Dallin's Blog (Paraguay Asuncion North Mission): Just another "normal" week...

Dear Friends and Family,

Luckily, this week Elder Crofts and I didn't have to go on any 6 hour road trips to remote parts of Paraguay. The downside of that though is that we had a relatively mundane week and if anything really interesting did happen, I've probably forgotten about it by now (because I haven't been very good at taking notes lately).

Kind of fun story: The other night, I was in great need of a haircut (it's been getting sort of shaggy). It was late (we had been running some errands for the mission) but I asked Elder Behrens (a good friend of mine who also happens to be from my MTC group and is also the mission secretary) if he could give me a quick trim with his little hair trimmer. Like I said, it was late. We were all kind of wanting to go to bed, but Elder Behrens is intelligent and a quick thinker, so he made me a deal. If he cut my hair, I would have to wake up with him at 4:40 in the morning to go running with him before he had to go take new missionaries through the migrations process. We were all tired, and I knew I was really, really, really not going to want to wake up in the morning... but I needed a haircut, so we agreed, I got a super quick haircut from a sleepy non-professional, and then got about 5 hours of sleep before having to wake up and run a 5k (that I was not physically ready for). In the end though, it was all for the better. Elder Behrens gave me a decent haircut (not the worst I've had in Paraguay) and I got a decent workout. The only real downside is that I've been limping around all week since!

Early morning run with Elder Behrens

Early morning in Asuncion...

After the 5 AM run... (Elders Fairbanks & Behrens)

Elder Crofts and I have been doing lots of divisions lately. The goal is to do divisions with all the zone leaders every change -- which means about 2 divisions a week. This week, after a zone conference in Mariano, I had the opportunity to go on divisions with Elder Barreto, my old friend from Concepcion. It was super hot all day, but we had a fantastic time together. We had a great lesson with an investigator Elder Crofts has been teaching and then went out and tried to get into some good religious conversations.The coolest thing that happened on our division was meeting G. When we initially contacted her, she received us pretty coldly. She was respectful and all but basically said, "I really don't care to hear your message. We believe in different things." We kept trying though, explaining to her that really, our purpose is just to invite people to come unto our Savior Jesus Christ and to help them to get to know Him better. After explaining that, she -- somewhat reluctantly -- let us in to share for a bit. After we got in, we just started talking with her about our Savior and the blessings he has to offer us. As we taught, she started tearing up, and before we could ask why, she began to explain that recently, she's been having some problems in her family and that she really wants peace in her life. In the end, she accepted the invitation to read the pamphlet that teaches about the restoration, she told us that we needed to visit her daughter as well, and asked us to pass by another time to teach her again. Even though I was a part of the teaching process, I was really surprised at the change we saw in her. From the beginning, where she didn't want anything to do with us, to the end when she trusted enough to confide in us about some of the struggles she's facing with her family right now. In that particular lesson, Elder Barreto and I got to see the Holy Ghost, the real teacher, touch that woman's heart. Definitely a special experience.

This week we were also expecting a new missionary to get here. She's from California, but couldn't get her visa till recently so she was supposed to fly down here yesterday, but while she was waiting in Santiago, Chile for her flight into Paraguay, that flight was cancelled and postponed until today. The big problem with that is that while we knew exaclty what was going on, we, as a mission, had no way to get in contact with her (a missionary flying on her own) to make sure she knew what the plan is and to make sure she'd be okay spending the night in the airport. Last night, I stayed in the office with Elder Behrens as we did everything we could to get ourselves in touch with that missionary. We called the Chile Santiago mission. We called the Chilean Airport. We called the church offices. We literally tried everything. In the end, we took a late-night roadtrip to the airport here in Paraguay to see if they could contact the new missionary. They couldn't, but they accessed the flight records and saw that she was checked into her flight. So at the very least, we knew that she knew what was happening and that she'd be here in Paraguay today at about 9:00 in the morning--and that was enough information for us. After going through all that, we treated ourselves to hamburgers on a late-night BK run -- we figured we deserved it.

"Late night road-trippin' with Elder Behrens"

One other little thing, we were going to go up to Concepcion today to spend the weekend there and do a district conference and all that. I was super excited to go up and to spend the day in the city I love so much, but in the end, the trip was cancelled because President had to deal with some things here in Asuncion. The good news though is that we still have to go up there sometime for the zone conference and interviews. So pretty soon, you guys will be hearing about some fun stories from up there!

Recently I've begun to read the Book of Mormon again. As I read about Lehi's vision a little bit a short little stuck out in a way I've never thought about before. It talks about God's love, "which... is the most desirable above all things... yea, and the most joyous to the soul" (1 Nephi 11:22-23 italics added. Maybe there are things that are more desirable and joyous to our bodies, or the natural man, or our tastes, but God's love is the most joyous to the soul. If we want to grow and become better people, if we want to have real peace and happiness, we need to obey God's commandments and thereby enjoy his promised blessings. I know that obedience to the principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ really do bring more joy to the soul than anything else.

I love you guys. As always, thanks for the love and support. In the future I promise I'll take better notes on all the fun, little, random, and interesting things I do down here in Paraguay!

Elder Fairbanks