January

January 2 2012

Well it sounds like you all started the new year with a lot of Stress but its best to get it all out of the way now instead of having it drag out through the entire year.  i now its hard but with faith we have hope for a better world Ether 12;4.  this last couple of weeks i´ve been teaching a lot about hope and faith unforntently with the way the world is going especially here in paraguay People have lost hope and they just drag through day after day But i Give testimony that this is not the way of Jesus Christ This hopeless saddness is not of CHrist and its not the plan that God prepared for us Way back in the premortal life.  Man was created to be happy 2nephi 2;25 and we are happy and blessed when we keep the commandments of christ mosiah 2;41  Christ sufferied for all of us!! every pain and affliccion and every tempations that we have every felt and will feel he suffed so that He could know how to give us comfort and strength Alma 7; 11-12 But God repects our agency and he can not give us comfort or help or strength until we ask for it, because if he did he would be taking away our agency and God will never force anything upon us,  So when you feel the need for strength or comfort hit your knees to the floor and ask  i have seen outlooks on life make a complete 180 after the indivduals humbile themselve enough to ask God in sincere pray Why and please please help me understand and give me strength.  a lot of times bad things happen to good people beacuse of the choices of others or bad things happen becasue  its just life and we don´t understand why 1nephi 10;19.  however i add my testimony to those of the prophets that Gods arms all always outstrechted to ALL his children.  He never turns his back on us however through our actions whether we know it or not we´re turning our backs to him  so my invition for all is to turn back to christ and be filled with everlasting hope, joy and peace.  its like it says in Helaman 5 the winds and stroms of life and the devil are going to come we will face challegesa and  feel real pain but IF we are built on the foundations of christ we will not Fall.  Take up the yoke of christ Matt 11: 28-30   work with him not against him make this year an easy one.

Well that was really preachy but please know that this is true seeing how people live and feel here in paraguay with out christ and the change that happens when they accept him is incredable and i know the change can be that real for all that just ask and then do.

the New year and christmas was very different this year and the best part was getting to talk to my family it was wounderful i feel like that was so long ago becasue so much has happen.  But Sariah asked me a question she asked what would she like the best about paraguay and i told her that she could wear a bikni  everywhere and no one would care then she asked what mom would like best and i couldnt think of anything so this whole week ive been trying to figure out what everyone in my family would like about paragauy.  One thing that i´m sure everyone would like is that is is so pretty here just beauitful.  sure it takes time to learn to look past the trash that litters the street and the dead anmial carcasses the are left to rot on the side of the road but when you open your eyes you see how beautiful the sky is just a crystal clear blue and the trees Stunnly green every one and the bannanas and mangos that are ready to pick  hmmm the fruit here is so good fruit all the time they have the best fruit salads every here i love it.

 and Danny i live in a thrid world counrty there is no mailing system here the address i gave you since i got my call will be my address for ever (its the mission office)  

Paraguay Asuncion North Mission

Avendia Satísima Trinidad N 1280 C/ Julio Correa

Casilla de Correo 1871

Asunción, Paraguay

January 9 2012

For the team for regions

REDMEN!!!!

Lift up your heads and look around.

Here in this holy ground awaits your destiny.

Here in these scared waters we will Swim For our school and our City.

Faclons and Thunder have gathered from afar to Destroy all that you have work for.

For months and months you have waited and prayed for the opurtunidad to Show What you are made of

As the redmen of old you are outnumbered and outgunned and just as General Custrad thought at his last stand ¨those redmen dont stand a chance¨ so do the Falcons and Thunder.

However Just as general Custard was tramble into the dust So will we do the Same to our enemies WHY

Becasue we Swim and Fight for a better world a World were Cedar high once again is the Regional Champion 

No More shall Our name be dragged in the dust Lift Up your heads Redmen and SMell the Clean Air a New world is in your Hands FOr months you have prepare.  for months you have sweated bled, and dried and now is your chance to Make it all worth it

When the Indians CAme cashing down upon Custrad not once did they look back to the safety of there hill they took off and fought with all their might mind and strength holding nothing back Now its your turn Leave it all in the Water Hold nothing Back Fight REDMEN and become That which your were made to BE

Be the Champion within you!!

