Week 79

Hey everyone!

sorry about no letter last week. idk what happened to it. i cant even remember if i did one or not haha

This week was amazing! we got so much work done! but we did get our transfer calls and it pissed me off a bit. ill get to that later tho.....

Monday 2-16-15

it was one of those relaxing days. we took it way easy for the day. but when we went out teaching we had a good day too. we saw a new person named samantha today. she had come to church yesterday so we set up a time to see her today. she has some really good desires. its a bit weird cause she is one of those girls who works at a bar............ but she has good desires and thats what matters haha. then we saw george like we do every week. it was a really productive pday. something thats pretty rare but sweet when it happens haha!

Tuesday 2-17-15

today was pretty interesting. we had a good lesson with Ileen on the restoration. she seems to have understood ti pretty well. our lesson with Okara was super great too. sheika had a really good lesson plan for her. we taught about repentance. she got the whole thing so thats good. she committed to do it. next up tho is the Law o Chastity. that should be interesting haha. the week so far has been really good. hopefully it keeps up.

Wednesday 2-18-15

we had zone meeting today and the rule that i was dreading came in today. we now cannot teach ANY FEMALE without a male being there. im really scared about what this is going to do with our teaching. we were still able to see samantha in the night tho. she brought a few males over. that lesson was super good! she seems way prepared. hopefully it continues. yallahs has really been having a lot of people get prepared. this branch is gonna grow pretty fast!

Thursday 2-19-15

i went on a split today. the first one that i have ever done on my mission haha. elder newcomb had to do some BP crap so elder stewart went with elder fowkes and i got to take around Pete Meddow today. he is way sick. everyone was super glad to see him too. he really helped to get the effects of this new rule out of the way too. it gave us a male at each of the lessons we saw Ileen and went over the Book of Mormon. turns that she cant read tho. but we committed sis stanley to help her out with that. then we also saw sonya and went over the first part of the FTSOY. kinda a lame lesson. our lesson with sis lee was great too. her and george really hit it off. things are a lot better with her than i expected them to be. yallahs is booming haha.

Friday 2-20-15

today we saw Okara and taught her the law of chastity. it was actually a really good lesson. it was super spiritual and no awkwardness at all. okara continues to impress me every time that we go there. games night was sick too. we had a lot of people come and had a lot of games for the night. the best if dominoes tho haha. cant wait to be passionate about that game back home haha. 

Saturday 2-21-15

well today we had the transfer calls. i found out that i will be going to the Boulevard Ward in Kingston. my new comp is gonna be elder pullan. i think he is from Heber, Utah. im kinda pissed tho cause i really dont wanna leave yallahs. this place is the best place that i have ever been to. i would so take here over home any day of the week. it changed my whole mission around and now i just have to leave. but elder pullan is cool so im excited for that. im sure going to miss this place tho. we went to a baptism for Sis Nicely today. i taught her for 2 weeks when i first came to Yallahs. elder newcomb and fowkes have been teaching her since. she finally got baptized haha. it was way sick. her kids should be baptized here soon too. they just have to pick a day. then we got brother campbell to come with us to sister lee and samantha. both of the lessons were freaking sick!  the new rule has actually been doing some wonders for us. most of our discussions have come after the rule came. so it looks like things are going to be good for that. then FHE was pretty good. it just feels really strange to start having people sign my journal. i wish it was something that i didnt have to do. i wanna stay in yallahs

Sunday 2-22-15

today was super sad. i had to give my farewell testimony in church today. i really do love this place so much. its by far my favorite area. i cant wait to come back here in october and/or chirstmas!  after church i went on another split with alwayne for the day. we went and dropped Orasha cause he hasnt come to church once. then we went up to Sonya so i could prep them both on the lesson. the lesson with okara was on eternal marriage. the lesson was really great. there were a few..... odd..... comments made during it but Okara said that she really wants to be married in the temple and she committed to do it. then after the lesson the 3 of us ended up talking about some other things. someone said that they really wanted to see a super bad movie so i spent the next 30-45 minutes trying to get them to commit to not have anything to do with the movie. they were pretty stubborn about it, almost as much as me haha. they were really sad but they finally and honestly committed to not watching the movie or anything close to it. it took a while but it was time well spent. i think i found the reason why i was here tho. i got here when i did so i could get help from one of the members while i was trying to reactivate them. the steps they took when i first met them are so sick and i hope they stay on the path. finding friends like that in areas is the best thing ever! they are a huge reason why i stayed out on my mission.

so thats the week. it was super good. im way sad to be leaving yallahs of course (if you didnt get my ranting in this email haha). yallahs has really turned into my favorite place in the whole world. areas on your mission are like vapor, they are there, and then its gone (see James4:14). i wish that this vapor was bigger. i wanna stay in yallahs for the rest of my mission so bad. i really have come to love the people here. i felt the love when i got here and that is another reason why i am still out here. i dont know what woulda happened had i not served a mission, but i dont want to find out. serving a mission has given me a great testimony of this gospel and i have made the very best friends ever down here!

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

Acts 5:15 with Matthew 14:36

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Week 76

hey everyone.

sorry about last week. we got back late from kingston so i had no time to email at all but to sum up last week. it was really great. we picked up a former investigator that i taught a few lessons too before and she is progressing really well. her name is Okara and she has a baptism day forthe 21st of february. so here is this week (#76)

Monday 1-26-15

well of course for pday we went into kingston to play basketball. we played with the constant springs elders and the zone leaders. it was way fun, but i still hate going into kingston. the bush is where i am the most comfortable. probably where i will end up living back home haha. out in the middle of no where. teaching was alright. just saw one person. monday nights are so hard when things blow out.

Tuesday 1-27-15

today was kinda a bummer. we went up to a less active member, and found out that he is crazy. he has been baptized for a year now and knows basically none of the doctrine. we went over the baptism interview questions and he failed it hard. things are gonna be really interesting with that for the next while. then for all of the other lessons we had today we went around and showed some short movies on the D&C dvd set. so not really a super exciting day.

Wednesday 1-28-15

zone meeting today wasnt so great. kinda a bit of a rambler. but we had a good day when we came back tho. our lesson with okara was a bit shakey but we did learn that we need to be a lot simpler with her. we have another lesson with her later in the week so it will be great then. then we went over to Sonya and had a super good lesson. we just went over expectations that she has for herself in the gospel and then the ones that God has for her. elder stewart and i have been doing that with a lot of people and it works out super well. she made some really great goals and understood the goals that we/God has for her and she committed to do them. one of the best expectations lessons that i have had in the few weeks ive been doing them.

Thursday 1-29-15

it was a pretty good day. we saw 2 new people as well as sister Lee. the 2 new ones are so new that i still dont know what to think of them. sister lees lesson was good, but it was also a lesson i think that she wanted to get out of cause she was tired. she had just gotten home from work. we tried doing visual aids, getting her involved more, but she seemed way tired. i think she is meant more for elder stewart than me. oh well. as long as she gets baptized haha. 

