Happy Last Day of April!

Mon, Apr 30, 2012

We had another good week in Ochi, in spite of the rain. It rained most of the week, but we managed. Things are going well. We have a few good referrals and others that we are beginning to teach, so we'll hopefully begin to see some results fairly soon.

 

This week we had zone conference. President Hendricks spoke about the main concern the Brethren have with the church experiencing growth, but not real growth. The church is growing amazingly fast numerically, but many of those baptized are not being retained as a result of a lack of true conversion or a lack of understanding of repentance among other things. This is definitely the biggest problem we have in Jamaica. If you noticed in conference, several of the speakers addressed the issue of Real Growth. Anyway, our meeting was very good and opened my eyes a little bit more.

 

As for Mother's Day, I was thinking that I don't really need to call since I'll be home soon anyway. Ok, Just kidding. Skype would be the easiest thing for me. We'll have to do it in the evening. We'll probably use the same member's computer as last time so hopefully it works better this time.

 

Have a great week. Love you lots!

Elder Kartchner

Warming Up

Mon, Apr 23, 2012

 

Hey Fam,

We had a very good week here in Ochi. The only problem is that it went by too fast. It seems like my weeks keep getting faster and faster. We were able to get a lot done though, in terms of finding some good new investigators and getting some good referrals. Things are starting to pick up a bit. We spent wednesday and part of thursday in Montego Bay working with the elders there. besides that we've just been doing some good old fashioned missionary work.

 

That is really cool that you get to work in the temple. How often do you get to do that? For the conference talks, I wish we had a way to read them online, but I'll just have to wait till we get the May Liahona.

 

Well, have a great week. Talk to you soon. Love y'all lots!

Elder Kartchner

 

Happy Easter!

Tue, Apr 10, 2012

Hey Fam,

 

Things are going well. We didn't get to email yesterday since all the stores were closed for Easter. It rained all day anyway so we just stayed inside. My new companion, Elder Wright, is great. It helps having a Jamaican companion to connect with people. He's really good though, and he's a great cook. I got a taste of his rice and peas and fried chicken yesterday. It was good. I think I might gain a few pounds this transfer. Anyway, besides all that, things are going fairly well.

 

I'm sure you heard about the big storm and such in Texas last week. Well, we had 7 new missionaries that got stuck in the Dallas airport during it all. they were supposed to get here on Tuesday, but didn't make it until Friday. Two of them are in our zone now so I'm glad they made it.

 

Besides that things are going on pretty normal. We haven't heard any more about Cuba. I'm sure we'll talk about it when we have our meeting with President Hendricks on Thursday. Well, love you all but I've got to go. I'm a little short on time today.

 

Elder Kartchner

Happy General Conference!

Mon, Apr 2, 2012

General Conference was great. We got to watch it at the church here in Ochi via the internet. We just had to run a wire from the computer upstairs down to the TV and presto! Thankfully it didn't freeze up during any of the sessions which was a miracle since the computer got a bad virus last week. Anyway, the talks and such were amazing, as usual, and answered a lot of my questions. We had one investigator there on Sunday. It was really cool.

 

Well, this week is transfers. Elder Randle is getting transferred to Kingston and I'm staying here in Ochi with Elder Wright. I'm sad to see Elder Randle go. We've been serving together since the beginning of December and he's been a great companion. I'm excited though for Elder Wright. I don't know him at all. I just know he's a Jamaican from Kingston.

 

Well, sorry to miss all the Easter egg coloring fun. You'll have to eat some extra for me. That's cool that you got to see Joseph. Tell him hi for me and could you also get his email for me.

 

Have a great Easter! Love you all.

Elder Kartchner