Christmas Parties, Nephite/Lamanite temples...More awesome experiences!

Merry Christmas Everyone!

On December 7th I got to go and see the pyramids that the scriptures talk about! My companion and I were walking with a couple other missionaries all morning to go and find them. We finally arrived and I got some pictures, I found something that is over 1000 years old too!!!! It’s a small shell that belonged to a necklace. It was buried over 4 feet underground. Don’t ask how I got 4 feet underground just know that I did..... Anyways, that was really cool and really tiring.

Me in front of the temple.

We found an entrance to this temple, we walked inside and there were spiderwebs everywhere. Like big Spiderman type spiderwebs.

Here is another temple that isn't to tall. We climbed to the top and found some alters. They could have been sacrificial but we aren't experts. There were other areas on top where they looked like big bowls. Places where you can stand in. We think this is where they did baptisms because there aren't any rivers or streams nearby that are big enough to fit a person, let alone two people.

On Monday Dec. 21st I asked Tyler if he had any information about Skyping on Christmas and his response was, “Umm not too much information... EXCEPT THAT I GET TO TALK TO YOU GUYS IN 4 DAYS!!!!!!!!!!!!!! :D”.

Hi Family,

So, I´m going to start out my email with my experiences of Tuesday and go on from there. We were in a place called Tetizuclan for our Christmas conference. It was a 6-7 hour drive to get there from Misantla, so we got up pretty early and got to bed pretty late. When we arrived, my companion and I helped set up everything and get everything going. I brought my iPod to give to my Mission President because of the rule with the screen. I gave it to him and was talking to him. He pulled it out of its little case and sighed, "Ugh, why did you have to bring one with a screen." and he put it back in the case. I then asked him why having a screen on it was so bad. He replied, "It’s not the fact that is has a screen, it’s because of the access to the internet, we try to limit it as much as possible because there are a lot of missionaries who give into the temptation of doing things they shouldn’t" I then explained to him that it didn’t have access to the internet. We talked a little some more as he interviewed me with questions like, "Does it have movies? What type of music is on it?" etc. After I answered all his questions, he looked down at the case, back at me, smiled, and gave me my iPod back. He thanked me for my honesty and told me to enjoy the music that I had brought. I use this experience to think about how I was able to not only keep my iPod, but use it as moral experience for the future. With honesty comes trust. I could have just kept my iPod and not have told him about it at all. I could have used the excuse of, "well it only has church and Christmas music. I´ll be ok." But my goal is to be obedient to the rules, and do the best I can to be a good missionary.

My next experience is during our Christmas devotional. We all had to prepare a talk in our second language about, "A gift for the Savior." I didn’t know that my talk had to be in Spanish until the bus ride over to our conference. All the time when I would talk to my companion he would always say it had to be in English. But what he never mentioned is that it needs to be in our second language, with his second language being English... you put the pieces together... So on the bus I quickly tried to think of points I could talk about in English, and then do my best to speak my mind in Spanish when I would talk. But this is how talks work here. Everybody prepares one, and then when it comes time to speak, the President announces who will be giving the talks. Only 3 people are chosen. My companion told me not to worry about anything because there were over 50 people in the conference. Yet out of the 50 people there, I was chosen to speak last. My talk was in very broken Spanish, but I got my message across. I started out with a question, "What gift can you give to someone who has everything?" I continued to talk about how there is nothing temporal in this world that is worthy for the Savior. Not gold nor silver. Only the things that we put a sentimental value to. I used the song, "The Little Drummer Boy" as a reference. In the song it says, "I am a poor boy too, I have no gift to bring." but what the boy did have, was his drum. And all the boy had to offer was a song. The boy walked into the manger as humble as can be, and asked the babe if he could play a song. The babe nodded, and he commenced the song of his heart. The words "I played my best for Him." show his love, his offering of all he could give to the savior. And at the end of the song the words, "Then, he smiled at me." Showing that the new born babe, the future King of all and Savior of the world, had accepted his humble offering. What gifts can we give the Savior this Christmas? He has already given us commandments, scriptures, prophets, and other guides for us to return to our Father in Heaven and live with Him and our Savior in Their presence. Gifts that we can give not only this Christmas, but throughout our whole lives are obedience to those commandments. One of the commandments you can focus on right now, in this moment. Is His new commandment, love one another. Live with the Spirit in your hearts and continually try to find opportunities to give love and peace to others.

