Week 22

Whagwan! 

 so i was sick the whole week so we didnt get a lot of stuff done. having 7 bottles of mtn. dew isnt the smartest thing in the world i found out haha. president brown wasnt very fond of it either. Jamaica is still awesome so dont worry about anything haha. its a weird thing to think that i might be transferred here soon tho. transfers are on feb 12th and since i have spent almost 6 months here, i have the best chance of leaving here. not sure tho. fingers are crossed and praying haha 

 Monday 1-20-14

 so pday was pretty bad this week. with me being sick for the whole day we didnt do anything. the rain fell again so everyone just stayed in again. i just slept the whole day. my fever was at like 102 so i felt like crap the whole day. i took an real cold shower tho and that helped. also a priesthood blessing. that was the main thing that i needed. it helped a butt load. 

 Tuesday 1-21-14

 so i was still a bit sick today but i decided to go out. we had a lesson with Kashane and Sue-Ann on getting a youth activity set up so that people can see that mormons arent weird people. it seems like a great idea and they were all for it. its gonna be super fun cause its gonna be at the beach and a lot of people should be coming. we also had a lesson with Asha-Gaye again. we have really been trying to work on her coming back to church. she is starting to come back. last week was the first time i have seen her at church in like 3 months so its a good start.

 Wednesday 1-22-14 

so district meeting was really good today. there were a lot of things said that i am gonna start to apply in my missionary work more. really weird. we also went to pizza hut for lunch. thats gonna start being a weekly thing haha. is nice to go somewhere and have some american food. having jerk chicken every weekend is just enough jamaican stuff for me haha. but when we got home from Ochi i felt like crap again so we ended up staying in. i feel really bad for that. the rest of the week i am not going to stay in. our numbers really suck and we really havent done anything all week. it sucks. no more bed for me during the day! haha 

 Thursday 1-23-14 

so today we did a trade off. i went with Elder Strickland today. it was pretty fun. we tried to see Janet but it didnt work out the way we hoped. i did show him "mission man" and he loved it so we printed the chords out to the pokemon theme song for the uke and then the lyrics to mission man. kinda a small obbession we had for the rest of the week haha. i was still a bit sick but nothing bad haha. we also went and saw brother james about helping out with the brach. there is a little bit of contention here. we are starting to teach all the members about the 5 main things they promise when they are baptized. Law of Chastity, Word of Wisdom, Tithing, and Keeping the Sabbath, as well as the Book of Mormon. we were told by pres brown and by the senior couple that works up here that that would have the contention die down. its gonna be tough but it needs to be done. we also had a FHE with the Taylor family tonight. it was super fun! the whole family was there and participated really well. when the lesson was done they actually asked us to give another one because the spirit was really strong. one of their friends had some questions so we taught about her concerns. she is a former investigator so we are gonna reteach her. we have an appointment for sunday! but the games after were very intense. i felt like a noob the whole time haha 

 Friday 1-24-14

 so today was really interesting. we taught Delano at his dads house, brother james. brother james had us explain a lot of stuff that elder strickland and i had left with him the day before. it was a litte frustrating. he didnt really study it he just asked us all the questions about them. i wish that people would get the point to studying the scriptures. he also tried to keep us there for a super long time. we finally had to use the cerfew rule to get out. it was pretty funny haha. but earlier we went to Asha-Gaye again. she admitted something to us. she didnt understand repentance for it so we went through that. we kinda chastized her for not understanding it so i felt pretty bad but at the same time it had to be done. she is gonna talk about it to the right people now. 

Saturday 1-25-14

 today was pretty good. we had a lesson with janet. i didnt go cause elder davis had elder strickland go for it. he is a sabbath expert so thats why. i went with elder ashby for the morning but we didnt see anyone. after the trade back, we saw kadeen. the lesson we didnt really plan for cause her and her friend wanted some questions answered so we changed it up to answer their questions. we also went back to Asha-gaye again. we were going to just read with her and have nothing about repentancecause we felt like we chastized her pretty bad. but she kinda wanted that talked about a bit more. we did and she understood it. she wants to get what she did off her chest really bad now so when she gets taht interview then it will be a good thing. 