Friday 1-30-15

well today was a blowout. every single thing that we had planned fell through. so the only thing that we got done was FNA. it was still way fun tho. not as big of a turn out but elder fowkes and i did 2 1/2 hours of french and cutthroat dominoe. cant wait to be playing that more at home haha! :D

Saturday 1-31-15

we did pretty good for the day. we spent 90 minutes rebuking brother mckenson. he is a less active that has not been to church in like 10 years. he would not make a solid commitment, and elder stewart and i were not leaving that house without him saying he would come to church. he finally did tho so thats good. later in the day we finally got Sonya to come and do missionary work with us! she only came for one lesson, but she did a great job! we took her to see Okara and she taught her part of the lesson in like 3 seconds so simply! i so wish i could do that haha. okara even retained it all so much! i need to start doing that haha. for family home evening we taught on family history work. i always get rebuked when i teach that haha. but im gonna do some back home. yes dad, that means you'll have a friend to help you out haha. so today was super good. its gonna be one of those "sleeper days" haha.

Sunday 2-1-15

well church sucked today. we were supposed to have a special conference for the caribbean but the internet here sucked so it never happened for us. we had like 45 people come, and they didnt get much. sister fisher did get something tho haha. she ended up quoting something she heard. it was only like 5 seconds long but she still got at least one thing from it haha. so we had a testimony meeting instead. we'll be doing fast sunday next week. it was way good tho. Okara was gonna do it, but she was shy, and sister lee got up and gave a simple one about how church blessed her week. so sick! this next week we should be doing a lot of work. so far we have had 20 lessons and 22 lessons. we really are trying to get to 30 so we are well on our way.

so thats the week. not like a super good week but we worked hard and thats what counts. we should be having some baptisms soon so pray hard haha

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

Alma 34:8-10

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Week 74

well...... im out of patois phrases for the week haha

this week was transfers. i got my new comp. his name is elder stewart, from houston, TX.

sorry if this letter is short. i forgot my journal at the house again haha.

Monday 1-12-15

well for pday today we went to port royal. we went and played capture the flag at one of the abandoned forts there. it was pretty sick. but i did realize how much i dont like capture the flag haha. there really is no point to it. plus, it really sucks when you get put in jail haha. teaching was just us going around to sister alvarenga and george so we could get some pictures for elder hall before he leaves. not a whole lot of actual teaching haha. the days that we end up going to town i hate. going into town is the very worst thing ever! i so want to limit it to once a month for only zone meetings.

Tuesday 1-13-15

we went around and got elder halls journal signed. all finished up for transfers tomorrow. i kinda forgot a lot of stuff that happened today. i do know that we went out to Whitehorse and got fed by sister stokes. that food was pretty dang good.

Wednesday 1-14-15

well i had to teach one final district meeting today. i found out like the morning of haha. i spent about half the day with an elder from constant springs. we had a good day. we were able to get in a few lessons and a good thought with sheika. then elder stewart came and i spent the rest of the day with him. we went up to sonya and had a lesson with her. she didnt read again. so we read with her and gave her an assignment to read a little more. man, people who are like me back home really make me sad, cause it reminds me of how retarded that i was then haha.

Thursday 1-15-15

well we had a really busy day. it was another day where i think every hour was filled up, we had a lesson in each hour, and our numbers today looked awesome! we went into sister hudsons yard like 3 times today for different people haha. i think the best lesson we had today would be with sister hudson tho. sheika and sister alvarenga started to rebuke her so hard for not coming to church. i just sat there and was thinking "this is awesome" the whole time haha. she really needs to hear it from some members instead of some missionaries. now given, i have never told her that bluntly, but it was still super awesome to see haha. she still made up some dumb excuse for not coming to church, so things are not going to be good for her if she doesnt change soon.

Friday 1-16-15

the best part of today was FNA. before that tho we went over to george and taught a little bit about the temple. hopefully he can start to make harder plans to go there. butfriday night activity had a good turn out again. we just need to start getting more investigators to show up now haha. but my former companion elder danvers showed up (the one in santa who got sent home). so i talked to him for the last part of it. it was good to talk to him again. still kinda the same guy, but he's sick haha.

Saturday 1-17-15

well today we went and saw angela, ritzans mom. it was.... interesting. we ended up talking all about some super deep doctrine. i didnt say much tho. elder stewart kinda taught the whole thing.... not too much i remember other than that haha.

Sunday 1-18-15

church was really good today but kinda bad too. we had like 50 people there by the end of it and like 40 were there for the sacrament. the numbers are now starting to make a good jump. but youth class today was way bad. one investigator said that she wanted to go to a different class because people in youth class dont talk. only like 4 or 5 people really talk in the class. alwayne even rebuked them at the end of it. we might split the class tho so that will hopefully help. but we finally got to see akeemo today. not really the best lesson. hopefully next time we can have the spirit in it more.

so i think thats the week haha. hopefully i remembered enough stuff. the mission is awesome tho. its stress, but its some of the best stress that a person can ever have. infact, its THE BEST stress ever haha.

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

Hebrews 11

Week 73

ya wa gwan mi generals?

this week was pretty good. elder hall and i had a super sick lesson. and we got transfer calls.

Monday 1-5-15

today was just exhausting. we went out to morant bay and played basketball for a few hours. it was fun but super hot. the rest of the day we were just so beat. the day was spread pretty even tho. we went up to sheika and gave her a blessing. she just felt a little bit dark for some reason. we also went down to george as usual and shared a short thought. pretty normal monday i guess haha.

Tuesday 1-6-15

well today sure was.... interesting. first thing we did was go to see jessica. it was actually the best lesson we have ever had with her. i was way shocked. we ended up going over baptisms for the dead. we might have to drop her again but we will see. then we saw sister fisher, a member who just moved to yallahs from montego bay. since she'll be here for a while we decided to get to know her a bit. well she answered every question that we could possibly have. she ended up telling us her life story. our lesson with sister hudson later in the night really had the spirit in it as well. she just did the same old thing tho. played it off and made up excuses.

Wednesday 1-7-15

well we had district meeting in kingston today. it was pretty good. i taught about having the spirit with us more. things are really gonna get going here in yallahs. but we ended up spending the whole day in kingston. elder hall went and got cleared to come back to yallahs so i got him back today as well. thank heavens for that haha. he is just gonna be changing the bandages on his arm now. i just dont wanna see the arm. last time i saw it i just about passed out haha. we didnt do anything in yallahs cause we got back like right at 9.

Thursday 1-8-15

man were we busy today. we had 7 lessons that were numbers. thats the most i have had since i was in spanish town! all but one of them was a recent convert or less active lesson tho. but the one lesson we had with an investigator was sick! we went over to Akeemo and taught him the restoration. he was making awesome connections, understanding everything we taught, felt the spirit so strongly, and committed softly to a baptism day ofFebruary 28th! it really was the most powerful lesson that i have ever had on my mission. akeemo said that he would be the first one at church every week if he knew that the church was true! he is a big seeker of truth and is so interested in the gospel! he loves spending time with us and hates when we have to leave haha! teaching him is one of the greatest things ever!

Friday 1-9-15

teaching today was a bit lame. we did get to see sister fisher and teach the restoration tho. that lesson was actually super good. her daughter is super smart! even tho they are less active, the 8, almost 9, year old told us the entire joseph smith story. in great detail as well. it was so cool!!!!! then FNA was way cool. we had a really big turn our. i just really hope that that can continue. we need more people to be showing up. it just goes to show you.... FOOD IS DOCTRINE haha!!!!!