Now for more experiences. We taught a lot of lessons and continued to teach our investigators. All was well with me physically until Saturday night. I was talking with the Branch President of the little Misantla Branch and we got to the topic of push-ups. He asked me if I could do the claps. I told him yes and he told me to show him. I did it and all was good. He then asked if I could do behind the back... I told him I didn’t think so. He proceeded to tell me that he could do it and he was over 40 years old and fat. I of course accepted the challenge... I got down and prepared myself for the push up (note that the ground is tile with concrete underneath). I pushed up, got my hands off the ground and behind my back, clapped, and got my hands back on the ground. Regrettably... Once I got my hands back on the ground, I didn’t have enough time to push myself back up. Which means, my chin slammed on the ground, then following was the rest of my body. At first I just had a really big headache. As time passed, and the headache went away. I started feeling where it hurt the most in my head. My jaw really hurt, and my chin was numb. My chin started to bleed and people started getting wide eyed as they looked. I originally thought that I just got cut. But there is actually a chunk of my chin that is missing. I took care of it and it’s in the process of healing now, but when the Branch President got down to do his behind-the-back-clap-push-up. He couldn’t even do a push up!!!!!!! I now learn to never trust a challenge from anyone here. All the Mexicans say, "Never trust a challenge from a Mexican".

Yesterday was really cool. We started off the day by getting ready and studying. Normally before church, we walk around and contact our investigators before church. We had already talked to all of them before, so we were able to use that time to study. We went to our church meetings and all was well. There was a family that is visiting their family in Misantla, from the United States. They live in Wisconsin and they drove by minivan with 4 kids.... I don’t know how they did it but they did... After the meetings, the dad approached me and asked if my companion and I could give him and his wife a blessing. We of course said yes and went into another room. I couldn't have felt more worthy of the power I hold. I just took the sacrament and felt the spirit throughout all of the church meetings. I gave the blessing to his wife, I felt as though the words just flowed out of my mouth. Towards the end of the blessing, my mind went blank. At this moment I knew to close the blessing. It was such a cool experience, I could feel and know how every word that I said was guided by the spirit. Another funny experience about yesterday is that there is a member that has a crush on me. It was funny how I found out but it’s cute. She is 12 and is a recent convert with her brothers and sisters. She was showing me pictures on her phone when it locked. I then tried to be funny by guessing her password. I used, Book of Mormon. She said no and we laughed. I then asked if it was a person and she said yes, I asked if it was someone I knew and she said yes. I was thinking it was some celebrity but then I was going to put in mine and my companions names. I commenced typing "Elder-" when she said, "no it’s just Koontz". She got all blushed and I just thought it was funny. None the less, it’s funny and I was joking about it with my companion on the way to our next appointment. We went to teach Ivonne, Jaime, and Pan. Jaime never came to church today but Ivonne and Pan did. We were talking to him and he just said, "I was sleeping". (Pan told me earlier about how he tried to wake up Jaime 2 times) We were talking to him more, and he started asking more questions about the Book of Mormon. I could tell that he was just trying to prove us wrong. He keeps trying to tell us what the bible says and he asks if the Book of Mormon teaches the same. We then explain how it does, and it teaches more about that principle. He tried to disprove the Book of Mormon without even reading it. He kept asking all these questions about what it’s about when all the answers to his questions were in the Introduction!! I personally was talking to him for about 20 minutes about the Book of Mormon. I bore my testimony and my knowledge of Spanish wasn’t a problem at all. The words flowed out of my mouth as I testified of the truth it holds. How it’s literally ANOTHER TESTAMENT OF JESUS CHRIST. It doesn’t teach against the Bible at all, in fact it does the opposite. It teaches with it. I felt like Captain Moroni, Nephi, Alma, Helaman, Moroni, Lehi, all the people of the Book of Mormon were with me in my testimony. AHHH it was so cool. It was a great way to end the night. The Spirit was strong in our hearts, and we were doing our missionary work the way God intended it to be.

That is going to conclude all my stories for this week and I will continue to share more next week! I’ll keep talking to all of you individually too :)

Love,

Elder Koontz

P.S.  Here are a bunch of pictures with a description for each one.

This is my zone at our Christmas party. 

No words.  :)

The food of a missionary....Ramen

This is the picture of the Guanabana! Its about as big as my head,
 and the spikes hurt you if you grab it too hard.  It's my new favorite fruit.

