Letter #41 August 23, 2014

Hey Everyone

I cant think of any good jokes this week, thinking hard for next week!!  This week was nuts.  We ran all over the place trying to get things ready!  We had an awesome weekend nonetheless. This week after months of long hard work, the Barbosa couple was finally able to be married and baptized!!! We ran around like chickens with our heads cut off this week and made sure that everything was perfect for them.  We had to do paperwork, find witnesses for the wedding and on top of everything make sure that money was in order.  Here in Paraguay it is 200,000 Guarani or around $40 dollars.  That's around half a months salary here, so it was a huge sacrifice that the Barbosa family made.  Brother Barbosa has been fighting the entire 3 months we have been working with him to try and stop smoking and drinking.  This week it was make or break.  Either he was going to stop doing these things, or they weren't going to get baptized.  Monday night we decided to go buy him a big bag of candy to help take away his urges to smoke and drink.  That night we took him 6 lbs of candy.  Man did he eat a lot of candy.  We did not see him a single time this week without candy in his mouth.  He is an awesome guy and he is going to be a great Priesthood holder.  I was touched when he asked me to baptize him and I thought a lot about the change he had made going from a passed out drunk to now being a member of the Restored Church.  At the baptism we hit a couple of snags.  There was no leader there to preside, no refreshments, nothing.  We had to run all over again in order to get stuff ready.  To make things better, the water in the font hit me about mid thigh.  Super low.  I had to let Brother Barbosa down easy then shove him under the water.  He came up with a huge smile on his face!!  We have seen all 5 of these family members enter the waters of baptism, and they are now on track to becoming an eternal family.  Nothing short of a miracle!!  Don't worry,  we also had our share of funny experiences this week.  Friday night, we wanted to go stop by the Barbosa´s house just to make sure that he was staying strong and fighting the urges.  We decided to get on a different bus that we thought would drop us off closer to their house.  After about an hour on this bus, I turned to my comp and we both knew that we had passed Ita Paso over 30 minutes ago.  We just started to laugh and decided we would ride the bus to the end of the line, then swallow our pride and ask the driver where the heck we were!!  We got off at an abandoned gas station and walked in the general direction of Ita Paso, down a dirt road with only the vague lights of Encarnacion shining dimly in the night sky (man I should be a poet ;).  We hit a spot where a dirt path turned off the main road and we took it.  We walked through a bunch of weeds for around 20 minutes before somehow we ended up in the front yard of the Barbosa family!  It was a miracle!!! I didn't know whether to laugh of to cry at this tender mercy.  Not going to lie I was pretty sketched out at the thought of walking down a dark dirt road in a sketchy part of our area, but God knew my heart and blessed us.  I am so grateful for all I am learning and especially for my better understanding and love for the Gospel.  The scriptures have truly come alive and I look forward to studies everyday.  Understanding this love would of helped me in school before my mission ha. 


I love you all and you are in my prayers always!!!  Letters would be great, and photos too!!
Elder Ollerton

Letter #40 August 17, 2014

August 17, 2014

Hey Everyone!!

