so abundantly on my mission.  Right when I got here, an old investigator showed up out of now where and wanted to take the lessons again.  We even set a baptismal date for him! the 13th of August!

Nothing too crazy happened for the week, I´m running short on time because we got back from visiting sevilla so late.  But what a cool city! We went to a cathedral and to the "Plaza de españa" where they filmed the naboo palace scene from star wars episode 1! way cool!

We work mostly with less actives here in alcalá because there are just a ton of them. We stay pretty busy with them. It is pretty frustrating because they just...I don´t even know, they are just inactive to be inactive. I just don´t get what their deal is.

here are some more pictures from alcalá
we had a reference for a pastor, a sheep guy, out in the middle of no where. It ended up being un-profitable. But it was cool to see the nothingness of sevilla.

I had a few things on my mind that I had to confess to the priest, ;p

The other day, some Jehovah´s witnesses knocked on our door, your should have seen their eyes when they saw us. It was great. They immediately tried to condemn us to hell and they just keep talking about how evil we were and that the scriptures say this and this and whatnot, and after they finished their little spiel, elder barney and I asked some questions, totally stumped them and they tried to give us a book on "how to understand the teachings of the bible" but they ended up taking a restoration pamphlet from us in the end.  I have truly come to realize the power of asking good questions.  We taught a lessons where we used almost only questions to teach and it was such a powerful lesson. Good questions are just great!

I have seen my self grow in so many ways since starting my mission. I can look back and see how much I have matured in responsibility and the way I present myself.  I have learned so much about the man I want to be.  But some things, well, some things will just never change ;p (when you see the picture you´ll get it..haha)

Well I love and miss you all and am so grateful for the letters!

Lots of Love and besitos,
Os quiro,
Jason

Extreme Heat!

Like I said before, I´m in the pueblo(town) of Alcalá de Gaudaíra and here is my mail address again so you can send me stuff!

Calle Avena 7
41500 Alcalá de Guadaira (Sevilla)
España

But anyways,

On transfer day I got here and it was 113ºF. Whew.  But its only gotten hotter! Today it has been 118º and the people say that the heat is just getting started.  But on a happy note, our house is a real house! It is HUGE! we have a main level, a garage, a "backyard" an upper level, two bathrooms, and a roof that we can hang out on. But my favorite part is...AIR CONDITIONING! WOOHOO! oh its nice.  I don´t understand how anyone can live here. It is unnaturally hot.  They say last summer broke the all time heat record at 140ºF.  Isn´t that the lowest setting on an oven?

My new companion is Elder Barney from Boise, Idaho. He´s been out 7 months so we´re a pretty young companionship.

But enough of the heat! I got to meet the ward this past sunday and it is going to take a lot of work with them.  They´re a little interesting.  Also, they go through bishops like crazy because they all get offended by him or have some small issue. We have a binder with papers for about 50 less active members all because they had a disagreement with another member.  So most of the "Alcalá work" is bringing less actives back.  Today for Pday, since we have a huge house, a bunch of elders from our zone came and we had a 4th of July BBQ.  It was very fun. We also went bowling. I got a 145! I think my best game of bowling ever.

I am still getting used to the extreme heat here, I went from about 90F to 113F in one day.  But the other night I was a totally dehydrated and was completely trippin out.  When we were sleeping that night, I woke up felt my legs and noticed that I was wearing shorts.  I tripped out thinking we were at a members house for some reason.  It was pitch black (they have the reladins here) so I get up and start shouting for my companion. He was in the bed next to me and was like "what the heck is going on!?" and I shout " Where are we?!" (thinking we were in a members house) and he says "Spain!" and then I finally said "But were in our house in bed right?!" he reassured me that we were in our house and that it was bedtime.  I went back to sleep but in the morning I woke up again completely dazed and had now idea where the heck I was. It was pretty scary.  So I am drinking much more water now.

On this wonderful day of independence I reflect on what it means to be free and how grateful I am that I am American.  They aren´t free here like they are in the United States.  Sure they have laws for freedom of speech, religion, press and what not.  But Spain is enslaved by tobacco and pornogrophy.  There is a tobacco shop about every 50 feet with cigarette vending machines and just about every adveritsement for whatever type of product has a completely naked person on it.  Yes we do have our issues in the US, but not nearly as bad as it is here.  I am proud to be an American and I am so grateful for the Freedoms that we have because without them, the gospel of Jesus Christ couldn´t have been restaured back in the early 1800s.

