Anudda week in the life of the Paraguay Asunción North Mision. Funny how with every change in this life we go through levels of adjustment and eventually arrive at the comfort and efficiency that we found before, with a whole new set of responsibilities. I`ve found that doing so in the service of my Savior Jesus Christ has given me an added ability to adapt and develop my talents according to the requirement of the situation. As has often been said in this great work, and as I`ve learned in the last 2 weeks, which have flown by: The Lord qualifies those that he calls!
This week we were able to help a Man named Ricardo enter the waters of baptism after marrying his Wife and beginning a new life as a family in the Church of Jesus Christ. It was wonderful to see him make the change from a very relaxed, less than focused victim of his circumstances, to an excited, dedicated father of his family. This week he will be able to recieve the priesthood and bless his family with that gift of God.
Natalia and Emilio were LOTS of fun to teach. They are both very smart and sweet children. Natalia speaks some English and so often spoke to my companion who doesn`t understand Spanish, making him feel more comfortable in the lessons.
As for me, it has been really fun getting to feel really comfortable in Spanish and now working on Guarani, which seems to be the langauge of the people`s hearts here in Paraguay. People will give you this skeptical look until you bust out 2 or 3 words in Guarani and then suddenly they are your best friends. It`s great!
Tidbit: when I was in the office we had weekly meetings with President to talk about our field and office work. One week he shared with us the story of Trojan soldiers that were being led to conquer an island. They disembarked, and the first thing they did upon reaching shore was to BURN THE BOATS. That way, it became win or die...the options were very few. I have really latched onto that idea and it has helped me to DESTROY any trace of the impulse to make excuses within me. When I set goals that I know are the will of the Lord, I set them, embark, and then I burn the boats, never looking back, only forging forward. If we ever fall short, which we are certain to sometimes do, we know where the responsibility lies. That has been a powerful principle for me!
Well, this week we have zone conference and I am looking forward to taking that step back and seeing how I can improve.
I love you all and thank you for your support and help. I hope you have a great week!
Elder McCarty
Monday, March 30, 2009
Monday, March 23, 2009
Yikes! Time! 3-23-09
The Rolla Holla
Well everyone! Exciting news! At the end of this change Elder Agudelo was called to serve FAR away, in one of the furthest areas, and I was left here with an Elder that arrived from Canada 6 days ago and is now my companion. He is great. We are working harder than I have ever worked in my mission and due to his limited Spanish, I have lost my voice by the end of the last 3 days.But boy have we seen the results. Heavenly Father blessed us to meet ALL of our goals (which we set high to stretch us), and has prepared us for another week of stretching and working even smarter.Yesterday as we walked a TON to visit all of the investigators that we had attend church, a young woman of maybe 24 years called us and asked us to share our message with her. She told us to wait there and went and got her husband. They seem like a promising family and we have a return appointment this Tuesday. They are 1 or 2 great families that we are blessed to be teaching right now who are likely to arrive at the sacred waters of baptsim.I feel a certain unquenchable intensity in my soul to go out and do this work with all of my vigor in the way the Lord wants it done. That is something that excites me and inspires me and at times, usually late at night, brings tears of joy to my eyes as I lay in bed exausted from a day of giving it all I`ve got. Thank you for your prayers...THEY WORK! I love you ALL!Elder MCCarty
Well everyone! Exciting news! At the end of this change Elder Agudelo was called to serve FAR away, in one of the furthest areas, and I was left here with an Elder that arrived from Canada 6 days ago and is now my companion. He is great. We are working harder than I have ever worked in my mission and due to his limited Spanish, I have lost my voice by the end of the last 3 days.But boy have we seen the results. Heavenly Father blessed us to meet ALL of our goals (which we set high to stretch us), and has prepared us for another week of stretching and working even smarter.Yesterday as we walked a TON to visit all of the investigators that we had attend church, a young woman of maybe 24 years called us and asked us to share our message with her. She told us to wait there and went and got her husband. They seem like a promising family and we have a return appointment this Tuesday. They are 1 or 2 great families that we are blessed to be teaching right now who are likely to arrive at the sacred waters of baptsim.I feel a certain unquenchable intensity in my soul to go out and do this work with all of my vigor in the way the Lord wants it done. That is something that excites me and inspires me and at times, usually late at night, brings tears of joy to my eyes as I lay in bed exausted from a day of giving it all I`ve got. Thank you for your prayers...THEY WORK! I love you ALL!Elder MCCarty
Tuesday, March 17, 2009
2.16.09 Holla and Pics
Here I am. We were going to have the final word on our changes today. However, we`re told President spent the night in his office, and has been there all morning, surely pouring his heart out to a God that both he and I know guides this work.
The rock of this church is it`s revelation from heaven: the part that lets us know we`re here right now because God wanted us here and at this very moment.I am excited to see what lessons he is preparing for me. Excited to reach out and take advantage of them. To apply my faith by doing all in my power and then following the Paraguayan model of trust that everything will turn out ok.