How are WE!!!???!??!? 

Letter

WEll nothing to crazy has happened this week this week Elder Mckeon and i tought 29 lessons to investigadores and  17 to menos activos  its not much but it is the most we have ever done together.  the trick with this area or the mission in Paraguay is that you can almost get in every way but the trick is to know if they what to learn or just talk and waste time  because they have nothing better to do anyway even with all these lesson we still had no investagodes in church just like every other week since i have been here with an expection of Adriana i believe that this Area is trying to teach me the importance of Keep the sabbath day holy it bugs me because i hear a lot on the streets those mormons they just what me to go to church No!! we dont want you to God wants you to it is one of the Ten commandments but people dont like to hear that God wants them to go to church they want to hear You´ll all saved just confess in your heart that Jesus is the Christ and You´re saved.  God is misericoridia ( mericful) but not that much he has to complete the laws of justis just like anyone else and the laws are the commandments.

once again i dont now how i got on that little soap box but what ever sorry i forgot to start putting pictures on first thing so you wont be getting any pictures this week hopefully next week.    but i bought a sombreo to wear it is a HUGE help with the heat and today i got to sit in a Paraguain dentist waiting room part of my companion´s tooth fell out so he had to go get it fix love you lots 

 Elder Hafen  

January 16 2012

To start i have the best mission in the world there is no mission in the world like the one i´m in right now.  to start most of the people i teach dont even know there real birth date.  they were born out inthe middle of no where and their mothers have forgotten so they just pick a date or change it based on how they feel. trash litters the streets and every three days about they rack it all up into a big pile and then burn it all i love the smell of burn diapers jk.  i also never teach inside houses becasue it is hotteer int he house then outside so i teach seating on buckets or bricks sometimes on the ground i love it it makes me feel like im back on the ranch if you find something to sit on great if not pull up some grasss and take a squat.  the other day i had a really cool experience i was on a division with elder Brasher we were out in his area about 30minuets from mine.  it was a little after noon and our lesson had just fallen through do we had so one to teach and we were stuck out int he paraguain sun.  well we were walking about looking for people to teach prayer for inspiriation Elder Brasher said he just had a thought to go visit a sick home bound siter in the ward he had never visited this siter before he only know where so lived beuse one time his companian pointed out her house while they were walking by.  so went to her house and were invited in by here daughter she took us into the house and into a bedroom where this sick old grandma as resting. right when we walked in she ask us for a blessing for the sick and to pray for her daughter that was sick in the hospital.    so we prapared some oil and then gave her a blessing and prayed for her daughter. but the thing that was awsome about this experience is that durning this whole time she told us about her desire to go to church and how she knows that she was going to see her husband again soon becasue they were married in the temple for time and all enternity and right before we left she told us thank you and that we were an answer to her prayers she told us that she was parying all night moniring and afternoon that some one fromthe church would come and give her a blessing.   I felt so honoried to be an answer to a pray of a humble faithful daughter of God and i Pray that i will be forever worthy to answer the call to give blessing and be senitive to the spirit to reconize spiritual whispers.
Another great experience was that we had invetigadores in church this SUNDAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

!!!!!!!!!!!!   we found them much the same way elder brasher and i found that old sick grandma through following the proptims of the spirit.  one night elder Mckeona dn I were walking home adn as we past a coner there was a couple sitting down on some steps and i said the usally ¨adio¨  which means hey i´m just passing have a great day.  but about 10meters away i had an inpression to turn back and talk to them so i did and i am so greatful that i did.  we turn back adn i told them that i felt like i had something that they needed to hear we explained that we are missionaries of the church and that we represent Jesus Christ  they gave us their address ( more like the general area where they live becasue no one has addresses here) and we found them just this week adn they are so amazing i dont have time anymore to explain how these people are but there names are Christian and German. i´ll tell you about them more next week they have a baustial date for the 2nd of febuary adn are going to get married on the 26th of january  they are probale on of the most hapy couple i´ve ever seen. 