Well not too much else is going on for me. It´s hot. We were working hard. The church is true.

I love you all and thank you so much for your love and support!

Os quiro
Jason

¡BAUTISMOS POR MILES HABRÁ!

(for the record, I have no idea what that means.. – Ashley)

Yesterday was probably one of the happiest days of my life.  First, at church they had the best farewell missionary sacrament meeting. It was just like in the movie the other side of heaven, no joke.  So it wasn´t intended to be like that but thats how it ended up.  So one of the sisters spoke as the last speaker and she talked about how accomplished she felt when she went out and helped us once with a lesson.  She just went on and on about how great we were and how great missionary work is.  Three of the Four elders in the ward are being transferred, so she talked about how much she would miss us and how we actually did a lot of work compared to elders in the past.  It was great.  And then, the bishop called Elder Burdette up to give his testimony and it was just wonderful, then the bishop said we were going to change the closing hymn to "Hasta ver" (God be with you till we meet again) and they invited the 3 of us onto the stand, and we all stood and sang it. I lost it.  I don´t know what got into me but I just couldn´t hold in the tears.  As I stood in front of the congregation, looking at all their smiling faces and I lost and just starting the waterworks.  I worked with these people and reactivated quite a few of them and seeing them smiling at me, I feel that I can´t even describe the love I felt.  When the song was over, I went back to sit with my family (the ones we baptized) and they all had tears in their eyes and it was such a beautiful moment. 

I have seen 2 big miracles while I´ve been in Málaga.  One, is that I helped bring a family that was inactive come back to active status, and I just love them so much, the Pávez family from Argentina and I seriously think of them as family.  They are so dear to me and close to my heart.  It was funny, when we told them that I was getting transferred and my comp was staying, they were pretty bummed. They like me 10x more! haha. anyway, and the second one is that we found, taught, and baptized the Martínez family.  And I love them just as much as the other family, if not more.  I really don´t think I can express the love or feelings that I have felt in these past few days. It was just amazing.

So funny story now.  So at the baptism, the water wasn´t started in time so it was pretty shallow.  So the mom, Veronica is a bit bigger and taller, we decided that I would baptize her.  I had to baptize her SEVEN times in order to get her completely in the water! what a pain! haha, but she was a great sport about it and now the mission president(who was in attendance) is making an example out of us to make sure the water gets started on time! haha.  But it was a beautiful event and get this, almost the entire ward was in attendance, it was amazing! I have been so blest to have been able to serve in this Ward!

Ok, so transfers, I´m headed to the one place I didn´t want to go for the summer. wait for it...wait for it...SEVILLA! UGGGGGGGHHHHHH!

and on top of that, I´m not in the city, I´ll be in a little town.  The best comparison I can make is, its like me living and serving only in the town of herrenburg.  We´ve got a branch up there with 15 members with 7 active. But I´m ready for the challenge! I hope! haha. Its funny, whenever I tell people where I´m going, they tell me they´ll pray for me!  Sevilla is the hottest city in Europe with temperatures up to 130ºF.  Pray for me. When the president called me to tell me he said, your is hard area and has a bad reputation, but I´d like you to change that. First of all, WHY would he tell me that! but whatever, I´m excited to raise this little town out of the ground! I´ve been in a little town for most of my mission so far, so how bad could another one be right!? haha.

well, that´s about it for me!

oh yea, here is my address for the next 4-6 months

Elder Jason Hunt 
Calle Avena 7
41500 Alcalá de Guadaira (Sevilla)
España

One Week Till Transfers!

I´m about ready to kill my companion.  But I can do it.  I only have a week left and on thursday I´ll find out where I´m going to be transferred! I´m pretty excited and nervous about that!  I absolutely LOVE Málaga and I love our ward here.  Málaga is the coolest place in the world. But when I say cool, I don´t really mean that, it was about 45º C the other day.  I thought I was going to melt.  The heat and humidity don´t bother me too much, but then, I´m in long pants and shirt and tie. That´s when it starts to bother me.

Nothing too big or grand happened this past week.  However, on saturday, two drunk guys walked by us and said  ¡Creo en Dios! (I believe in God!) and then he got on the ground and started bowing and "worshipping" us.  All  the while his buddy was busting up laughing. It was pretty weird.

