Morope The Edge of the Vinyard

Hey Everyone!

First before all, Michelle Perry I just got your letter this last tuesday!!!!

Natalie Cameron congrats on your call!!!!!!!!!!!! holy cow im so excited for you!!!

And michelle i havent had time to write back yet, but I am expecting to hear the big news from you, not from my family haha. so DONT FORGET TO WRITE ME! haha Im waiting for that letter about your call!!! 

Wow so i have a lot to write haha. This last transfer has been crazy. I am in a place I never expected to be. I have been sent to Morope, its a small village about 20 min from Labayeque and about 40 min from Chiclayo and about 20 min off the coast of Perú!

This area is going to be really different. Morope is a small fishing-farming village. Everyone owns animals or Chakra wich pretty much means feilds of crops. There has only been four missionaries here, and i am the fourth. The people here are very poor, but still reject us a lot. I guess this is known to be one of the harder areas of the mission. there hasnt been a baptism here for at least 5 transfers which is 30 weeks. but just in this last week we have seen a lot of progress. I cant beleive it my new room is now a 3 story house haha. (mostly because we live in the church) there is only 4 families in our family group (there is no ward or branch out here) so i guess i will be giving a talk every sunday for a few months now haha. 

We are pretty much the pioneers out here. there isnt much to work with but we have had progress. I like to joke around that the lord has sent us to the edge of his vineyard haha.

 Our area is actually pretty big because we have our small town morope, but we are also assigned to all the little casarías in the area. (or small small villages around us) we got to visit one of them this last saturday. The village is called Caracucho. HOLY COW i have never seen anything more beautiful. we have two families out there and one of the owns one of the most beautiful chakras i have ever seen. and the best part... its FULL of mango trees haha. Mango has become my favorite fruit in peru. We will hit mango season in January or Februrary from what I hear and I will be here for it! :D We have already had a lot of mangos. 

So thats my new area, my new companion on the other hand is just as awesome. His name is Elder Cordero, He is from Chile and he is my first Latino companion and I am his first Gringo companion. So he has been helping me a lot with spanish and I have been helping him a lot with English. He is a really layed back guy. He likes to play soccer and he has 2 brothers. From the first day we have been laughing. He is funny guy and its fun to joke around with him. I will probably only have him as a companion for one transfer, and so im kind of bummed but its fun for now. 

This last week we have been teaching like crazy. Even though the people in general are rough, we have been really blessed to be able to find people to teach. 

we are teaching a couple named José y Deisy (yes its spelled like that). And they are awesome. I think they are going to be the first baptism in Morope! but first we have to help them get married... we are praying we can do it this month. the river next to their house has been full lately so we have been joking around that we need to get them married and baptized before the river dries haha. 

we had an interesting experience with José this week. we were teaching them one night and after the lesson José asked if we could help him understand something, and of course we said yes. He went on to explain that the night before he had a dream about us (the missionaries) he said that we came to help him finish his house (he doesnt have a roof and a few walls still, because he needs to earn more money) and we started digging a trench around his house and at first he didnt understand why, but then he saw that the river started to overflow and started distroying all of the other houses but when it got to his house it didnt pass the trench we dug. he said he took it as a sign to keep listening to us. 

One reason why they love listening to us is because we stop to talk. they said they can see a difference in the missionaries. that we dont just stop by to hand out pamplets but really were here to help.

well its time,

Love you all

Always turn outward, and keep smiling.

Elder Bunker

ps... i think this is the first time a lot of people have seen a gringo. (They all think its so funny i have arm hair haha)

Cambios... Me Voy...

Hey all.

So... This week we have transfers, and its mine turn to leave... wow. This has to be one of the hardest parts of the mission. I have been in Latina for 4 months and two days now. And even though it doesnt seem like a whole lot of time this place has really become my home. the ward has become a family for me, my companion is my best freind, and the converts have become my brothers. For some weird reason it feels like im at the point of being dropped off at the MTC again, there is a huge void ahead, and im not sure what it holds, all i know is im going to charge into at full speed like i did before and trust the lord is on the other side.