Cultures, much like people, have their strengths and their weakness. And, like people, we can choose to love them and allow the weaknesses to become endearing, or we can react in some other way. The beauty of service is that it requires one to love. The beauty of the mission is that it requires one to serve. I don`t know if it`s a poem or what but I just wrote a bunch of stuff about how I feel towards the culture down here.
A tribute to the Paraguayan people
The enduring through the eternal day.
The stomach hardening grit to brave heat, distance, and feet battering roads of rock.
The overcoming hunger in order to try to aleviate it.
The total tranquility.
The offering everybody a cool drink and friendly hand.
The toothless smiles.
The endless good.
The windowless houses.
The mountains of fried food.
The bouncing bus salesmen and their monotone voices mimicking excitement.
The meat floating in water and grease: called soup.
The corn bread prepared, as they say, ¨indian-style¨, which must include the grit and dirt from not having washed your hands, and in place of non-stick spray, is coated with paraguayan leaves, or else...sorry, it`s just not as good.
The families that are doing what they have to do to be together...forever.
The reminding me that I left a world of cars and cell phones and seemingly endless wealth to teach a people who`s suffering ended up teaching me.
The promise it all inspires in me to NEVER take for granted what I had and will have, and above all, to NEVER stop giving all I`ve got.
Thank you Paraguay,
I love you
Elder McCarty
Pictures and Descriptions
Elder Agudelo kissing a giant frog. I told him to do it and I didn`t think he actually would!
Before our lunch appointment on Sunday, waiting for the food to be ready, and Elder Agudelo sleeping!
Sunset with me just a standin there.
There are lots of these horse drawn carts down here. I asked this guy if I could take a pic and he just said Ikatu (guarani for ok).
Standing on an old building foundation overlooking a cliff and a tree filled vally.
Outside a nunnery while I was still in the office, where you can buy all kinds of sweet handmade artifacts by Guarani ¨Indios¨ out in the chaco. Nativity sets, neclaces, wooden knives, etc., of Palo Santo, or holy wood, which smells really good and is famous in Paraguay.
BIG NEWS! 3-9-09
Well, it looks like my move to the office was a little more temporary than even I thought. To be honest, that makes me very happy. I just found out that tomorrow I will be moving. You´ll never guess where I´ll be packing my bags to go for this 3rd time in one change…drum roll…back to San Jorge!! I know, crazy isn´t it!?!? I´ll get to go see all of the tear-stained faces, and eyes full of goodbyes that I left in my place of birth as a missionary. Wow! I´ll be with Elder Agudelo again. President has told me that it will be just until the end of this change (next Wednesday) and then Elder Agudelo will be going to a different area and I will be staying there with a new companion. It´ll be back to the small living space with one room of air conditioning, and a broken old camping stove. I can´t even believe how excited I am. First of all, I LOVE Elder Agudelo, and second of all, I LOVE the area and the people we taught. Some of the very same people I was helping to teach are now very close to their baptismal dates. I can´t WAIT to help them get there! Well, not much time, I´ve got to pack my bags and get ready to go. I love you all! Preparation day will be back to Monday and I´ll be on the old schedule again. Thank you so much for all each and every one of you do for me! With Love, Elder McCarty
Saturday, March 7, 2009
Pictures in the Office
I have been terrible with taking pics but Elder Guest just got a SWEET new camera so here are some from his.
Giant sweet tie
Funny green picture, we decided it looks like an alien from some movie we can´t quite figure out. 
Another green, this time either eating something or posing like a model.
A district meeting with my Comp and our district leader Elder Hansen (and random Hermanas that came to sit in on his class since it is so dang good!
Looking eager…a night after office and field work, chatting around the table.
Planning in our room after a day at the office. Elder Guest interrupts us by coming in and laying on my bed.
Another cool color function, jamming for the roommates.
He´s got the whole world in his hands. Cool color function!
Giant sweet tie
Funny green picture, we decided it looks like an alien from some movie we can´t quite figure out. 
Another green, this time either eating something or posing like a model.
A district meeting with my Comp and our district leader Elder Hansen (and random Hermanas that came to sit in on his class since it is so dang good!
Looking eager…a night after office and field work, chatting around the table.
Planning in our room after a day at the office. Elder Guest interrupts us by coming in and laying on my bed.
Another cool color function, jamming for the roommates.
He´s got the whole world in his hands. Cool color function!
The Rolla Holla! Saturday, March 7, 2009
Well, this week, it´s time for a more in-depth description of…¨The office.¨ We wake up at 630 like everyone else in the mission, unless we happen to have been up to 2 or 3 the night before working on special projects for President in preparation for zone conference or special changes, or whatever the surprise of the day might be. We are basically his helping hands, his running feet, his delivering wheels, and his typing fingers. I eat, exercise, shower, practice the piano (yeah, cool, I almost have Called To Serve down and plan to keep learning, hopefully one day to be able to just site read music). Then, we do an abbreviated study, to get into the office by 8:30, and work according to a personal plan and a very independently motivated environment.
