Week 45

yo bossies wappen to yuh?!

this week has been pretty good. we had some pretty funny bike drama this week. just so you all know, i love bikes a lot more than walking, but i still really hate bikes haha. they are just really annoying when you have to fix them every single day about.

Monday 6-30-14

so we had a few more errands today that we had to run. nothing too bad. its just really hot haha. but the bad part is that we didnt even get to teach a lot today. everything mostly just blew out. we did get the bikes fixed tho thats the good thing. i really didnt enjoy walking too much and i never will lol. but then the bikes broke down again. thats why we had no appointments. elder phippen had some bad gears on the bike he has now and i got a flat tire halfway home so i had to patch the stupid thing up. man was that stressing. and the stuff we had later in the week was even worse....

Tuesday 7-1-14

Hello July!!! man its hard to believe that in 2 weeks from now, i will have been out for 11 months!!! where did the time go?! today was a pretty good day. it was super hot in the morning, as always, and cool in the afternoon, which is being more common now. its like 95 at 10am when we go out and i swear that it gets down to like 80 by 3pm. its sad how that is cool for me tho haha. 80 used to be so hot, now its like there is freaking AC in a room all the time haha. but we went and saw amoy and sister warren today. we talked to them a bit about Joseph Smith, just trying to get them all familier with the restoration. that way they can share in with their friends and amoy can be prepared for when she goes on her mission. her papers were turned in as i got here so hopefully she will have her call here soon. after we were there we went up to the Russell home and had a small lesson with them. they are pretty interested in the plan of salvation now so when we go over there we will be talking about that. we mostly just talked about scripture study today. they also want us to come over 2 more times a week and help them study from the book of mormon one day, and from the bible a different day. thats gonna be a lot of work but i think that its gonna be super fun. we also went and saw a kid named Todd. he is a pretty cool kid. when i first saw him i thought that he was a bag of jokes but after the lesson we had with him, which was on the Holy Ghost, he seems like a really sincere kid. he is just a typical 16 yer old teenage boy haha. he is sincere but just wants to be a punk and look tough. he enjoyed the lesson really well. the future with that should be pretty fun.

Wednesday 7-2-14

today was the first district meeting that ive had in santa cruz. but it wasnt in santa haha, it was in a place called junction. its like an hour taxi ride from santa. its also a bit of a small town but its pretty nice. the church there has AC and the town is super cool cause its in the mountains haha. its everything that santa cruz wishes that it was to say. it was a pretty good district meeting. just a lot of unnecessary talking. next week should be better tho. most of the appointments that we had today too blew out as well. we only saw one guy. his name is Nigel. he lives clear in the heck out there. its like a 40 minute bike ride to his house. the only reason we still teach him is cause he is very humble and we really think that him and his family can make it to church. we told him our purpose, which is to help people make covenants, and then explained about those as well.  it took basically the rest of the evening. in jamaica, if its past 7pm, its super hard to go see people cause they think that that is super late. we have to be doing something then tho. we dont take dinner till 8 so finding stuff to do then when something else blows out is never a fun thing haha. but i also got another flat tire today. that was not fun. the holes were also too far apart to patch it and we didnt have enough patches to even get the whole thing.

Thursday 7-3-14

first thing first. i went and got a new tube for my bike tire. this thing is getting really annoying haha. we are at the bike shop almost every single day it seems like. good thing that i did learn how to patch bike tires. that sure does save me a lot of money in the long run. i just wish that i coulda done it right now. that woulda helped a lot. but the back tire sucks and thats the one that was flat. there goes like $500 right there. oh well tho. we went up to amoys house. she and her mom ended up feeding us as well. that was really good since the start to our day started out SO GOOD haha. we didnt have any lessons until the afternoon tho. we went back out to Newriver (where Nigel lives) but now quite as far as before. we saw our investigator named Staysha. she is doing pretty well. she is having some questions when she reads so we mostly just answered her questions about the Book of Mormon. all she really has got to do now is come to church. i really think that once she comes to church, she will come for the rest of her life.

Friday 7-4-14

crazy crazy day for us today. we ended up not starting our super planning until like noon cause elder phippen had to do follow up calls with the sisters in junction and then we had elder and sister vance come and inspect our apartment. they didnt give us a very good grade to say the least. i think it was a bit harsh but whatever. i can still live in the thing haha. im not dead yet and thats what counts in the long run :) so we did super planning until 3 and had lunch so we didnt get out until 4pm. and we didnt really have any lessons today either. by the time we got out, we had to go buy snacks for friday night activity, and then go to the church for a planned lesson with Mickailia. that didnt even work out tho. we were going to watch the restoration video with her but a member needed to get on the computer to do something for their calling and ended up taking forever on it. by the time the member was done, it was way past time for the activity to start, which was gonna be karaoke. we then tried to get everything working on the computer, and the internet shut down for some reason. we had some back up plans for when the member was on the computer and some of the people also were outside playing a small game of football. thats soccer for all of you american people haha. but even tho it was a total disaster tonight, everyone still had fun and next week we are going to make it up to them by doing karaoke again. i think we have a way figured out so that the computer doesnt act dumb again. we're just not going to move it from the spot its in haha. and we had more bike problem today. elder phippen somehow snapped the handle bar on his bike. so now its just half of the handle bar. so guess where we get to go tomorrow. the bike shop..... again....