Saturday 1-10-15

today was interesting. our lesson with alwayne today was super lame. we joke around too much with him. we are gonna start taking those lessons more serious. he needs to be keeping his covenants. oh ya we also got our transfer calls today. i will be getting a new comp. elder hall is going to old harbour, and i will be getting elder stewart. he's from houston texas. he was my ZL when i was out in santa so im way excited to serve with him. sad that elder hall is leaving of course. we were doing some really good work here. then for FHE tonight at sister alvarengas we watched 17 miracles. it was super good. everyone really loved it. something about that movie always brings the spirit haha.

Sunday 1-11-15

i find it funny how people in jamaica come in right after the sacrament. we had a lot of people at church. but they all came in after the sacrament was over. gets me every time haha. we didnt do much else today tho. since elder hall is leaving we are going around having people sign his journal. always a great part of transfers haha. its not till people leave tho that it really kicks in that they are in fact gone. should be good in a few weeks or so haha.

so thats the week. its kinda weird cause i think that i am on my last 6 weeks in yallahs. i really hope not tho. i have really come to love this area so much. when you really put your heart in the work, the lord does wonders for you. can only imagine what life woulda been like back home if i had my heart in the gospel before. but its a new chapter, so make it good haha.

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

D&C 84:85

Week 72

wa gwan people mi daya pon the gully side ya na.

HAPPY 2015! well i spent my new years in the hospital. so i dont know
how good of a start that is to the week haha.

Monday 12-29-14

well we went into kingston for my birthday today. its so weird being
20 now. it feels like a big jump haha. we went to a place called south
avenue grill. man that place is good! and expensive haha. i spent like
$4000 just on myself. the steak i got was 2100 all on its own. it was
the best steak ever tho! i guess it was the good part of the cow.
like, the very best part that everyone loves. but i wont be going
there on my mission again unless i serve in kingston. the trip today
made me realize how much i hate going into kingston. it causes so much
stress and screws up our pday so bad. and since it was my birthday,
the other elders floured me haha. but no pics. they did it while i was
in the shower. dont think you wanna see that haha. i felt like i was
stepping in a dumpling haha. but its all in the spirit. as for
teaching today, we saw sister stanley and went over diligence. then we
went and saw leonard and sister williams. the kids there wanted to
play a game so we played black magic with them. it was funny haha.

Tuesday 12-30-14

well i did a tradeoff today. but i got to stay in my own area for once
haha. the day was pretty good tho. we had a really good lesson with
sonya tho. she needs to be reading from the book of mormon more tho.
she reads from the church magazines, which is good, but not from the
book of mormon. then we had something at the church called reach out
night. it was basically home and visiting teaching. it was a day that
we had a lot of numbers today, but we need to put those into baptisms
and reactivations soon.

Wednesday 12-31-14

well elder hall has been having a weird thing on his arm the past week
and a half or so, and he woke up with his arm all swollen. so the APs
had to come and get us and take us to the hospital to get it looked
at. it ended up taking all day long. the doctors said that he needed
to get surgery to drain it (it was an absyst or something like that)
so i ended up sleeping the night in a hospital room in a chair while
my comp was passed out from anistedic haha. so no teaching done, no
district meeting done, just me talking with the APs the whole day
haha.

Thursday 1-1-15

well elder hall and i were in the hospital until like 5pm today. it
was so boring. i did get a lot of reading done tho. thank heavens for
that haha. but we still got no teaching done at all. by the time we
got out of kingston, it was like 7pmand its an hour or so drive to
yallahs. but right now i am serving with elder newcomb. elder hall was
kept in downtown kingston so he could be close to the doctor. he needs
to get the gauz changed each day so they took elder fowkes from there
and brought him with me. his cousin is the one in yallahs so they are
serving together now (special promise from pres haha) and i am with
elder newcomb. we should be back to normal by next wednesday tho.

Friday 1-2-15

i super planned by myself today haha. elder fowkes came and helped a
bit tho. i let elder newcomb go and super plan in his area. it was
interesting haha. but then almost every appointment we had fell
through. we tried to see a lot of people but no one was home. we did
have a good turnout at friday nightactivity tho. we played uno with
like 9 of us. most fun that we have had it in a long time. next week
should be way good tho.

Saturday 1-3-14

today was super good for us. we went out to 14 mile and saw a less
active member. he is a bit of a beggar tho. its annoying. bu then we
saw a guy by the name of Javaunnie. he is real cool. we just need him
to come to church. he accepts the message of the restoration, but
doesnt wanna leave his church too bad. then we also saw ritzans
family. their ok right now. hopefully soon come they will improve with
the message. our lesson with Akeemo was good too. he even invited 2 of
his friends up to hear us too. he has some faith issues, but him and
his friends seem way prepared. we did end up running into a funeral
tho. our former investigator, jessica, i guess had her mom die a few
weeks ago and they did the funeral today. i felt very bad for her. and
as weird as this sounds, i hope that it prepares her to hear the
gospel.

Sunday 1-4-14

church was great today! we had like 44 people there! akeemo even came
with a new friend. he came late but he said that he loved church. and
he is even reminding us about our next appointment. he so needs to get
baptized! youth class was super big too. we had like 15 people in the
class. so good to see haha. then the rest of the day we saw a few less
actives. the funnest part was when we went over to Sonya and floured
her. we just had to since it was her birthday today haha. we had elder
newcomb get on the roof and give her a big surprise haha. i forgot my
camera at that point so i didnt get any photos. but it was super funny
haha!


so thats the week. hopefully the subject didnt scare you all haha.
having 2 days off really made me member how much i love being a
missionary. there is a special joy in watching the change that people
make. something that you can never replace

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought
D&C 93:24

Week 71

well.... hey everyone.....

sorry if this note is short. i dont have my journal again today. we just got back from kingston.

haha dont worry, this week was pretty good. not the best week ever but defiantly not the worst.

Monday 12-22-14

well today we relaxed for pday. elder newcomb and fowkes went out to kingston for something so elder hall and i were stuck bored in yallahs. funniest part of the day is when i had a random bum from Morant Bay start to cuss me out. he was begging us and i told him we had nothing to give, so he kept asking. i then told him to "gu we" (go away). he didnt really like that haha. he started calling us BCs, BBCs, white bast---, some f bombs, and so on so forth. you could say that he was just a bit pissed off haha. later in the day we went and saw george. he was feeling quite down with what happened on sunday. cant blame him really. so we just went and tried to cheer him up.

Tuesday 12-23-14

today was another day of a lot of biking. we saw sister stanley in the morning, which was a really good lesson. we talked about the importance of reading and praying every day. sister stanley is such a good member. all she really needs to be doing is coming to church more. shouldnt really be too hard for that one. the spirit seems to be working on her quite well. then we biked out to easington to see shantel. not too sure whats going to happen there yet. our lesson was really awful. no spirit, and no organization. we cant see her till next week so it will be interesting to see what happens with that. then we went to sonya and had a pretty good lesson with her. she seems really down with the church and all that so we just told her that we are only here to invite. we then told her our own conversion stories. it was a pretty spiritual lesson. hopefully it has some effect on her.