We practically live in the middle of nowhere. This is a picture of me at the edge of the town. We have an investigator that lives in the house right next to where I'm standing and he is on the very edge and corner of the town. Our appointment with him fell through and he wasn't home. So we took the opportunity to take a quick picture and move on.

This is me and some other missionaries at our stake Christmas party.

We had a big tent set up on the outside of the church building and people
danced and we had a Christmas program with a play.

Some more missionaries at the stake party.

Me and my companion at the party.

OH. The people of Misantla love us!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They gave us presents!!!!!!!!!!!!! All the people of the zone gave all the missionaries in their area presents! Misantla gave Elder Herrera and I the most! We were SUPER excited because we weren't expecting to get anything. We were going to wait, and then we realized that there could be things in their that might go bad, we could use, or something that needed to be opened right then.

Here are some pictures during the dinner at my table.

Here are some pictures during the dinner at my table.

This was the bus ride home from Tezituclan.

I caught our zone leaders sleeping on the bus... Later on, I fell asleep
and peoplegot pictures of me.. I don't have those ones though

Our updated Christmas tree since I got my extra decorations from my mom :)

I have all of my Christmas decorations on my desk now.... I didn't really see any point in having them spread out when there weren't so many because then I couldn't enjoy them all. So they occupy various places on my desk as of now :).

And more Christmas decorations..

Ok... It looks wimpy in this picture but its just hard to tell how deep this
gash really is with a camera. This was after I had cleaned it up.

      Some more missionaries at the stake party.

Me with the son of some members

And some of the contents of my mochila

Week 7...Found 11 investigators..Pics of his apartment, etc.

Ty and his companion Elder Herrera.  Ty said he feels like a Giant around everyone.
 Elder Herrera is from Mexico City and speaks just a little English.

Hi Family,

We found 11 investigators this week! 11 people that are preparing for a baptismal date!!!! :) 6 out of the 11 came to church yesterday, and each of them have certain obstacles in their lives, and it fills my heart with joy seeing them work through them. Ivonne is keeping all the commandments. She had distractions, but she said that she felt peace and happiness every time she thought about hearing another lesson from us and continuing to her baptismal date. Jaime at first wasn’t really interested in our message. He had read the bible and believed in it. He couldn’t understand how the Book of Mormon could teach with the Bible. We gave him a copy and invited him to read it. He told us about how he prayed to know if it was true, He read the introduction and I think the testimonies of the 3 witnesses and the testimony of the 8 witnesses. In our next lesson, he explained to us his testimony of how he knew Joseph Smith was a true prophet.

Saturday we met Maribel. She didn’t believe that God knew who she was. She said she believed that there was a God but that he was only there and that he created us. Her husband had passed away a while ago, we explained to her about the Plan of Salvation and that sparked her attention. She listened further and during and after our lesson she began to cry, and tell us that we must have been angels. Because of the happiness that she felt, and the peace in knowing that through the covenants she makes here on Earth, she can see her husband again. She came to church the next day and had questions, she asked the teachers and they had the answers to what she wanted to know. She talked to us afterwards and shared her feelings. She explained how she felt the same way that she did when we had taught her the lesson the previous day. She invited us to come back over so we can share with her more.

All these experiences help me feel the spirit. It helps me to remember my purpose for being here and it gives me energy and strength to go about my day. I love seeing the brightness in the eyes of our investigators when they feel the spirit. It’s nothing huge. It’s not some overpowering feeling that makes them do anything crazy. You can just see how our words, the words and guidance of the Spirit work wonders in the hearts of people. I love the mission. I hope you strive to feel the spirit. I am blessed to serve in the Lords name. I have His name on my chest and I represent Him every day.

Pray. Pray sincerely, offer your heart and ask a question, it doesn’t need to be anything huge. Anything your heart desires to know. Truth, guidance, peace, literally anything you wish to know or feel and your prayers will be answered. A quote from the scriptures, "with a broken heart and a contrite spirit." Sincerity is how we can know.

Love,

Elder Koontz

Splits

With Jaime, one of their investigators.  His nickname is Pan (like bread in Spanish)

P-day Zone Activity

P-day Zone Activity - Broom Hockey

With Investigators

With some of the youth in their area

With the baby of one of the investigators.  Ty LOVES babies!

Ty has fond memories of living in our apartment in California and the Mexican man coming through
with his little cart with corn on the cob covered in Mayo and salt.  Disgusting I know but he loved it!

Ty's study area, he's very proud of his cleanliness. (he told us so)

Study tools.