Saturday 7-5-14

well, elder phippen got his bike fixed today right in the morning. man was that necessary. later in the day we ended up biking out to this place called Lacovia. its like 5 miles away from santa. its so crazy far. its a beautiful ride out tho. you could probably get there in like 20 minutes or 40 if you really tried hard. the ride back is like 30 minutes, and half of it you can do in like 10. but we saw a member out there. Brother Morrison. he is a super cool guy. he told us all about his conversion story. its something like youwould never believe. i guess he just decided to read a good book one day and the first one that his hand touched one day was the book of mormon. he didnt like that at all haha. but he read it and started to just read and read. he ended up taking 6 weeks to be baptized and has been faithful since. he was the branch president of the hopeton branch a while back. then we had to bike back and have a lesson with Mickailia. it was a good lesson. we taught her the importance of receiving and answer through prayer and not on people. she understood real well and is gonna be praying about the book of moron a lot now. she is so sincere about it all and really does want to join the church. we gave her august 2nd as a baptism day and she said yes to it! im super excited for that! i wanna stay here for that so bad!

Sunday 7-6-14

church was so interesting today. it was fast and testimony meeting of course. thats never a good thing in a small branch. in the time allotted for testimonies. we had like 4 people bear "testimonies". more like talkamony haha. only 2 people were really like a testimony. the other 2 were not. one just said a lot of trials that she was going through at the time. the branch president had to cut her off or i think that she woulda gone for the whole time haha. the other one was like going to a pentacostal church. it was just "in the name of Jesus" every 3 seconds. the branch president had to cut her off too. and thank heavens there haha. the lessons we had today were pretty good. we saw a recent convert and talked about the talk that elder holland gave last conference. we also saw a guy named Devon. he is pretty sincere but also crazy. he asks so many weird and random questions that even when they are honest, they are just stuff that people should know by common sense. he is way smart tho dont get me wrong. teaching him should be very interesting haha.

well thats the week. its a lot better than last week ill say that haha. but santa cruz is starting to grow on me. its amazing how fast that an area can just be in your heart. the next however long im here is gonna be so much fun!

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
1 Peter 4:12-14

Week 44

So uh....... Wagwan?

This week has been so crazy. to explain the subject of the letter...... We had elder phippens bike stolen from out house monday night so we walked all week. and with santa cruz being hot.... it was not fun.

Monday 6-23-14

so today we had to run a lot of errands for out Pday. it wasnt really too relaxing. plus, it was burning hot. the only relief that we had from the heat was when we went into KFC for lunch and sat there for the AC for like 90 minutes. there isnt much else to do in Santa so that was the Pday haha. also, every single appointment that we had blew out. we saw no one today. that is never a fun thing. we biked around the whole time for nothing. but it was an ok day.

Tuesday 6-24-14

so we woke up today and went to the gym. yupp thats right, im going to the gym. its more from being forced tho haha. elder phippen wants to go to the gym for his work outs in the mornings so elder dean and i just wake up an hour early and go with him. i never thought that 6:30am would be sleeping in. its so sad haha. but we also woke up to the bike being stolen so what i great way to start off the day. not. so we had to go back to walking for a bit. and if youve seen any of my past letters, you should know taht i think walking is the way to get to the gateway to hell. with bikes, you go right by it, but walking just sucks you into it. also, with santa cruz being so hot, it feels like hell all the time. you can imagine the predicament that i am in with that haha. but we had a good time today to say the least. we found some kids fishing in a small steam near an investigator so we kinda fished with them. it was way cool. it was just some line and a hook with bait. no pole or anything. they were way small fish but they had a pretty good size one for the stream. just could fit in my palm but it was impressive the same way haha. not really any big lessons. with walking this week, we wont be having a lot of things done now. next week will be better tho.

Wednesday 6-25-14

we had zone meeting in Mandeville today. its a way nice town. pretty american if you ask me. the church there is super nice too! i wish santa had one like that haha. but we got quite a few more members, a lot more, until we get that haha. it was a pretty good zone meeting. i feel like its all stuff that has been repeated for the last 6 months tho. i have been trying to use all this stuff. hopefully next time it will change a bit. so now with the walking i am being sore. plus the gym isnt helping a lot with that haha. my legs are just killing me along with my abs. im a wuss i know haha. again, not a lot of lessons today. the walking is just killing us. we did see someone by the name of Sasha tho. she seems pretty interested to learn more so teaching her should be a lot of fun. we also got chatted by some rasta guy. sometimes chatting is cool and funny, but most of the time it just pushes my buttons. it wastes time so much. days are so weird here haha

Thursday 6-26-14

so today was really like being Shadrach, Meshach, and the other guy that i cant spell the name of haha. i know how they feel about being in the furnace cause that is what i am in now. Santa Cruz is by far the hottest place that i have ever been. it might even compare with the heat of Death Valley. ok its not quite that bad but its super hot here. everything blew out for us in the morning so we were stuck with nothing to do until the evening time. the only thing that we did was go to a members house and do a small lesson to prepare for another investigator. the lesson style for me here is very different. sometimes talking just doesnt come for me. there are not a lot of chances for me to talk. i am getting by it tho. sometimes its a nice thing cause i am just so out of it.

Friday 6-27-14

i really hate being an errand boy. sometimes people call us for the dumbest things. i wish that people would have it in their heads that we are called to preach the gospel, not to run stuff by your house cause you wont go there. running an errand today made us pretty late for other things during the day, which sucked bad. the best thing i think we did all day was our Friday Night Activity. it was just a bible study today tho. we had an ok turn out. there were about as many people there as show up before, like 6. by the end we only had like 3. a member, and her friend, and her brother. santa is tough yo haha. but we mostly stayed around the church today for that. the bad thing, its still hot, and we're still walking haha. my future spouse is getting hotter by the second tho ;)

Saturday 6-28-14

Today i met my first crazy member in Santa. this guy is less active and is in a lot of debt. like 32G in debt. he doesnt understand it tho. he is putting 18G into a barrel so that he can make money later. too bad he is never gonna get that debt payed off like that. we also had a really good lesson with a new investigator tho. her name is Mickailia. she is the best friend of one of the strongest members in the branch. i think that she understood the lesson pretty well. other than the other girl who would not shut up. i have learned down here that i really hate people who just chat their lives away. they get pretty annoying haha. i am way excited to teach Mickailia tho. she is way smart and would be a great missionary when she is 19 (she is 15 now). i think the branch just needs a new start. my focus really is gonna be the youth. i think that if the youth are real good here, then the branch will be very good in the future.

