It’s
Elder Maybury here in Mataró!!!!
I miss
you guys so much! I love each and every one of you! I am so happy to hear about
your experiences back home. It sounds like you guys are having more fun without
me there! Just kidding. I am really glad that the Lord has been blessing you
and the family while I am here.
Mataró is
very hot. The ward and church building is a lot smaller than the one back home.
The members are very nice though. I am trying not to think about home so much
because I miss being there. I am trying to turn my heart and mind to the Lord. I
will keep praying.
My first
day in Mataró was a bit difficult. Contacting is hard to do on the streets so
we are focusing on door knocking. We walk a lot and we take the bus when we
can.
My miracle story
was when I first came out to Barcelona and I was with my temporary companions and I
was very hungry. We went to go teach a family and they had food for us. It
wasn't even a dinner appointment! What a blessing!
I admire that my companion is very obedient to the mission
rules. It also helps me stay positive when I am down on myself. I think I might
be in the red zone too much. My week here is very difficult for me. We mostly have cereal for
breakfast, lunch and dinner. But we do have dinner appointments as well. Elder
Graham is a nice elder, really smart too. He is helping me adjust here.
We don't really
have and baptisms or any investigators with dates. There is an investigator who
has to find another job before he gets baptized because he works of Saturdays
and Sundays. But if he gets a new job, he will be baptized in two weeks. We did
find a family who wants to hear the gospel and we will teach them later this
week.
We did a ping pong
activity at the church. It was fun. We only had 3 members show up but it was a
good experience.
I have been
focusing in trying to feel the Spirit. I don't think I am feeling it as often
as I should. I am trying to study and be obedient. I am trying to increase my
language but it is very hard for me.
I will do
my best to serve the Lord and his people. I will do my best to forget myself
and go to work. There are miracles here and they do occur daily. I am trying to
feel the spirit. It's just going to take some time to get used to being
here.
Elder Maybury
A few pictures…
Elder Maybury looking over the mission (Castell de Montjuic)
On the
train ride to Barcelona with Hermanas Warburton y Boriosi
Train ride to Barcelona with Elder Eiguren
Overlooking
the city of Mataró
Spent some of our P-day in Girona with other missionaries
This blog post was a heavily edited one because my son was
feeling very down this week. The
transition from the very safe confines of the MTC, where everything is handled
for you (meals, schedules, AC, language) can be difficult as you transition to the
“real” world. The missionaries focus on
working 12 hours a day. Most of it is
walking and trying to find people to share their message with. As you can imagine, it is very hard. On top of that, he is not fluent yet in
Spanish, or even at the point where he is feeling comfortable. That also makes it difficult. And, as you read above, he is on his own for
food – which mostly consists of cereal, unless someone they are teaching offers
them food. This is the life of a
missionary. All of us who have served a
mission, understand these moments.
To be honest, receiving his email this week broke my heart. I could feel, throughout the week, that he was struggling. In part it was because I am aware of how hard the first week in the field can be, and I know my son and I could just feel his struggles. I can't explain it anymore than that. To finally hear from him was wonderful, but to see his despair was quite difficult. Both his father and I sent him back an immediate response in hopes that we could extend to him a little bit of the connection and encouragement that he was needing.
I will share with you a little bit of my response back to
my son.
…my son,
you are not weak because you feel [these difficulties] so heavily. On the
contrary. You are strong because you can recognize how hard it is.
It takes strength to recognize your weaknesses. It takes strength to know
when to ask for help. It takes strength to kneel down and humble yourself
before the Lord and tell Him that you cannot do this on your own. Elder
Graham sounds like a great companion. And he did not get where he is now
by being great on his own all the time. He, too, I am sure, went through
difficult moments early on. The mission is a great changer. It can
change you, if you let. It requires you to shake off all of the old
weaknesses and all of the natural man, and all of the expectations that YOU
brought into the mission because IT WILL THEN BUILD YOU BACK UP INTO WHO THE
LORD NEEDS YOU TO BE. Growing can be painful. Growing can be
stressful. Growing is always difficult. But it is never the wrong
thing to do.
Mijo, … I
knew that this week would be hard for you. I know that the immediate
answer is to feel that Spanish is too hard and the mission is too hard and that
somehow coming home would be easier. However, … “a mission is not
supposed to be easy”. If it is hard sometimes, it means you are doing the
work. Yes, it will get easier. Of course it will. But you are
in a new country, with a new language, doing this work 12 hours a day! Of
course it is hard! Of course you feel a little small for the task. But do
not diminish the fact that you were called. You were chosen. I
don’t want you to come home the same way you were when you left. You are
there to learn, to grow, to listen, to heal, to weep at times, to get
connected, to figure some things out, to work, to humble yourself, and to
become as your Father in Heaven needs you to be. Don’t come home until
you are that man. Don’t come home until you have fully taken upon
yourself EVERYTHING that a mission has to offer. EVERYTHING. Mijo, … you
cannot know FULL JOY and FULL HAPPINESS if you have not experienced these low
moments of sadness, weakness and vulnerability. HOW can you recognize the
fullness of the Lord’s love and joy if you never experienced the depth of
sorrow at your own weakness? We all must go through this.
Son, do not
worry about the language. It will come. It will. No one has
ever lived in Spain for 2 years and not been able to speak the language. But
DO NOT think that you are supposed to be fluent by week 7. You have 97
more weeks to pick up the language. You will do just fine. Take off
some of the pressure, mijo.
The reason I am
choosing to share this with you all in this week’s blog post is one, because it
is important to document Elder Maybury’s journey, even through the difficult
times, so that he can look back and see how far he has come after 2 years.
Two, to ask each of you to say an extra
prayer for my son. Pray for his
strength, his health, and his focus.
Pray that he will be able to face the challenges that each day presents.
And three, so that each of us can look at
missionaries in our areas and maybe be a little kinder, extend them an extra
hand, or even offer them a meal. These
young men and women work hard and they leave their families and the comforts of
their home for 18-24 months and instead of focusing on our own comforts for
just a few minutes, maybe we could just extend to them a simple gesture of
kindness. I think it could make all the
difference in their week.
Finally, I had shared
this with my son in an earlier email (around Week 4) but I sent it to him
again. It is a great reminder of who
walks with us in times of difficulty. May we each benefit from being reminded that
in OUR moments of weakness and difficulty, WE do not walk alone.
As always, if you would like to write to Elder Maybury, please do so at this address:
Elder Alexander J. Maybury
Spain Barcelona Mission
C / Calatrava 10-12, bajos
08017 Barcelona
Spain
Thank you for supporting our son!
Note: His P-days are now on Monday and so this blog will be updated on Mondays/Tuesdays from now on.
Note: His P-days are now on Monday and so this blog will be updated on Mondays/Tuesdays from now on.
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