Número 36

Hola familia!

This was another good week. We are seeing some good progress here in Ocotal. I am dying from this heat here. It's doing me dirty haha I am just waiting for the rain season to get here. It should be here in the next couple weeks. 

We had a really good sunday this week because we had 7 investigadors in the church this week. Emilio and Corina went and Jose and Maria went this week which made us super happy. It is always a good feeling when I work hard all week and then I show up to the church and there are a bunch of investigadors there. They all told us they had a great time and felt the spirit there. This week we are going to talk to both of those families about their marriage and see if they will get ready to get married soon. That is the one thing that is hard here is that no one is married here. We will see what happens. I am praying for them. 

In one of our lessons with Jose and Maria we asked Jose to say the last prayer before we left and he is always usually hesitant to pray but he agreed to it. One thing that I love about this mission is hearing a prayer that comes straight from the heart of someone. Jose was praying and in his prayer he says "Heavenly Father, I know that this is your church and I know that these two kids are your servants, thank you for sending them to me". When he said that, I felt the spirit so strong and felt that I was doing my job correctly. I have seen that family progress so much and they have seen the blessings of the Lord in their lives for following his path. I am so glad I didnt stop visiting them. 

One thing I have learned here in Nicaragua is every loves to talk mess about our church and how we are crazy and all that stuff. I think it is so funny how so many people think they know everything about our church and say so much stuff. Sometimes when we pass by churches, the pastor will just start talking about how crazy the mormon church is haha it is hilarious. I think it is funny how our religion doesnt talk about any other religion, but everyone talks about us.....wonder why.

Their church building. 

I guess the last thing is I ripped two pairs of pants this week. There is no worse feeling than ripping a pair of pants because I just feel like I am so fat. I hope that isnt the reason why I ripped two pairs of pants, but who knows, this beans and rice every day might be taking a toll on me haha. 

Not going to lie, I got super mad when I ripped the second pair haha I still struggle with my patience issues here, I am working on that. 

Anyways, I am doing good here. We hope to be seeing some success here pretty soon. 

I love you all

Elder Sherle

Elder Rowe- he is from meridian and graduated from capital high. They meet each other for the first time on their mission and only live 10 miles or less from each other here at home. John loves having him there and has really got to know him well as they are both serving in the same zone.  This was a new t-shirt he got down there. Love it!!! 

Numero 35 - Octoal

Hola familia! We had a lot better week this week! Pretty busy and exhausting but we did good!

My comp and I had a lot better week this week than last week. We worked a lot harder and were able to see the blessings from it. This week we were really focused on finding. To be a good missionary, you need to be able to find people to teach. So we worked a lot this week on contacting and finding new people to teach. We found 3 new families this week and they all live really close to the church. It is always a good thing if they live close to the church because everyone has to walk here and if they live close to the church it doesnt take to long to get to the church. I am excited to see how it goes this week with them.

We had a super cool lesson with a different family that we have been teaching for a little bit here. In this mission, if the people dont progress within 2 weeks we usually drop them, its a little different here. WIth this family, we have been teaching them for about a month now and they keep having excuses to not go to church but for some reason I just cant drop them. We went to their house this week and we had a super cool lesson about temple marriage and eternal families. They had never thought about anything like that before and I think it really touched them. For the first time they went to church this week and they loved it. I hope we can just build and build with this family because they are just so cool.

This week I have just been so tired. I feel like such an old man sometimes getting out of bed and my whole body is sore. Walking in the sun all day sometimes is a little rough. This last week my body has felt like I just went a full week hard at Hoop Dreams practice and my body just feels dead. Its a good feeling but I have just been so tired. I guess that is the whole thing about being a missionary, learning how to adjust and be at your best even though you are so tired. I have learned how to deal with it and work through it.

Well thats all I got for you guys this week. I am doing good here. I am working hard down here with these Nicas.

Espero que todos tengan una buena semana.

Adios a todos

Elder Sherle

Número 34- Staying in Ocotal

Whats up fam!

This week was alright, nothing to crazy happened or anything. It was a pretty normal week for us.

I heard duke won.........no comment on that. You all know I am a North Carolina fan. I really thought that Wisconsin was going to win that game. I wish I couldve watched it. I heard it was a pretty good game though. 

Changes: Something I never guessed but my comp and I are staying together for another six weeks. I wouldve never guessed that. My comp and I already have 3 months together and Presidente Collado never leaves a companionship longer than 3 months together. I guess he feels that there is a reason for us to be here together for 6 weeks longer. I am excited to be with Elder Lainez for another 6 weeks. We get along real well together. He is a cool kid. My spanish is going to be so good too because I will have more than 4 months with just spanish. 

We are getting into the hot season now here in Ocotal. The cool thing with that is its mango season now. There are a ton of mango trees just in the street and in peoples houses so we have been eating a ton of mangos this past week. I feel like a straight monkey peeling it haha because we just peel it with our mouths and eat it like a straight monkey. They are good though. A bunch of people are making mango juice now and I love it so much. 

Having a little over 8 months in the mission I have realized that I just love helping people, especially here. The people here are so humble and I love it when I am able to help people out and put a smile on their face. We had a lot of little oportunities to help people out this week. It just makes me feel so good that even if it is just 10 minutes of our time, it can make someone so happy. Being a missionary, it isnt just preaching about Jesus Christ, it is about serving the people too. 