Sunday 6-29-14

church today was the normal haha. we had like 5 before the sacrament, and only the missionaries could pass the sacrament. by the end tho we had like 8 or 10. the sad part, like 3 of them were not even members yet. one of them was Mickailia tho. she has been at church the last 3 weeks tho. she really does enjoy it a lot. she even taught youth sunday school today! it was a fantastic job! after church the branch decided to do a little "munch and mingle" so that people could get to know each other. that went really well. the branch, those who were there at least, really loved it. i think that it was a major success. then we had a member call us to come up and eat at her house. its a bit of a waste of time to go there so we tried to get out of it. its also like a 2 hour walk up and 2 hours back. and we had no money for taxi really. so it wasnt getting out of it, it was telling her we couldnt. but she told us we had to come and then hung up. we scrambled around for some change to use to taxi up there, found it, and went. well, the member is crazy. i have never seen a crazier member than before. she even had the crazy eyes and laugh. oh man. santa cruz may kill me haha. so many things just go down here!

Despite how it may sound in my letter, i still really love my mission to the very end! once you get past the parts that make it seem like its satan the whole time, you realize that God is working on everyone all the time! but the most important person is you. my mission has CONVERTED me to the gospel of Jesus Christ. i hope that none of you will ever take the gospel for granted. it really is the greatest gift that our Heavenly Father has given us!

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
1 Corinthians 9:14

Wwek 43

Hey everyone!

so ya im in a new area. the area is Santa Cruz, which is kinda on the south-western part of the island above a place called Black River. the title of the letter says it all. Santa does not live at the north pole. it feels like im in Africa right now. it is super hot, it never rains, and that makes cloud cover very rare. plus, there are hills up the wazoo! ive never had such a hilly area! getting to appointments is so hard! the god thing, the house is by KFC so we can go there whenever we want haha.

Monday 6-16-14

so pday today wasnt really too relaxing. the first off, since i had my transfer call, i had to pack the whole day. once we got done with shopping at stuff, i was packing. i really hate packing! hopefully i will only have to do one more thing of packing while im on my mission. well i guess two. one to leave here for one more area, and then again to pack to come home. but it really sucked to say the least haha. then we had a lesson with Chayanne. that really was not a good lesson. she was very distracted the whole time. it seemed like she was trying to hide from us. of course we tried going there without a member again. that was stupid. we never shoulda gone there without someone. it was the last lesson i had with her so elder farb and carter will be able to take care of that. then we went to see the cardoza family. we met with matthew and his mom. we decided that we were gonna teach them the thing that president brown gave during stake conference. "6 ways to build/keep a stake". it went super well! they loved the aspect of getting activities going again. idk why but it seems that all of the branches just stopped doing activities. they were really good with it in the 90s but started to slack off. hopefully that will change soon cause the cardozas are right on top of it. they said that they would talk to bishop smith about getting them going all the time again.

Tuesday 6-17-14

today is my last day in spanish town!!!!!!!! THAT REALLY SUCKS!!!!!!!!! i just dont want to leave at all. this is the worst feeling in the world!!!!!!! i love spanish town so much!!! i really feel like ive made the very best friends that i ever could down here!!!!!!! somebody wanna come take my spot so i can stay here?!?!! so today i went and said my final goodbyes to people. the big ones were Christinea, Nakeitha, Britteny, Sherefah, and Khadejah. so basically the best friends down here that i made haha. i really am going to miss those people. kinda weird how they are all girls too..... no comment there i guess.... but i got a bunch of photos with them so ill be sure to send them. that was kinda the whole day tho. elder farb and i just went around and got a bunch of members to sign my journal. i really hate last days in areas. i just cant wait to come back to spanish town after i get home! im so planning a trip as soon as i can to come back down here! SPANISH TOWN IS ZION!!!!!!!!

Wednesday 6-18-14

Transfer day. the worst day of my entire life. the day i have to leave spanish town. so the drive out to santa cruz was really cool. there were a lot of hills on the way. the road that leads down into the town is like one of the biggest hills ever. its down hill for like 3 miles or more. i kinda wanna ride my bike down it haha. but we really didnt do anything today. elder phippin and i got all of our stuff unpacked and then did a bit of shopping to tide us over until monday. the bad thing, im already super area sick. i really miss spanish town and i have only been away for a few hours. these next few days are just going to be very depressing for me. but i am way excited about santa cruz. it is a very small branch (10 people come to church, and 65 are on record) but it is a very nice place! the weather is normally very hot and there are tons of hills. it should be a lot of fun sweating all the time and working my legs out constantly haha.

Thursday 6-19-14

well, i was right. THERE ARE SO MANY HILLS!!!!!! getting to our first appointment was so hard! i have not had so many hills or so steep of hills my entire mission! Porty doesnt even come close and Spanish Town is super flat! i was not prepared for this haha. and yes, im still very "area sick". i really miss spanish town. but today was a really good day. we met a lot of the members mostly. our first lesson was super good. we went up to see Amoy, a potential missionary, and her mom, Sister Warren. we wanted to teach Amoy how to teach the restoration to someone but it ended up being focused on sister warren. we only got through how god loves us and gives us families but she was crying during the whole thing! she even gave us a referral for her other daughter! it was a great way to start out the area! it looks like there are a lot of less actives in the branch, as yesterday shows haha. i love working with less actives tho. something in them just has me loving to work with them. i really look forward to seeing what happens these next 6 weeks/months.