This week has flown by!! I feel like just yesterday I was writing all of you and now here we are again.  (That’s probably the dumbest way I have ever started an email.)  Forgive me.  But this week was good.  We saw a lot of success and a lot of progress in more areas than one.  This week started off a little hard as my companion and I were still playing the quiet game.  I remembered advice that President Lapierre had given me for my future marriage.  He said "Elder, if you ever have a fight with your wife, do the smart thing and stay home from work to fix things."  So I thought it might work for our companionship too.  I told my comp that I wasn’t going to leave the house until we talked things out like adults.  I expected him to last until lunch maybe, but lo and behold, we stayed inside all day long.  I read ALOT!!!  I actually studied around 10 chapters in Alma, and then had time to read through the entire book, "Our Search for Happiness" by M. Russell Ballard (great book btw).  The next morning even though it was difficult, I felt like I needed to apologize to my comp for giving him an ultimatum like I did.  He still didn’t want to talk, but I can be a little persistent, and we ended up having a great talk, and now, all is well in Zion, Zion Prospered!!  We are continuing our work with The Barbosa family and it is going well.  Hermano is working hard to stop smoking and drinking.  He is doing so much better. Their date to be baptized is this Saturday so we stopped by yesterday to give him some extra encouragement.  We also had a lot of success with one of the families that Elder Silva and I found in divisions.  We have been passing by every other day trying to help them better understand our message and they seem to really like it!! Maximiliana and her 3 daughters always listen, and her husband listens when he is home. This past Sunday all 5 of them came to church!! In total we had 12 investigators in church this week!  The only thing is that we are scared to bring people to church now because of the crazy stuff that always happens with members.   This week, Sacrament meeting turned into a discussion again and the final speaker (1st counselor in the District Presidency), got up and talked for 40 minutes on a variety of topics, just a few of them were.... The Abrahamic Covenant, the Millennium, Satan being bound, and how we are all descendents of Ephraim and Manasseh. He called everyone to repentance, and ended by talking about Patriarchal Blessings.  My comp and I were dying!!! Our poor investigators had no idea what he was talking about.  It was super frustrating!!  After church we went and talked with Maximiliana and her family to see what they thought.  They told us they loved it!!! We decided to teach them the Gospel of Jesus Christ using the cross.  At the end when we revealed the cross, they all freaked out and thought we had really performed a miracle!!  It was the best reaction I have ever seen.  Normally when we use this example it’s with kids.  These women were 15, 20, and 21 years old.  We had to hold back our laughs. It was such a good lesson.  Overall, this week was full of awesome experiences, but like every other story, more detail will have to wait till I am home.

Stay safe and know you are in my prayers!!
Elder Ollerton

Letter #39 August 12, 2014

August 12, 2014

Hey Everybody,

I feel like I start off every single email the same way, so this one is going to start off with a joke. 

Two jokes are walking down the street, one joke sticks his foot out and trips the other joke... what a bad joke. :)

Now that we got that out of the way, this week was definitely a battle.  We worked hard but my comp has decided to play the worlds longest version of the quiet game.  Not sure what’s going on but he has just kept to himself all week.  I have been praying hard to know what to do to help, no answers have come yet.  This last Wednesday, we also did divisions with the Assistants.  Elder Silva and I stayed in Ita Paso and Elder Murillo (other assistant) and Elder Magdaleno headed to do a baptismal interview an hour away.  We had a ton of success and I learned a lot.  In total we had 11 lessons in the day that I worked with Elder Silva.  We found a bunch of cool new people.  One of the coolest experiences that we had though came when we decided to go find an Indian Tribe.  We had heard from some people that there was an Indian Tribe that lived in Ita Paso, and we wanted to find them.  We clapped a couple of houses and then we were pointed in the right direction.  We ended up having to talk to their Chief and he gave us permission to talk to his tribe.  They are all super open to the Gospel and have accepted a baptismal date for the 6th of September.  It was an awesome experience.  They even have their own language.  It's not Spanish, not Guarani, it’s called Macá.  It sounds a little like German, kind of weird.  Definitely something I wont soon forget.  We worked a lot on street contacting, something that Elder Silva LOVES to do. We passed out so many pass along cards and talked with so many people!!  It was an AWESOME day!! 
We also have realized that we basically live in a zoo.  People have the weirdest pets here.  We went back and visited a lady that Elder Silva and I found, and her husband brought out some 20+ lbs Komodo Dragon looking thing.  No idea what it was but I am definitely taking a picture with it sometime soon.  It's like 3 ft long and the guy told us that it just eats raw fish.  Not even sure what it was, but it was sweet!! Also we found a family with a pet monkey here.  Super cool!! I may have to move here to Paraguay for the sole purpose of having an awesome pet!!
Thursday this week, we went to visit the Barbosa family and when we got there the brothers of Sister Barbosa were all there drinking Caña.  It’s a favorite past time of every alcoholic here in Paraguay.  Luckily, Hermano Barbosa wasn't drinking.  He really is fighting these addictions and I think he is winning!  The drunk brothers all pulled me aside and told me they had questions for me.  I didn't have very much patience for them but they began to ask me super stupid questions.  They started to ask me who pays us to do what we do, where does all the money come from, stuff like that.  After like 5 minutes, we just got up and left.  About an hour later, we got a call from Hermano Barbosa asking us to come back.  We went back and they told us that their 9 year old son Carlos, had totally dropped cain on all his uncles for drinking and making the Elders leave.  He totally kicked them out of his house!!  What a stud!! This week was a battle but "I’m still standing", the people here love 80´s music and it makes me smile. It reminds me of home. I had to throw that in there).
I have really found strength from the scriptures this week and It has kept me going!! Alma 26:27 really motivated me today.  Gotta Love The WORK!!!