We are teaching a super cool family named Emilio and Corina. They are a working to get baptised here soon. They are so humble and so willing to learn about the gospel. They need to get married but we are planning on doing their wedding in the church this weekend. Its always the way of God but I am praying that they will be able to get baptised this weekend too. 

I am doing good here in Ocotal. I love it here. I know that our Savior can help us through our problems in life and he can give us comfort through our trials. I hope everyone remembers that He is the reason why we are here.

I love you all. I hope you all have a great week!

Elder Sherle

John with a friend from Estelli

John says this is how bus rides are wherever they go. 

Ok.... Now I see why he has his key latched to his belt loop. :) 

Número 33 - Ocotal

Whats up fam!

Well I dont have much time today to write but I will try to throw in a couple thoughts that I have about this week. 

FIrst off, today we had a super pday with our whole zone. Presidente gave us some money to go to a river and have a bbq with the zone for baptising 24 people this last month of march. It was a fun day. I got burned pretty good though. I got such a bad tan line on my arms from always wearing short sleeved shirts. We just got back to Ocotal and we have some meeting tonight so we are writing super fast haha. 

As most of you guys know, we had general conference this week. It was a good conference. I took a lot of notes to help me in the mission field here. We watched the saturday part here with the members in their house and sunday we went down to esteli to watch it with all the members from over there. On saturday we watched it in spanish, which i understood most of it, and on sunday we got to watch it in english. I felt like a lot of the speakers were really focused on the family. It talked about eternal marriage and how important the family is right now. Our family is used to help us stay strong in our faith and resist the tempatations of satan. I have definitely seen the blessing of the lord in my family when we are all on the same page and strong in the faith. God wants to protect us and help us through the trials of life and through the families we will be able to keep happiness and joy with us at all times. Another part i really liked was a quote i heard and it says "Average is the enemy of excellence". That really hit me in the conference. I have realized that it is so easy just to be average and be idle throughout life. The best thing is to work as hard as we can to be the best we can be. I know that if I remain idle I wont be able to reach excellence and will only be able to reach "average". I want all you to know to be great in all you do. Dont settle for average, work for greatness.

Another cool thing that happened was we got to be on tv here in ocotal. The other missionaries talked to the news station here and we got to have an anouncement running all day on friday and saturday of us anouncing the conference for everyone to watch. I never thought I would get on tv in Nicaragua or even talk to a camera in spanish for a couple minutes. It was pretty cool. 

I guess the last thing is that this will be the last week with my boy. I will finish his training this week and on sunday we will find out our changes. I hope i dont leave here in Ocotal. I love it here. It is such a cool little place. I am praying that i wont leave haha. 

Well thats all I got for you guys this week. I am doing good here. I hit 8 months today and am now a third done with my mission. I cant believe it. Time is flying. 

I love you all and hope you have a great week!

Elder Sherle

Número 32

heyyyy everyone! How are you all? 

I am pretty good here in Ocotal. I had a good week last week with a couple highlights. I am just going to talk about some things that happened and give you guys a couple updates on what is going on down here. 

Well first I had my last new persons meeting with my baby boy this week. We went down to Managua to listen to President and listen to a bunch of different people to help the new missionaries adapt to the mission life. It was a good meeting. It is cool to see a ton of my district now have kids and are training. I sat with Elder Ward and we got to chill again. We have had to travel a lot to Managua this month though so I am kind of sick of going down there. We have to wake up at 3:30 in the morning to get to the meeting by 9:30. Its pretty rough but its cool to hear President speak to us.

This week starts the "Holy week" here in Nicaragua. Everyone goes crazy here it is pretty funny. Holy week here is Easter but they do it for a whole week in latin america. I am not exactly sure what they do here but it is a big deal. I just know that there are a lot of celebrations and that a ton of people like to party and have a good time. I am excited to see all the stuff that is going to happen this week.

Everyone knows this week for being super hot too. It is getting really hot here. I am starting to die. I just sweat and sweat and sweat. It is so gross. I am lucky too being here in Ocotal it isnt that hot here but I am still dying. I am getting a little tan though not going to lie. I know all you guys have seen me super white but now I got a little color to me. I guess that is the upside to being in the sun all day long. 

On Saturday we had our baptism. We baptised the guy named Eusebio. We got to go to a waterfall and baptise him there. It was so cool. I think that is a dream i have always had is to baptise in a waterfall. My comp baptised him so I hope I got some more time here to do it myself. I will send some pictures just to show you guys how cool it was. We confirmed Eusebio on Sunday and everything went good. Its been awhile but there is nothing like the feeling of seeing someone get baptised.

I guess the last thing I would like to say is that this sunday is a very special sunday. I remember going easter egg hunting and having a huge dinner and everything but there is a special meaning of easter. We need to remember that our Savior died for us and three days later rose from the dead. Because of him, we will be able to rise up again and live with him forever. I hope everyone can take a little time to remember all the things that He has done for you. 

I love you all so much. 

#GraciasqueÈlvive

Elder Sherle

Ps -this part of the year is so hard for me because I know that all of the

March Madness games are going on and I cant watch them. I miss basketball
so much. I miss playing, miss watching, miss being in the gym all the time.
I get to shoot around a little bit on pday but nothing serious. Who ever is
watching the March Madness games just know that you are a lucky person.
haha.