Friday 6-20-14

so today was a slow. the work here is way good it was just a super slow day today. we met a lady named Iona. she doesnt seem as interested but her daughter and her friend seem very interested. they are like 12 years old each and they are super smart! im not sure if as smart as the campbells in spanish town but they are way smart! we want to be able to teach them. we'll have to meet with them again some time. we also met sister thomas. she is super smart as well.she is training her daughter how to be a missionary already! and she's 13! i love when people do that haha! even her friend is super smart! it seems that the people out here are just like the smartest things ever! thats gonna make things super fun! we also got a really random referral. President Blake, 2nd councilor in the mission presidency, drove up and saw us, pulled us over, and told us that he wants us to go and teach his uncle in a part of our area! it was super cool! i love referrals haha

Saturday 6-21-14

for some odd reason, a lot of people down here remind me of people in spanish town. i guess that just explains how "area sick" that i am haha. Lisa, a potential missionary, reminds me so much of Khadejah. they just talk and act so much alike. it kinda scares me to be honest haha. and then this kid named Bryan, a recently reactivated priest, reminds me of Sherefah. of course thats cause they both do cadet stuff (army). but it kinda scares me. we had a really busy day. we need to get in a lunch time tho. we didnt eat until like 4 today and that just wont do. i need food before then haha. especially since there are a bunch of hills. but we'll cross that bridge when we get there haha. nothing really exciting happened in the lessons. i really cant say the one thing that i did think was funny...... its not good haha.

Sunday 6-22-14

man it is a small branch here. i guess there is normally like 7 who come to church on a normal basis. well we had way more than that! we had like 12 be there before sacrament, and 16 were there by the end of church. you can see just how small it is haha. the church is an old doctors office so its super small. but its a relly good branch. the people here are really genuine. but the sad thing is that there isnt a lot of worthy priesthood, so us missionaries are the branch clerks. we're not quite the branch presidency cause there is a guy here, President Durrant, who is super cool and really wants the branch to grow. he is the only one out of 3 guys tho who is worthy to hold a calling. i have a lot of high hopes for him tho. he really wants this branch to grow and he has the confidence to do it! but so far i really love Santa Cruz! its a super nice place with excellent people! i also love that its a bit more like Porty. just a small town. there isnt much here but there is enough. spanish town of course was way nice cause i was away from the main part of town. but even town here really isnt too bad. i really look forward to serving here!

so thats the week. im super sad to be out of spanish town but i am really glad to be here in santa cruz. its small now but soon come it will be a big branch. if i can get more people to come here then my job is done. i really just want to help this branch hit its potential.

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
D&C 45:66

Week 42

alright first off everyone look up this link https://www.lds.org/church/news/elder-holland-organizes-first-stake-in-jamaica?lang=eng

my converts and most of Port Antoino is on the photo of the jamaica stake thing!!! thats so awesome for me!!!!!!!!!

the ones i know are the far left for the first 4 girls. then its the 2 girls above them, then its kashane, then the girl next to him and the 2 boys below her are in the branch (the young one being my convert as well as the girl to the right of him) and then the far right one is sister blake. it makes me so happy to know that Jamaica is growing in the church so much! soon come these people will have the same blessings that Kingston and Spanish Town have! I love the Gospel!

so the world cup is on now and everyone down here is going crazy. i myself am going for spain. too bad they got their butt handed to them haha. oh well. i also made a lot of predictions. i have only missed one game so far. and the best part. the email place we are at right now is playing the Germany vs Portugal game haha! i love football so much more haha!

Monday 6-9-14

today was a pretty relaxing day. not really too much to do. the only lesson we had today was with Shelly. it really was not all that good. there were a ton of distractions and she was not focused at all. we wanted to teach her the Plan of Salvation but because of the non focus, we didnt. we just read the Book of Mormon with her. a guy was also outside kneading some Ganja so that didnt help too much. Jamaica sure is an interesting place haha.

Tuesday 6-10-14

today i was on a tradeoff with elder tuala. so we were in his area. a lesson we had early in the morning was interrupted pretty bad haha. we were about to get right past the prayer, and then some jamaicains got in a huge fight so we had to stop the lesson. there were a lot of jamaican cuss words going around haha. sometimes they are just funny. this was one of those times where it was a split. it was funny, but you could feel the spirit just leave right off the bat. thats really it for the day. we didnt get to do a lot of interesting things haha.

Wednesday 6-11-14

so we had a really good district meeting today. it was just a discussion about how we can best use the stake. it was probably one of the most productive meetings ive had on my mission. we also went and saw Matthew. he is really starting to cheep up.we are starting to get him back into missionary work. he even pulled out a role play for us right on his veranda. i was in awe. he had to be a really good missionary when he was serving a few years ago. the other thing that we went to do was see Christinea. she told us that she wanted to serve a mission! i was really happy with that one! she has come a really long ways since i first saw her clear back when i first got to spanish town. she is gonna make an excellent missionary! i so hope that she will be able to serve while i am still out here! that would be the sickest thing ever! and thats all for the day. a lot of things are blowing out this week. its kinda sad but i am still loving the week!

Thursday 6-12-14

so we did another tradeoff with elder tuala. but this time he came to our area. the first thing we did was see Israel, a less active member. we mostly just read with him. he usually flakes out for church but we still invited him. did he show up, no. but we'll work on that. we also saw chayanne today as well. we took britteny with us for that. she loves going out with us to her haha. we reviewed the plan of salvation with chayanne cause i guess on tuesday she said something that meant we had to review it. it was really good and she now gets the whole thing. she is also on date for July 5th. that day will be super awesome if we can get Shelly on board as well. and once again, thats it. so many appointments are blowing out this week. its really crazy.