Wednesday 12-24-14

today was a pretty interesting day. we didnt really have a lot of lessons cause it seems like no one really wanted to see us. but we were able to find some people today. the biggest part of the day was when we went to sister alvarengas home and did family home evening. we were lacking some more fun so tonight we just read some christmas stories with them and then played some games. elder hall taught some people how to play rook while others did dominoes, and then 1 or 2 people sat around and watched. honestly, it was a fun time. next week on "watch night" should be way fun.

Thursday 12-25-14

haha today was interesting. to start off we went and delivered a lot of christmas messages to people in the morning. then we all talked to our families. fun time there haha. we ended up going to alwayne for a quick visit, and he fed us a bit of food haha. unplanned meal appointments are so awesome! then we went over to george and had a small thought. he then fed us in a planned meal appointment. being fed more than once is so hard for me haha. i need to learn how to pack even more food still haha. but the last christmas on the mission was pretty fun. looking forward to next years tho.

Friday 12-26-14

well the only lesson that we ended up having today was with sister stanley. we talked a lot about charity. its not really something that she has a problem with, but elder hall and i decided to go over the christlike attributes with her. its always good to have a little bit of a self evaluation on that haha. should be way fun to do. friday night activity was us playing dominoes again. it was interesting cause a crazy member of the branch came, and was the only other one there, and just about beat us all haha. and for everyone out there, dominoes is all skill, not luck. haha

Saturday 12-27-14

today we did a lot of service. we went over to georges house and chopped some yard next door to him. i guess that his sister owns that property so they are gonna finish a house on it and then move in there when they can. we are gonna be sure to go and help them out with that as much as possible. then we had to go like 3-4 miles away and do some more service. i was dead tired haha. but after all that, we went to a kid named Akeemo that we found on christmas eve. he is way sick! he is planning on running for the university of maryland in 2016. we had a great first lesson with him. we started talking about the atonement and then it somehow got into him asking some pretty deep questions about where God came from. we didnt answer it yet but told him we would get back to it in a different lesson. one of the best first lessons that i have ever had. he even told us that he normally doesnt like to talk religion but with us its way cool. he goes to church right up from us so getting him to come shouldnt be too hard.

Sunday 12-28-14

today was a sad day. we went up to joyce and had to pre drop her. she isnt really doing that much work. an interesting situation came up too. i dont think i can say it but its super unexpected. hopefully it all gets sorted out. but that really was all that happened today. we had a missionary come back i guess. formerly elder staurt came back to the branch. he was the ranch president from like feuary to may. so we had quite a bit of people at church haha. especially a lot of white people. here a quote to put on the quote board tho. im scared of white people haha. they just look so weird!

well thats the week i guess. not really too eventful haha

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

Luke 17:32

Week 70

Hey everyone whats up? MERRY CHRISTMAS ON THURSDAY!!!!!!!

so this week we finally had a baptism! so freaking sick!!!! 

Monday 12-15-14

pday was super fun today. we went out to morant bay to play basketball. its been so long since i have last done that. or at least it feels like forever haha. it started raining on us right at the end too so that made it even more fun. then after emails we went and did arm ball at the church. that sport is dang fun! im gonna have to be sure to take that sport home and play it with everyone haha! teaching today we saw sister stanley and george. sis stanley is way cool. she is one of the nicest people i have ever met. she just needs to be coming to church more often. we committed her to coming more so that she has the possibility of working in the temple one day. idk if that is going to happen or not but at least she can be ready if the chance comes. we also had the zone leaders stay over night so that they can give alwayne his baptism interview tomorrow. so that was the pday really haha.

Tuesday 12-16-14

well today i was with elder england for a tradeoff. he did the interview for alwayne and alwayne passed big time. so everything is now set in stone for his baptism on saturday. we also had a thought with sheika. to not a lot of teaching really done today. we had to coaster into kingston to end the tradeoff too so elder hall and i had to run some errands in down town. when we got back we just did some mission prep. so not a super eventful day. 

Wednesday 12-17-14

well it was district meeting again today. it was pretty alright. i am kinda getting dead on teaching them now haha. i kinda hope that someone else comes to yallahs to take my spot as DL haha. nothing really big happened today tho. we're a bit worried about joyce tho. she is not reading like at all. its been over a week since we last saw her and she didnt read one thing. we might have to drop her soon if she doesnt pick up the reading. then our family home evening ended up going into some doctrine mentioned in the King Follett Sermon. so that was probably the most interesting thing all day haha. i think that with christmas eve being next week, we'll have a lot more fun tho haha

Thursday 12-18-14

well we had another day of long biking. we did about 7 miles by 1pm today. we went up to easington for a lesson, and then dropped right down into Albion. it was a good lesson thank heavens haha. we will see what happens with the next time that we go there. then there are some members that are really starting to piss me off. one is just making a bunch of excuses of why they arent at church and the other one is just all talk. they dont do anything. the family for them is not in a good spot right now. then we went and had a lesson with sonya on the plan of salvation. we went pretty in depth with it so we only got to the atonement. but it was a really good lesson. i thought that sonya was feeling something during it. i felt the spirit so hopefully everyone else was too. the next lesson should be way good.

Friday 12-19-14

today was pretty good. out leson with alwyane was good. he had to leave so he kinda rushed the lesson. then we had a lesson with some other guys. they are still potentials so we will see what happens. but friday night activity was fun. we did arm ball, and then some dominoes. we got daquon to talk with elder newcomb too at last. hopefully that will help him out. im just super stoked for alwynes baptism tomorrow right now tho!

Saturday 12-20-14

not a lot of teaching today but we got what matters most! A BAPTISM!!! alwayne was baptized in the ocean in the morning. it was so sick. elder newcomb did the baptism and they were being knocked around by all the waves haha. it was pretty funny to see. if they had said the words at the right time, the wave may have baptized him its self haha. but everything went super well. then we had the branch christmas party. we were there for about 6 hours to help out with anything that needed to be done, as well as party with the branch. people were having a good time tho. it was a big success. i think around 70 or 80 people came so we had a great turn out. super fun day really haha

Sunday 12-21-14

well we confirmed alwayne in sacrament meeting today. i was the one who confirmed him. it was a bit scary haha. i have never done that before. but everything went well. i didnt mess up on the words somehow. now the only thing left for me is to personally baptize someone. but im fine if that doesnt happen haha. other people should do it :)  church was pretty good tho. we are starting to go down in numbers, so thats not good. hopefully we can get more people to come tho. we also went to a meeting for george today. we may be doing a lot of service for him. the government kinda screwed him over so he is losing his house in a week. things are starting to get really interesting in yallahs i guess haha.

so thats the week. i enjoyed it a lot. having a baptism is always the best thing ever. its been a long time comin for alwayne as well. now we just need to get him out on a mission in a year haha. its so crazy to think i have been out here for 16 months already. it feels like just yesterday that i was home playing nba 2k haha. its gonna be a sad day in august. but at the same time, i cant wait to go home so i can come back to jamaica and see everyone!!!! Jamrock for life baby!!! haha :D

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

The Christmas Story

Week 69

well wa gwan everyone?

this week was pretty eventful. i got the news of grandpa dying on Tuesday. that was a pretty big shock. but thankfully the gospel tells us there is more to look forward to. im doing pretty alright with it all. but anyways.... here is the week....

