(No Subject)

Email received June 24, 2013

Hola Familia!

I`m glad you all enjoyed the broadcast, it didn´t quite make it out here in the city I`m in called Capiata unfortunately but they promised us that we will be watching it soon so I`m pretty excited. This week was pretty great, we had a baptism! Guillermo Flores, the son of a menos activa lady got baptized and it was awesome. His newly ordained priest uncle named Edgar did it and it was a very cool service. His dad who isn´t a member came. When I invited him he said I´d better bring my camera because it´s only the second time he´s been to church. I don´t think he´s planning on making a habit out of coming but it was cool that his whole family was able to come and support him. So as for Caleb Reber going into the MTC this week he´s in for a big treat. It´s pretty scary at first because your teacher will only speak to you in Spanish and you won't really know what´s going on but don´t worry because nobody else that is in a suit coat and has the red dot on their plaque knows whats going on either. Plus you can´t really mess up so when you don´t know what´s going on just do your best (it´s just orientation stuff so it´s not actually that big a deal). The MTC is such a sweet place I loved it so much. I definitely recommend joining the choir and just doing your best. I read a quote from I think Wilford Woodruf this week that said something like whatever we do acting on the most light we have is counted unto us as righteousness (something like that). Pretty much I would give you the same advice Elder Bednar  gives and it´s Be a good boy and quit worrying. As long as we´re doing our best, being obedient, and trying to love others than we don´t need to worry about anything else. Enjoy your time at the MTC mi amigo fiel (also I would definitely recommend watching the Character of Christ talk by Elder Bednar one of the Sunday nights you are there after the devotional because that talk really changed my life and helped shape my entire mission). I´m pretty excited about Weston getting his call, I live with another missionary named Elder Barker who really reminds me of Weston and we are having a great time. So we are definitely seeing amazing miracles here in Piro`Y but the adversary is also definitely working extra hard. We have one kid whose progressing really well named Alexis. He´s 18 and he´s been coming to church and he wants to get baptized and serve a mission. He´s super funny and friendly but pretty shy too so we´re praying that things keep going well with him. La familia Cristaldo is awesome! They invited us over for lunch on Friday and I think they may want to make that a regular thing. The problem is that they´re little baby, Jesus (Jesusito is what their little daughter Sol calls him), has been pretty sick and in and out of the hospital. The hermana has a ton of faith but it´s been hard for them to come the church because it´s freezing cold here and he´s just a little baby. But we still have lots of hope and faith that things will get better for them. I´m definitely learning a lot about prayer, fasting, the Lord´s ways are not my ways, and humility. Fasting has become a much more used tool to me now on the mission and it´s funny to me because I always fast for things and they never quite work out how I thought they would, but they work out so I definitely know that the Lord is listening and blessing me. Also tons of prayer. There are seemingly insurmountable obstacles sometimes and a lot of things that I worry about that I can´t control, that´s where prayer comes in. Every moment of everyday I can just tell the Lord that I´ve done all I can do and that the rest is in His hands, and He always delivers. Before I didn´t trust as much in that and I spent a lot of time being worried sick over things that I really can´t even control but now I`m really growing in my faith and trust in the Lord. I can actually know there is something big and important and not have to worry about it because I know I´ve done my part and I know I can count on the Lord to do His, He always does. It´s been kinda weird for me learning that because I thought I must have been doing something wrong or not understanding something right if I didn´t feel stressed out of my mind, but really it just takes hard work and trust in the Lord and that´s a lot easier and more effective than stressing about things out of my control. And as far as humility goes I´ve always struggled with pride, but there´s a part in my patriarchal blessing that I´ve found to be quite true and it´s about finding myself in deeper and deeper depths of humility. I could probably go on for a while about humility because it's kinda my theme currently. Well I love you and I hope you have a wonderful week in the nice hot sun. It´s been pretty cold down here and it´s a different kind of cold, but I´ve actually grown to really enjoy the cold so it´s all good. I'm loving it down here and having the time of my life. I received a letter today from the youth in the ward which was pretty awesome. It helped me remember why I came out here. This work is real, and it´s real awesome. 

con amor,

Elder Zachary J. Hulsey

P.S. Presidente McMullin is coming in next week and I´m pumped to get to meet him. Word on the Street is that we´ll be having a big mission meeting to welcome him in, should be pretty awesome!