Friday 6-13-14

so the world cup is super awesome! ive really been keeping track of it this year. members are a huge help haha ;) people down here get into it a lot as well. we get a lot of people just asking us what team we bringin. its way cool to be honest :D first thing we did was have a lesson with christine. she had to go but we taught her the last part of the plan of salvation. she understood it real well. we also found a girl by the name of Kadesha there. she sat in on the lesson for a bit and then we set up a time to see her later in the day. she is super prepared! when we went and had the lesson with her about the restoration, we didnt even get to the great apostasy before we extended her a baptismal date. the spirit was just really strong and she was understanding a lot of stuff. she was basically teaching us! it was one of the best lessons of all time! we gave her June 28th as her day. she was a little sketchy about it but she'll be baptized soon regardless haha. we also had a lesson with the campbells. it wasnt as good. i think we just need to do topics with them. they seem to enjoy that a lot more.

Saturday 6-14-14

so i got my transfer call today and it was the worst news of all time. im going to be leaving the area! i really dont want to leave here. i love Spanish Town so much! the members here are like the best people ever! here and Port Antonio are always going to be my 2 favorite places on earth. i thought that Porty was the place to be but Spanish Town is such a great place too! i definitely have got to get back to Jamaica as soon as i can haha! so i will be going to Santa Cruz. its a really bush spot on the west side of the island kinda by Black River. i wont be going there too much tho. i think its for a different branch. i will be in another Tripanionship tho. it will be with Elder Deans, from Nassau Bahamas, and Elder Phippin, from Idaho Falls. he is one of the guys that i roomed with in the MTC. so this should be a really fun transfer haha. the main lesson that we had today was with the campbells. ya its way late in the night. it was all we did tho haha. more stuff just blew out. the lesons are back on track tho. we went over hope with them and everything was back to normal. its sad that i have to leave the campbells. they are by far my favorite family ever! besides my own of course haha. we also did not play basketball today. with the world cup on, everyone was inside watching that. we didnt really think of that before so we ended up going to the court still haha. Christinea decided to come with us so that she could spend more time with us before i go haha. it was pretty fun. we had a small game happen when jay showed up later. my elder baller status from the MTC is definitely back. i can always just end the game on a 3 now. why couldnt i do that back home? haha

Sunday 6-15-14

i am saying a lot of goodbyes now. i took a few photos at church with some members and ill be doing that for the next few days haha. transfers are always the worst. you get to love an area, and then POOF! your gone. i really am sad to be leaving tho. Spanish Town i think is the best area that i served in so far. and it always will be. this really is Zion. i think Joseph Smith meant spanish town jamaica not independence Missouri haha. we had another great lesson with the campbells today. we went over something that president brown said in stake conference of how to build/keep a stake. they are really interesting points. they loved it. i also had them sign my journal. it took a little longer than i thought but i was fine with it. it means that i got to spend more time with the campbells haha! we also took britteny with us. we were giong to see chayanne but as the theme of the week says, it blew out. she still wanted to do something so we took her with us. she seemed to have fun with it. i love that members are wanting to come out with us to teach. it means that us as missionaries are doing the job we should be doing.

so ya im super sad to be leaving. its a bittersweet thing that is more bitter than sweet. but i know its where i need to be at this point. having a few trips down here is so gonna go into a yearly budget back home haha. i just need to get a super good job.

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
something to change it up a bit haha. here it is https://www.lds.org/church/news/elder-holland-organizes-first-stake-in-jamaica?lang=eng

Week 41

hey everyone whats up?!

this week was just so amazing! as i have been going off about in the last 3 or 4 letters, ELDER HOLLAND CAME TO JAMAICA!!! AND THE FIRST STAKE EVER IN JAMAICA IS HERE!!!!!!!! this is something that everyone has been waiting for for so long! and its here! the church is growing and its gonna continue to grow! wo getting ahead of myself here...... back to the week...

Monday 6-2-14

So pday today was pretty stressing. we took a bike ride down a mountain today. we had the zone leaders drive us up to the top, which took us like 30-40 minutes, and then rode down the whole thing, which took like 15 minutes. its was fun but also a bit anti-climatic as well. it was pretty steep tho. we had to of been going close to 45-50 mph. we really had to get our brakes checked before it haha. it was a ton of fun tho. it did cause a bit of stress tho cause we got to emails way late, and then we had to bike over to the place that we shop for food. its like 2 different ends of down. that wasnt the funnest thing ever. but we got home in time to take a short rest. that felt pretty good haha. later in the day we taught Chayanne and Shelly. we had to different lessons for the same household haha. first we taught Chayanne the Plan of Salvation. or at least the last half of it. we had Britteny come with us for it since they are about the same age. she did a very good job. its so much easier to have a 14 year old explain something to a 13 year old haha. i still need to improve on that a lot but im getting better. then we took Britteny home and went and got JD to teach Shelly. that was a very good lesson. i didnt get any words in cause JD taught the whole thing! it was the sickest thing ever! that kid is still a fantastic missionary! he so needs to go back out on his mission. i dont care where he goes but anywhere is where that kid needs to be. he knew exactly what to do and how to do it. so cool!

Tuesday 6-3-14

to start off the day we saw Kayann, finally. one thing that we are doing during the week now is showing a lot of people a talk by Elder Holland to get them pumped up for stake conference. kayanns lesson was ok. she just didnt seem to pay a lot of attention to it really. thats a really hard thing to see. you prepare so hard for something and someone just doesnt care about it. i hate agency haha. now i know how God feels with us when we are like that to him. we did that with basically all of the lessons today. we saw a few more members, a couple were less active, and then went to see our investigator Christine. we did not show her any Elder Holland today tho. we needed to get done with the restoration and introduce the Book of Mormon to her. it was a really good lesson. she is very willing to come to church and listen to what we have to say. we tried to extend a day for her to be baptized but she wouldnt accept it yet. we will try again later tho haha.