I love and pray for you all everyday!!

Much Love!

Elder Ollerton

Letter #38 August 3, 2014

Hey Everybody,

Well this week has to have been one of the hardest of my mission.  We worked hard, and my body is absolutely wrecked.  I have been sick for the past 4 days.  It's not the normal stomach problems I have had here either.  For the past 4 days, I have had migraines, chills, a fever, and aches throughout my entire body among other things.  It has been super hard to even think without something hurting.  There has been a couple times I have almost had my companion catch me just because my body has no energy to even stand.  But on a good note, I have become more humble, thanks to my inability to move.  All is well in Zion!! This letter is going to be shorter than the others because we worked 4 days this week because I was sick.  A cool experience we had this week happened when I least expected it.  I was really struggling to increase my love for the people here.  My companion called me out on it and it made me think, because it made a tough situation even harder for me!  He told me that the best thing he has done to help increase his love, is do an act of service.  I told him that would be a great idea if people ever asked us to do service or told us yes when we offered it.  Just as we were walking to our next appointment, we saw a family of 3 carrying a washing machine and it fell apart right as we caught up with them.  We asked if we could help and before they could give us an answer, we just picked up the washing machine and started walking.  We walked a couple of blocks and ended up at their house.  Turns out this family is a family of less active members with 3 kids waiting to be baptized!!  I didn't know whether to laugh or to cry at this tender mercy of the Lord.  I was so grateful.  Something I have learned from this quick 10 months on the mission is that the Lord presents us with opportunities to improve ourselves.  He doesn't do it for us.  The Lord gave me an opportunity to strengthen my love for the people and serve them and in turn my love grew.  I'm grateful that we had that experience and now we have another family to work with! 
I hope everything is going well and that everyone is living it up :) Stay safe!!
Love,  Elder Ollerton!!

Letter #36 July 21, 2014

Hey Everyone!!