P.P.S Just some pictures I haven´t sent home yet.

(No Subject)

Email received June 17, 2013

Hola familia!

Hey everybody hows life¿ (that´s the best you're getting for a question mark). I really love Paraguay and life down here in the mission. Miracles are happening and things are awesome. It was a pretty busy day today so I don´t have hardly any time to write anything great, but just know that I´m safe, I´m healthy, and I´m happier than ever. That´s so funny that Spencer is having clothes problems because I remember thinking the same things. Then in the MTC I still had a hard time with my clothes because the MTC in Provo at least is a big fashion show, but then I got here in the field and it doesn´t even matter anymore. All of my shirts are slowly turning yellow, but they´re still holding up great. All of my pants are getting nice and worn at the knees but they too are holding up wonderfully, and my ties are just getting hammered, haha. Now it doesn´t matter at all to me because my clothes are still working great for me and at least here and at this point in my mission that´s all that really matters to me.

I´m super glad Emma got a job. I was praying for her too. Taco Amigo es lo mejor! Tell her if she ever runs into Mitch Vance to tell him Elder Hulsey says hi. He was the assistant when I got here and he helped me a ton, he also told me that he frequents Taco Amigo because it truly is the best. Well one super cool thing that happened this week is we were having a sorta rough day but then we entered into a lesson and from there the day just turned around and was awesome. Anyways one cool part of this lesson is that we were explaining the priesthood authority and the guy stopped me and said hold on, are you telling me that the Pope doesn't have authority from Christ. I thought about talking around it but decided to be direct and honest and I told him if our message is true than no he doesn't. He said to me do you realize that that would mean that over half the world is wrong and deceived. I told him yeah and that´s why this message is so important for the whole world to hear. He told me that sounds like a challenge, and that he really likes challenges and wants to learn more and see if this is really true. It was a super powerful and impactful moment to me just knowing that this message is true and not having to be afraid to tell it to anyone. I've really learned a lot that the promises of the Lord really do get fulfilled and that this really is the Only true church of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I've always had that testimony, now it´s just even stronger and firmly rooted. I love serving as a missionary because the person that benefits the very most from missionary service is the missionary, and that´s totally okay. Have an amazing week this week!

con amor,

Elder Zachary J. Hulsey

(No Subject)

