Hola de Nicaragua

 

From: Ethan Bever [mailto:ethan.bever@myldsmail.net]
Sent: Monday, September 17, 2012 5:14 PM
To: jsbever@molalla.net
Subject: Hola de Nicaragua

Hello everyone!
Another great week in the mission here in Nicaragua. I will have been here for an entire month on tomorrow, however it really feels like yesterday that I got off that plane and the heat hit me ... now it  really isn't that bad and I don't sweat too much and I'm comfortable living here.
Thanks for the e-mails, its good to hear from everyone. I got an email from Danielle Hepler but don't have time to reply. Just so you all know, anyone can still send me a dear elder whenever they want and it will get here in about 2 weeks ... and its free. Which isn't an excuse to not send me the 3 packages that you have all teady for me at home ...

I attached 4 more photos that mom can add to my scrap book ... actually I'm pretty sure I don't have a scrap book, nor do I want one, but it would be helpful if you'd hold onto these:

The first is with my good friend Moises and my companion Elder Franco. Moises is the one I was talking to you about earlier. As you can see I found a good use for that tie. It has been a truely humbling and wonderful experience for me to watch Moises progress, only this type of change can happen in the gospel.

The second is with Moises and his member wife. I think she's like 18; initially she didn't want anything to do with Moises, but they really are happy now that they are growing together and working out their difficulties. We are going to baptize Moises this Saturday, we just need to get them married first. I'm going to have my first baptism!!!

The third and fourth ones are from today, we had a joined P-day with our zone and it was fun ... as you can see by my facial expressions.
This week I learned a lot. I learned about rejection. We were talking with a recent less-active convert who joined the church ultimately because of mistaken impressions of other elders. We were working with her and her Sister (who isn't a member) to bring them both to church. She told us yesterday that she now wants absolutely nothing to do with the church and is perfectly happy where she is. We sat and listened and tried to understand where she was coming from. I couldn't help but think how our heavenly father feels when things like this happen, and I felt a little bit of that sorrow yesterday. I bore my testimony there and we left. Its so sad to be here teaching people who have absolutely nothing, offering them absolutely everything, and they don't want any of it. I just wish they could feel how important this really is, and how much they are loved.

I'm learning about blessings too. As missionaries, I receive a whole pile of blessings every day and its really fun to sit down and figure them all out every once and a while. But that's not all. Because we receive so many blessings, others close to us who have helped us receive many of those blessings too.

Someone doesn't have to do very much to be wonderfully blessed by the lord through helping his missionaries, and for that, you have each done your fair share for me, so I think its safe to say that you'll be receiving something your way as a result of what has been done for me and an extent our heavenly father.

I am also learning about looking back. We always will want to be doing the next thing, to go to the next place, to be another year older etc ... The sooner we can figure that out, the more we can appreciate where we are now. Everything will seem better looking back because we only remember to see the good parts. If we will start looking for the good parts now instead of looking back, or instead of looking forward we will be a whole lot happier today, I am.
That's all I have and I hope something there helped someone somehow.
Have a great week and know that I haven't quite forgotten you yet,
-Elder Bever