July 23, 2011

Dear Family,

Basically, Ill start by describing the title of my letter. I have made an official scientific discovery. (Hypothesis, theory, and facts included) The second week of every transfer is the toughest week here in the office. Up to this point we have not been able to proselyte in our sector for more than 1 hour. It´s been tough, however, we have done almost everything that we will need to do for the next couple week, so we hope to be able to get out and proselyte a bunch in the next couple weeks. We try and work as much as we can in our sector, but it is pretty tough. Elder Noriega is awesome though. We still get along great, and he loves to teach. When I get tired of teaching taxis, he just jumps right in and takes care of it. I learn so much from him. Other news in the office. We have partially been busy with an activity that we are going to do Monday. Monday we are having a mission-wide activity. Its going to be pretty sweet. We are basing it on the Pioneers because of July 24th. I have found that is really sweet to be in a different country when you start talking about things like pioneers, because the pioneers of the gospel in some of the central and south american countries are still living. For example, my companion´s grandparents are some of the pioneers in Guatemala, and we have an Elder from Colombia who is a pioneer for the gospel in his city, and an Elder from Ecuador who also is a pioneer from his tribe. (He is basically what you would call a native American. He still lives in a tribe, and he has church authorization to have long hair because it is part of their culture. I think it´s pretty sweet.) We are planning games, and a video and its going to be a really spiritual experience.

This week we have had some interesting experiences teaching. We have mostly taught taxi drivers, but during this time, we have found a few receptive people and a few less receptive people. One man I had a chance to teach was actually a less active member. He was baptized when he was 17 years old, and so we taught him and we gave him another Book of Mormon. He was really excited to be able to read it, (he had lost his years ago), and he told us that he would make some time to go to church. It was a highlight in a pretty rough day. We also have been able to plan to get ready for the following week. We also had another opportunity to do another baptism interview. This time it was Elder Noriega´s turn to do it. The sister missionaries in the ward are working really hard and are having a lot of success. Its pretty awesome. We are able to help them a little bit with their investigators, which turns out being a blessing for all of the work in the ward.

Sad news on Leon (the 80 year old priest). He had a stroke this week. He is declining in health, and its been pretty rough for him. We hope he will improve, but its looking less likely now, however, Elder Noriega and a member gave him a blessing the first time they went. (I was with Elder Pineda at the time) We have the faith that he can be healed, if it is the Lord´s will. However, we also find that it is important to follow what I call the "if not" scenario. If it is the Lord´s will, he will recover and be able to come to church and be baptized, but if not, the Lord knows our hearts and his heart, and he will have the opportunity to receive the blessings of baptism through baptisms for the dead. We are going to be taking down his information, just in case. We hope for a speedy recovery and we will continue praying for him. We are also going to try and visit his family in the next week. We received his family´s information, and the member who gave us the information says that they are also interested in the gospel.

I know that the gospel is true, because I have seen the blessings of the gospel in the lives of others and my life here in Peru. God loves us, and desires our happiness. We can receive whatever thing we ask for from God, if it is right. (3 Nephi 18:19-21) I know that Joseph Smith was a prophet of God and translated the Book of Mormon through the power of God. Thomas S. Monson is a prophet, and the apostles are also prophets seers and revelators. They receive revelation for us. I know that prayer has power. I love you all, and hope that God will bless your lives this week and in the future.

Tyler

July 16, 2011

Happy Birthday Megan!!! In 5 days anyway,

I´m gonna say that it feels really weird for me to think that Megan is going to be turning 18. I feel kind of cheated because Megan will have the opportunity to vote before I will, but its okay. I also am reminded that my little sister will be as far as me in school when I get back from my mission. Weird.