This week was crazy.  I was all over the place!!  Monday after writing we all went out to the Ruins.  They were huge and pretty cool as well.  Still not really sure what they were, as far as I can tell it was a Guarani Indian civilization before.  We all had a great time running around taking pictures and just enjoying the sites.  Tuesday, I did divisions with Elder Quesada for like 3 hours and then we headed to the terminal here in Encarnacion.  We had to go to Asuncion, along with around 14 other missionaries in order to do paper work and more visa stuff.  I swear it never ends haha. We had a 5 hour bus ride to Asuncion that started at 12:00.  I woke up at 4:00am in the morning and asked a guy where we were and he told me we were about 30 miles outside of Encarnacion.  Our bus had broken down and we had been stuck in the same spot for 3 hours!  It was awful.  A 5 hour bus ride turned into 9 long hours on a tiny bus that was not designed for American sized people.  We finally got to Asuncion and it turns out that it was transfer day in the Asuncion mission.  I actually met friends from Lone Peak High School that I didn't even know were in that mission!!  It was so cool to see old friends from before the mission!  We headed to Migrations and took care of a couple issues and then got to go and see the temple!! It had been 9 months almost without seeing a Temple.  The feelings there were so special and it is definitely something that I miss a ton!  We took pictures, walked around the temple grounds (incredibly tiny), and then got to go to the Distribution Center and it was like Christmas morning!!  I got a ton of stuff for only 50,000 Guarani (about 10 dollars).  We then headed to one of the highlights of the trip... PIZZA HUT!!! They actually had Pizza hut in Asuncion!! It was awesome!!  They did some weird stuff to the pizza though.  One of them was covered in corn, another had hot dogs on it.  Someone needs to teach them how to make a pizza ha.  Overall, Asuncion was a blast!! I loved being able to see even more of the world!
Back to reality,  we had to do a ton of contacting this week trying to find new people and it was super hard.  We work hard all day but we haven't really found anyone that will progress.  This week we clapped a guys house and he let us in to talk with him.  Right as we had started to talk, his nephew showed up and it just so happens that his nephew is a Pastor for a different church.  He sat down and actually knew quite a bit about Joseph Smith and the Book of Mormon, and then he asked if it was ok to call us "Mormons".  We said yes and that it was just a nickname.  Then he told us he didn't want to call us Mormons because he had Googled what the word "Mormon" meant and then he told us that in Chinese , Mormon means "camino al Infierno".  For those of you that don't speak Spanish this guy tried to tell us that Mormon in Chinese meant "Pathway to Hell".  I tried not to laugh at this guy.  There are some pretty interesting characters here in Paraguay!! I still got 15 months here to meet even more of them!! Bring it on!!  I hope everything is going great at home and everyone is safe. 

Mom, Dad and fam,  I hope that you are loving Powell and I am still a little bitter that I wasn't invited!!

Love you all!! 

Elder Ollerton

P.S.  If you are looking for some killer scripture study this week,  Mosiah 3 or 24 was amazing for me!!

Letter #37 July 28, 2014

Hey Everybody!!

Wow every week I feel like P-day comes faster and faster.  This week was the last of the transfer so we worked hard so we could finish strong.  Monday, I did divisions with Elder Vindas.  It was a weird change because the last time that I did divisions with him he was my Zone Leader and now the roles were reversed.  We worked hard so that we could meet as many people as possible!  We began clapping houses and a lot of people let us in.  I want to share one experience that we had together that was especially powerful.  We walked down the street and met a woman named Jorgelina who was out on her porch smoking.  Elder Vindas asked her if she was stressed and she sad yeah.  Then we asked her if we could share a message that brought relief and she brought us some chairs.  We began to talk to her and she just wouldn't open up to us.  She gave us very short answers and didn't show much emotion.  Then out of nowhere, Elder Vindas began to tell her what he felt about her.  He began to make bold statements about why she was the way she was, and what had happened in her life.  I watched in shock as my friend, filled with the spirit of the Lord, made bold observations about her.  After a minute or two,  I looked at Jorgelina and she just said "Si".   It was an amazing experience!! I learned a valuable lesson that night, that when the spirit tells you something, DO IT.  Thanks the spirit,  we were able to get to the heart of Jorgelina and she accepted a baptismal date of August 9th.  Our divisions were focused on being bold.  I love the scripture in Doctrine and Covenants 24:12 (Look it up)  Everyone of us can be more bold in bearing testimony and sharing the gospel.  This week we really focused on the Barbosa family.  The kids all had sufficient attendance so they could be baptized the only problem was their dad.  He drinks a lot and he thinks that his kids are not prepared sufficiently to be baptized.  This Saturday, after a lot of hard work, all 3 of the Barbosa kids entered the waters of baptism.  We headed out to the Barbosa´s house (around a 20 minute walk).  We had the baptism planned for around 5 and so at 4 o'clock we got to their house.  Only Maura, the 12 year old daughter, was there.  We waited until 4:45 when finally Alfredo and Carlos showed up.  After we got to the bus stop and waited for another 20 minutes, we learned that there were not any more buses from Ita Paso at that hour.  We had to call a taxi and at around 6:30pm, an hour and a half late, we had a baptism!! It was so cool to watch the look on their parents faces as their kids took this incredible step!  Their parents are still trying to get through the marriage process so that they can be baptized, but you could see the motivation in their eyes after the baptism.  There are great things ahead for this family!! Other than that,  this week was good.  There's always a lot of stories to share, but they will have to wait another 14ish months ha.