Sunday 1-26-14

 so church today was pretty good. one of the members gave a really good talk on how the branch needs to love each other more. it was the talk that everyone needed to hear haha. after church we had a lesson with sister blake on what we can do to help her with her children. she said to just pray for them. we also went through the 2000 stripling warriors and upped her spirits with that. we also went to Shanice, the person we found from the Taylor FHE. she is super interested in changing her life around and the lesson we had was super good! she is on date for the 15 of febuary. she seems really promising cause she wants to put forth the effort to be baptized. she says that she also has small habits that she needs to get rid of but thats what the lessons are for haha. So thats the week. sorry if that seems short. being sick for half the week affects what happens in the day haha. but i hope you all are doing well. i love this gospel and i know its true. it blesses lives and changes them for the better! 

 Love, Elder Kurt Meacham

Week 21

Whats up everyone?!

So Elder Martin is doing way good. better than anyone could ever think. he had brain surgery down here and he is walking, talking, and being the same old goof that he has always been. Miracles are in the works with him right now.

Right now i am a little sick. i will get to why in the Sunday part down the letter. its kinda funny to be honest :)

Monday 1-13-14
Well having a Pday is awesome! Elder Davis and i went to the beach out in Long Bay. i will send pictures later. Our appointments today were really good too. We met with Kadeen about preparing for a mission. she is going to school to get a job so that she can save up for a mission but she decided after the lesson that she was gonna put work on hold so that she can serve in like 8 months time! its gonna be so sick to see one of my converts out in the mission field! odds are she will be called to Jamaica but oh well! she is way solid and is gonna make a fantastic missionary! We also went to the Campbells again for Family Home Evening. We had Sister Campbell teach the lesson cause we taught it last week. She did a really good job! the spirit was so strong in that home! its something that we are gonna do a lot of now when we go there. have the family teach the lessons. they are so much better like that!

Tuesday 1-14-14
So first off today we went to Janet early in the morning. im not a fan of going out there early like that but its the only time that she will see us so guess i need to do it haha. she is still a little frustrating. she will not accept the sabbath day still. we tell her the same stuff and she sees why, but she wont take that step of faith to apply it. one day she will get it tho. it may take a while but she will get it. we also had a lesson with Kadeen again. she had a question of why the sabbath was on sunday. she grew up a 7th day i guess. we explained it to her and she accepted it really fast. wish that janet was like that... haha. we tried to have a lesson with Keena but she flaked out on us again. idk what to think about all of that. we went over to have a lesson with Asha-gaye as well. her friend Dichoda was there so we had a lesson with her. it was pretty good and she agreed to meet with us again. she was taught about 18 months ago and was also dropped again right before i came here at the end of August. she is way cool but we have a ways to go.

Wednesday 1-15-14
well district meeting was really good today. as always tho haha. elder davis does a super good job at them. being the comp to the district leader is weird. who knows, maybe im the next one haha. we were gonna see Keena today but it flaked out again :l oh well. one day well get her haha. we also taught Dichoda again today. we taught her the Gospel of Jesus Christ. she understood it really well. we tried to extend a Baptism day but she said no. we will work on her. she is prepared whether or not she knows it haha.

Thursday 1-16-14
today i went on a trade off with Elder Ashby. it was an interesting day. my bike got really mashed up so we had to walk like 2 miles back into town to the bike shop. then i realized after that i forgot my wallet so we went back home. then we went and did service for a bit. then went back to get my bike. like 3 hours later. it cost like 1000 just to get it fixed. really weird.but we had some good lessons. they have one investigator who is ready, he just has to have permission from his mom. he is very obsessed
with anime. he is way sick tho. it rained most of the day so we got super wet haha

Friday 1-17-14
today was just a super interesting day. we had like no lessons today. Kashane called us and wanted us to have a lesson with him. everything blew out so we were more than glad to go up there to have a lesson with him. he said that he was struggling with reading so we read. the lesson was super distracting. a lot of texting, small infants, and stuff like that. despite all of the distractions, i think that Kashane really learned something. hopefully it will show in the next few weeks.