So we did not have a baptism this past weekend because the investigator is loco.  She has been investigating the church for 2 years and still hasn´t been baptized.  She has had several baptismal dates, but when it comes close she runs away.  The same thing happened this time.  The weekend was coming up, and she said that she HAD to take some vacation deal to Madrid.  So she took off.   I´ve lost my charity towards her. hah.

BUT, this sunday we have a big baptism for the Martinez family and I am so excited for them! They are just great and I love being in their home teaching them! All 4 of them will get baptized, we would have 5 but the daughter is only 7, so she´ll come later!

Well I don´t have much else to say, this week has been way hot and sadly way long.

Remember how in Okinawa we would find shirts with english on them that wouldn´t make much sense? well we´ve got those in spain too. I actually bought it cause I loved it so much. haha, it said in big worlds " Life is too short" then underneath in smaller words it said " Don´t follow your dreams, chase them" then in even smaller words it says "may the force always be with me".  but the best part is that behind it is a picture of a roaring lion.  Its not nearly as poorly translated as in Japan, but its still pretty good.  I like it, haha.

Well I hope everyone has a fun week! I hope to see lots of fun pictures next week! Vale?!(Okay)

I love and miss you!

Jason

Oh yea, the family we are teaching just got a puppy.  Isn´t he just precious!? he is a german shepherd and lab mix. Or in other words, he´s gonna be big.

Os Quiro!

A Humbling Week and Pictures

Well this week was...humbling.

Last week was just a week of fire and lessons and investigators and just progress.  But sadly it didn´t last.  This week was disappointing to say the least.  But the mission can be pretty disappointing at times.  I´m sending a lot of pictures because we had a lot of time to take pictures. haha.  So first of all. Last P day our washing machine broke, so this project took up the whole P day. Elder Blanch and I took it completely apart and then back together and now it works.  So there is something new on my Manly skills list the mission has taught me: How to fix a washing machine.

We read the scriptures everyday and I just love them.  The crazy thing is that on the mission, the scriptures really become alive.  We were in Casarabonela this past week and we went to the top of an appoartment building so we could just start knocking on doors.  But there was an open door that lead to the roof, so of course, we wanted to check it out and see if there was a sweet view.  Bathsheeba was up there waiting for us.  We got to the top, turned the corner and BAM, naked woman sunbathing, needless to say, we hightailed it out of there in a heartbeat!  Also, on that same day, in personal scripture study I was reading about Korihor the Anti-Christ and Elder Redd read in Jacob about a different anti-christ.  So we joked in companion study that we were going to find an anti christ.  That night at an appointment, we encountered an anti-christ.  This guy was crazy.  Whew, I don´t even know how to describe it, but we totally went Jacob on him and said "Have you read the Scriptures" he said "yes" then we got him with "well then you don´t understand them". Owned.  But it was an interesting meeting with him. His daughter is a member and his wife is thinking about baptism but when we almost got her to commit, her husband, the weirdy, went off and started preaching some weird religion and all this crazy stuff. Crazy stuff.  The last instance this week where the "scriptures came alive" happens quite often.  The bus we take to our area also goes to the beach, so we always get on it and see tons of people headed down for a sunny day of fun. But anyways, some of Potiphor´s wives were trying to stand a little too close on the bus and tried to tempt us saying, "hey boys, why don´t you come to the beach with us!?" They didn´t take any articles of clothing, but it still makes me think of Joesph. haha.

I sent so many pictures that I forget which ones are there, but there is one of me at Casarabonela again, one with the familia martinez (the familia we are teaching) one of me and Alejandro, he is a member in our ward and the only member in his family, so we´re working on them. There is one of elder redd and I, me with a backpack. We had a FHE with the martinez family and we taught the word of wisdom.  So we had a push up contest but the backpack was filled with books and represented not living the word of wisdom, so obviously, it was super hard.  But the point was made and they had a lot of fun with it.  The little daughter who is 7, ran to the kitchen grabbed the moms box of coffee and put it in the backpack. It was pretty hilarious. But they get it! fun stuff.

And now I forgot the rest that I sent. OH! there should be one with me and the black pearl bar. Fun stuff. haha

Well I love and miss you all so much!

Jason