Greetings from Houston! how y’all doing?
My last few days at the MTC were great. We had a last few days of class, and said goodbye to our teachers, Brother Lee and Brother Evans. They were such amazing teachers and our district really developed a love for them.
We had a couple last devotionals and finally I said goodbye to my good friend and MTC companion, Elder Guzman. He will be going to Boise, Idaho for a while until he gets his visa to go to Tijuana, Mexico. So, from Monday until Wednesday morning I was in a trio with Elders Barroteran and Moscoso. We packed, cleaned, got everything we needed from the bookstore and then got on our respective buses Wednesday morning. Actually, I think Barroteran had to stay for another week. My bus left the MTC at 6 in the morning. It drove north to the airport past Lehi and Saratoga Springs. It was crazy to see everything for one last time before I left.
On the plane, I sat next to a man named Clyde. He works for the world’s biggest manufacturer of cranes and he was going to Houston to do some maintenance work on one of their biggest cranes. I talked to him for a while, he said he had talked with missionaries before and we talked for a long while about what we believed. I was able to leave him with a pamphlet on the Gospel of Christ and a pass-along card.
When we got here it was really chilly! I wasn’t expecting it to be this cold! Temperature wise it’s not as cold as Utah but the humidity makes it seem colder, although it’s not too bad. I think it was it was unusually cold that day, all the other days have been reasonable.
I love it here! it’s beautiful. So many trees! I have never seen so many. They are everywhere.
My mission president, President Crawford is great. He and his wife both met us at the airport and took us to a Texas barbaque house. It was AMAZING. Then we had an orientation all day and ended with a testimony meeting.
We live in Houston, in the Spanish-speaking part. It’s nicknamed “El Barrio” or “The Hood” and it’s kind of a humble place. It can be scary at night, there are places we aren’t allowed to go after sundown. Actually, we aren’t allowed to knock unfamiliar doors at all after sundown. My first day we knocked on doors for hours! All of the white people here are baptist and all of the latinos are catholic. My first street contact was with an old lady and she has been baptist all her life but she took a pamphlet.
My companion is Elder Bruneel. He is from Washington state and he has been out here for five months. He is great. We get along really well and are super obedient to the mission rules. Every morning we wake up at 6:29 and immediately have companionship prayer, then personal prayer. Then we work out for half an hour and get ready and eat breakfast. Then, we have personal study for an hour and companionship study for an hour. Then, we have an additional extra hour for language study for him so I usually just keep reading the scriptures.
Then, we hit the road! Going to our appointments for the day, trying the doors of people we are somewhat familiar with who expressed interest, or just knocking door to door. The past couple of days have been a challenge, but a good one. Many of our appointments have fallen through and those investigators who meet their appointments haven’t been progressing.
The people of the ward here are amazing though! We usually always have dinner with a member family and teach them a lesson and get referals from them. The people here are so poor.. the houses are really run down, but they offer us everything they have, which isn’t much. We live in a tiny little house, and although our conditions aren’t the best either, we are still way better off than a lot of the people here. Most of the people live in extrememly humbe conditions, but they are amazingly giving. It’s quite humbling.
Elder Bruneel and I bought a tiny little Christmas tree for a dollar. We have a couple presents under it from the members of our ward.
Like I said, we have been working HARD the past few days. Once my head hits my pillow at night, I knock right out. Which means I’m a good missionary, says Elder Bruneel. But we haven’t been seeing much success. Until yesterday. We were tracting some apartment buildings after church and after one of our appointements there fell through. We were going to leave but decided to knock one more door and they let us in! It was an amazing young family and they were so receptive and attentive and I could really feel the spirit during our lesson. I felt like these people had been prepared to hear our message, like we are promised. It was amazing! We have a return appointment with them.
Then we taught a part member family and one of the family members committed to baptism and they all committed to coming to church next week! Also, we were teaching Leo last night. He is the president of a fraternity but he was really receptive and we had a great lesson on the plan of salvation and the plan that God has for us. It seemed to answer a lot of his questions like “Where did we come from?”, “Why are we here?”, “Where are we going?”. During the lesson a couple of his friends came over and they seemed even more excited about it. They all expressed a desire to learn and leave behind their partying. We are visiting them again tomorrow.
Please write me I would love to hear from all of you! My address is
Elder Carlos Viitanen
2926 Dover
Houston, TX 77017
I hope you all have a Merry Christmas that is centered around its true meaning! I would like to share the verse of the Hymn “Nearer My God To Thee” with this in mind:
Nearer my God to thee,
nearer to thee.
E’en though it be a cross
that raiseth me.Still all my song shall be,
nearer my God to thee.
Nearer my God to thee,
nearer to thee.
Amen.
It made me think hard about what we really need in this life. really, the only thing we need is the Savior and His gospel. That’s why I’m doing this for two years. Why I’m living a little bit out of my comfort zone, without certain luxuries and without certain things that I was used to. That’s why I’m living in circumstances that I haven’t ever lived in before, and why I am sacrificing two years of my life for this when I could be doing something else. Because I have recieved the Gospel and have felt of the fullness, peace, and happiness that it brings. What sort of Christian would I be if I didn’t share that with others? That’s why I’m here.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=inZM6lJSx4c&rel=0&w=360
Just a funny story. I got up to go to the bathroom late last night and in his sleep, Elder Bruneel clearly asked the question, “Have you had an experience where you have witnessed the hand of God in your life?” It made me laugh really hard. That’s how dedicated we are that we are asking inspired questions to investigators in our sleep.
Well, I love you all. Hope you all are doing well. Write me, and keep me and all other missionaries in your prayers!
Elder Viitanen
Thanks, elder Viitanen. Good work. Way to go.