Saturday 1-18-14
Today it just rained. and rained. and rained. and rained. and we walked to the church so we got really soaking wet on the way home haha. but we went and had a family home evening with the Taylor Family. meaning Asha-Gaye, her friend Kyle, and former apostate Sister Taylor. she has been coming to church and she is doing super good! she is way happier than when i first met her. we taught a short lesson and then went to games. we played dominoes and Egyptian Rat Screw. super fun with them. Asha-Gaye was sad that we had to leave and she wants to start this up as a weekly thing at the church. which would be an awesome finding tool! well have to see what we can pull off haha. we will probably be stopping by there next week for another FHE.

Sunday 1-19-14
so today it rained SUPER hard. we had like 20 people come to church. like 5 were here at 10 so church started a bit late. but it was a really good church service. the taylor family came back to church! or at least Sister Taylor came again and then Asha-Gaye came for the first time in like 3 months! i have been working my butt off trying to get her to church to be the example to her family and now she is! super boss! but afterwards we didnt have anything to do. we went home for a lunch appointment but the rain just kept falling. like SUPER hard! the 4 of us ended up staying in for the whole day cause it was extreme weather. elder strickland gave us a very interesting story. its impossible to explain. i also had like 7 things of mt dew today and that is why i am sick now. i feel like major crap. hopefully ill be good soon.

Well thats it for this week. lots of rain and now me being sick. im gonna get chastised by sister brown haha. wish me luck :)

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Week 20

Hey Everyone!

So real quick. Please pray for Elder Martin, from my MTC group, and Elder Dalley. they are comps right now. Elder Martin was hit by a car over in Linstead. he went through surgery in Kingston and is doing ok but could still use the prayers of course. Elder Dalley also saw the whole thing happen so he is very stressed out still. he had such a bad panic attack that he couldnt move. big prayers for them.

But this week has been really frustrating but im really happy too. Ive learned out here just how much that agency is frustrating to God. it is to me so its gotta be to him.

Monday 1-6-14
so for our pday we went fishing. Elder Davis is a big fisher. his job back home was for him to guide hunting and fishing trips. he even fished in tournaments to pay for his mission. he is a stud. we caught a barracuda and some ugly thing too. nothing to keep. just a for fun thing. we went over to the campbells for another family home evening. we had some bike probs, AGAIN!, so we had to walk there. going from boundbrook, where we live, to anchovy, where they live, is not a fun thing. its like a 30 min walk. i never thought that i would love bikes so much haha. we read a bit from the Book of Mormon and then had to leave so we could get home on time. not a bad day to be honest.

Tuesday 1-7-14
we didnt have a lot of lessons today. all i really remember from the day is us going to sister clarke to check up on her. she is super poor and can almost never come to church because of the fair. she cant walk the whole way so she has to do taxi. its really sad how poor she is. we never blame her if she doesnt come to church. but today when we went to check up on her she broke down crying cause he life is so hard and people keep breaking into her house. we gave her a priesthood blessing and she said that she felt better about everything afterwards. hopefully her life will turn around real soon.

Wednesday 1-8-14
today was the first district meeting we had with elder davis in charge. he gave a pretty good lesson. bad thing, my driving days are probably over while he is here. he knows how to drive and is not scared to do it haha. next time i will drive will probably if he is sick, if i am a Zone Leader (ya right haha), or if i go to the office, which is very possible this next transfer. we did teach Keena today tho. we were gonna teach her the Book of Mormon but i forgot to bring one to give to her. we brought a member with us. the member basically taught the whole ting! it was so sick! keena was listening the whole time to it too! her being baptized will come soon! we also went and read with Asha-Gaye. she hasnt been reading or coming to church so we are staring with the reading thing. hopefully one day she gets it. we've been trying to get her active for like 2 transfers. she wants to serve a mission in a few years but she needs to be active first. Elder Davis was also pulled over on the road on our way back from Ochi. some cop decided that he wanted a power trip so he tagged us and pulled us over. maybe he was new. idk. we cant pay the tickets down here cause no one from America, Canada, or England (majority of white missionaries here), dont have TRN numbers, like social security in the states. if we pay them then we are paying for someones lunch. we just laughed the whole time. super funny!