Wednesday 6-4-14

this is where our week started to get interesting. the devil was playing a big hand today. it sucked but its what comes in with life and with a mission i guess. it did start off really good tho. we had a super good district meeting. the spirit was felt heavily and we were all very involved in it. then we had jennys. you cant go wrong with that haha. but after that is where it did start to go wrong. the first thing that we did was drop gary and nicole. they werent doing a lot of stuff so we told them that lessons with us wouldnt continue. nicole i guess has been saying a lot of stuff about us behind our backs to Christinea, her next door neighbor. christinea was pretty stressed out about it. we tried to take sherefah with us as well. the lesson with chayanne we had was kinda boring so she didnt have a lot of fun today. then we heard all this stuff with nicole and we just kinda thought, "man things just cant get any better than this". it was a hard day to say the least. but we went and saw christinea before the night was over to cheer her up and it ended up cheering us all up. we ended up sharing a talk from elder holland so that helped out so much with everything. things were just shoved in our face by satan today. it sucked but its what comes with the "job" haha.

Thursday 6-5-14

i have realized that being sick on the mission is like the worst thing ever. you cant go out and teach cause you dont feel like you have the spirit, but you cant stay inside cause you just feel so worthless. ive been sick since wednesday with something but ive been trying to tough it out. its not really too bad i just feel weak sometimes and a headache haha. nothing i cant get through. we started off the day doing service tho. we thought that it was gonna take us like 10 minutes, all we were doing was moving boxes at the church with the Salvation Army, but it ended up taking us like 3 hours! man that was long and my arm started hurting from it haha. the good thing is that we got free pizza from Pizza Hut at the end of it all haha. we didnt have to eat any of our food today cause sister blake also cooked for us. we also took around sherefah today again. we decided taht we needed to make it up to her for yesterday so we took her to sister blakes house as well. she defiantly had more fun today than the last time haha. we also had a lesson with Shelly. we showed her an Elder Holland talk, of course haha. she said taht she wouldnt be at church tho cause of a funeral that she was making a big deal out of. we respected that tho and sid alright. i so wish that she coulda showed up tho....

Friday 6-6-14

today, i am still sick...... i hate being sick. its not fun at all. we did have an alright day tho. we saw christine and showed her a talk from elder holland. she loved it and said that she really wanted to be at church this weekend. she said that she wouldnt make it to saturday but sunday for sure. that made us sad but it was what we were going to get haha. she is really coming a long ways tho. i just wish that we could teach her more stuff in a less amount of time. oh well. its worth it for a full conversion one day haha. then we went and saw sister blake and did the same thing. for some reason tho our lessons have been down this week. we really havent taught a lot of people like i feel like we have been in the past. hopefully that will change next week cause with stake conference, we still have time blown out haha.

Saturday 6-7-14

so stake conference was like the biggest thing today! it was such a great time. elder holland gave a very good talk about hastening the work when he got up. he shared a story of 3 men who went to the door of someone. the guy came out and saw them. it was his bishop, elders quorum president, and sunday school president. well the man had a cig in his hand. but it was in st. george clear back so everyone knew that he smoked. they all went in the house and just stood there. then the bishop just blurted out, "frank we are here to call you as a sunday school teacher!" after dabbing his cig out on the coffee table, used for coffee and not decor as elder holland put it, he said, "BUT I SMOKE?!"  the bishop then blurted out "FRANK I DONT CARE IF YOU SMOKE! THATS YOUR PROBLEM NOT OURS!" (we had a good kick from that. southern utah humor haha). frank then turned around and saw elder holland in a different room. this is clear back when elder holland was 10 so the man, frank, is his father. he then said that his dad got a revelation to him right then taht they were talking about elder hollands class. elder holland got very serious right here and said something like, "DONT YOU EVER! THINK THAT GOD IS NOT WORKING ON THOSE TYPES OF PEOPLE! "(cig smoker, coffee drinker, beer drinker)" HE IS WORKING ON THEM EVERYDAY!!!!" (that was super scary cause he went from joking around a bit to his rebuking face and tone. i thought that i was about to die haha but back to the story). his dad then asked when he wanted it done. then elder holland said this. "THERE WAS A SUDDEN CRASH IN OUR KITCHEN. MY MOTHER SAID THAT SHE DROPPED A POT. OH PLEASE! GIVE ME A BREAK! SHE PULLED THE WHOLE CUPBOARD DOWN!" (elder holland is a very funny guy haha) but then he let us think about how that is hastening the work. hastening the work doesnt always mean missionary work. it can go from family history work, to reactivation, to retention, to whatever. the lords work is everything. and it needs to be hastened. he also said a very cool quote that got me thinking. he was referring to those 3 people who came to his dad but he said "PEOPLE LIKE YOU, HAVE SAVED PEOPLE LIKE ME!" now just imagine that. this is a man who has seen Christ himself, and he is saying that an ordinary person like us has saved people who are like him. such a crazy quote but such a great one at the same time. its very true. you never know what is going to happen when you help just one person out. that generation or the ones that follow could be effected for the rest of time.