In Latina I have grown so much. Some say that the Mission is Life and if that is so I have grown from 10 years old to 20 years old here in Latina, Its here I was a ´teenager´ in the mission and learned how to speak, how to walk, how to conduct myself. I cant beleive that i have already had 6 months in the mission... 1/4 of ´Life´ has already passed right before my eyes.

this week has been a week of wrapping up everything. we had more lessons this week than in all the other weeks of my whole mission. and we challenged more people to baptism this last month that all 5 months before put together. Right when i feel like we are going to change the world the world has changed on me haha. Part of me would like to feel like its not fair but the other part knows that its more than fair, and that the Lord is in charge.

Somethings that have really brought me comfort this week. On my mission plaque I asked that they put the scripture D&C 6:32-37 the lord explains in this scripture that what one sews he will reap and that one should not have fear to do good. This has definately been the case here. I think i can leave this area and honestly say that i have done everything that i have been able to do. even though i wont be able to see the results or the people get baptized i feel confident i did my part.

the other thing that has really brought a lot of comfort is talking to our ward mission leader. He said that this área has really changed in the time that i have been here. that before i came it was closed and a few other missionaries had opened the area with only a few baptisms, and that Elder Larson and I have been able to prepare it even more and that we are going ot see many more baptisms.

Im sad to leave and i will be praying for the people here. But i know the Lord is calling me to another place and im anxious to see what experiences lie ahead.

I sent a letter home about goal setting this last month, and i want to share the results of our labor. Our zone had set a really high goal of baptisms this month and we had prayed fervently to know if we should set a goal as high as we did. We felt impressed that it was the right thing to do. We have worked as a zone really hard together to realize our goal, and to be honest, we didnt make it. some might look at our zone and think we had failed this month because we didnt make our goal, BUT this last month we led the mission in baptisms. We had the highest baptism amount that we have ever had before.

The power of goals is great and the power of goals with inspiration from god is greater.

I love the quote that ´two men can acomplish ANYTHING together, as long as one of those men is god´

I know this is true, i feel like all too often we forget god is all powerful and sometimes the only that is lacking in miracles is our faith. (we must remember that all things will be accomplished according the will of god as well)

this week we found a man that has been inactive for two years. well... i shouldnt say we found him, he found us. we were walking in the street one day and this man came up to us on a bike and began speaking to us in broken english, he told us he was baptized in our church and he would like for us to come to his house to talk to him more. we tried to go to his house the following sunday but we were swamped with appointments, we finally had time this sunday to go visit him and what he told us broke my heart.

He told us that he was a convert to the church and explained how his freind introduced him the missionaries. The missionary who baptized him is named Elder Scott from California, Im assuming he has already returned home. He told us that elder Scott had become his best friend and they shared a lot of good times together. He said elder scott went to his house every week and they would teach the gospel in english and spanish and Genaro (thats his name) would help them with their spanish and read the book of mormon with them. He would often tease elder scott and tell him that he should marry a girl from peru and live here in Latina.

After his baptism Genaro went on a trip and Elder scott was assigned to a new area, but before he left we tried to contact Genaro and when he couldnt find him he ended up leaving a note.

Genaro pulled out an old sticky note with a message written on it. it said that elder scott was glad to have genaro as a freind and that he needed to continue in the faith.

Genaro told us that he tried to talk to Elder scott but he had lost contact. Genaro looked as if he was about to cry, i think i have only begun to realize the importance of the missionaries to the converts.

Genaro told us that he was afraid that we had forgotten about him. and he was waiting all day on sunday to talk to us and when we didnt come he was really sad.But he was glad we came this sunday.

I hope and pray that the people i have taught here will never feel forgotten

Love you all

Always turn outward and keep smiling

The Lord is in charge.

Love Elder Bunker

Sewing for others to Reap

Hey everyone,

Im going to apologize in advanced if this is really short.

First, Happy thanksgiving to all, i almost forgot until i read the email from my mom. we dont celebrate thanksgiving here so i wont be doing anything different besides the normal. I dont know maybe my companion and i will offer a prayer of thanksgiving but we wont have time to do anything other than that. 

This week has been really good. something suprising has been happening in our area. we have been finding more and more people who are ready for baptism. there are only a few... road blocks. I have been here for almost 4 months now and I have really grown to love Latina. Im scared that im going to be sent to a new area. i feel like things have just started to get good. I feel like if my companion and i could just stay a little bit longer we could change this area. I have heard it is a lot harder than a lot of areas but then again, i feel like this is the best area i could of hoped for. we have cambios (changes) this next week so we will see what happens.

One of the things that has made me the most excited for this area is the families that we are teaching. We have been teaching two girls for a little while now, Paola and Mirely. who are 16 and 18 and they have been progressing really well, but its hard to find them durning the week. they had a baptismal date for the end of this week (we had to change it, they are not quite ready yet), but the miracle with them is during one of lessons their older sister Karla came in to listen. She is attending a catholic church and is studying medicine. we had left 3 nephi 11 with paola and mirelli to read before the lesson and when we arrived they had a few questions about baptism and how it works. we explained we are baptized the same way jesus christ was baptized and asked they beleived if it was important to be baptized in the way jesus christ taught. They all afirmed that they beleived this was the way we should be baptized. we were able to later in the week challenge karla to baptism. so the three sisters have a goal to be baptized the 15 of december. and their little brother is going to start listening to us too. their mom is a member, the only hard person to teach will be their dad i think, but i shouldnt judge the situation yet. I havent been able to talk to him too much. So we have a whole family to teach!!!!! im so excited. (and sad becaus i might not be here to see them all be baptized.)

(Karla is an investigator of gold, she reminds me so much of junior, she has a really tender heart and we have had some really great lessons with her. every time we teach her we can feel the power of the spirit. she knows what the spirit feels like, and that is the most powerful tool anyone can have as they look for answers)

somehting else interesting has been taking place here too. There have been a lot of trials in the lives of the people who we are teaching but it seems to be opening up the hearts of their families and the members of the ward.

I wont be able to share a whole lot because a few of the situations are a little delicate and i dont want to be throwing personal information everywhere. but i will share what i can.

Junior´s family has been passing through some hard times. His sister had her baby, but there has been complications. The family is really heart broken and humble right now. I have taught this family the whole time i have been here in latina and its been hard to help them progress. they are a wonderful family and they keep their commitments and listen to us and invite us in their home, but their hearts havent been always open. They arent hard hearted, they just havent seen why our message is so important. We had the opertunity to go to the hospital (its nothing like a hospital in the united states, healthcare is REALLY different here) and give a blessing to natalies baby. ( long story short, i know these little ones are straight from heaven because of the spirit in that room ) and the ward members have been stopping by their house to offer help to the family. we have really seen a change in the family. their hearts are more open and i know its been an answer to our prayers. I hope we can continue to help them. 

The other miracle is with a man we are teaching named franko, franko has had a really crazy past. I wont go into everything, but he hasnt always been a church going guy. he really wants to change his life and we are so excited to teach him. he loves when we visit and he never wants us to leave and he loves to go to the church. the only problem is his wife is super catholic. she sometimes doesnt let him leave. this last week she had an accident. she got burned really bad by boiling water so franko has been taking care of her. we stopped by to visit franko and she was there. she has always been nice to us, but has never wanted to talk much with us. we started talking to her and asked if we could help her in anyway.  i think it softened her heart.

she let franko go to church this week

I love you all

always turn outward adn keep smiling :D :D :D

Sincerly Elder Bunker

Desafios

Hey everyone,

Before I begin i want to say "Happy Birthday" to Jean (my brother-in-law). I hope its a good one,

So... this week... wont lie, its been hard and good and full of new experiences. The mission is a rollercoaster. 

This week all of our baptisms fell through. None of the people with a baptism goal showed up to church, and we dont have much time before their baptismal date. Nobody said missionary work was easy. Please be praying for the people who are listening to the missionaries right now. they need all the help they can get. And if you have missionaries in your area offer them your time and prayers, they also need all the help they can get.

I am starting to understand how much missionary work really is the front lines of the battle we are fighting in this world against the advesary, the comforting thing is that we know who in the end will turn out the victor.

I wanted to share something cool that i got to see this last p-day. I havent had a chance to send a picture, but maybe for those who are reading this if you have time you can look up. Its called the Árbol Milenario or in other words the Melenial tree. it is a tree that is incredibley old. it is in the polmac forest near chiclayo. this tree has split in half and fallen over, but it has a unique ablility to turn its branches into roots and for that reason it is still living. i was looking at this tree and i noticed how the branches dissapeared underground and reamerged as smaller tree a small distance away from the origional trunk. and how no matter what obstacles it encountered it continued to grow. 

I wont take the time to make the connection, but i want to invited everyone to ponder this idea. that faith is like a seed, and sometimes we are expecting our testimony to grow tall and perfectly straight with symetrical braches and the whole 9 yards, but life isnt that way, we face obstacles, we are subject to sin, and we have trials in this life. Although this tree in the forest has grown in the most unorthodox way it is by far one of the most magnificent trees i have seen.

I wish i could share more of a mission experience but im out of time

Thanks for your letters (Brandy Mayo i just got yours this week, Im excited for you and all the decisions ahead!!)

Always turn outward and Keep smiling!!

Love you all 

Elder Bunker

ps its mango season!! seriously the best!! haha I have had mango like 3 times this week. (it also means its the begining of the rainy season... haha wish i had photos of what happens in our house when it rains...one of our hallways doesnt have a roof...)

pps we are also due for El Niño this year. (giant flood) should be fun. only happens every seven years from what i hear. 

ppps im still learning the customs here. I learned this week never to turn down food even if you are full... they get really offended here if you dont accept food. they usually understand when we tell them we cant drink coffee, but to turn down a plate of chicken... wow. that, and i learned that brushing your teeth in the kitchen is not ok.

Elections, Choices, Baptisms.

Hey everyone!!

K, first, thanks again to everyone who has sent letters and emails i really appreciate them. If you sent an Email I just will say im sorry I havent been able to reply. We cant email people besides family, but thank you all for the updates. I love hearing from home and for the support. Sometimes we really need it. 

K, so biggest things going on. (list from less important to most) Halloween, they have halloween here, but nobody does anything. Everyone is scared to dress up because alot of churches preach its satanical. second, what is going on with heritage tours now that the mission age has changed. Is brother Eliason still doing it? Third, Elections are tommorrow!!! Its going to be really interesting to see how this changes our country. I think we might be seeing a few more divisions after this next election no matter who wins. 

and finally, but most importanty, we have FOUR baptismal dates placed! Im so excited. Four children of god have commited to prepare for baptism the end of this month!! I think we are going to be able to challenge 4 more people this week too! Now, i hope im not too excited about everything, nothing is set in stone yet, but wow, i never thought i would see this area progress so much. there is so much to do. 

One of the things that i am seeing more than ever is the principle of oposition in all things. the four people who have a goal to be baptized this end of month have all been experiences great opposition from family members, family tragidies, or doubts from other sources. they are still progressing, but wow, there is opposition. Just like we are working hard so is the advisary. 

Im confident they will all be baptized, but i think this is my last cambio here, so maybe its a little selfish but i would like to be here to see them be baptized. Its amazing the love that grows when you pray for someone. I want to ask everyone to pray for these 4 people, and all the people who are being introduced to the gospel. its not an easy thing to change ones life, and we all need help, but everyday i am seeing that through the atonement of jesus christ its possible. 

one of our investigators has had a really crazy life. I will avoid to explain everything he has been through, but i just want to say i have experienced and seen the power of the atonement in the lives of the children of god. He has changed a lot, and for that he is receiving a lot of opposition from family. I am praying we can help him overcome these obstacles. 

I have a lot experiences i really want to share but i am afraid to, i dont want to offend the spirit of the events that have taken place this week. so i think it is sufficient to bear my testimony that i know god is in this work, I have seen his power in the lives of the people. sometimes i wonder why we arent baptizing 8,000 people like the sons of mosiah, but i remember the words of Elder Uchtdorf about missionary work.  He said that the work of saving souls was never easy, it wasnt easy for Jesus Christ who had never done anything wrong, and we cant expect it to be easy for us to help others either. The worth of a soul is great in the sight of god, and i think im only begining to understand what that means.

I love you all, thank you all for your support,

the church is true tell your freinds,
always turn outward and keep smiling.

Elder Bunker

GENERAL CONFERENCE

Hey everyone,

Ok this has been burning a hole in me to write home about these last two days.... is anyone else freaking out about the announcements of general conference???????? what??? that is so crazy!! girls can now serve at 19 and boys at 18. where was this rule when i was 18?? hahaha i was thinking the entire time of thomas, and also of a few HT girls i know who will probably be returning home from missions when i get home now haha... Im sure there was a few telefone calls made with some tears and freaking out. If im right i think i deserve a DearElder...

k so i have way too much to write and no time to do it. Pretty much the biggest news of my life is general conference. I dont know if its because im on my mission but 1. it was waaaayyyy to fast and 2. I think this was the best general conference i have ever heard. My heart was pounding the whole time. It was hard to focus on other people during the conference because i wanted to take notes the whole time. I love though, that the talks are recorded. I have found one of my favorite things to do while im waiting for my companion in the bathroom or during small moments of the day is read the conference talks in the liahona. wow... lo maximo!

oh and they are building a temple in arrekipa!!! ahhh

This weekend was one of the most stressful i think i have had in the mission (baptisms are by far the most worrying) because i wanted everyone to go to conference and hear the profet speak so we were running around all over the place trying to get people to attend. and praying the whole time that they would be able to feel the spirit. we will see what happens this week.