Thursday 1-9-14
Today was a super good day. we were full of lessons. we had 6 during the day! which is the most since ive been here i think! we had a lesson with Kadeen, who joined us for a lesson with a random bum right before her lesson too. we also went back to Asha-Gaye and read again. one day she will get the point. eventually we will back off a bit when she starts to get the point. we also had a lesson with someone named Donna, im not sure if ive mentioned her before. she is delanos mother in law. she is very prepared. we just have got to get her to commit to baptism. she had a day but then said she needed to find out if the Book of Mormon is true first. fair but also frustrating.

Friday 1-10-14
we had an ok day today. we taught janet again. i thought she would be a little hardened to me but she is not. we just need to get her and her family to church. they live far away and are very poor. somehow it will work out tho. she said she has the faith to come but i have not seen it yet. but she said that she would come sometime in the next 2 weeks. we cant give her a day cause she doesnt want to be rushed so we just have to have her show faith and teach her a lot of stuff. we also had a coordination meeting with SueAnn, the member who is friends with Keena. its for tomorrow on the Book of Mormon. it should be a good lesson.

Saturday 1-11-14
we taught Janet again today. it was weird cause it was way early. like 9am. we had to be sure to get back to the house at some point for comp study. we also talked to Shanakay again. all she really needs is to come to church and to get married. hopefully that is something that will happen way soon. we also finally met with the gospel principals teacher. the lessons are very interesting so we went and helped her to make them better. we should be good for the next few weeks haha. Keena blew out today so we will have to try again a next time. we are gonna try tomorrow so that should be really good.

Sunday 1-12-14
Today was a pretty good day if you ask me. keena was late to church again so we had to push her back a week. she was upset about that but understood it. she will hopefully be baptized on Feb 1. president Blake from the mission presidency came down today too. he gave a good talk and lesson about Zion and how it will be when Christ comes again. Moses 7:18 is what it will be of. he is a super cool guy. he will probably be the next mission president when president brown gets done in 2016. We went to Asha-Gaye again. she didnt come to church but her mom did. we kinda chastised her for it. i really hate having to do that. its not the funnest thing in the world. we are gonna start to walk with her to church to make sure that she comes. agency is a really annoying thing. when people choose to use it wrong its just super annoying. sorry about that mom and dad haha. learned my lesson now i guess :) it just shows how it must be for God when he gives us a choice and we use that choice wrong. something that i will be thinking about a lot from now on.

Well our week was great! we are looking forward to a new week! love you all!

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Week 20 Photos

Elder Dalley

Kurt and his first companion Elder Dalley, right before transfers!

Week 19

Hey everyone!

So this week has been pretty weird. i know that last week i said that i had a concussion, ill get to that haha. it was also transfer week. elder dalley left so i got a new comp. which i will also get too later as well ;) i forgot my journal so i dont know what day it is but oh well haha.

Monday 12-30-13
well last week i said that i had a concussion. i called sister brown and she said that i was suffering from a mild concussion. im not sure if i told you the story so ill try right here: me and elder strickland were playing around a bit, i got a broom and he got a police baton that he bought when he was in spanish town. i let go of the broom and ducked. he thought that i was gonna continue holding on to the broom so he swung and hit the broom. since i let go of the broom it hit me right in the head. i had a good size bump there and then i starting having headaches and nausea. not a pleasant thing to have haha. so we stayed in for the whole night cause i just felt like crap. i also could have no solid foods so ice cream and i got to know each other a lot better today haha. that night i was not allowed to sleep more than 2 hours at a time. that was not a very fun night. i was pretty tired when i woke up haha.

Tuesday 12-31-13
well i was still sick today due to my concussion so we didnt do much. i tried to go out at first. we did some service for Sister Campbell, the investigator, but after that it was all down hill. i felt like crap again with headaches and nausea so i took a little nap. we didnt know how long i was allowed so we just assumed the 2 hour thing was still in effect. but then we stayed in until 7 cause i still felt like crap. i still did when we did out but i had to get out of the house somehow. the lesson was pretty good. she went off about some random stuff so i dont know how she took the lesson.