Frosted Flakes with...Energy.  Alrighty then.

Like I said, he feels like a giant, even in his own apartment

Hello!

The walkway that leads their apartment.

With Modesto, the first member he met and ate with when he arrived.

Kitchen area

Ty's space.  Again, proud of his cleanliness.

With some more members

Ty says there are animals EVERYWHERE!

He's very thankful for the cover he has for his bag. It has rained everyday.

The streets are always flooded

The streets are always flooded

Public transportation or their own feet.  That's how they get around.

Church activity

Ty's first week in the field

Presidente y Hma. Greer

Hi Family,

I made it to Xalapa last Monday and now I am in my first area which is Misantla, Veracruz, MX.

I love my companion and we get along well. His name is Elder Herrera and to me I think of him as Mario. I told this to Brendan already but I said that if I were to give him a red hat and a mustache I could either make millions or be sued for copyright purposes.

We eat with the members Every Single Day. Pretty much, if we don’t eat with a member we don’t eat....until today. We went shopping and stocked up on food. My lovely, real American food. The food here is good, but its sooo different. We have tortillas with every meal and they are always freshly made. They are different though. They aren’t the white flour tortillas and they are kind of like corn tortillas. I have learned to love them because we eat pretty much once a day. I now love limes, tortillas, rice, beans, soup, and a lot of spicy stuff. I think mom prepared me when I was in the womb for my mission because it has grown on me pretty fast.

They have to pay for toilet paper in public places. 

THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU for teaching me how to deep clean. When I first got here the place was disgusting. I was surprised that people would live in such a sty. I literally cleaned that mess out of the place today. The ways I coped with the filth throughout the week is because when I was in the shower, I would look around and say, "Monday... You’re mine."

I love the work, I have already developed a love for all the members and investigators I’ve met. I’ve been learning a lot, and I had my first commitment to baptism on Thursday. It was sooooo cool. We were originally looking to contact an inactive member and we ended up teaching her sister. I knew that she had been prepared by the Lord because of the desire to know of the truth. I understand the language with the doctrine pretty well and I feel comfortable when I bare my testimony because the words just seem to flow. Regular language is difficult though. I can understand quite a bit but normal conversation is difficult.

They have my packages but I don’t get them until December 16. So just a little longer and I can send more pictures.

I seek the spirit wherever I go and I seek out every opportunity. I believe my first challenge was this week. Friday night I started to get sick, Saturday it got worse, and Sunday I felt terrible. On top of that, we started a 24 hour fast midday on Saturday. I worked through it and did all I could to focus on the work. It’s funny, I was talking to my companion and I told him that I knew that it was a test. We continued throughout the day and he kept suggesting that we go home but I did not want to because I wanted to keep working. I focused on diligence and endurance and forgetting about my problems. We ended up finding two more investigators last night. Ivonne and Jaime. Brother and Sister. They committed to baptism and we have a date set in January. I know that if we push through our problems we will be blessed. I went to bed last night and said my personal prayers. During my prayer, I explained how I had recognized my trial and I conquered it. I asked that he would take this sickness away from me. I had a headache, sore throat, my eyes were sunken and my nose was plugged, and then I just felt all around weak. My body was a wreck. I went to bed still feeling terrible and when I woke up this morning I was completely fine. J

We don’t really know our exact address because our area is weird. There are street names and everything but we don’t know ours. I am in Misantla, Veracruz. Look up where the church is located and we are across the street. There should be some big garage and a small road leading into an alley way looking thing right next to it on the left. If you can go into street view, go into the alley way and there should be a white gate. That gate leads into our apartment.

Talk to you next week….Love you,

Ty

Ty's last week in the MTC

Hi Family!

I´m still in the MTC but I leave for my mission area on Monday. It’s a 6 hour drive.... At least I´ll be able to study and read. I have gotten to love reading.

 There was an Elder that had appendicitis last week, one of the guys in my house said a "Specific prayer" asking that if it was the Lords will, the guy would go into surgery at 1 o clock on Tuesday, everything would be fine, and he would return home safely on Friday. He said this prayer Monday morning and then told us about it. Midday on Tuesday a man from the hospital came into our class to give us an update on him, he said that he would be going into surgery in an hour and would probably return the next day. It was noon when he told us this. He went into surgery at 1 and came out fine. His process of recovery was normal, and the doctor said he could probably return the next day. His recovery was taking longer than the doctor had expected, he then ended up returning safely on Friday. Prayers are real, I know they influence our lives when we just ask sincerely.