Good news!!! we have another baptism coming up. some times i wonder if i really do anything in this work because the people we baptize just want to be baptized and it doesnt seem like we do a whole lot, even though there are other people who we work with ton and pray for a ton and nothing happens. I think it goes to show 1. I have a lot more to learn 2. this is the LORD´s work not mine. and 3. this wonderfully-irratating thing called agency is still working its wonders haha.

sorry thats all i can write today.

Love you all,

siempre doble afuera, y continua a tener un sonrisa

Elder Bunker

Sancuros

Hey Everyone.

First, I got a few letters the other day that im not sure i will have time to repond so this is the fastest way. thank you everyone that sent letters. (Krysta Thompson, and Elisa Logan, Matt Leach, and others) just to let everyone know the fastest way to send me something is through dearElder.com, its free. The second is through a normal letter. and last is pouch mail. I found out it takes about a month for something to get here from the united states through pouch mail. Better just to send somehting via DearElder.com

Second. If you would like to see where I am right now, my area is called latina, it is in the city chiclayo, its kind of the suburbs. you can type: Jose Leonardo Ortiz, Lambayeque-Chiclayo to see it in GoogleEarth. I have a huge parque and a Municipalidad close to my apartement.

This week it rained a few times so thats been nice, it doesnt rain often here, mostly just overcast. But because its warming up the Sancuros or Mosquitos are starting to come out. Saturday night I got bit 11 times on my left hand alone by the same bug I suppose. Kind of irritating but its alright. Have to find a way to hide from the bugs at night.

We had intercambios with the zone leaders this week. it was great. I learned a lot and got to enjoy the life of the Zone Leader (haha its a lot busier than normal missionary work - glad im just a missionary without leadership assignment) What was really nice though was I helped my Zone leader Poner un Fecha or invite someone to baptism, and they accepted haha, my zone leader likes to joke and tell everyone if it wasnt for me they wouldnt have a baptism to perform. Nice to have zone leaders who are uplifting and edifying even if i didnt really do anything.

we got a distrurbing note from the office this week thougth. The office elders sent back one of our baptism records with a note on the back that said that it wasnt valid. "read moroni 8" it said. it turns out the record we turned in said that a girl we baptized only was 7 years old and the others elders were joking around saying that we had several baptisms in our area and 1 catholic baptism because we baptized "a baby". haha my companion was really worried we had commited apostasía. we ended up asking the parents and it turns out the year they told us the wrong year and she really was 8 years old. haha what a releif! it would be kind of embarrasing if we had to baptize her again.

Speaking of baptisms. we had another baptism this weekend. it was amazing. we have been teaching a young man (19) named jordy. Jordy is a really nice guy who is really interesting. He works with computers and dresses like a skaterkid. I remember the first time we taught him I was suprised he showed up to the lesson He just didnt seem like the type of person who would be interested in the gospel. Shame on me for judging.

Jordy has had a really intersting life. I wont go into detail everything he has gone through, but he has really turned his life around. I have been so blessed to witness this kind of change in someone. I remember the 4th or 5th lesson we had with jordy, we showed up the house and he just looked different. At first i thought he had cut his hair or somthing, but I watched him a bit longer and i realized he was dressed the exact same, something just looked new about him something bright. and I remember being hit by the realization that he had been repenting, and had received forgiveness. just the lesson before we had taught him about repentance and a few of the commandmants. He really had changed and turned his life around.

I just want to let everyone know the process of repentance is real. there is no-one who is reading this who has commited a sin they cannot repent of.

k a small tidbit about what i love about peru. Before the mission i had a pair of blue converse that i loved to dance with, and here everyone, everyday, for almost every ocasion wears converse of some sort, but the most popular is blue converse like the ones i had. haha the BEST!

Im loving Peru, the people the food, the work.

The mission really is the first 2 years of the best years of life.

Always turn outward, and keep smiling (I am :D )

El Elder Bunker