Email received June 10, 2013

Hola familia mía!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So pretty crazy week last week. We had changes...Elder Williamson left and he is switching to the south mission and I stayed in Piro´y so I will be staying here in la misión Paraguay Asunción Norte (I remember when I opened my call I couldn´t even say Asunción right haha). My comp came out here to die so I will be killing him (that´s mission talk for he´s going home in 6 weeks and I will be his last comp). His name is Zachary Landers and he´s from Highland, Utah (he didn´t go to Lone Peak because he went to that UCAS school at UVU). He´s a nice guy and he doesn´t seem too trunky...yet, haha. We get a long well at least and I just told him that he can decide what we do for P-days until we go home. Like I said he´s super nice so it should be a fun couple of 6 weeks. The other elders we live with also had changes and Elder Barker from Ogden came in and he is also finishing up his mission with my comp, but he doesn´t seem trunky at all. Super full of energy so we get along pretty well. We also got a new hermana in my district and she says she is in Ann Kawai´s stake, small world. So Dad congarts on the Job! I´ve been praying and fasting for you, I´m super happy for you. I´m glad you guys enjoyed the temple, it´s a great place, I wish I could go more. We taught the familia Cristaldo about how in the temple we can be sealed together forever and the hermana told us that to her it seems like a grand blessing to have a temple here in Paraguay and I realized just how true that is. Speaking of the familia Cristaldo we had an awesome lesson with them where we watched that corny church movie Together Forever and they loved it. They weren´t able to come to church because their little newborn´s throat swelled up and they had to go to the hospital, but he´s doing better now. It was a bit of a sad Sunday because there were only 27 people in church, but an old investigator randomly decided to show up at church yesterday so that was sweet! His name is Alexis and he also wants to serve a mission! He was hesitant to accept his baptismal fecha because he didn´t want to have to go up to the pulpit and give a talk yet, we told him not to worry about that right now. I can´t believe Blake Clark is going to Japan! I never would´ve guessed that one. Anyways so this week I was studying a talk called the 4th missionary by Lawrence E. Corbridge and I may have talked to you already about this talk because this isn´t my first time reading it but it talks about giving God our desires. I realized that I had gotten a lot better about not thinking about home or anything, but I was getting all sorts of distracted with other things like cool recuerdos and little things. I realized that I need to focus more on the people and my purpose in helping them. I´m here to invite lost souls to come unto Christ. I want to be able to help people feel the joy and the Spirit that I have felt, and unless I consecrate myself by giving ALL to the Lord, my thoughts and my actions, and serve him with all my heart, might, mind, and strength than I will not get to be as influenced by the Spirit and that is what I want more than anything. The recuerdos are cool and all of the little things that distract me aren´t bad things, but they´re not the best things. This week I´m going to try and sacrifice a little more and try to give my whole heart to the Lord and His service. It is a sacrifice because it´s stuff that I enjoy thinking about, but there is a time and a place for all things and during the working week I need to be focusing better on my work. I´m really excited to get better at this because I know that I will feel a greater influence of the Holy Ghost. I hope you guys enjoy the summer vacation and enjoy the constant companionship of the Holy Ghost that you were promised as you were baptized and confirmed a member of the true and living church, even La Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Últimos Días. Les quiero mucho!!!!

con amor,

Elder Zachary J. Hulsey

P.S. so you can keep sending stuff to the same address, nothing´s changed.

Yeah I´ve turned into a ranchero.

(No Subject)

Email received June 3, 2013

Mba´echepa

 

Hows it hanging everyone! Oh boy what a week last week was! So as of right now I do not know any changes yet but I will find out at any moment today so maybe by the time I´m finishing up this email I´ll have them. So this week was extremely spiritual and pretty funny as well. So two funny stories. On Thursday we did service in the morning and then we had a lunch appointment so we didn´t have time to go back to our house and study so I suggested that we just go to a park and sit under a tree and study (I´ve done that a couple of times before and it has been a pleasant experience). So we sat down in this park a little in front of a school and began to study. Within about 4 minutes there was a group of about 4 or 5 eight year old girls sitting down next to us moving closer and closer until they were RIGHT next to me. We didn´t know this but I guess the school had just let out. They started in with all of the normal stuff telling us how pretty our eyes were. So we thought since they were eight they would get bored of watching us study after like a minute or two so we were just going to ignore them until they left. Well these weren´t your normal eight year old girls because they sat and watched us for a Half Hour! Finally it just got so weird that we got up and found a different park. Haha at one point I pulled out my pen to mark something in my scriptures and they were gasping and saying "wow that´s so cool" Haha marking scriptures is pretty awesome. The second story happened on Saturday. So Elder Williamson is a very competitive guy, and for a while now he´s been wanting to arm wrestle me and he swears he´s never lost. Well on Saturday he brought it up again as we were getting ready to leave and I figured why not. So we were going at it and I beat him! Haha he was pretty upset and immediately wanted a rematch. I wouldn´t let him and it was driving him crazy! Haha he´s just super competitive so he started throwing all these things on the table. I finally agreed to rematch him today and he said if I loose then he´s going to buy me two alfajors (alfajors are kinda like the Paraguayan Hostess Ding-Dong cupcake but with dulce de leche instead of cream) and an oreo alfajor if I win (which is super good but a little expensive). Haha we´ll see if I can win again.