Wednesday 1-1-14
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!!!! nice to think that i had my new year before you guys haha ;) but i was still having some headaches today. i was supposed to go out with the other missionaries while elder dalley went down to transfers but i thought that i was just going to feel like crap. so i got permission from president brown to just go down to transfers instead. transfer meetings are super spiritual i learned. when i first got on the island i didnt know what was happening so i didnt get much from it. but now its like "wo, thats super cool and why didnt i think of that hefore?" type of deal. i wish that i could go down to each one haha. but i got Elder Davis as my mission mother. he is from a place called Kirtland, New Mexico. he told me that it is right near the 4 corners area. ive never heard of it haha. he is a super awesome kid! everyone in the mission refers to him as a spiritual giant and its so true! im really excited to work with him for at least 6 weeks. we somehow got back in time to teach some lessons so we went and did that for a couple of hours.

Thrusday 1-2-14
today we finally had a lesson with Keena, a former investigator from a year ago that we have been trying to have a lesson with for a long time. we had a really good lesson with her. i didnt say much cause elder davis was talking the whole time. i pulled him aside after the lesson and talked about that. we worked everything out so our unity should be good. its just weird getting used to a new comp. that should be fixed in like a week tho. everything will be soon good haha. we also had a lesson with another former investigator named Donna. she is pretty solid. we taught the restoration to her and another kid who we found out is hated by all of Jamaica. not going to say why. too personal. but he is pretty cool in my mind. we invited her to be baptized, she said no cause she was baptized into the Pentecostal church already. we then told her the importance of the priesthood and how a man can be baptized 100 times but if its not with the right authority then God doesnt see it as a baptism. she understood that really well and then said yes to the day. she is really solid we will just have to work a little bit with her. its been a long time since she was able to meet with the missionaries.

Friday 1-3-14
i really dont remember what happened today. the only thing that i really remember is that i got in a small bike wreck. it was way funny. we just started to pull out of the church on our bikes. i only looked one way and i was looking for cars. it was safe on that side so i pulled out a bit, then looked the other way and see a guy on his bike coming for me. he couldnt stop in time so he t-boned right into me and my bike. he was pretty pissed off haha. i just said sorry a bunch, brushed off my self and his bike, and went on our way. im not hurt tho. i think that it hurt him more than me. and maybe some of his self confidence haha

Saturday 1-4-14
Today we taught Keena and Donna again. the lessons were super good. we taught Keena the restoration cause we did the plan of salvation last time. she was very understanding and a lot less flirtatious this time haha. we are not going to be going through that again. but she is excited about being baptized so thats good haha. Donna we taught the book of mormon too. she was super understanding of it. she is very prepared. we almost dont have to do any work. missionaries love that haha. people who are so prepared that you really dont have to do any work. those are the elect and we live for those people haha.

Sunday 1-5-14
today was a super interesting day. we had donna and keena come to church, although keena was very late.but we still have them on day for baptism, something i havent had in like a month. we also had a few less active members come back. including an apostate member. i was super shocked by that one. it was sister taylor. the one who wants to take her kids names off the church membership records. she even bore her "testimony". it was more of a super rebuking time for her. she has a grudge with a member here who has her grandson. its a very confusing situation that no one is on her side for. she came and rebuked but stayed for all of church so that was a good thing haha. hopefully she will start coming again. we are starting to have civil conversations with her and she seems a lot more happy than she was before. something is changing, i just dont know how fast that its going to be. her daughter Ashagaye was not at church tho. we went over and found out why. she gave us a big scare. first she told us she was on disiplinary, so we thought she broke a commandment. then she cleared that up by saying she was on probation, so then we thought she broke the law. she then cleared that up by saying that she was grounded. we were a little frustrated haha. its a dumb excuse. well have to work on that one haha

well thats all i got this week. my concussion is healed, and this may be my last 6 weeks in porty. its sad but its gonna be a good transfer!

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham