la carta final (August 24,2010)

LAST EMAIL FROM QUINN FROM HIS TWO YEARS SERVING IN COLOMBIA!!!!!!!!!

- He didnt say this but I figured I had to because Im just soo excited to see him tomorrow!

I know I wasnt the best at keeping this blog always up to date but Im pretty sure all the emails he has written should be on here now. This way even if you all didnt get to read them every week from Quinn you can go back and read them now. Same for himself once he gets back and realizes how to use this again. Thanks for putting up with me.

--hey this is really short because i have to go to translate for the new gringos and the asistant is telling me to hurry, so im hurrying.

thanks for all your letters and love and it has been wonderful writing to you all these last two years, im happy that i will give you all a big HUG thursday.

its such a blessing to serve the lord and his children and im so glad that with your help that i could serve a mission.

write more later if i can

Elder Larson

A Wet Weekend! (August 16,2010)

well everything went as planned and Luis Valencia was baptized and confirmed, i was able to confirm him and it was a great experience to promise him blessings that the Lord has waiting for him. WE are going to watch the video la restauracion with enrique in lucho´s house tonight to get him all pumped up for his baptism this weekend. we feel really blessed to been able to teach personas so prepared like the ones we have found lately. My comp is working away here in the area while i am on intercambios and he is going to have alot of exito in a few weeks. i got to talk in church yesterday and i shared my testimony that this is the only church that will permit us become like Christ by guiding us in his footsteps. And i am so grateful that i have a full week and then some worth of miralces to make. Keep praying for Faidus, Enrique, and Alejandro. The Lords is blessing us greatly as a family and its wonderful to share with others these blessings. not to long this one but what more is to be said?
Thanks for all your love and letters,
Elder Larson

p.s. HAPPY BIRTHDAY MOMMY!!! i´ll give you a big huge soon.

Good Story Time (August 2,2010)

this past week was very enjoyable, due to the meetings at the beginning of the week and the weekly intercambios i get to do as a DL i wasnt really in my area alot with E Pastran. But it was fun to meet interview a few people and help them get over their unique difficulties (one investigator has the gift of being a bruja which she is trying to get over pretty interesting that one ask me about it later). It seems like the thing that the Elderes in my district are best at is reminding me of how much time i have and dont have as a missionary, its rather bothersome, we are going to have to talk about it tommorrow in district meeting haha. first off HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD!!! i did know last week that it was going to be your birthday but i figuered that bc today is closer to your birthday than last monday i would tell you today so HAPPY BIRTHDAY. dont really have all the space to write how much you have had an influence on me and how grateful i have become (and should have always been) for your care and guidance. ive thought alot about how my life has been impacted to have the presence of a strong priesthood holder espcially i thought about you while i read the talks in GC of Elder Erying (the priesthood session one) and Elder Anderson. There are tons of things that i want to share with you about the mission and how important you have been to keep me giving all that i could but it will be better to tell you in person so when i get back just say ¨hey recently released Elder Larson tell me how important i am to you¨ and we can have a good long talk. (Mom all that applies to you as well for your birthday that is coming up).
well here comes great story time.... due to the fact that i had to been in the DL meetings all day tuesday i was in the north of B/quilla which is the Zona Paraiso which is where i started the mission. It was quite strange riding around in taxi in that part of the city because i saw alot of things that reminded me of ohh so long ago. BUT THE BEST was after the training meeting Tuesday we were leaving the stake center at around 6 and as i was walking out i saw some elders talking to a member who was waiting for an interview to go on his mission. Well i always get excited to see Costeños going on the mission so i went over to cheer him on but as i approached him he looked at me rather strange and then i could tell he recognized me like he had seen me before. i really had no idea who he was but he got really excited to see me and presented himself as Jose Perez. When i calmed him down and got him to stop smiling i asked him how did he know me and then he told me something so marvelous that i dont really know how to write it. He told me that he was a contact that i had made the last day i was in Puerto Colombia, that he was a positive contact and that we taught him the restoration and left him a BoM with the challenge to read and pray. The next day i left to go to Santa Marta as CM but he said that E Beltran (the comp i left behind) went back and kept teaching him and he accepted the Lords invitation to a better life and was baptized within the month! and now a short year later he was getting ready to go on a mission and so happy to be going and so happy to have known the goodness of the Lord. Well i just about started to cry (really im surprised i didnt... ok my eyes got pretty watered up) and give him a real big hug and didnt know what to say. He then continued to tell me that the miracle didnt stop there, but after he was baptized his family also listened to the lessons which led to the baptism of his parents and little sister who are planning on going to the temple in october! that floored me as well but THEN he told me that the Castro family (the first family that i found and was able to baptize) is doing well and especially the 2 sons John and Johnathan and John is also really close to going on the mission! ohh i almost crushed the poor skinny brown boy bc i was so happy i felt like jumping around and dancing and praying and crying all at the same time. to tell the truth im getting all teared up writing about how wonderful it is that the Lord let me be a DL my last cambio so that i had to go to a silly 3 day training meeting so that i could see the convert i never knew i had. it makes D&C 18 all the more true and special in my life, and not just a posibility but a promise. It takes so little space to write this story but i feel like im writing my whole mission, all the work, sweat, dirt, blood, noise, rejection, sun, RICE, and sadness are completely consumed in the joy that comes from serving the Lord and as alma prayed in his mission to the zoramites in Alma 31.
I remember in Puerto after i was able to see the conversion of the Castro family i felt such joy having them come with us to the lessons and was a little worried thinking that the Lord was giving me all the joy of the mission at the beginning bc really i didnt think i would be able to experience more joy than what i felt with them as my first converts. But spiritual joy is something so powerful that the Lord has let me feel it even more strongly through my time of service. through the trials and pain he has enlarged my capacity to feel spiritual joy and as Pte. Roundy always taught ¨physical pleasure or pain is nothing compared to spiritual joy¨ he was very right. The Lord loves His children so much and He has given me some of that love, He is so pained when we use are agency to scorn Him but will always forgive those who return to Him. He accepts the puny efforts of the boys of His church as they leave all that they think they know so well and magnifies them and molds them to do His marvelous work as only a God can. i still dont understand why the Lord would let me have such an amazing and marvelous this was so spiritually powerful to me which really difficults me to try to extend the experience to you all but im trying hard ( I feel like moroni in ether 12). but thinking of it all it just returns to the greatest commandments love God over all things and then your neighbor as yourself. Give God what little you have and as He includes you in His amazing plans you will really see the greatness how His power and capacity to change the hearts of men from the darkness that they are used too to the brilliant light of hope that the Savior is to the world. its wonderful the mission it really is and im so glad that the Lord has given me the chance to live it but if ive learned anything its that i can always be an instrument in the Lords hands to bring others to repentance and the Savior. He is always willing to accept my efforts to bring others to the gospel because it saves others souls but also mine as well, a great secrect that is not too secret.
well after feeling all that in the space of 5 mins with Jose i wrote down his e-mail address gave him a hug and told him good bye. Probably that was one of the most impactful 5 mins in my mission and im pretty sure ive still got a bit to learn from it still but so far that is what ive felt so far.
Thanks for all your love and letters although i love la Costa truthfully im excited to see you all and share these things in person.
Love
Elder Larson

CARTA!!! (July 26,2010)

hey family, taking a quick moment to write to you all to say im grrrreat! we had a good attendance in church yesterday and they have me playing the keyboard in primary to sundays are the best. i think it is something strange for the members to see a big white gringo sitting behind a really small table with a big keyboard playing primary songs and singing in his opera bass voice becuase almost everyone that passes by looks in to see what all the noise is about. i fully enjoy it. Our investigators are still progressing but with lots of dificulty, its quite hard for people to actually put faith into action when they dont have pratice doing it and when sacrifing could mean there is no food on the table for the family. but with lots of little steps they are working towards baptism. we really need the members help to show them its possible to live how the Lord wants us to here in B/quilla so we are going to be doing the extra work of getting the fun members here out of their house and on the street. dad in response to your question if im better looking now than before i think if alma 5 is true and i dont look any different we would have problems wouldnt we? in response to moms question about our investigator who dreams he said he saw ME so he recognized me when i stopped by. also he has told us more of his dreams which has been a hoot but just so you all know i am the same size a Jesus. he said the last time he had a dream about jesus he was my same size and build so thats interesting. the reason im writing so little is that they are taking 1/2 of the pday to have a DL meeting with the new MP. its a 3 day deal bc they are making some adjustments to the way the missionaries are going to teach so they are getting us up to speed. let me tell you im just so happy that they are going to take me out of my area for 3 days so that i can learn how all the OTHER missionaries are going to teach but thats the way things go.
thanks for all your love and letters. you are the all the BEST family ever.

Elder Larson
Misiòn Colombia Barranquilla
La Iglesia de Jesucristo de los Santos de los Ultimos Dias

(i finshed my letter like that becuase i notice thats what all the cool rich misionarries in Germany do... BACANO TU PAPÀ!)

CARTA (July 19,2010)

well had a good start to the week that my companion labled ¨the beginning of the end¨ i didnt really appriecate it. Unlike my dearly beloved mother i cant say off the top of my head how much time i have left, and after so much time without doing math it takes me too long to figure it out and so i dont haha i just know i have ALOT of hours left. we are getting everything worked out so that we baptize these great men that we have found. Alejandro got to church yesterday and felt great to be there, we are really excited for him. Robinson is as always a champ and has gave the prayer in gospel doc. class yesterday which was big for him. Luis Valencia is another señor that is progressing well but is still a bit nervous to actually get baptized, he was preparing for this weekend but he got really nervous and his wife wasnt helping a whole lot so we are working that he gets baptized the same date as Robinson in Agosto. The only problem with these men is that their familes (especially their wives) are not progressing with them and we want to baptize FAMILIES! but tonight we are going to do a super family night with soda and everything at Alejandros house (or more like room) and we are going to make sure that Luis is praying and reading the BoM with his wife. Robinson we are not really too sure if we want him to pray with his wife becuase we are not sure to what she will pray to, being a witch and all haha. Another interesting thing that happened to us is that yesterday a man that we invited on the street actually CAME to church. After every negative contact we always invite the person to church and they always say ¨oh yeah ill be there¨ but they never show up but this guy (enrique camacho he is called) walked in during sacrament meeting and we didnt recognize him but after the meeting he told he we had invited him so he came. yesterday por la noche we went by and taught him and he was really acceptive and like the BoM. The field sure is white and getting whiter here in Colombia! He told us that he has dreams (OH NO COSTEÑO DREAMS you know what that means) but he told us that about 3 months ago he saw me in a dreaming teaching a class and so when i contacted him he got really startled and told me he didnt want to talk to me haha. Oh also he said he saw me in the dream with a blonde girl so i guess i was teaching a class with KATIE GARLICK, way to go Kate you made it into the Costeño dream realm! this week is going to be important for my comp. because i have to start doing intercambios with the other elders of the district (they put me as DL again to finish up) so he is going to get to be in charge of things it will be good for him. He is learning alot and works hard so im happy.

let me know how the german missionaries are doing, that is if they arent already back in la mecca mormona.

thanks for all your love and letters

Elder Larson

Cambios (July 13,2010)

heyyy family,
im writing late becaUSE todsay is the last p-day of the cambio and we have p-day the second half of the day! we have cambios today but lucky for us (my comp and i) there arent cambios! this is a happy thing because we are going to get to see our invest. batized hurayy! i was very surprised because i was sure they were going to change me up, that i would go to an area that needs alot of help, contact like crazy and find families and then change and not see them get baptized. that has been the normal cycle here in CBM. id even been studying scriptures about how its not that important who gets to baptize and that kind of thing but luckily the Lord wants to give me that chance to baptize in these 6 weeks that are coming up. so this past week the troubles came for our invest. Alejandro is having a hard time getting work and his family has been pretty sick with some kind of flu and all of this prevented him from coming to church again sunday. Well we passed by and invited him to repent and not repeat and then gave him some hope and he really felt sorry and he is ready for church this weekend come hell or high water (and that high water part is really possible thanks to the rain here). yesterday there was a huge rainstorm for two hours that flooded alot of houses including ours! but not really flooded just kind of formed a river that goes from the back door to the front door and then to the street, it doesnt cause any damage and kinda cleaned a little bit. also as we were waiting the storm out in the house of the members who gave us lunch the hermana abuelita didnt like lighting and everytime it thundered or did lighting she would yell and duck, one lighting bolt struck a eletricity transformer a block away from the house which made it blow up and was really loud.....she almost tackled my comp from being so scared haha. ROBINSON is chugging along and reads a ton of the BoM but we ran into a slight problem with his marriage. problem one his birth registro doesnt exist anymore and that means he has to make a new one which takes time its just really odd that he legally doesnt exsist, thats is the normal problem. the ABnormal problem is that the reason his wife doesnt want to hear us and is not in the house alot is due to her job.... which is..... being a WITCH. yes his wife reads crystal balls and uses cards to tell the future and communicates with spirits all that stuff, on a good day she gets to take demons out of people by using other demons which has its own process that i can fill you in on later rather frighting. there actually is alot of this kind of stupidness here in the coast but this is a first time my invest. is living with a witch. well we arent really sure what is going to happen but i should be interesting but dont worry i wont be looking into her eyes for longer than 5 seconds.
ohh we had our conference with Pte. Gaviria. it was kinda funny the poor man got there really late with his family (they had been traveling alot and looked tired) he has 4 kids from 18 to 4 years. He and his wife kinda presented themselves and then gave us advice but the advice part was funny because they said things like ¨use your cell phones to call the LD¨ (we dont have cell phones) ¨be careful going from the AC into the heat¨(AC doesnt exist) ¨i really admire you all for using suit coats while preaching¨(we NEVER use suit coats for the heat and because it would make us MORE of a target). basically they are new and its fun but im sure they are going to be super great presidents and the coast is going to keep bringing many converts to Christ. thanks lars for the letter im sure scout camp was a blast! Good luck Uncle Rob with that kidney sounds like an interesting way to use your vacation time from work.
keep praying for the invest and they have the hope and faith to keep progressing to making covenats
love ya all
Elder Larson

NOTICIAS DE COLOMBIA (June 28,2010)

another week and it was GREAT!!! there just isn't any other way to describe the Lords labor and being able to participate in it. we had a good assistance in church yesterday and the ward is super excited that i asked the bishop to let me play the keyboard in sacrament meeting. The first two weeks i forgot during the week to ask the bishop if there existed a keyboard but after two weeks of hearing everybody sing ¨oh God the eternal father¨ without any kind of music i wrote it down to ask the bishop and make sure that he would let me play, I'm glad i did. nobody actually sings any better but when i play the keyboard i have to turn up the volume real loud and since im playing the keyboard it almost drowns out the congregation singing haha. anyways yesterday was a challenge for our families that we are teaching. The flia Velez Herenandez is on hold bc the father and two of the girls went to Venezuela for 3 months... not the best news. BUT the family Manjares is doing great but with challenges we are just looking for an active family to come with us to teach them about FhE and all the other great things saints do to be holy. They are working hard to give up cafe and we helped them set a goal to pray as a family every night this week so that's what we are shooting for. the biggest thing that they need is to see how upping their responsibility with the Lord is the best thing they could do. its always a challenge for people here to actually take the decision that brings so many blessings but requires a constant effort to obtain them. sometimes its difficult to help the people really see how much God really WANTS to bless them and bc he knows that we have to make covenants with him to get those blessings he is so willing to help them make and keep covenants. we just have to let God help us by doing what he says and believing. we just barely got the conference Liahona here in Colombia and boy was i excited to finally get it. My comp and i jumped around yelling ¡new scripture new Scriptures! (something that would be completely blasphemous in any other christian religion) i was almost losing my testimony of Thomas Monson bc it had been so long without knowing what he is talking about haha. its funny being a missionary, everybody else is all pumped up about soccer in South Africa and im all excited about a wordy magazine with messages from elderly people in formal business clothes, i guess its more of the spirit it brings than anything else. i liked reading Elder Andersons talk ¨tell me the stories of Jesus¨ because it reminded me alot about my wonderful parents and family. Ive also loved how here in the mission im able to obtain stories of Jesus in what he does in my life like how he guides me always to those who wish to accept him, or how he always protects me from the world, or a million other things that Jesus dones for our family and for me right now.
we´ve been so blessed to live in a time so wonderful and with a family so great. one reason im so grateful to be on a mission becuase i know it lets me SHOW the Lord the gratitude that i have as his servant. Constantly i tell the Lord of my gratitude but its so much better when i can go out and work and let that be a testament to my gratitude for all the things that the Lord has given me. but luckily for all you who are without name tags we can all do the work of the Lord and you all can as well show your gratitude through your works.
thanks for all your prayers and letters
Elder Larson

I had a cold yesterday for the first time in B/quilla! (June 21,2010)

its true yesterday i had cold during the sacrament meeting. Well it started out that going to get our investigators it started to rain a TON!! well luckliy we had our umbrellas but unluckily they are very cheap umbrellas and they turned inside out and the rain was coming on more of a diagonal than straight down so they didnt really help alot. Never the less we kept on wading various flooded streets until we found ourselves challeneged by a very FAST flooded 2 meter ditch. When i say fast it was fast and it also was up on the hill so it also had a waterfall effect going on and i remind you that this isnt pretty rain water after it hits the street here it turns all kinds of brown and when the flow passes where there is a sewer top it puts an even more interesting shade of brown (when we got back to the house i disenfected my feet its necesarry). well lucky for us someone had put 2 old concrete telephone poles across the stream and we carefully made our way across got to the familes house... it was exciting! Well lucky for us it rained from 730 to 830 and then stopped so basically it rained enough to drench us but still give our invest, time to go to church which they did. the families returned for the second time and a new family joined us la familia Manjares, they are a family of 5 and the parents are MARRIED and the husband (alejandro) is way awesome and ya has a testimony and they dont live too far from the church.... pray for them! well simply the reason i was cold was when we got to church we were completly soaked and then we sat in air condiciong for an hour and i really was cold, i throughly enjoyed it. other fun stuff that happened this weekend is that we had our last zone conference and my last interview with Pte. Roundy. They (the Roundys) gave us all the advice they could think of and it was really special to hear their testimonies. the last interview with Pte. Roundy was a little strange being that he is going home before me, but he told me that i had made a great impact on the mission and that he was especially grateful to me for training well so many elders . this week Elder Torres of the seventy is coming to teach us some fun things so that will be exciting. my comp and i are getting along well, he knows quite a bit of english so he is teaching me when we are in the apartment. its silly because randomly he will say some weird phrase in english and his voice in english is really funny. also here in the mission they have given the missionaries a booklet to learn english and the examples of conversations are between elders and members things like... hello bishop how is the retention going? great elder, always in the service of god we are blessed!.... and things of that style so we quote the funny sentances and laugh.

things really are going great here, i feel so blessed that the Lord has let us find some people who really WANT to hear and change, it makes everthing alot nicer. im always grateful that missionary work diligently performed forms a wall of protection against temptacion or disanimo (that something that is promised in PMG in the chap 6 part about obediencia) becuase ive really have felt that my time here and i contiue to feel so.

thanks for your love and prayers and letters

Elder Larson

que PODER (June 14,2010)

sounds like an exciting weekend for all you gringo folks up north. IT just started a huge rainstorm here so we are going to be wading out of the internet after we finish typing.. YAYY!! it has been a good week of hard work looking for people who are willing to listen and change to be more like Christ (the keyword is change b/c here in friendly B/quilla almost everyone is willling to listen as long as they dont have to do anything). Here it was big soccer news 1) b/c the world cup started and everyone is glued to the TV and 2) this last weekend was the nacional finals of soccer with B/quilla playing at home for the championship. About 2 hours before the match started nobody was in the street or if they were they were watching a gaint street screen. Our area is about 5 blocks from the stadium so we could hear all the noise and see the fireworks. The only time the costeños actually get angry for us talking to them is when there is soccer so we got some fun insults thrown at us. One guy angrily told me that if the team was to lose it would be my fault bc i had inturrupted his prayer to the saint someone that the team would win. Luckly i didnt inturrupt his prayer too much and the home team won!! our apartment is next to a main street and that street was full of people blowing on plastic trumpets and playing drums until early in the morning. these happy people are always ready to start a party for whatever reason. On a more important note yesterday we had a good group of investigators at church which made my compa all happy( me too). it always is neat to me how one gets to an area, starts with pretty much nothing, start talking and testifying, and if you look hard enough with your eyes of faith investigators start to form. It has always seemed to happen to me to get to start an area over again and its such a miracle to see how the Lords guides those who wish to be guided to thos who will accept Him. It just cant be something that ¨happens¨ bc it happens so much and when it happens (it being finding people who are really prepared to change) its amazing! so here to working hard and smart so it happens some more!

We have a neat family of 5 (la familia Velez Hernandez) who are really friendly and looked like they had a good time in church yesterday. the ward really struck a home run with talking to them and taking them to classes when they were looking to sneak out early. i felt really relieved that the ward helped us on this one bc after all the work it takes to get people to go to church once they are there its up to the members to make them feel welcome, and it they dont do it there really isnt much that can make up for it. also another man who we found our first day together while we were walking around lost came to church by himself and with his BoM in hand. He informed us that he had read all of the book of Jacob and was working on helaman, we were floored. It just reminds me how big of a power the ¨el libro de los mormones¨ (like they call it here) is to convert, the only thing is trying to get this people who see the need to read books to READ it!!! as a mision we have been reading the BoM together since Jan. and we are going to finish the end of this month. i have really enjoyed seeing how the book has elevated the mision to achieve the goals we have set as a mision and i have seen alot more humility in the mision. and personally reading the book has helped me mantain the focus that is so important here in the service of the Lord.

thanks for your letters and love,

ill hear from you next week,

keep praying for us here and well pray for you there

Love

Elder Larzón (our name colombianized)

Mail Time! (June 7,2010)

Well hello family! It was great to get all your letters and find you all well and happy. Here in my new area of Ciudadela all is CHEVERE! First of my new compa is Elder Pastrán from Mendoza argentina which is cool. His accent is more manly than the chilenos accents so that is good. He comes from a rather crazy family life but so far he is normal. He is really excited to be here and listens well and learns quickly. One thing im teaching him is how to walk side by side without bumping into his companion. I guess he is orbiting around me and because im so much chunckier now my gravitational force has increased and he cant help but colliding into me every 5 mins. But we are learning and more than anything it makes me laugh about all the stuff that he is learning to do that I didn’t even realize that a missionary does because it just am used to it. My area is WAY different than where I have been the last 6 months. If we remember sincelejo is a cattle town and monteria pretty much the same. So I m used to lots of mud, pigs running around in the sreet, cheap crazy veggies, and more iguanas smashed on the street than dogs. Well B/quilla is not like that, this is really the first time Ive have the chance to work in B/quilla wince intercambios in Pto. Colombia way back when so its exciting. Lots of salsa music 24/7, buses that go WAY to fast, 3 legged dogs and no iguanas, oh and its started the tropical rains here so about every day at 2 it rains real hard and B/quilla is famous for its flooding streets that really do turn into rivers and sometimes overturn cars (we don’t cross them when they are like that don’t worry). When we got here we got soaked bc neither of us had umbrellas so we bought 2 and then it didn’t rain… just like the mission. The Barranquilleros are a very friendly specie (the females sometime overly) and they always say they want to hear us, but when we come back the next day they have completely forgotton and say OH I didn’t think you were going to actually come back!. But contacting these last few days we have found some good people which has been a good experience in listening to the spirit seeing that when we got here neither of us had any idea to where to start. The ward is really strong and anxious to help so that is a new one for me. I was actually a little overwhelmed Sunday with the all the members who talked to us and wanted to give us food send their son to teach with. So things are looking up like always here in the service of the Lord, its great to be in a place where so many people need the gospel and to know that it can help them. My compa keeps telling me im an old man because I am constantly saying ¨one time in….¨ and then share a teaching story from times past. But its great to have those stories, while making new ones, while working like im just starting! Love you all and I hope that Lars and Layne can live until schools out!

Love ya

Elder Larson

Changes! (June 1,2010)

well familia im writing you late because we have CAMBIOS!!! and im going to be leaving monteria to work in the big city of Barranquilla. this will be the first time i will actually be IN B/quilla so it will be will fun and alot different than here in my area of monteria. my new comp is coming in fresh from the MTC of Bogota so i get the blessings of a new missionary again yayy!! what i wrote when elder diaz was coming in 12 weeks again applies here again so if you want you can read it again. But im really happy that im going to have a comp that is excited to change the mission and B/quilla at one time. im a little short on time due to the fact that i have to pack but im going to send you some fotos which is worth a thousand words each so this letter is actaully really long! im so happy to be working at this time in the full time service of the Lord and having the oppurtunity to serve his children as he would.

thanks for all the letters brothers!

love

Elder LArson

ps. o send you the first ones big and the last ones little so that you can see that my camera isnt fuzzy

I feel like stephen (the one from Acts) - May 24,2010

yes this week i was hit with a rock. it was kinda of traumatic and a bit difficult to return to the neigborhood where the scene of the crime happened but i prayed with faith trusting in the prayers of my mother and returned to where the Lord needed me. JUST KIDDING but i was really hit with a rock but not for being a missionary what really happened is a man was trying to hit a dog that was getting too friendly with his female dog. well since about 88.6745% of the people here need but dont have glasses he chucked the rock even though we were behind the offending wannabe alpha male dog. Well the rock didnt hit the dog but landed about 8 feet in front of me and bounced and struck me in the leg. really it didnt hurt at all and more that anything im really excited because but now i can say i´ve been stoned for the lords sake in the mission (biblicly stoned not hippie style). but talkin about hippies this week i bought some super super glue for my shoes and was gluing them together in the little room that we have to study and due to the strong odor of the glue my compa started to get real light headed and giggly.... we put a fan in the room fast i dont like giggly compas hahaha. other than that the week went by fast and enjoyable. The daughter of Laureano was baptized and confirmed this past weekend which was a blessing to see. im not sure why but costeños just dont liked to get baptized all at once there is someone who always wants to linger and ruin what could be a super baptism picture but the picture isnt important and she was confirmed (which is). These weekend the little sister of a convert that Elder Abanto and i baptised is preparing for baptism so the Lord is blessing us quite a bit (like always) here in Monteria. Sin embargo im still praying to find that bishop and his family, maybe ive already found him and he just has to grow up and have a family, but ill keep working like i havent found him and like i should... diligently! its such a blessing to serve in the lords labor. yea its hard and hot and sweaty and smelly (i washed my clothes today and they smelled just amazing, i had to use a bucket of bleach) but really i know there is no other way so great at this point in my life to help other people and myself come to Christ than what i am doing now . its a blessing to serve and everytime i do something good for someone i help the Lord do what he would do. and doing what the lord would do sure feels great. thanks for all your support and prayers. i know that my preparacion for this time in my life started when you first taught me how to pray and read the scriptures. Its such a blessing to help others start a path that they might never find but also teach them how great it is to walk it relying only on God. so many people here rely on their pastor or their priest so they can grow spiritually and sometimes its hard to help them understand that they can progress without us always at their side . Teaching a gospel that is so personal and individual is a blessing to all who really desire to take upon them the name of christ and work out their salvation. But im so very thankful that all you wonderful family of mine that you all decided to do what the Lord would have done and helped me serve a mission, thus progressing personally but also helping me in ways so special and personal. its a blessing to choose the right.

Love

Elder Larson

Baptisim (May 17,2010)

Hola familia querida. This week has been very enventful and special, ill start with the most important and finish with the least so that if you get bored you can stop Reading halfway. First off Ana Laureano and Anderson (thier son) got baptized!!!!! WE had soooo many Little things that got in the way this week, we had to send them to antoher town to get married and the car broke down, the sister who made the cake for the party came late, her mom decided not to stay for the baptism and that made her sad, and the baptismal clothes for Laureano were too small…. BUT THEY GOT BAPTIZED!!! It was really a special experience to see, this family has changed so much to be able to be baptized and confirmed it was a roller coaster helping them get there. Ana was especially touched by the baptism and as she left the wáter she just started to cry and was so happy. As she bore her testimony after she changed she just said she felt so different, lighter she said, a feeling so warm and loving (something that she hasnt had much in her life), then she said somthing that really was awesome she said ï felt like i never knew how to sin¨. What a great way to explain how the spirit influences us. It makes the very thought of breaking Gods commandments look totally ridiculous and stupid (as it is). They were married and baptized on Friday so Saturday we passed by to remind them how important it is to get to church on time for the confirmación and she asked us again about this feeling she had felt after she was baptized. I felt impressed to tell her that her soul was being lightened from sin and then promise her that she will never have to feel like she felt before her baptism after she recieves the holy ghost and is worthy of it. It felt good to teach the truth. It got to do the confirmaciones which was a special way to express the Lords feeling for them through his servant (Little ol meJ). My compa is pretty happy being these his first converts but we arent satisfied because a family that we have been teaching that werent too excited for marriage have changed their minds and are all pumped up for getting hitched! Thanks for all your prayers in behalf of Ana and Laureano. I know they helped them as well as me, it really is hard work getting a family baptized andi feel so blessed that the lord let us succed. But the work isnt over yet to please direct your prayers for the family Llorente. tHey are a family of 4 that are going to get baptizted in a Little as 2 weeks if our prayers and plans work out. Well besides that the most important thing other fun details, this past Tuesday was the dia de la virgen maria in case all you mormons didnt know. Well everyone was lighting candles and reciting the hail mary with alot of faith so guess what…. She appeared to someone in the neighborhood!!! Yea i know but seriously there is a crack in one of the walls in one of the neighborhoods that someone decided looked like the virgen and went and told all the old ladys who are crazy about the virgen and they all came in forcé and roped of the area and lit candles and put flowers down. Some pretty important stuff….but it made me laugh because even more people than normal asked us about Joseph Smith being a saint and one old lady was willing to light a candle for him. i told her it wasnt necesarry but if she wanted to she could pray to the elect lady Emma Smith… just kidding!! Its great to be able to help the faithful people direct their faith in the right directions which is to say make covenants so they can recieve the blessing that their heavanly father wants so much to give.

Love you all tons

ELDER LARSON

el gran sueno (May 10,2010)

well it was super great to hear from you all a fun way to end the week for sure. to clear up the doubt about in what language i do interviews with Pte. Roundy the answer is a resounding.... SPANISH. after the 3rd interview here in colombia all the interviews have been in spanish so the last time i had an interview with pte roundy in english was more than a year ago. the idea was not speak english so i had to speak spanish so i could learn faster, i think it worked.

well after telling you all about my marvelous life yesterday as promisedhere is a funny dream i remeber from an invest. back in Sincelejo.

one must remember that sincelejo is a cow town and if you remember i think i wrote you all about the ¨corraleja¨ which is put alot to drunk people in a rodeo type arena with an angry bull and see who gets run over first. Well thats is a tradition since 50 years ago so often contacting we would run into old guys who were all scarred up from getting gorred when they were younger and all guns to talk about the glory days liked to show us this scars. One of the best ones was when we contacted a man who let us teach him in his garden of mangos and papayas behind his house. he seemed pretty interested at first but then... the dream! just as we got to the part of lesson one where we talk about prophets out of nowhere he interrupts and tell us how much he believes in jesus because he saved him from the crazy cows when he was younger. Well i knew this was going to be a great one so i had to ask him how. well he told us how when he was 20 he decided to go to the corraleja and being drunk he was gored but the bull. he was gored in his lower abdomen (which scar he did NOT show us) and while he was injured and the rest of the spectators carried him off the rink he looked at the people and saw carrying him off the rink peter, james and the VIRGEN!!! (the best apostles ever as he told us). he told them he didnt want to die and the virgen at this point had turned into jesus and he told him the if he wanted to live he had to give up the corraleja and drinking. Well the injured dreaming costeño told the dream jesus that he could give up the corraleja but he wasnt too sure about giving up drinking because he really likes it. Well because jesus is to kind he told our dear costeño friend that that was ok and he had to give up just the corraleja.... how nice. Well he got better and to this day he hasnt gone to another corraleja buthe still likes to drink! the costeños really are a special people and a hoot but i love em and if i dont work for their salvation i dont know who will (besides the Lord). keep praying to Laureano and ana (the Jimenez Gomez family) this weekend is going to be great!

love you all!

Elder Larson

lluvia (May 3,2010)

YO HOOOLA familia

bueno un gusto a escribirles to tell you im grrrreat! we had a missionary week (missionary week = great) for muchos reasons ONE) we taught tithing to Ana and Laureano and so what did they do this sunday..... PAY TITHING!!! that is a first for me, to see people who arent members yet pay tithing. super blessings are in store for them TWO) the relief society is going to help us sell the fritos so ana y laureano can get married THREE).... well im testifying of christ and inviting people to repent thats good enough in inself. It sounds like the hiking trip was a good one and HOW cool is it that katie is going to stay with you all. Tell her she can use my pillows if she wants. Well i understand that you all got some rain and im sure that its true, BUT here in colombia we´ve started the drenching season. All in all im pretty sure that we end up getting about the same about of rain but the dramatic thing is that here it dumps 2 days worth of rain in about 30 mins! that makes things interesting becasue its floods the canals and what is in them starts to float around on the street (we wont talk about whats in them but it is of various colors and smells interesting). also the streets turn to complete MUD after they have drained. well what we usually do when it rains is obvious.. teach but the thing is almost all the houses in our area have tin roofs. so when the rain is coming down colombian style its like somone has put a tin bucket on your head and then starts to whack it with drumsticks.... all in all it makes it rather difficult to communicate. But with my ever eager compa i usually pass the lesson to him when it the strongest and he yells really loud and the people sometimes understand him. OHH and what makes it more fun is when water starts coming in under the wooded walls and we arrange the seats (we are always in a very small cirlce so we can understand something) 2 or 3 times to avoid the puddles. sometimes we even help put little buckets out to catch the rain that leaks through the roof. but all this excitment is olny about 30 mins of every other day its not like nonstop lluvia and just when it stops out comes the sun strong as ever to dry things out bone dry. umm this sunday other than being mother day here is also stake conference so that might be fun, you know how i am with stake conference. Oh also yesterday they asked me to lead the hyms NOOOOOO it was so ridicouls. i was set to get everyone to sing the right rythm but i was completly foiled by the songs the bishop choose 1st one a poor wayfaring man of grief (the first time they heard it im sure) and the last one the best latin favorite...... HOW GREAT THOU ART!!! but ive learned to enjoy the interesting singing style of peopel who never have had the chance to study music.

thanks for your prayers for our invest. it has helped alot. pray that they strengthen their testimonys of the BoM its so important.

thanks for all your love and letters

Elder Larson

les escribo (April 26,2010)

well to quote the famous Elder Bangerter Andrew.. it was a great week! but im not going to make up reasons for repeating myself buecause i find myself teaching the same thing almost everyday just to diferent people. I was thinking about that during my limited personal think time (usually when im walking a 30 min long distance walk) and came to the conlcusion that since there is only one truth there really arent that many ways to say it. its a worldy desire to have something NEW and FABOULOUS every 2 months but the good thing with the unchanging gospel truths is that it seems one can understand something very common but on a new spiritual level. so i have to keep studing the scriptures that they put in PMG even though by know i know what they say before i read them bcI have to grow so I can understand them better. so back to my week me and my chilean child are going strong, we are getting really excited for the baptism for Ana and Laureano in a few weeks. WE are going to sell fritos to raise the money necessary and hopefully the ward is going to pitch in. Keep praying hard that they recoginze how important this is and that their baptism is the most important thing for them now. They have quite a few of family realtionships details to work out and its kinda rocky this whole change thing but we are heading over tonight for a fun family night and they asked us to dedicate the house (ana says she sees spirits and she spooked my compa and he said he felt something too.... ohhh latinos). Umm this sunday they called tatianna (my conversa from a few weeks ago) to be a primary teacher and that made me happy. It really is great to give onself to the edificacion de zion. i feel that a little bit too often we focus on want the mission does for the missionary but we have to remember that the mission that i have the great opurtunity to serve is to build zion. This is to say that instead of worrying about if we are good enough for the calling we just have to do our best knowing that the Lord will do his work like he wants to and he will do it with whatever servant is willing. This is another product of personal think time that helped me alot when i was in Cartagena.

congrats matthew with the gradutation and the safe return of the norweigan princess. ohh im going to call for mothers day the 9th of may. the easiet time will be in the afternoon at 4 or 5 but if you want i could call later like 7 or 8. let me know next week.

thanks for all your love and faith, pray for the costeños because they need your prayers (me too)

LOVE

Elder Larson

de MIII (April 17,2010)

heeeey family,
well sounds like an eventfull week. Matthew tough luck, it seems like the adversary
has a stronger hold on iceland than other places, that or the Lord wants to see if you can
pray down a volcano.... better get started. If you promise that ill see the wedding ill join you with
my super faith filled greeny but if not we´ll leave you on your own. jaja but seriously that is kinda crazy
that a volcano interrupted (i put interrupt and errupt togother!!) things. pero se acuerda que para siempre es PA´
SIEMPRE. well here we had CAMBIOS im staying put with E´ diaz which is going to be great! WE are going to baptize some great familes and we are going to find MOOORE.

we are going to play ping pong so i have to write quickly, but i send pics, which are worth a thousand words

thanks for all your love and letters

Elder larson

p.s. send my regrets to the Bangerter family. When i was little and heard andrew talk about Grandpa Bangerter i thought he was the profeta!

Pa La Gente- April 12, 2010

it was great to hear from you all. It sounds like you are all getting warmed up for a fun larson summer, sounds great. Mom as a response to your question i think kalan doesnt need any boyfriends, also i feel that taylor is a girls name. Dad maybe you could make the fence colombian style like i told you about a while back, lots of sticks on end with a wire holding them together, im sure the neighbors would enjoy it. this week went well with my compa E diaz. he is getting used to being exposed to all the problems of our investigadores that he didnt have to deal with at home (something that happens to all misioneros at first) so i get to cheer him up alot, in my cheery way. the family Jimenez Gomez (laureano y ana) are doing really well, they both have had really tough lives and are excited to have things forgotten thanks to Christs atoning power. Ana has given up cafe like a champ and Laureano hasnt drunk since his birthday 3 weeks ago so we are making progress. Next comes marriage which is going to be an excellent opurtunity to`promise blessings. Ive come to find out here in the good ol Mision colombia Barr. that with anything but especially marriages it seems its alot better to prevent things from going bad as opposed to letting them go bad and then trying to fix them. Some things are just better left unsaid and not done then ask forgivness. I think this is what you were trying to teach me about school mom, its better to start out on top rather than dig yourself out of the hole (although i was never sure how i could dig myself out of a hole, i always thought climbing out made more sense). ohh funny story that only happens teaching in colombia....

so we were teaching our invest. about the word of wisdom and the best thing is that he is living 100% YAYY! when we got to the part about drugs he said he totally agreed and that it is way important to stay away from drugs. Well he said it in such a way that we thought he might have had a problem with drugs which means we need to know if he has or not so we can prevent him from using drugs again. he told us he never used drugs but just when he was a teenager he lived on his family farm in the country and they grew marijuana for a few years!! he said that in the 80´s some guys from bogota came and talked his family into growing marijuana and after they grew it a bunch of gringos came in planes and shipped it all to we know were.... (california for sure). but after a few years they stopped growing it because it was alot harder than growing the normal stuff they grow here and they didnt want any problems with the kind of problems that happen in colombia when you grow drugs. exciting stuff right.

well thanks for all your letter and love, im doing good working away and focusing on the time that i have left to do something that i wont ever be able to do again in the same way. its a gift and thanks for letting me live it.

Love

Elder Larson

Happy P-Day- March 29, 2010

dear family,
thanks for you letter i hope you are enjoying a little bit more sun than what you are used to. But it is still not like my favorite Colombian star that has the capacity to fry gringos in less than two hours or your money back. Sometimes it makes me wonder if it is the same sun here that i grew up with, not having the opportunity to read anything scientific for the last 19 meses I’ve almost forgotten the reason why its hotter here. from my religious standpoint i think it is hotter here because the lord is warming things up here first for the last burn which we got coming but maybe not. The week has gone well finding new investigators and helping people pray as familys. THANKS for teaching me to pray as a family its REAL important that my investigators do it and thanks to you r teaching and examples ive been able to share a very strong testimony that family pray brings happiness and unity. Also we got a couple curve balls thrown our way with some of our investigadores but the Lords will will be done. Funny things this week, well yesterday was Domingo de Ramos and the catholics get all pumped up and go to church for the first time since Christmas. After mass they have a parade in the street where they have the school marching band (there aren’t trumpets or anything just drums and xylophones) start off and then the priest follows with a bunch of people carrying crosses and virgins (the plastic kind). Well my compa and I got to the intersection where the parade was about 15 meters before they were going to pass and we needed to cross before them because we couldn’t wait for them to pass by and get to church on time so we scampered in front of the parade. As we got to the other side I couldn’t help but take a few seconds to watch a bunch of virgins pass by BUT to our surprise the parade started to turn and go down the street in which we were in the middle of! WE started to realized that if we didn’t start a walking we were gonna get stuck in the middle of the after mass mess so we took off, but the best part is that the parade kept following us down the street! Well since we were just about 20 meters ahead of the parade and nobody else was in the street it looked like we were leading the parade so I started marching and waving to the few people who were looking on. My compa almost died but I thoroughly enjoyed myself.

My compa and I are really pumped for conferencia and hopefully we can get our investigadores to go with us Saturday so we can go. But Sunday we get to go si or si so that is going to be fun. Enjoy priesthood session with Dad Lars, that is one of my best memories of being an aronic priesthood holder .

Im happy and safe and I pray hard. Thanks for your prayers for us and our investigadores.

Love

Elder Larson

Fotos - March 22, 2010

aqui les escribo- March 22,2010

Thanks for the letters it was great to hear from you. Thanks so much for writing every week it means alot and as simple as it sounds lots of missionaries dont get letters EVERY week like im so blessed to get so THANKS ALOT! Also thanks mom for spelling Colombia with an O and not a U like the majority of the gringos that write me, you with the spanish awareness award for the week yayy! Oh speaking of spanish (i speak spanish thanks to miracles) its been fun speaking with my chilean compa straight from Chile. He says alot of words that arent words here and gets a little frustrated when nobody understands him, also his vocabulary is more refined than that of the costeños and what i have learned. Words that are bad words (or palabrotas in spanish) in chile are fine to say here which is funny because half of the words i say get him riled up! Like if i drop something i say ¨carajo¨ or ïrda¨which is what the bishop says but he gets red faced and tells me to say things like sapos or rayos (toads or lightning). Personally i think saying TOADS when i drop something will 1) prevent me from growing facial hair for being so girly and 2) make the costeños laugh at me for being a sissy. But ive just realized that my spanish vocabulary is….. well we could say and i basically talk like a costeño, which is to say compared to other latinos, simple yet descriptive. But i like it!

this week has been great because we have found 2 families and they both came to church yesterday! The made quite a sacrifice to come because both walked) about 25 mins to get to church (walked because they cant afford anything else…. just like me). That was pretty awesome and we are going to be praying hard to keep them excited to come. Pray that they can understand the answers that God is giving them to their prayers. WE are working hard and still looking for the BISHOP we are going to batized. My compa is fun because he all excited about everything, his first district meeting he loved it, and today was zone conference and i thought he was going to stop breathing when Pte Roundy started to teach (but really it was a good sermon from our dear Pte. Roundy).

Ive just been really grateful for the service ive been able to give these past months and that i have yet to give. If one thing i have learned is that in serving one learns so much. Serving anyone brings happieness but serving the Lord is the BEST way to grow and learn. Because nobody can do the Lords work by themselves so if someone wants to serve the Lord, He welcomes them knowing that He will have to help that person every step of the way so that they can be sucessful. Well the work i do i can never do alone so if you think i have gained any kind of sucess its because the Lord taught me how to do it and helped me to do so.

Gracias por todo les queiro mucho

Elder Larson

p.s. enjoy the fotos!!

pps the first one is me with my two hijos its the LARSON FAMILY in the mision colombia barranquilla!

CARTOS! March 15,2010

Well hola familia,

It was fun to hear from you all and see that you are all doing well. Im glad mom is off her leashed perch on the couch. Im excited to hear about the basketball results from Lars and Layne. Well im going to actually answer some of moms questions for once (im sorry i forget these things easily). Yes i boíl my wáter (its a rule). I try not to swallow when i brush my teeth but the Little toothpaste that the King Larson family gave me tastes so good that sometimes i do… just kidding. I dont need you all to send me shoes i found a zapatero who is going to sew a tire on the bottom of my shoes (a jeep tire at my request) so im pretty sure that should last, at least till i get home. Monteria is actually pretty big (well its big realitive to the other towns here) im just in the not too rich neighborhoods so it looks like a pueblo. In the nicer parts of Monteria (or whatever city in the coast) the adults have a colombian univeristy education (not the same as an american university education), but where im working the best educated are high school grads. Most times we have to reapeat things alot. All the little colombian kiddies go to school and have to wear uniforms. Because there arent many teachers there are two options of 6 hours clases from 6 in the morning until 12 or 1 in the tarde until 7 in the evening. Other fun colombian insight is that yesterday was election day for their versión of congress. What they do here to get people to vote is almost the same as what we do to get people to go to church, pass by 2 hours before and remind them, and then pass by again. But the politcal people do it in vans and them drive them to the voting polls. WE werent too happen when we got to a investigators house just in time to see him jump in a van and tell the driver to step on it so he had an excuse not to go to church but it happens.

Things are fun with my second hijo elder Diaz, He is from Chile and was a bit worried about his family due to the crazy earthquake down there but he Heard from them before he got here and they are fine. He is the oldest of 3 brothers and they live just with their mom. He got here with a charge from Pte. Roundy to baptize a future bishop and his family so we are gearing up for that (gearing up to find a bishop means contacting alot more, practicing the lessons, fasting, and trying to get members to help us among other things.) Its also funny how naive he his, one time we were talking to a group old kranky catholic men (who were hanging out in front of their houses without shirts) and they asked us not too kindly why we were there. Well i told them because we want to help people have all the blessing that God has for them, and my comps response was because he loved them…. It was a good answer and all but the men looked around kinda awakwardly and said ¨….ok well….neat…¨ i laughed. Or this morning when we were buying mango the guys wanted to sell them to us for the White person Price (higher) and im sick of paying the White person Price so i was talking him down to what they were really worth. Well i almost had him when i said ï all have is 2 mil pesos so thats i can pay¨but my comp said öh dont worry i have more money¨…. We ended up paying the White person Price. But he is excited to work and see miracles and he listens to me and more importantly the spirit so we are doin gerrrreat!

Thanks for everything (life, the chance to be here, helping me get a testimony etc. Etc. Etc.)

Love

ELDER LARSON

CARTA CARTA QUE RECIBAN ESTA CARTA

HOLA FAMILIA!! it was great to get your letters and hear that all is well. im glad mom that you tried to teach Lars how he needs to say no to girls in a nice way but Lars is so smart that he is already practicing for the mission and yells them away. sounds like your winter is still going strong here they tell me that its going to start to rain soon which makes things a little bit cooler but also our whole area will be complete MUD so that will be interesting as well. As for jose and Yulema we are working hard for this weekend, yulema is still going strong and is just waiting patiently for her husband to grow up. He had some doubts about the BoM as well so we cleared that up and we are praying that we have been able to open his heart so that the Holy Ghost can strentghen his weak testimony. We are ending all the lessons kneeled in prayer and we arent sure what is keeping him from his testimony that he says he wants, but we trust that the Lord willdo his will and that he will help us to accept it. We´ll just keep trying to do what exactly what the spirit tells us to do because we cant get too far off track that way. also this weekend tatianna is preparing for
baptism as well as another youth. I think i mentioned tatianna in the last e-mail but she is our golden
investigator who got a testimony the same day that we taught her lesson one and is reading the BoM a chapter a day.
well she is still doing great and she loves what she is reading and is really excited for her baptism. she really understands that it is something that will take her closer to her Heavenly Father and that is will erase some things that she wishes she wouldnt have done. another good thing about Tatianna is that she got and RECOGNIZED her answer in the correct way through an overwhelming celestial feeling, the way it should be. a large number of the Costeños have an amazing talent of thinking that the only way they are going to get an answer through a dream or a vision. now im not saying visions or dreams and that kind of stuff are bad all you visionary dreamers who are reading this but here is an example of a typical dream answers. ex 1) the person is watering the dirt outside of his house (a typical costeño habit) and a man selling fruit comes by and the person calls him over to buy his fruit, when the person asks what he has the vendor says i carry mango, piña,coconut and jose smith fruit. Well our surprised dreamer asks in wonder ¨what is jospeh smith fruit¨ and the drean vendor sells him a mormon bible (the BoM). The dreamer then makes juice and its good. maybe that wouldnt be such a bad dream except that the invest. procedes to come to a bunch of WRONG conclusions from his dream that 1) we dont use the bible 2) jose smtih wrote the book of mormon 3) that we sell the BoM 4) that are our real names are jose and victor. Also when the invest does get an answer from the Holy Ghost he ignores it because his dream was way cooler. That was just one example of great dream answers when i get back i can tell you a bunch more, and belive me they are great.all in all im still way to happy, and healthy and blessed.pray hard for Jose that he recognizes the answers the Lord is sending him and that he opens his hear to the truth.
Love you all,
Elder Larson

p.s. the latest scripture i have memorized is jacob 5: 71 its UN PODER!!

I saw monkies this week!! (Feb 22)

but more importantly our investigadores are progresando. This weekend we have a young family programed to be baptized, Jose y Yulema Hernandez. As of a week ago Yulema didnt want to believe that the BoM could be true and we couldnt have that so we all got on our knees and asked God what he thinks about the Book of Mormon and He let us know. Since then Yulema has been progresando rapidamente and is getting real excited for baptism. Her husband Jose is doing OK but he is still getting over the fact that he is now married and cant hangout with his loser older brothers and play pool/ nintendo 64 all day. Its a rather typical costeño male problem, get married (well normaly he doesnt get married but thankfully jose did marry Yulema before they had a kid), has a kid, realizes its alot of responsibilty, gets scared, and hangs out at his moms house until his mother in law gets sick of her daughter whining and tells him to shape up or she wont let her daughter live with him anymore (the best part is when the mother in law tells him to shape up with a broom or a hose or something like that, the whole barrio comes out to see it). But we are going to watch ¨juntos por siempre¨with them, they react well to movies here, and pray alot. So pray for Jose and Yulema so they can get baptized TOGETHER this weekend. Other than them we have an investigador of GOLD who is doing golded. Her name is tatiana and she is a reference from her member boyfriend. WE taught her the restauracion about 2 weeks ago and after we invited her to read she got curious and read and prayed that night and got a big YES. since then she reads all the chapters we leave her 2 or 3 times and is also reading the BoM from the beginning a chapter a day. she is programed for the 6th of march so we are excited for the 6th of march, but pray for her too because alot of stuff can happen to an investigador in 2 weeks. As for me im really happy that im a DL again, not so much stuff to do and more preaching. I dont have to think so much about all the missionares in my zone and can focus on my distrito and my investigadores. oh also i have discoverd what was making our room smell strange at night latey i thought it was mice in the wall but...... its my compa!! he has a very peculiar smell at the end of the day and since i have discovered this i wont pray with him at night until he showers (i shower everynight just so you know, its complelty necesary). im sending you pictures of the central park here in monteria, thats where i saw the monkies and the iguanas, fun stuff.
Thanks for everything and i love you all
Elder Larson

p.s. the last photo is the latest of me, like i said earlier the sun here is extra crispy and i ran out of sunscreen about 3 days ago and this is what happened.

p.p.s. just kidding he is a mini misionero from Cartagena (he was in my ward)that is here because a misionero got sick hahaha fooled you all!

oh so there is snow there.... i have mangos (Feb 15)

so im glad the lord has seen fit to send the answer to all of my prayers as a highschooler a few years late, so enjoy the snow!! mom as an answer in what lars and layne could do inside1) have them memorize the first vision (preferibly in spanish) 2) send them back out to play in the snow for me bc there DEFINTALY is not snow here. ill stick my head in the fridge tomight to try to experiance it again. Im happy to see that everyone is enjoying themselves where there exists winter, here it doesnt exsist. Also i didnt even know that yesterday was valintines day but no big loss but im sure that matthew couldnt stop thinking about his frozen norweigen valintine jejeje. well this week has passed by really quick and why, because we were busy working our guts out, so fun! de verdad. when i got here my compa was teaching good and all but we started getting better and now were a restauracion teaching machine whippnig out LEc 1 in 30- 40 mins INCLUDING invinting the people to get baptized, and they best part is that they UNDERSTAND us as i will let you know when i get back the costeños are very simple and most of the time cant pay attention for more than 12 mins. the best part is that the Lord let us be succesful and we taught alot of people who we contacted and then taught right there and then invited them to get baptized. Also the Lord led us to people who just seemed like they were waiting to hear us. all in all our new investigator pool got a big ol boost because the lord let us invite 30 people to get baptized this week(they all accepted). here in the coast the people are really great and have alot of dead faith (dont want to do much with what they believe) so they are very willing to say they want to get baptized in the true church but little by little we find out who really wants to shock their faith to life by repenting and changing so alot of the mission is find as many as you can so chances are that more will be willing to change it was great that the Lord gave us a goodly number to work with. This week we are going to be teaching alot of how to recognize and answer about the BoM and why we need to go to church so pray that the goodly costeños read and pray and and connect love for God with being to obeying his commandments.
well as you can tell im happy because we are working hard and it has been a good week, we are excited to keep chugging along and finding those who will recieve us. Thanks for all your love letters and prayers
LOVE
Elder Larson

me writing you all

Saludos familia!!

Well i got the christmas Packaged… thanks a ton! It was great to hear from so many of you and im glad that everyone is so blessed back in the good ol USA. Thanks King larsons for the toothbrush i used it right away! Evreything is going great with my comp. Elder Abanto. He is very diligent and want s to learn and serve so we are getting along well. The number of people going to church dropped a bit but a family that we thought wasnt going to go showed up all of a sudden which was great. Also we were able to help one of our investigators get a testimony of the the BOM this week which was a very special experiance. He was confused about how the holy ghost really talks to us because he had seen as a child those crazy evangelista people who punch people in the face so they relieve the spirit and then they start to flail and go crazy. Well he didnt really want an experiance like that so he was understandably afraid and wasnt praying, so E. Abanto felt like we should pray with him and we did and boy did he get his answer!! It really was a great opurtunity and a privledge to witness it. As we were leaving i pointed out that God must really love him to give him an answer to clear and he sai ï just realizad that¨ how great an answer that is! It is all about getting people to really see that god loves them and it was so awesome to be there.

Thanks for everything, the BoM is true so keep Reading it!
Love
Elder Larson

p.s. send me some snow!!!

dusty dusty Monteria

Here in Monteria things are going just great. My compa is Elder Abanto from Lima, im his 3rd comp and he is all fired up to work hard so we get along great. He was baptized 3 years ago and is the only member in his family which is pretty cool. Our area is called Emundo Lopez and its the outskirts of Monteria so all our roads are dirt roads and we are in the dry season here so its DUSTY. my shoes are alot more brown than black. Also a neat feature of the barrios im in is that they dont really have a sewer system, they have dicthes that run in front of the houses and the dirty water from the house runs into the ditch until they get to a bigger ditch and then who knows where it goes. but it makes things smell interesting when the sun almost boils the murcky black water at 2 in the afternoon. Everyone says here that monteria is the hottest part of the mission but i havent really noticed the difference, it just hot. all in all the area is a little less than a walk in the park but what super makes up for it is the people here are really great. We had 11 in the church yesterday which hasnt happened for me in 2 transfers. we are teaching 3 families and 1 of them is already married (and the other family actually has their birth certificates so we wont haveto search all over colombia to find them)!! Also now that im a DL of a small district i have almost the whole week to teach in my own area with my own comp! In sincelejo i was in intercambios almost everyday (its a mission thing that we do lots of intercambios) so it will be nice not to travel as much which means more time working yayy!
Umm here in monteria they have a cool fruit call guayaba agria which is an a guayaba but more acid... maybe you dont know what a guayaba is. its a fruit the size of a fist and normaly its really sweet and pink and it makes super good juice with milk. guayaba agria is the same fruit but more sour and with water it takes thrist real fast, we drink it alot. well im happy just working away with my compa, he has good ideas and he works hard so the people will understand the gospel. Im excited just to be back in the thick of things and not paying bills and other ZL stuff. Ive learned that if one puts in the hours diligently the Lord always blesses in one way or another and sucess comes in the Lords time, and im happy i can put more hours in!
thanks for your love and prayers
Elder Larson

p.s. they say there are more iguanas and ive seen 2 but both of them were dead in the ditch in front of our house... not to exciting until a pack of buzzards found them and they got in a fight with a stray dog to see who could eat them first... the buzzards here are super ugly ill try to take a picture and sent it next week.

im 21!

HOOOLA FAMILIA,
Well it is cambios so that is why im writing today and not yesterday. Im heading out to Monteria now as a district leader, which pleasently surprised me. Not because i like avoiding responsibilty but more because my Compa menor is taking my place and he is prepared, and now i can write more in my journal. I have learned alot in these past months as a zone leader and im grateful for the oppurtunity i had to serve as such. More than anything i learned that positions in the church dont matter as pertaining to ones personal progress and that its great to serve wherever the lord wants you to. BUT i am kinda of bummed because im going to miss the baptism of Delsi which i was really looking forward to. She has got such an awesome testimony and was just waiting for someone to invite her to pray about the truth. She has taught me alot about how pure faith, pray, and will can overcome even the most difficult things (such as a 40 year addiction to smoking). My birthday passed by not like my others because as a misión we FASTED Saturday, so i had my birthday fasting. A good way to pass the birthday in the misión for sure. I havent gotten the package yet but the missionary in the office told me that its there and that he is gonna send it to me pronto. Last week just as i finished writing to you all there was one more type of movilización that took to the streets…. HORSES!!! The street was full of them and they were all riding around and prancing and whatnot. I had my camera with me so i took some sweet pics, enjoy the horse mounted mariachi (mariachi is not colombian b/c it is super mexican). Sincelejo is kind of the cowboy west of colombia because lots of cows and horses and they have this corraleja party. Lots of sobreros costeños and ponchos as well.
All in all im kinda sad to leave Sincelejo so fast its a calm Little town (montería as well) but it was kinda of fun to teach lessons with cows grazing in between you and your compa. But new adventure and new town.
Thanks for all writing me it made me feel special for my birthday :)!
Love
elder larson