Monday 12-8-14

today was so stressful. we went into kingston to shop at price smart. its like a costco for down here. i dont know why i always get excited to go to places like that and megamart. they are still way expensive cause you have to buy it all in bulk. plus i think the food will last about the same amount of time. of course, i still have it so im doing pretty good with it all haha. we had a good night teaching when we got back tho. we had to hurry up to joyces house and have a games night there. it was very relaxing for her. a lot of stress seemed to come off of her shoulders with it. then we went down to george and leonard for a short spiritual thought. i always love going there. they are extremely humble people. i love seeing their love for the gospel and the commitment to always live it. so a stressful start, to a relaxing finish i guess haha.

Tuesday 12-9-14

we got quite a bit of work done today. we were able to watch the restoration dvd with sister loague. that was really good. she said that we always come with something that she is thinking of. sometimes knowing peoples concerns helps a bit haha. then we had a realy good lesson with Shashay today, the girl we had a different lesson with on sunday. she ended up reading all of the plan of salvation pamphlet, marked it up, answered the questions in the back, and put a little part of it on Facebook!!! man it was awesome to see! we had a really good lesson with her too. there was a small interruption that drove the spirit away but she still understood it super well. prepared people are the best!

Wednesday 12-10-14

well.... today was pretty crappy. we started out going to alwayne and having him teach us a lesson on alma 56. he did a super good job. he is gonna be a fantastic missionary when he is baptized. so that was really good. and we even had a really good talk/lesson with sister grant. man is she a saint. i am convinced that she will be going to the celestial kingdom. she is just so nice to everyone, and sacrifices so much to go to church and help people. she is always at church no matter what. but the day fell apart from there. i found out about grandpa during this time. that was a complete shock. but as i said before. im doing pretty well with it. it looks like he died in a good way. just went out peaceful. the rest of the day we didnt really see a lot of people. we had a good family home evening with sister alvarenga about revelation. thats really about it tho.

Thursday 12-11-14

we had zone conference in kingston with elder martinez of the 70 today. it was super good. it was more of a discussion about a talk we were supposed to read. but i forgot to read it haha. guess i better get to reading it here soon haha. then we got all of our christmas gifts. i opened mine pretty fast (sorry mom haha ;) ) i was pretty stressed out today for some reason. not really sure why. hopefully by tomorrow it can just settled down so i can have a good day.

Friday 12-12-14

well we only saw daquon and alwayne today. we went up and read a little bit of alma 34 with daquon. he wanted to go in and play some video games so we only got to read like half of the chapter with him. not really too much you can do there. then we went over and alwayne teach us again. this time we had him go from alma 32. once again tho, he did a fantastic job. he teaches things very simply, asks inspired questions, and relates it to the person he is teaching very well. he makes me feel like a bad missionary haha. we gave him prayer as a topic that he needs to teach us on now. hopefully we can take him teaching with us real soon. for friday night activity we ended up having a rap battle. of course i stayed out of it haha. i cant rap worth a crap ;) but it was prety fun haha :)

Saturday 12-13-14

we saw a lot of people today. probably around like 7. but only like 4 of them really were numbers. oh well. they were still effective lessons so i cant complain about that at all :) the big lessons that we had were with daquon and sonya. with daquon we went up and read with him. we just finished the last part of alma 34 with him. he seemed to learn from it. hopefully he will apply it tho. he needs to talk to elder newcomb about some stuff really bad right now. the good thing is that he is one of the only people that i see that really let the scriptures speak to him. he really learns a lot from them and can really feel the spirit talking to him when something comes up. its way cool to see. then our lesson with sonya was interesting we read from alma 47 to start out. then we got onto her going to some parties, to having good friends. everything is good with her really. we somehow got onto the topic of our life stories too. not much for me to really say haha. i was a sheltered child :) i was a bit worried that it was too off topic but she didnt hesitate to say the closing prayer so i guess it was all worth while haha. building relationships with people is one of my favorite things down here. i never want to bring random people to the gospel. just my friends and family. mostly family tho haha. i dont have friends down here. just family :)  right now i just really want alwayne to come to church tomorrow. if he comes then he can be baptized.....

Sunday 12-14-14

ALWAYNE CAME TO CHURCH!!!!!!!! WE ARE GOING TO BE HAVING A BAPTISM THIS SATURDAY!!!!!  im so stoked for that! its been way too long since i have seen a baptism. he is so ready for baptism and i cant wait for it to happen! elder hall and i had to go up and rebuke daquon tho. he didnt come to church cause "he didnt feel like it". we gave him a good chastisement but also did it very lovingly. if he doesnt come to church next week then i am going to hit him over the head with a rock. well maybe not that bad, but im gonna want to hurt him bad haha. we had to do a lot of tracting today tho. a lot of things blew out so we just tried to hand out some pamphlets and cards.

so thats the week. one thing i love down here is meeting prepared people. whether it be a young adult in porty, a family in spanish town, a teenager girl in santa cruz, or a young male in yallahs, its the best thing ever! they always end up being such great friends and family to me! i just cant wait to come to jamaica again to visit everyone without time restrictions haha!!!!

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

2 Nephi 31:18

Week 68

hey everyone!

we have been in Kingston for some shopping today. thats why this is so late. so i dont have my journal with me so it may be a short email today. we did a lot of biking tho. we went to a place called Llandeway. look at the directions on google maps and you can see how far it is haha. too far for me

Monday 12-1-14

well we went and talked with sheika for a bit today. i dont really remember what happened. all i know is that it was pday and it was a bit relaxing. at least i hope that it was haha.

Tuesday 12-2-14

today i did a tradeoff with elder newcomb in his area. with transfers tomorrow, i had to get one more in so it was officially in the transfer haha. it was pretty fun. we were able to see quite a bit of people during the day. it seems everytime i go into their area its a good day haha. maybe that can happen for ours here soon. we had a good week, but we get pretty average days.

Wednesday 12-3-14

in district meeting i taught about D&C 20:37. we went really in depth with all of the qualifications. it seems like it was super good. hopefully it helped the other elders tho. today we were able to see joyce. we went over the family proclamation to the world a bit cause she isnt getting along with her family. idk whose fault it is, but its pretty stupid. it was an alright lesson. joyce read finally. and she was really into it. now we just need to get her reading everyday. we were also able to have a family home evening with sister alvarenga again. we showed the thing that we did on sunday. it went alright. sister alvarenga seems way excited to share the gospel with this christmas thing so i guess that i cant complain haha.

Thursday 12-4-14

well today was the day that we biked out to Llandeway. that was a far bike ride. we had some appointments blow out so elder hall and i decided that we would just go on a road until we felt like we had to stop. well, when we felt like it, it was time to go back for lunch. we didnt see a lot of people out there but the land sure was pretty. its worth a drive when i come back haha :) we were able to see daquon today. that was a good lesson. he is really back on track. he told us that he would be early to church this sunday. as long as we talk about what he knows is going to help him, the lessons are always super good. we also saw Alwayne today. we had a lesson on tithing. really he knows it all. he just needs to come to church 2 times in a row to be baptized. he wants to do it so hopefully he starts to act more on it. then we went and talked with george for a bit. he is going through a rough time so we just went down to help him out a bit. things in yallahs are going pretty good.

Friday 12-5-14

haha man was today interesting. we dropped sister bassett today. she is just too hard hearted. she wont act on anything we teach her so there is no point in going back there. we said some other things to her but thats for a different conversation haha. then our lesson with joyce was pretty bad. she didnt really want a lesson so we just read with shantoy. joyce eventually joined us and we left them with some homework. friday nigh activity was awful too. we had a big spirit of contention there with a lot of things. first sheika was mad and i had to talk to her about it. then i got pissed and basically didnt talk to any missionaries for the rest of the night. not the best day in the world.

Saturday 12-6-14

today we had a really good day for numbers. we went to alwayne and went over d&c 20:37 with him. he is all set. we had a small concern about that but we figured everything out in the lesson. then we went and had a lesson with daquon. we wanted us to read something from the book of mormon with him that he came across on friday night. so thats what we did. it was alma 32. he seemed to like the first part of it more. kinda rare, but i think i might too haha. its so cool. we kinda got kicked out of a lesson tho. we just kinda pushed someone outta their comfort zone and they kicked us out in a very nice way. i felt bad about it. i talked to the person at church about it and they said that nothing happened then. idk about that but ill take it i guess. we still have a good relationship with the person so im not too worried.

Sunday 12-7-14

we ended the transfer off really good. we had alwayne come to church, so that means that he only needs to be on time one more week and he can be baptized! super stoked with that! we also had a lesson with a new person. it was pretty good. we will see what happens on tuesday tho to see if we keep going back there. we also saw sonya today. the main thing i learned there is that i need to shut up haha. ever since i have gotten to yallahs i have been a freaking chatter box. i will probably be having elder hall talk a lot more. i need to allow other people to talk and also the spirit. when i speak, there is almost no time for someone to really listen to the spirit. sometimes its just me rambling on about nothing. this week i will be controlling that tho.

so we had a good week i would say :) we hit 20 lessons and the district had some good effective numbers as well. time on my mission is going by way fast all of the sudden. sometimes i wish it would be faster but most of the time i just wish it would slow down haha. the mission is just too much fun. i have found more members of my family down here. all my friends here are a part of my family. its almost like i just belong here in jamaica. haha we'll see tho. maybe ill just retire to here :)

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

1 Corinthians 15:54-57

Week 67

Hey everyone!

so transfer calls were this week. i will be in Yallahs still. hopefully for a little while longer haha. it would be so awesome!!!

Monday 11-24-14

Today started out really relaxing. i was able to take a nice long nap for my pday. pday is the only day that i will ever take naps cause if i do it any other time, i have no motivation to go out and teach and i just feel like crap. gotta take advantage of the times i get right haha. we didnt get any lessons in today cause we ran into a situation with the tithing. everything was eventually figured out so its all good. but kinda just a boring day in that aspect.

Tuesday 11-25-14

oddly enough our morning was a lot better than the rest of our day. it was still pretty hard tho. we had a lesson with jessica on prayer, and it did nothing. the spirit was not there i i dont think that she payed any attention the whole time. her prayer at the end sounded like she didnt learn a single thing. we'll have to go over that again at some point. our lesson with daquon was quite good tho. we did another role play with him, this time on prophets. he is super good at teaching haha. at least better than i was before my mission haha. once he is a missionary he will be a stud. he is very motivated from YSA so hopefully he can stay on this path that he got on.

Wednesday 11-26-14

zone meeting was pretty good. i didnt write down a whole lot of stuff but it was still pretty interesting. one thing taught was D&C 20:37. as a district leader i have to have that in my head when i do baptism interviews, when they come that is haha, so it was really good to be able to go into depth with it. we only got in one lesson and it was a small family home evening with Sister Alvarenga and some people who live around her like Daquon and Alwayne. we had a pretty good thing planned but then her neighbor started to move in so everyone started to help out with that. we only got in a short thought but it should be really good to be able to get in the habit of going there every week. im super stoked haha.

Thursday 11-27-14

we had a pretty alright day. elder hall and i were pretty excited to share a chirstmas thing that we learned about in zone meeting. its onchristmas.mormon.org if you want to check it out. its also the front thing on thelds.org page and will be the only thing on youtube on december 7th haha. its super big. we were able to share it with sister robinson and sheika today. our lesson with joyce was pretty interesting. we told her that she needs to be sure to read from the Book of mormon. we also taught her the proper way to pray. that was the interesting part haha. she seemed a little... struggling... with it but i think that the spirit was telling her that it was true. she is progressing super well. i really hope that she will soon accept a baptism day. i really want it to be in the next few lessons. pray hard haha.

Friday 11-28-14

today was a bit strange. we had 2 lessons, but neither one was one that we planned for. we had a sit and teach lesson with a guy named Omar. we taught him the plan of salvation cause he seems super attached to his son. he said that he feels like it could be true. im pretty stoked with that haha. its a start to him feeling the spirit so we can really work with that. we also had a short thought with Daquon. friday night activity was pretty good too. im just a bit tired of members who come complain that nothing is happening when they dont do much to change it. complaining is one thing that just annoys me. stop being a part of the problem and be part of the solution.

Saturday 11-29-14

we only had one lesson today cause it rained the whole time but it was a super great lesson! one of the best times i have ever felt on my mission. we went up to Sonya, a less active member, and talked to her a bit about the book of mormon. she hasnt read it in years so we just started to review it. after a while it got into how long it had been and she said that it had been a very long time since she had read. then we asked her how she felt when she was reading it all those years ago. she told us that she didnt remember that much. but then the spirit talked to her. she then remembered that when she was reading she felt very safe and she knew who Sonya was. she then said that she doesnt know who Sonya is now and she doesnt remember how to be. she started crying and left the room for a minute. man was the spirit so strong!! we committed her to reading everyday to find out who she is again. giving people a reason to change is the best thing to do. if they dont have a reason to change, they wont do it. but Sonya has something that she wants to change and something she wants to find out. she is gonna make some big steps and i am super excited to see those steps made. later we texted her to remind her to read and she already had! things are really looking up for her. the next few weeks are gonna be so great for her!

Sunday 11-30-14

church was pretty good today. not much really happened tho. we didnt really even get a lot done today. but we were able to help out a member who is in some serious trouble. he is gonna get kicked out of his house if he doesnt pay like $500 US by the 29th of december. he is struggling pretty bad with stress and depression. i so wish that i could help him. he really is just hanging on by his testimony of the gospel right now. he is such a great member. with elder newcomb being able to sign checks tomorrow, i think we are gonna try to see what the church can do to help him. he is one member of the church who deserves it completely. he is faithful, converted to the gospel, and never asks for help from the church. hopefully things can get figured out for him. we may have a lot of service planned for january but our fingers are crossed that we dont, in the best way of course haha.

so ya thats the week. there was a huge up, and a huge downer right on the last 2 days. hopefully everything will work out well for them both. but the gospel is defiantly true! nothing is ever going to change that! i hope that each one of you can be converted to the gospel! it is the fulness of Christs teachings and the one thing we can always turn too in our rough times.