i love you all very much good luck mom with school Great job by the way with teaching yourselves calc thats amazing pray always Eliza keep working hard and use enjoy the new world of sight you poor thing sorry it was so bad for so long but just do what the doctor sasy and more importantly what mom says.
Love Elder Hafen. 

I made apple pie!!!!!!!
My somebro!!!
My companion´s teeth or at least a part of it.
MTC pictures

January 23 2012

its amazing how i can go through so many amazing experiences in one week and then get to the cyber and not know what to write i feel like the weeks are just flying by and that my time as a missionary is going by too fast its very scary.  for example its already transfers agina most likely i´ll be staying in this area becasue Elder Mcken has four changes here and i only have three usaully they change the guy with more changes in one area but we never really know.  so most likely I´ll be saying good bye to Elder Mckeon here next week.  we´ve had a look of fun togehter not as much success as we wanted but i feel like we have done our best and have lefted this ward better then what it was.

i had some fun experiences this week

first one night after teaching a lesson to an investigafore Elder Mckeon ask if he could have a hamburger. ( this lady works on the side of the street and cooks hambugers and empanadas)  so while see was cooking Elder Mckeon´s hambuger another ladycome up adn asked for three empanadas so me wanting to be nice offended her my seat so she could sit and wait but when i offered she said ¨No no i´m super busy i can´t sit Come find me another day.¨  ANd i was like no Hermana i just thought you´d like to sit while you wait.  but nope she wouldnt sit next to us she just stod the whole time instead of taking my seat.  it was pretty funny and is funny the way some people act around us . 

Random fact about paraguay did you know that in stead of knocking doors i clap at gates.  

January 30 2012

well i feel ten times better today then i did last week and its all because for the past three weeks we have had investigadores in Church yesterday we had five in church four of them it was there first time but still it was amazing to see there progression and their faith.   we have one man that i love he is 38 years old and has like 11, if that, yellow teeth and a desire to become something.  he is a single guy we used to have a family but we got into drugs and other women so his wife lefted him and took the kids and now he is a straving man that cant buy food becasue he spends all his money on cigerates  he has a huge smoking problem for the past 27 years he has been smoking 20 cigeragets every day but for this past week he has went from 20 to 13 a day and this week that is coming we plan to have him off completly.  there is nothing better then to see someone change their live for the better when i first met this man, my first week in the field, i fell in love with him but at that time he was not ready to progress. however know he feels and wants to BE something not just another poor paraguanin. 

But anyway did you get the pictures i sent of me and wardy and roman and my apple pie you never say anything so i can never know But YES i did get the milk duds and no they didnt make me sick they made me so happy they were all melted into a big choclate carmel mess but i broke it up and made  that popcorn  treat it was amazing and that herb cheese favor was very good as well Eliza i{m so sorry i didnt get to write anything for state but YOU HAVE TO LET ME KNOW WHAT HAPPENS AND SEND PICTURES AND DO YOUR VERY BEST SIS AND NO MATTER WHATS HAPPENS KEEP YOUR HEAD HELD HIGH AND BE THE SUPPORT OF YOUR TEAM THEY NEED YOU I¨M SO VERY PROUD of you and what you are doing...  MOM you are amzing you do so much i have no idea how you do everything you dod and do it so well  you are just a super hero i guess.    any ays i dont have time becasue i wrote a letter to my presdident and danny and dad before all ofd this and i´m already late but I am so happy adn i pray for aall you of you every day!!!

Good luck God Bless and SMILE!!

ELder Hafen.