Another week has gone by, really, really, really fast. We have been super busy as well with a few different things that have come up in the mission, however its been pretty cool as well. This change we had a ton of changes to the mission. We also have 21 new missionaries who have entered the mission and only 14 left, so, the mission keeps on growing. We also had a change here in the office. Elder Bate finished his mission and so we got a new assistant. His name is Elder Stauffer and he is from Layton. I like joking now that half of the office Elders are from Davis County so the office must be pretty cool. Elder Stauffer is awesome, and he is going to be a great assistant, although the office is going to miss Elder Bate. He had a huge impact here. He was a great example for me as well. We are excited to have Elder Stauffer here, and he is excited to be able to serve the other missionaries in the mission, we are also excited for this upcoming change. I am also super excited to be able to work with Elder Noriega again. He is awesome. We get along great, because we are quite similar, and although we still need to work a little bit on our unity in teaching, we feel like things are going to go pretty well for us this change.

This last week has been pretty crazy, we had an activity in the ward that went pretty well. The members gave us a bunch of support. We also had a division. I was with Elder Pineda and Elder Noriega went with a member to teach an 80 year old priest from another religion in the hospital. It is amazing the effect that members can have in the work. This man became interested in the gospel because of a member who worked at the hospital who had the charity and the love to help this man when he was in need. He saw the light of Christ in her and the example of the believers that she was, helped him find the gospel, and now he wants to be baptized. We just need him to get out of the hospital. We are going to go back and visit him again tomorrow, and see how he is doing.

Well that´s all for this week, I hope everything is going well, and you can find teaching opportunities every day, and you can be examples of the believers like this sister in my ward. I love you all,

Elder Tyler Rasmussen

July 9, 2011

Hey family,
Sounds like life was pretty normal this last week. Its pretty awesome that Megan, Trevor and Alex are all working. And way to go Adam for beating us all at merit badge getting at scout camp. That´s pretty sweet. You finished half an Eagle Scout in one camp. :) Just remember to keep working hard to achieve it.
This week in Lima has been pretty interesting. We are getting ready for the changes, so obviously there is a lot for us to do right now. We are also trying to work hard on finding people to teach and help come to the knowledge of the gospel. We haven´t had much success with the references and door knocking, but we keep trying to move forward and be happy. One cool thing is that I learned how to do a rubik´s cube again. :) We also have had the opportunity to talk to a few less actives in the ward and plan with the youth leaders more on how to work with the young men.
There isn´t a whole lot to report. Mostly we have just been really busy. Although Wednesday in our District Meeting. Elder Lopez, who is our district leader, taught about the fact that everyone needs to improve and we decided as a district on how we could help each other improve on the Christ-Like Attributes. I had two that I decided I wanted to work on. Obedience, and Love and Charity. Obedience is always something I can improve on in the mission. Little things like going to bed at 10:30 and getting up right at 6:30, and using study time in an effective way. I also decided to work on Love and Charity. I have learned here that love and charity are things that are essential for missionaries. I sometimes feel like the mission is too hard, or get frustrated when people don´t listen, and then when we pass people in the street who I would rather not talk to because I don´t think they would listen or I don´t trust them, I realize that I am not showing love for them. Someone once asked a group of us in a meeting if we loved the people in Peru. Everyone says, ya we love our investigators, and the members... but to say that they loved all of the people in Peru that they come in contact with is very hard to say yes to. Its something I want to work on. An unconditional love like that of Jesus Christ.

I love you all, and hope the weeks keep going well.

Tyler

July 2, 2011

In the flying missionary pictures last week we were landing on a mattress on the floor.
A few pictures
1. The office with President and Sister Tyler and their daughter.
2 My poor shoes... Yes I did finally start using the other pair.
3.Map of our mission. Its kind of hard to see, but if you can zoom in using the computer you can see the names of the zones. PS you can also see missionary boundries by logging in with your member account on maps.lds.org. Its pretty cool. You can see really how incredibly small our mission is.



