The Rolla Holla: The Rolla Holla! Saturday, 7.25.09

Let me take some time to tell you about the people that surround me. I´ve talked about President Wade and Elder Frutos. Hermana Wade is incredible. She has the gift of appreciation. Like my own indescribably awesome mother, she has a way of making you feel her love and appreciation for you. The sometimes demanding leadership style of President Wade is perfectly complimented by her concentrated love and consistent compliments and expressions of gratitude. The burning desire to serve President well, bordering on fear of dissapointing, is supplemented by the desire to deserve the Hermana´s praise, and pay back her love. The two do a great job of reminding eachother to be balanced, it seems, since the President will often stop himself in the very rare moments of frustration or criticism and remember to give praise or the Hermana to give assignments :-).
Some time last week the Hermana came into the office and sped past my desk before I could look up from what I was typing. I heard her yell from the office kitchen, ¨have you Elders eaten yet?¨ Whether we had or not, the question was music to our ears, and we all shouted no, almost in unison. Within minutes a sweet, familiar scent was floating out of the kitchen on waves of smoke…my mouth starting watering and my mind rang with memories of back porch cook offs and summer night gatherings: we were in for a BBQ! Though a few weeks late, it was time to celebrate the 4th of July. Hermana Wade popped in an audio presentation explaining the origin of the star spangled banner and opened Windows Media Player to the hippy looking waves and explosions view—the next best thing to a fireworks show. President, the Assistants, and us 4 Office Elders sat arround Elder Davis´s desk right outside the kitchen, eating hot dogs, smiling uncontrollably, and feeling patriotic.
With changes came my new companion: Elder Rodriguez. He is Urugayan and speaks excellent English. He is a great missionary. We did a division in my 3rd or 4th change and he taught me the importance of ensuring conversion before baptism. I´m excited to teach with him and we are both fired up to turn the office area into one like any other. We are convinced that our Heavenly Father is willing to bless us for the sacrifice we make to be in the office, especially after we were given it -as an Apostolic promise from our last Area Seventy visit.
Change week was once again crazy, but we let our investigators know (Javier and the Marcial and Saides family are the only ones really progressing right now) so our absence wasn´t TOO big a shock. We returned this weekend and they are all really well and ready for church. Marcial and Saide will be married August 8th and the 3 of them will be baptized August 9th.
We have seen the power of setting goals, as we set out the desires of our heart to a loving father in Heaven and see his help. The other day on a cold humid Paraguayan night, we needed 5 more contacts to complete our daily goals and thereby our weekly goal of doing 7/7 days completing our daily goals. We drove around and when we saw Marcos walking, we felt we should contact him. We flew around the next corner passing him and jumped out of the car so as not to appear awkward. We came around the corner just as he was, about 20 feet away from our truck and hollered a greeting in Guarani. Turns out he is a great guy and invited us over to share our message with him. I know without any doubt, from experience, that God is preparing people to receive his gospel, according to our faith and works. I love to see that happen and am so thankful for it. I am thankful for you, my friends and family, that love and support me. Thank you for everything! I love you all!
Elder McCarty

041 I thought it would be cool to have a goodbye breakfast the last basketball morning of changes. We made a delicious cinnamon syrup and all just dipped: shared syrup like everthing else in Paraguay.

039 This weird animal at the park that just walks around. We think it is a mix between a horse and a wooly mammoth.

036 Our office football team in the Paraguay Classic, jersey´s thanks to Elder Williamson´s excellent design skills. He now went off to Horqueta in the north desert!

029 Hacking our way through the Paraguayan Jungle

McCarty: Elder Williamson and Javier and I looking like tough guys. He is the investigator with one leg who climbed up onto a bus for the first time since his leg was cut off to make it to church!