The Officinistas live in a house of 4, my companion, the secretary, me ¨The Clerk, ¨ Elder Davis, the Fichero (document guy), and Elder Guest, the Financiero. It has been great to learn from each of them and there examples. My companion is kind and loving and very willing to help with everything. He keeps the office running and reminds us of our deadlines for President. He knows how to do missionary work and speaks excellent Spanish. Elder Davis is tall and lanky and almost an exact replica of Napolean Dynamite. He dances and has a guteral goofy laugh. One day as he leaned over Elder Guest´s desk spinning scissors on his fingers, Elder Guest told him he was going to poke out his eye. His response was, ¨come on Elder, I spin Frisbees all the time,¨ which it turns out he does every night, and did in the high school talent show. The kid is hilarious. Elder Guest is loud and goofy and some think he is very obnoxious. I love him and, though occasionally frustrated, do a pretty good job of showing it.
As the Clerk my primary responsibilities are: taking care of ALL mail and packages for 140 missionaries, organizing their cell phones and keeping an updated list of who has which, organizing and executing marriages (with a Paraguayan judge), doing all cleaning, maintenance, and reparation on mission vehicles (or taking them to get done), creating the Going Home Video for missionaries who are going home, and making the layout and content of the monthly mission newsletter. Yup, keeps me pretty busy. Most of all, I love the creative jobs that I have. Designing and even writing some content for the newsletter has kept me excited and allowed me to do a little writing, which I love. Meanwhile I feel I am learning SO much to prepare me for what I hope won´t be a too-long-delayed jump back into the field. At the end of each day, I lay in bed, happy with the hard, mentally tiring office work, but overjoyed with the success that we are finding in our area, rich and more stubborn as it may be.
We found a man named Derlis. He has set a goal to be baptized the 11th, which will break a yearlong streak of no baptisms in this area. It turns out that past office Elders haven´t taken their out-of-the-office work as seriously. Derlis is excited and reads well and understands the principals that we teach him. His family of 7 is going to be coming from the Chaco (or the huge northern part of Paraguay where very few people live in a desert-jungle like terrain). He says they are excited to hear our message and would like to follow their father into the waters of baptism as well.
How exciting is this work! I love it so much. Thank you all for your love and support.
See ya in the blink of an eye!
Elder McCarty
The Officinistas live in a house of 4, my companion, the secretary, me ¨The Clerk, ¨ Elder Davis, the Fichero (document guy), and Elder Guest, the Financiero. It has been great to learn from each of them and there examples. My companion is kind and loving and very willing to help with everything. He keeps the office running and reminds us of our deadlines for President. He knows how to do missionary work and speaks excellent Spanish. Elder Davis is tall and lanky and almost an exact replica of Napolean Dynamite. He dances and has a guteral goofy laugh. One day as he leaned over Elder Guest´s desk spinning scissors on his fingers, Elder Guest told him he was going to poke out his eye. His response was, ¨come on Elder, I spin Frisbees all the time,¨ which it turns out he does every night, and did in the high school talent show. The kid is hilarious. Elder Guest is loud and goofy and some think he is very obnoxious. I love him and, though occasionally frustrated, do a pretty good job of showing it.
As the Clerk my primary responsibilities are: taking care of ALL mail and packages for 140 missionaries, organizing their cell phones and keeping an updated list of who has which, organizing and executing marriages (with a Paraguayan judge), doing all cleaning, maintenance, and reparation on mission vehicles (or taking them to get done), creating the Going Home Video for missionaries who are going home, and making the layout and content of the monthly mission newsletter. Yup, keeps me pretty busy. Most of all, I love the creative jobs that I have. Designing and even writing some content for the newsletter has kept me excited and allowed me to do a little writing, which I love. Meanwhile I feel I am learning SO much to prepare me for what I hope won´t be a too-long-delayed jump back into the field. At the end of each day, I lay in bed, happy with the hard, mentally tiring office work, but overjoyed with the success that we are finding in our area, rich and more stubborn as it may be.
We found a man named Derlis. He has set a goal to be baptized the 11th, which will break a yearlong streak of no baptisms in this area. It turns out that past office Elders haven´t taken their out-of-the-office work as seriously. Derlis is excited and reads well and understands the principals that we teach him. His family of 7 is going to be coming from the Chaco (or the huge northern part of Paraguay where very few people live in a desert-jungle like terrain). He says they are excited to hear our message and would like to follow their father into the waters of baptism as well.
How exciting is this work! I love it so much. Thank you all for your love and support.
See ya in the blink of an eye!
Elder McCarty
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