Sunday 6-8-14

well the stake is officially here! elder holland and elder cornish set up the first stake ever in Jamaica! this next generation of missionary work is here now. i cant wait to be doing all of this with a stake president as well. now i feel like all of those state side missionaries a bit haha. but the stake is only in Spanish Town, Kingston, Old Harbour, Linstead, and Portmore so i might get transferred out here soon haha. hopefully not tho. i wanna stay the rest of my mission in Spanish Town! another nice thing is that during the night i was able to get up to the church for a minute and see some of the youth. elder holland wanted to talk to them as well so we went up right at the end of that meeting to see some youth. i was able to see all the youth from Port Antonio that i was super tight with! man did that feel good! i miss home so much haha! Porty and Spanish Town are always gonna be my 2 favorite places of all time. there are no better places than them. i dont care what anyone else says about that haha. but it really does feel good to be here. its the best thing of all time.

so thats the week. it was pretty eventful if you ask me haha. but being out here is by far the best choice that i have ever made. there are people down here that i need to talk to and those people in turn need to talk to me so that they can teach me something. i will never regret the choice to come on a mission. this is the Lords work and nothing can stop it. the church is true. i may not have come out on a mission with a lot of knowledge, but i will come back with the best knowledge of all. and thats that i know this church is true without a shadow of a doubt. nothing could ever shake my faith in that. to put it as the Prophet Joseph Smith said Love You All, "the Standard of Truth has been erected; no unhallowed hand can stop the work from progressing; persecutions may rage, mobs may combine, armies may assemble, calumny may defame, but the truth of God will go forth boldly, nobly, and independent, till it has penetrated every continent, visited every clime, swept every country, and sounded in every ear; till the purposes of God shall be accomplished, and the Great Jehovah shall say the work is done."

Love You All,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
"The standard of Truth" from Joseph Smith Jr.

Week 40

Hey Everyone wappen?

so this week was pretty good. im not really sure what to say about it so ya..... here it is i guess:

Monday 5-26-14

today was just a relaxing Pday. we had a lot of time to kill on our hands so we stayed at the house and just rested up. missionary work gets tiring haha. we then went and picked up Sherefah to go to Chayannes. the lesson with Chayanne was pretty good. we just read the first chapter of the Book of Mormon with her. her attention span is a bit small so we kept the lesson pretty short. but we did get a new investigator from the lesson too. its Chayannes aunt Shelly. she joined us for the lesson and we set a return appointment to specifically see her. she has some really good desires. it should be pretty interesting to teach her as well too.

Tuesday 5-27-14

today we did some service in the morning for someone we want to teach. her name is Christine. she was doing some stuff to her lawn when we passed by one day so we came back today to help her out with other things. service has been a big part of us getting to teach people so we continue to use up the 4 hours of service per week we have. by the end of the week we have no time left for it. but we set up a return appointment for later in the week so im really excited about that. the only other lesson that we had today was with Chris and his mom. we went over and talked about chris serving a mission. his mom said that she woundnt hold him back from coming to church, even tho she has been the past little bit. she is going to support him but its gonna be a little bit of time before we can really get them all coming on a consistent basis. it was kinda a short day with all of this stuff but it was still a pretty good day. oh ya just so that everyone knows (and to freak the mom out a bit ;) ) one spot in our area was closed down today. some guy got shot with an M16 or something when we were right down the street. i never heard any of the shots haha. but i did hear that the cops found like 27 bullets at the scene. Jamaica crazy man haha :D

Wednesday 5-28-14

so today was a pretty good day i guess. we had zone meeting to start off with. the power was out in the church so it got pretty hot inside. we had to move rooms to where the power was actually working. but other than that it was good haha. the next lesson we had was a lesson with Ricky. we were gonna prep Christinea on it but Ricky came walking up wanting to have a lesson so we had one with him there on Chrstineas veranda. it was an ok lesson. it seems that we didnt really move on when we were supposed to. we will be better then next time tho. then the next lesson we had was with Chayanne. we were going to go over the plan of salvation but i forgot some cards we wanted to bring so that it was a little bit more fun for her. so instead we went over the book of mormon just a bit. mostly just read with her. but sister russell came in and gave some pretty good input with it. we did catch a couple of points in some doctrine that we need to go over again but thats not a big concern. we then stopped by the McCalla house for our last appointment. we were gonna share a thought with them but Sherefah suddenly had us clean up a wedding dress that she was using the next day for school. she had messed it up so she had us "dry clean" it. meaning it was dry, but it was getting cleaned. idk..... but we did that for an hour and then had to go home to keep the rules haha.

Thursday 5-29-14

to start the day off we went back over to Christine, the lady we did service for. the lesson with her went really well. she explained that the things that she likes in a church is basically everything that we do in this church, even tho she doesnt know that we do that haha. i really think that she will be baptized soon. we are planning on extending the 28th of June as her baptism day. once we see her next week we will do that. we feel like we need just a bit of doctrine taught first before a day is set. but she is very prepared for the gospel and i look forward to teaching her for the next little bit! later in the day we went over to Shelly, chayannes aunt, and had a really good lesson with her. its kinda weird. her whole countenance changes when she sits in lessons with us. she is strict with the kids there, but is super calm when she sees us. the good thing also is that we can get through the lessons that we have planned. we seem to be moving onto each point easier. thats super good. then later in the day while playing some indoor football, i floured one of the elders. it was super funny. its a custom in jamaica to flour someone on their birthday so thats what i did. i will send you some pics if i can.

Friday 5-30-14

so today we didnt do service to start off haha. we had to super plan first. kinda sucks but we were able to get some snacks before so it wasnt so bad haha. one lesson we had today was with matthew cardoza. he opened up to us about some things taht he has a hard time believing in. i want to help him but at the same time it might need to go to a professional. we'll have to see what happens tho. the last lesson of the day was with Ricky. this time we took him over to the Campbells tho. it was a really good lesson. he understood what was being said, we were able to get through all the points, and the campbells did a really good job at teaching the lesson. they are still a bit new to it but that will change in no time at all. they bore their testimonys and i think that it really helped Ricky out a lot. im super excited to have the campbells teach tho. they are just so solid! :D

Saturday 5-31-14

so we now have one week until Elder Holland comes down to the island! im am so super stoked for that! the first thing that we did today was go and chop through the "forest" in Christineas back yard. the grass back there was just super tall. it took us like 90 minutes to get the thing done, which really is a pretty good time. she wants to help us out with missionary work as well so we are really trying to get her to fellowship a lot of people. afterwards we went and saw Chayanne. this time we taught her just the first part of the Plan of Salvation. we are gonna put it in like 2-3 lessons for her so that its easy to understand. she understood it pretty well but i forgot my cards again. we will get it in the next time tho haha. we also went to Christinea and prepped her for the next lesson that we have with Ricky. we talked about the Book of Mormon so that we can share that with him. after that we went and played ball haha. its still a super fun thing to do and we can really find people from it. then we went over to the campbells home with Christine and talked about the restoration. as normal, another great lesson. the campbells are just solid haha.