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

The Three Pillars of Eternity by Bruce R. McConkie

(its a byu speech. i read it and thought it was fantastic!)

Week 66

Hey Everyone!

this week was pretty good. we had some unexpected things come up but still got a lot of work done. 

Monday 11-17-14

wo is it really already the 17th???? where did the time go haha. well today was pretty dang great. we got to see ritzan off. the aps came and picked him up so we went and said our "final" goodbyes haha. he will be serving here in jamaica so we will all be sing him again haha. other than that we had a pretty uneventful day today. mostly just hearing a few people about what members gossip and why someone is less active in the church now. so stupid. i hate dealing with stuff like that haha.

Tuesday 11-18-14

well i did a tradeoff with elder fowkes today so i do not know how my area really did as far as good lessons haha. but we did get to see quite a few people and even relaxed just a bit on the beach when we had just a little extra time. their area is in great shape. sometimes i wish that i could be in there haha.

Wednesday 11-19-14

well district meeting was kinda dumb today. i taught about bicycle safety. kinda just a last minute idea that i had. we all need to improve on it tho. my bike is a POC so i need to do something with it haha. we had a really good day afterwards tho. we were able to have a lesson with Joyce and Jessica. they understood the lessons really well. with joyce we read 3 nephi 11 cause she hadnt quite done that yet. with jessica we went over the plan of salvation. they were interesting in their own ways to say the least as well haha. jessica is just a 16 year old girl in jamaica that dresses a little.... bad. and joyce just talks a lot. mostly off topic. but we got it back on pretty alright. then we did some mission prep stuff with Daquon so he can come teaching with us one day and then a small thought with Sheikas mom. 

Thursday 11-20-14

well i chopped my leg off with a machet today. i am now biking around with just one foot. haha jk. but i did cut myself with a machet today. that was a weird feeling. its all healed up now tho. service  was our entire morning. it took forever cause elder halls bike randomly broke down so some guy came over and fixed it for free. i already know whats going to happen. its going to break. you get what you pay for down here for sure. we had a lesson with sister alvarenga and her daughter sonya today. they are super cool. very solid family as well. sonya is a bit less active but it looks like she is gonna get back to being active. we just have to get her converted to the gospel haha. but thats really all we did today. kinda a tough day haha.

Friday 11-21-14

The only lesson we had today was with joyce and her family. we read a bit with them and then talked about scripture study and prayer a bit. they even said that they would be at church on sunday! woo! friday night activity was the same as always. nobody really came. it was just us missionaries and sheika and 2 random members. we did a bon fire at the beach. we may not be having it anymore haha. we'll see what happens but if no one is showing up then there is no point in even having it. it will be interesting to see what happens tho with the members. they may have to do their own thing.

Saturday 11-22-14

we did service again to start off the day. it was just moving a butt ton of dirt. nothing to special haha. we were gonna try to help another member out with something but she said that we were "late" and wouldnt accept our help. i about told her off for it. we never said what time we would come and she never told us that she had to be somewhere. i just walked away from it to avoid a big conflict. elder hall then had his bicycle mash up again. knew it haha. so we will be walking for the next 2 days. we only got to see avril today. she is a tough one to break. getting to know her is super hard cause she almost pushes you away cause she doesnt know you. she was a little more open today but not by more than a fraction. the things i do on a mission haha

Sunday 11-23-14

well joyce and her family were able to come to church today! it was awesome! they said that they really enjoyed it! hopefully they can keep coming to church and they will accept a day. we didnt really get a lot of lessons in since we were walking. we saw okara, but i dont think that is really going to go anywhere. she doesnt really seem interested. then we towed all the way to sister meadows house. that means that i peadled my bike and elder hall sat in front of me steering. its pretty common in jamaica haha. we normally dont do it cause it looks like a "fish" bike. or gay haha. but it was more effective than walking to say the least. so thats really it. church was super good tho. i had to give a talk on baptism for 15 minutes, and it ended up being a 30 minute discourse haha. i need to work on my rambling skills haha.

so thats our week. we got the bike fixed so this week we wont be walking. dont know if i could do that again haha. but the mission is so great! i am so glad that i am able to be here! from the gospel to the friends i have made in Porty, Spain Town, Santa Cruz, and Yallahs, its all been so amazing. the people are the best part. i am so blessed by knowing them and having them be a part of my life. people always say that a missionary is a great blessing in their life, but more times than not, that person or that family is a bigger blessing in the missionary's life.

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

Matthew 10:34

ive been trying to read the standard works before i leave my mission so be sure to follow up with me every so often so that i can do it :)

Week 65

Hey everyone!

this week was pretty dang good. i had a small heartbreak, but it was picked up super fast. nothing bad haha. just the normal of being a missionary.

Monday 11-10-14

Well i started a trade off with elder adams today in kingston. he is the one from ephriam utah. he is one of the kingston ZLs so he was the one to gt me to come into kingston. we didnt really do anything today haha. we had to run errands so we got caught in Kingston Traffic. its hard having 600,000 people or so crammed into a 20mile by 25mile or so space haha. so many cars. but i did get to have a nice hot shower for the first time in forever! but i have to admit, im starting to love the cold showers a bit more haha. so today was just super relaxing. always good to have those days haha.

Tuesday 11-11-14

i was still with elder adams for a bit of today. we went and did some service in the morning for a member in the constant springs ward. didnt really do too much tho haha. then we had to drive back to yallahs to trade back. it was a good tradeoff tho. sure was a lot different than a year ago when we did a tradeoff with each other in port antonio. teaching skills have gotten a lot better. then not much happened when i got back to yallahs. so kinda a slow start to the week but it should get better.

Wednesday 11-12-14

another district meeting taught. today i did asking inspired questions in finding. i thought that it went pretty well. a bit long but oh well. ill work on that one haha. one day i wont have to teach again haha. i love sitting there more. i feel like i learn so much more. we had an interesting lesson with joyce today tho. we were just about to finish up the restoration with her when her neighbor came and started cussing her and her family out. im not fully sure what she was saying cause the "pissed of patios" is something that i cant understand haha. but the spirit was not there at that point so we had to end it. but joyce proceeded to tell us some things that we really did not need to know, but they made us laugh so hard! i thought that elder hall was gonna start rolling on the ground. the things that people in jamaica say just make me laugh sometimes haha. the end of the day was bad tho. we had our potential investigator ditch us so she could have a little bit of food. well, she may have lost her chance. i dont wanna waste time on people who do that. 