I love you all and you are in my prayers constantly!! Keep fighting and stay cute cool crazy!!

Elder Ollerton

Letter #35 July 7, 2014

Hey Everyone!!

This week was crazy!! We were running in all directions and we were drained in every sense of the word.  Tuesday we had Leadership Council in Posadas so we hopped the border once again.  It was an awesome day full of learning.  We talked all about being yourself and not trying to be any other missionary.  That is a huge problem here.  We all see missionaries that are just awesome and we try to adapt ourselves to them.  President LaPierre talked about how we weren't called to be anyone else other than ourselves.  I was called to be Elder Ollerton.  It has been a tough week trying to find out what I have taken from other missionaries and what truly is me. 
We were Posadas until Wednesday doing Leadership Council, and then paper work through Thursday.  We only had 2 days to work this week so that was also stressful.  Trying to find time to help other missionaries, and help people progress towards baptism is hard. Finding the balance between them is even more difficult, especially when I am not even in the same country.
We got out and worked hard through the rest of the week and ended up with a huge payback on Sunday.  In total we had 40 people in church, that is the most I have seen in 7 months!!!  We also had 13 investigators!! We are being so blessed here in Ita Paso.  I love the area and on top of everything it only rained once this whole week!!!  We are focusing on 8 people that we want to baptize this month and if all goes well, it will be amazing!! We have a lot of kids that love to come to church and listen to the gospel, and we love teaching them!!  We use a lot of visual aids (not just because they are young, but also because they speak a lot of Guarani) and also games to help them understand.  They always ask us when we are going to come back and when church is.  Super cool!  I am also trying to get more comfortable with all my Zone Leader responsibilities.  We have a lot more to do now.  We received a call on Saturday at around 12:30 from some Sisters in an area around 30 minutes away from ours. They told us that they needed baptismal clothes.  Their baptism was scheduled to start in an hour!!  We grabbed the clothes that we had and headed out the door to go to the bus.  Right as we got out the door, we saw the colectivo (bus) passing on the street above ours.  Elder Magdaleno yelled, "GO CATCH IT ELDER!!"  I don't know why but I just took off on a sprint!! I must have ran over 200 yards to catch this bus and I was dead beat tired when we got on.  I realized how out of shape I have gotten in a quick 9 months!!
We have been working with a lot of less active members and most of them are coming back to church.  We set a goal to become a branch within the transfer.  We are only 1 Priesthood holder shy of becoming a branch!! Keep all of us here in Ita Paso in your prayers :)  We are working hard and doing our very best to help the church progress.  The Lords hand is evident everywhere even in places that we never would expect.  We have a less active member that lives around 3 miles from our house.  We walk home every night from their house. It is very dark with little street lights anywhere.   Every night when we are about to leave, the family prays for our safety as we walk back.  Night after night we see some sketchy guys that drive by, but we are always protected.  The Lord truly knows his children and watches over us all even if we don't know it.  As I read the scriptures, I have come to realize how often the word Diligence appears in one way or another.  I know that as we are all diligent, in everything that the Lord requires of us, he will watch over and protect us.  I hope and pray that we can do everything that we can, so that the Lord can pour out all of his blessings upon us.

I love you all and hope you are all loving life!! Stay safe!!
Elder Ollerton