Hey family,


It´s way cool to hear about the experiences you have had this week. The youth conference in Kirtland sounds way cool. I think it would be awesome to be involved in something like that. Dad tells me that the spirit was really strong, and I felt the spirit just reading about it. Way to be examples to those around you. It´s great to hear that the kids talk about my mission, but at the same time, the boys can give their testimonies and share that you are also going to serve missions in the church. Never be afraid to bear your testimony, no matter how small it is. The simplest heart-felt testimony can touch the hearts of others and lead them to a desire to come unto Christ. You have power, and through the bearing of your testimony, your testimony will grow and become more powerful. Alma 37:6-7 says that by small and simple things are great things brought to pass. These small testimonies can bring the salvation to the souls of your friends. verse seven says that the "Lord God doth work by means to bring about his great and eternal purposes; And by very small means the Lord...bringeth about the salvation of many souls." Your testimony can be this small and simple thing. I am way happy and proud to hear that Trevor had the opportunity to bear his testimony about the experience during sacrament meeting. For me, testimonies are very important. Through a spiritually guided testimony, we can invite the Spirit to touch the hearts of our friends, families, neighbors, and all others who we come in contact with.
We are seeking to do the work of the Lord here in Peru and there are 50,000 other missionaries just like me doing the same. And that´s just the ones doing it full-time. The efforts of the millions of members throughout the world, inviting people to come unto Christ is amazing. As Daniel prophesied, the stone cut out of the mountain is beginning to feel the whole earth. I know that the gospel will continue to be preached until it feels the earth.
This week we haven´t had a lot of time to work in our sector, however we have been blessed with opportunities to teach and help others. We were involved in a family home evening and we taught about faith. It was a great experience and we were guided by the spirit. I love seeing the faith of the people around me here. We are trying to work with a lot of the young men in the ward, because many are inactive. We are hoping we can get to know them and help the learn about the importance of the gospel of Jesus Christ in their live so that they can feel the desire to come to church, and learn of him and eventually serve missions like we are serving right now. We are going to do it through a variety of methods. Activities, sports, and service. We are hoping that soon there will be 20 young men attending the ward. (Right now there are about 4.) We are also trying to help guide our investigators to the truth of the gospel. The sister missionaries in the ward are having a baptism today. Its Marco. Im not certain if I mentioned him or not, but he has only been investigating the church for about 2 weeks. It just goes to show that through the power of the Spirit many people can come to love their Savior. It also shows that the Lord brings the people who are prepared to receive the gospel to us as missionaries.
My scripture of the week is in Alma 61:9. In 60, Moroni sends a letter to Pahoran the chief judge and gets after him for not sending more reinforcements, In Alma 61 we learn that there have been problems in the land and Pahoran has been removed from the judgment seat by rebels. Pahoran could have been angry for the chastisement he received from Moroni, but he showed his humility and his love in verse 9 when he says "you have censured me, but it mattereth not; I am not angry, but do rejoice in the greatness of your heart." He then begins to talk about the liberty that is so important to him. I think we can follow his example and not allow ourselves to be angry with the things people say to us. Its definitely something I have been trying to work on here in Peru.
I hope everything continues to go well at home, and you keep getting opportunities to share the gospel with those around you. I love you all and hope that you can be the hands of God in blessing the lives of others.
Tyler

June 25, 2011

Hey family,


Its great to hear that you are doing well and that Megan survived the wisdom teeth experience. (I hope you filmed some of the experience. :) ) I will give an AMEN! to getting it done before college. During college was pretty terrible. Sounds like the end of school was good for everyone. And now that school has ended it means one thing.... I am getting way to close to the one year mark in my mission. Just so you know, I have decided to permanently be a missionary. Im never coming home. ha ha. These days are pretty awesome, but still lots of work and kind of frustrating sometimes, however, the good outweighs the bad. :) This week we have had a lot of surprises and a lot of days that were kind of long, but all were filled with good experiences.
Tuesday we had interviews with President Tyler. It was pretty awesome. It was actually kind of interesting. All of my other interviews with him in my mission so far were like 3 minutes. This one was 10. And I see him more now than I did before. It was cool though. He made sure that we are studying and practicing teaching and getting out in the field sometimes. And he made sure I wasn´t being incredibly overwhelmed. Basically, he cares about all of the missionaries a lot. I have a lot of respect for him. Sad story is that he will finish his mission and go home 3-6 weeks before I do. Kind of sad, but I´ll get over it.
Wednesday we wound up going to the airport with President Tyler and a couple of missionaries that needed to go home for medical reasons. It was kind of sad, but at the same time, we had the opportunity to ride back afterwards with President. It was good to talk to him. Although we just talked about soccer and the difference between Maradona and Pelé, (President Tyler really likes sports), it was still a pretty sweet experience.
Thursday we had a pretty interesting experience. We had to go to Tail Loy which is an office supply store to buy some ink pads so that the different Elders in the mission can do fingerprints for different legal documents. On the way back, Elder Noriega was teaching the taxi driver and as we got out of the taxi he forgot about the ink pads. So we had to go back to Tai Loy and buy some more. It would up being an awesome experience because we had the opportunity to teach like 8 more people and to give out a few copies of the Book of Mormon. Needless to say none of these eight people actually live in our sector, but it was still an awesome opportunity to teach.
Friday was an interesting day because we had to go and clean the warehouse where we hold the things like beds, mattresses and dressers for the missionaries. Basically after the big change where we had to shut some sectors to open up the two new zones, we left the place in a disaster. We cleaned and organized it and it was all working well, and then we got a call this morning at 9:00 that a water faucet had been left kind of running and had flooded part of the warehouse, so we got to go back this morning and clean it up. It basically killed our study time, because it split it in half, but in the end it was interesting at least. We had to be creative about where we were going to put the different things to dry them. We also took advantage of the fans that we have in storage. They are helping dry out the other things.
Today we also had an awesome opportunity to teach Diego. Diego is between 20 and 25 years old and he was pretty awesome. We taught him about the restoration and he is open to learn more, he is one of the awesome investigators that, after we had contacted him a week and a half earlier, had actually read the pamphlet that we left him, so when I said that the great apostacy ended with a young prophet, he said "Smith, right" The thought that ran through my head was, "Either this guy is awesome and read the pamphlet or he has heard from missionaries or heard about the church before and is going to try and argue with us about Joseph Smith." It wound up being the first one. It was a great experience. He accepted that when he receives an answer he would get baptized. He also isn´t catholic even though his parents are very catholic. That´s not normal here. 90 percent of the people we talk to are catholic so it was a different experience. He just believes in reading the bible and following Christ as best as he can (99.9 percent of the people here believe in Christ, its pretty awesome). We told him he could come closer to Christ and its something that he really wants. We are excited to keep teaching him.
Lately I have been reading in the book of Mormon about the wars in the end of Alma, and it has been a great learning experience for me. I learned about the faith and diligence that I need in my mission from the 2000 sons of helaman and the faith and confidence in the Lord that I need from Helaman himself. Helaman found himself in a tough spot, but trusted in the Lord and was guided in what he needed to do. We are trying to do that here in our sector, and when walk around the street, we knock every door that looks like a good door. Basically as we are walking, Ill look at a door and the thought will pop into my head, (you should knock on that door), and I we do it, we don´t worry if its the spirit or not. We are trying to do our part and we know that the spirit will lead us to the doors we need to knock on. Its happened at least twice lately, and its bound to happen some more.
I love you all and hope that everything continues to go well. I know that Christ lives and loves us, and that He restored His gospel through the prophet Joseph Smith.
Good luck in your fun summer activities.

Tyler


Photos
Elders flying through the air:
1. Elder Bate
2. Elder Noriega
3. Me
4. Me with book of mormon


Other picture with a story behind it. Sister Tyler wants all the missionaries to have a white board to write about their investigators, Elder Noriega and I brought the Assistants into the apartment and drew them a picture with nicknames we have given them. Elder Pineda has gained a lot of weight in his mission, so we called him watón. Its slang for big stomach, and Elder Bate goes home in 3 weeks so we called him trunky (missionary slang for a missionary who is thinking about home too much.) We als drew pictures to fit.
I think we are pretty good artists.
1. with everyone
2. the drawing
3. me and elder Noriega


other
E. Noriega and me at the ocean.