So like I said this week was also very spiritual. With Elder Maynes on Tuesday I learned a ton of awesome stuff. It turns out he served his mission here in the Paraguay Uruguay mission years ago so he went up a said a greeting in Guaraní, it was pretty sweet. Then I don´t know if you remember dad or mom (I feel like one of you were with me) but he came to a fireside once with us in our stake and told a story about how he had to sing a solo in his mission because he didn´t set up a musical number for a zone conference. Well he told us that story again but the cool part was we were in the exact same place where it took place! Some pretty cool things he said that I really liked were that the first vision was the first companionship teaching an investigator the truth in this dispensation. The second thing he said that I really liked was that the Holy Ghost can be our witness in the final judgment when we have to account to the Lord for the service that we rendered. The Holy Ghost can say that he was present at the lesson (if he was) and that we did our part in helping these people receive the restored gospel and come unto Christ. It was way cool. Another cool thing was we did a division on Friday and I stayed here with my zone leader to do a baptismal interview for 2 of Diego´s cousins. Both me and my zone leader were very worried about it because it looked like there wasn´t going to be anyone to bring them to church on Sundays so we wanted to wait to baptize them, but we didn´t know how to break it to them or their parents (because the last time we postponed the baptism the mom got pretty upset). We prayed and studied a lot and felt really good about just relying on the spirit in the moment, and he totally came through for us! The words we said were completely guided by the Spirit and we were able to get through a little bit to the Parents and they finally agreed to let us teach them! We really stressed the importance of the Gospel for the families and it was really powerful. We both felt really good afterwards. Then yet another super awesome thing that happened is that the family we´re teaching, la familia Cristaldo, came to church! The husband didn´t come but we figured he was just at work (he travels a lot). So I was praying so hard that the hermana could feel the Spirit and want to keep coming back. Well she ran into an old primary class-mate and she seemed happy and she asked us to come back after church. We told her we would stop by today, Monday, and share. Well last night we didn´t have anyone to visit and we were by her house so we decided to just stop by and set a time to return the next day. When we got there she made us come in and talk. She expressed that she and her husband had actually had a big fight and he left to go stay with his mom. I don´t want to give to many details but she was very sad and very worried about her family and really unsure what to do. She always tells us how it´s super hard because she wants the good example of a father for her kids but he´s never home and when he is he doesn´t set the greatest example and she feels really alone raising the kids. Well I guess one of the testimonies from a young women yesterday really touched her because the young women said we are never alone. The Hermana Cristaldo realized that she is never really alone and that God must have sent us to her right in this moment so she could come and here that and participate in the church. She said that she realized the happiest time in her life was when she was a little girl in the Mormon church. It was such a powerful experience to me because she is a real person with real problems and i´m just a little 19 year old kid here with a message from Jesus Christ, but this message is so much bigger than we even imagine. This message, when properly applied, has the power to bring light into darkness and hope to the hopeless. It literally brings joy! I know that Jesus Christ lives and that he has once again restored his Priesthood authority on the earth, thanks to this priesthood authority we can become clean from sin and receive the Holy Ghost as a constant companion. Those aren´t just words to me anymore. People aren´t clean and don´t have the Holy Ghost to help them always until they are baptized and confirmed, imagine how that must feel. I really took for granted the great blessing that I received being born into the true church with the real priesthood authority and to a good, strong, faithful family. I´ve started reading the Book of Mormon again trying to learn all I can about repentance and forgiveness. So far what I´ve learned is that repentance requires a change in behavior and desire, without both we aren´t actually repented. We as missionaries can try to help people to change behaviors, but it´s really only the Spirit that will help them change their desires. Once they´ve done that then they are ready for baptism and confirmation. It´d be extremely difficult for someone to feel that Spirit strong enough to change their desires, and they wouldn´t know how to completely change outside of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We´re needed as missionaries to help people, but we as missionaries need to Spirit to help people. It´s really cool being involved in such an important work and being able to work that closely with a member of the Godhead to do it. I love the Lord, I love this work, and I love all of you. I hope you have a great week (congrats on the graduation Spencer) and I hope that you love the temple.

Con Mucho amor,

Elder Hulsey

 

P.S. you guys never told me where Blake Clark is serving. Also see if you can find out how old Kyle Knickerbauker´s doing, and Nathaniel Adair. I´ve been thinking a lot about those two vatos lately