Oh! We watched a devotional that was recorded at the Provo MTC and sent to all the MTCs through the world. It was by Neil L Anderson and it was great. I bought a smaller journal to record all of my spiritual experiences in. I call them my Small Plates, and I call my regular Journal full of my day’s experiences in the mission my Large Plates. I think it’s pretty funny and all the guys in my room think it’s a good idea and we all get a good laugh at what I call them. When they were announcing the program at the devotional, I didn´t hear what he said but he said that some sister from West Jordan would be giving the closing prayer, my companion leaned over and asked if I knew her because she was from West Jordan but I didn’t know because I couldn’t hear. At the end of the devotional I looked to see who it was and I knew who she was!!!! It was Meghan Rollins. (Parker Rollins sister) I explained how she had been in most of my classes throughout elementary school and then in some in high school! I thought that it was really cool and that you should share this experience with her Dad.

Talk to you next week…Love you

Ty

Hi Family,

I love and miss you guys too. I don’t have a whole lot more time to email so I will try and cram as much as I can in. Everything is good and I´m continuing to work hard. I strive to feel the spirit and the Book of Mormon is awesome. There are so many cool stories and I´ve been reading my missionary library as well. Jesus the Christ is mind blowing and True to the Faith has so much information on doctrinal things that I have had questions about. I have enjoyed reading a lot more and it’s been great. My Spanish is coming great, too.

Elder Putnam is actually in another District but he is in my zone. I went yesterday to keep him company and he´s doing better. (Elder Putnam just had his appendix removed and the Elders have been taking turns staying with him in the hospital.) The work is good and my stomach is good. I´ve shared a lot of stories with my companion and my District. We’re all pretty closely knit. I haven´t listened to my iPod because they don´t let us listen to them in the MTC. I can once I get out but that’s all I know. I need another USB cord that can plug into my camera and the speaker. I just used the speaker cord for the camera and it worked fine. I can´t find it anywhere.

I have a new favorite scripture. Alma 26:22. Read it and apply it to yourself. Take out the words ¨he that¨ and ït shall¨ and replace he that with your name and it shall with the word you. It is my favorite scripture. I’ve been reading my patriarchal blessing a lot more and it’s been a blessing. I look forward to more great opportunities. You should read mine and take it literally. It’s mind blowing.

I have to go but I wish you all luck in your endeavors.  Pray for good dreams.  I do every night and I always enjoy them.  Stay safe and healthy.  I love you all.

Ty

Hi Family,

I have been reading my Patriarchal blessing A LOT more and things are coming more clearly to me. It is mind blowing. I want to live worthily already but by continuing to read it makes me want to be perfect. Even though there may be quite a bit of symbolism in it, I take everything literally so that I live my life according to receiving the blessings. I encourage you to read your patriarchal blessing.

Not much has happened around here that’s new. There have been a lot of gun shots just outside the CCM and Policia sirens follow shortly after. We just study study study and the days just fly by. I’ve been reading Jesus the Christ on my own time in the mornings and nights and its really good. During the day if I have time, I read the true to the faith book. It’s really good and I´ve really gotten into it. Did you know that when a church is divided into Stakes (Welby stake for example), it’s in reference to the prophet Isaiah when he said the church of the last days will be like a tent and supported by stakes?

I did get your package and I've been eating it sparingly ;) I wanted to save my package for Halloween, but we started our Sunday fast right after lunch on Halloween. My companion and I got sad, and the candy was staring at us the whole time during our fast... Even though I enjoyed my time fasting, and didn't feel that hungry. The candy still looked REALLY gooooood :)))) I haven't taken really any pictures this week because there isn't much to capture. I can't find my camera cord anywhere but I'm still continuing to look for it. Oh! I just remembered what we did for Halloween. One of the guys in my room Elder Stewart, and I had a costume. He got on top of my shoulders and he put on my trench coat. We walked into breakfast with it on and everyone loved it. Everybody wanted pictures and even our Mission Presidents second counselor thought it was hilarious. We combined our name tags so it said, Elder Koontzwart. I have a picture and I’ll send it as soon as I can. It’s rained quite a bit here and I've been getting great use out of the trench coat. People love it. They say I pull it off quite well. 

Love, Ty

Halloween Treats!

I sent Ty a treat for Halloween.  It was delivered the day before so hopefully it was a sweet surprise. I also hope he shared with his district.  :)