Thursday 11-13-14

we had quite a day today. our morning was quite busy. daquon is struggling a lot right now. he said that he wants to put whats happening right now on pause. we had to explain to him a bit that its not how that works. i was so mad inside. but he has his head on straight now so nothing too big to worry about for him. we also saw a members cousin. the lesson was pretty good. we found out that her baby father is like 47 years old and she is barely 16. some people just creep me out. we even had a lesson with Joyce and her family today. im really impressed with them. they all seem to want to know if the church is true. they even said that they have been praying to know since we got there. so prepared! we even got one more of her children to sit in on the lesson so we may have a lot of baptisms coming up soon! we just need to extend the day haha. things in yallahs are really starting to pick up. i try to stay busy as much as i can so that i can focus on the work. its when i sit around that i start to get depressed. amazing what happens when your donig the work of the lord haha :)

Friday 11-14-14

i think that today was the first time that an investigator really ticked me off in a long time. the only lesson we had was with sis bassett and saskalee. we were going through the plan of salvation and at the end we extended a baptism commitment. well, sis bassett got a little contentious. the spirit was so strong before that. we tried to recover from it a bit for saskalee but it wasnt quite there. she did say that she would pray about a day for baptism tho. i think it will be better if we do separate lessons. i think that saskalee is more accepting than her mom, but i still really wanna work on the mom. thinks will be interesting haha. then we did karaoke for friday night activity. it made me miss santa cruz so much haha. i really went through my camera and cried a bit. good thing that no one saw that haha. oh and how can i almost forget. 15 month mark today haha. bittersweet i guess. 

Saturday 11-15-14

well today broke my heart. we went out to Shackeyra cause no one has had contact with her in the last few weeks. well, her family is forcing her to not meet with us now. too much contention i guess. but Sheika was able to talk to her a bit and she still has a lot of desire. i think the best thing to do is let sheika keep in contact with her to be sure that she does what she needs to and still has a good connection with the gospel. i think i will lend her some money if she ever wants to go out there and visit her. we'll see what happens tho. then we went to ritzan when we came back and he told us that he is thinking of putting his mission on hold so that he can get a job and all that stuff. we talked to him a bit and just bore testimony that a mission was the best thing to do. later that night we called him and he told us that he would serve a mission. big relief there haha. his concerns were legit, but he just let them get to his head too much. he'll be a great missionary haha.

Sunday 11-16-14

Ritzan gave his farewell talk today. it was like mine. not to prepared haha. but it was better than mine by a long shot. he was sincere and didnt crack a ton of jokes haha. people in the branch are way proud of him tho. everyone was hugging him and congratulating him after sacrament so that should help him to stay out. it will be interesting to see what happens to him in the next 2 weeks haha. not much really happened other than that today. i just cant wait till next week :)

So thats the week. it seemed slow but we got a lot of stuff done. i really cant say how much that i love my mission. its by far the best thing that i have ever done. ive made so many changes and i have met my best friends out here! :D serving a mission was something to repay God, but now i owe him even more. i will never be out of debt to him!

Love,
Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

D&C 10:5

Week 64

wagwan everyone!

this week for elder hall and i really exploded! we got a lot more work done than we did in other weeks! i guess here is the story......

Monday 11-3-14

well this week we did basketball in morant bay. it was right on the beach too! it was so freaking sick! i still sucked it up tho haha. i just get off all the time. good thing im not ever going to be an NBA player. but elder hall and i went and saw a potential missionary trying to help him with teaching skills. idk about it haha. this guy is....... interesting with his style. he leaves next week wednesday (nov 19) and im a little worried. but then we went down to georges house and were able to get a potential investigator from it. he brought a friend over and said that he wanted to share the gospel with him. so we taught him about the book of mormon as well as some points in the restoration. he seems pretty interested so hopefully we can get some appointments from it. and maybe one day a conversion haha. 

Tuesday 11-4-14

to start off today we went out to bull bay to teach shanice. we went over the plan of salvation. it was another disaster. we brought the potential missionary out with us, and he went off again. idk what to think. one day something will happen i guess. its just gonna be on his mission i think. then we went up and had a lesson with an investigators daughter. she didnt want the lesson at first but then she decided to let us in. out of pity i assume haha. but she got really interested when we were teaching her. we were able to let her kinda teach herself more or less and she seems like a really promising investigator. we just need some time to see her. she is busy in Kingston a lot so we will just need to squeeze into her schedule a bit. but those lessons, along with one or two more, kept us busy the whole day. we didnt really have any part of the day where we had to wonder where to go. if something had blown out, we had a great back up to go to.

Wednesday 11-5-14

well i taught my first district meeting today. talk about scary. and then to make it even more nerve racking, president brown showed up too. well that didnt help haha. but president talks a lot when he come to district meetings so it ended up being super good. he is a very spiritual guy haha. then we had a small interview. not really much to report on with that haha. just a check up on how i was doing. i think you guys can see how well it is haha. when we went out to teach we were able to contact a referral we got from sister loague. she is so cool! her name is joyce. she is just like a stereotypical grandma haha. she seems pretty prepared. we just need her to come to church with her family. we were also able to see Daquon. that kid has got a lot to go through but he is making some great strides so far. it should be fun seeing him apply the atonement even more in the next little while. we were also able to have a small lesson with a potential investigator. we started off just talking to her but were able to move the conversation into a lessons about our purpose.

Thursday 11-6-14

today was a bit of a tougher day. we had a lot of things that just kinda blew out on us. we had a really good day planned, but things just went a little bit down hill. we did get to see a new less active. she moved over from spanish town a little while ago but we just found her. she was in the other branch from where i was serving so i dont really know her that well. we just kinda introduced ourselves for today. next time we hope to get started back into teaching her the missionary lessons. we also were able to have another lesson with joyce. we went over the plan of salvation cause her sister/friend died like right after we left yesterday. she like it and thought that it made a ton of sense. so things are really looking up. i also had to teach a mission prep class tonight so that was a bit weird. i always feel bad when i teach these things haha. it just reminds me that i was a fisher price (wanna be) tool back home when it came to all this. i feel so bad haha. 

Friday 11-7-14

well, today was pretty lame. we had a pretty good day planned out again, and everything just blew out. i felt pretty bad too cause we brought Sheika with us and she gets pretty down when things blow out. she should be turning in her mission papers soon so she will get that on her own here soon haha. friday night activity was pretty lame again. hopefully next week it will be better. we have karaoke planned. should be better than having some teenage girls scream in my ear ;) 

Saturday 11-8-14

it was a hard day again today. the week started out good and then died out. but i look forward to having better days haha. we were able to see sister loagues granddaughter today and the lesson was pretty good. we did a restoration lesson. she seemed to understand it and even committed to being baptized. we will see what happens tho. she has been taught in the past and was dropped before for not doing anything. we were also able to see our potential investigator Lorane today too. we went over the plan of salvation. she was a bit hesitant on some parts of it but i think that she really liked it. we are gonna call her and follow up on her reading the pamphlet again soon. i really look forward to teaching her. im way jealous of her family haha. its just such a happy family. something i have not seen in a very long time.

Sunday 11-9-14

another hard day. the only lesson we were able to get in today was a lesson with our recent convert stevin. he is very knowledgeable in the gospel so i always feel stupid trying to teach him haha. but we talked a little about patriarchal blessings and he wants to get one. it should be interesting to see that happen haha. we had like 31 people come to church today too so thats way good. i just want it to increase haha. this branch needs to be a part of the stake here soon. but it needs to be a ward first, or at least meet the qualifications to do so haha. soon come tho, soon come.

so thats the week. it started out good, and kinda died down a bit. but this next week should be really good. elder hall and i are able to keep busy and thats never a bad thing. now we just need some results haha.

Love,

Elder Kurt Meacham

Scripture Thought

1 Corinthians 2:9