Sunday 6-1-14

wo when did June come in so fast?! im almost a year out! what the heck? today was super cool tho. the church was packed! there were about 150 people at church! thats the most that there has been since i have been here! we normally get like 120 or so but we had to open the over flow today! so cool! thats really about it tho. we had a lesson with the campbells that was ok. kinda flip flopped. after that we just went in and gave our numbers and had dinner. so kinda a short day haha.

so the members are really getting into missionary work. its super cool. i so wish i had done that back home. but i never saw the missionaries around haha. utah i guess. oh well.

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
Mosiah 3:19

Week 39

hey everyone whats up?

this week...

Monday 5-19-14

so the only lesson that we had today was with Chayanne. it was a really interesting lesson. she has a short attention span and we didnt really teach all that simple. i thought it was a lot of information that was put out. we brought britteny along as well and we are hoping to get some other people to come along as well so that she can have some major fellowship. its super weird teaching teens haha. i can interact with them on a normal basis. but teaching them is a struggle for me since i have a certain way of doing missionary work. its a process to change it into several ways but its coming along haha. next time our lesson with chayanne is gonna be a lot more fun for her. pday was pretty relaxing tho. mostly just sat around until it was time to teach haha. best days ever if you know what i mean.

Tuesday 5-20-14

today we had ian come with us. ian is a member of the branch who is planning on going on his mission in november. he is a really great guy. he knows what he is doing cause he has been going out with the missionaries for over a year now. it was interesting getting the bike tho. we had to go clear up to the church and borrow it from another missionary. after a bit of the day went by, we tried to see soshana. she ended up dropping us cause she got confused. she started to ask other churches about us and it just confused her. nice job asking chevy about ford there. we respected her opinion tho to do some research so we gave her a Book of Mormon and told her to read it to find out if we were true. after that we went back up to the church. we had a discussion with a member, Kim, about JD and what we can do to help him. she gave us a few things that we can do. its something that we defiantly are going to do. after that, the day was basically done.

Wednesday 5-21-14

we had the weirdest lesson with christinea today. it was all about going to the branch president to talk with him. she had some concerns about going so we kinda just got those concerns resolved. it was by far the strangest lesson that i have ever done on my mission i think. the next lesson that we had was with Chayanne. this time we brought Britteny and Sherefah with us. it was a really good lesson. we just let Sherefah and Britteny take care of the teaching. it was just a small follow up on the restoration. they did a really good job. but the rest of our day was taken up with bring them home as well.

Thursday 5-22-14

well we went and saw sister dacosta today. i think she is crazy now. she somehow compared a mango to the bible. i really dont know what else to say to that. she may just be a crazy lady now tho haha. we also went and saw chris today. i didnt really know what to teach him. we ended up talking about mission stuff tho. he has looked up to missionaries in the past so he wants to serve himself. we mostly just answered a bunch of questions that he had. we also saw a new guy named orrett smalls. lets just say that he is not a very small guy at all. he is pretty jacked. we mostly just explained what we do as missionaries. they are 7th day as well so they kinda got into the whole Sabbath deal. its gonna be fun to teach them haha.

Friday 5-23-14

today we did almost no teaching. it was labor day and people down here take that pretty serious. so we did labor in the morning instead of weekly planning. dont worry tho. we had permission. we cleaned out a gully a bit. ill send some photos about it. then we did our super planning. then we went out and picked the McCallas up and Britteny for a lesson with Chayanne. the lesson was really good today. it was very simple about the Book of Mormon. britteny and the mccallas did another great job with teaching the whole thing. its gonna be a common thing that we do. we also had a very short lesson with the campbells cause we had to get the mccallas home again. never thought that taking people home would be such a chunk of time haha.

Saturday 5-24-14

today we saw a guy named ricky. he is super cool. we met him while playing basketball. he is pretty confused on the godhead, meaning that he doesnt really know if God is there or not. he is way interested in what we have to say tho. i think that we got him at the perfect time. i am really looking forward to teaching him. we also went out and played basketball again this week. its so much fun! my elder baller status from the MTC is defiantly back haha! the guys here are starting to give me no space whatsoever. its kinda annoying but funny at the same time haha. i look forward to that every week. its such a nice thing to do on "endurance day" we also went back to the campbells and had a very good lesson on gratitude as well. they are really starting to get into the spirit of missionary work as well. they want to start to invite their friends over. its so awesome! :D

Sunday 5-25-14

the church is starting to have a power outage a lot now. the power went out for like the 5th time since i have been here. its kinda annoying haha. hopefully it doesnt happen during stake conference when elder holland comes haha. but today the main thing we did was spend time at the campbell home again. they wanted to bring a friend over today so while brother campbell was getting them, we kinda prepped sister campbell on what was going to happen. well brother campbell was very late so we made a quick check up on nakeitha. she was in a lot better mood today to say the least. then we went back over to the campbells house to teach their friend. it was a pretty good lesson. mostly just us talking about what we do. another first lesson haha.

so thats the week. we did find a lot of new people which is really good. hopefully we can keep that up so that we dont run out of people to teach. i never want that to happen again haha.

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
John 3:16