Wednesday, April 24, 2013


Alma 37:33-35

Preach unto them repentance, and faith on the Lord Jesus Christ; teach them to humble themselves and to be meek and lowly in heart; teach them to withstand every temptation of the devil, with their faith on the Lord Jesus Christ.

Teach them to never be weary of good works, but to be meek and lowly in heart; for such shall find rest to their souls.  O, remember, my son, and learn wisdom in thy youth; yeah learn in thy youth to keep the commandments of God.

Updated Wall Photos

Saturday, April 20, 2013

MTC Companionships


Elder Hackleman from Papillion, NE (center right) and his MTC companion Elder Richards from Lehi, UT (far right). Elder Ovard from Boise, ID (far left). Elder Taylor, from Australia (center left). All roommates! Funny, not one of their beds are made! They'll get along great!!

When I have grown a foot or two.


Friday, April 19, 2013

Jaren's 1st Email from MTC



Hey Family!!!!!!!!! So my P day is on Thursday but we didn’t get one last week because it was only the first day after we got here.

The MTC is SOOOO fantastic! First off, I got called to be district leader ONE day after I got here!!!!! I am district leader over another companionship of elders and 2 sister companionships. My companion's name is Elder Richards. He's from Lehi and we are both going to the same mission. He is sooooo awesome. We room with the other set of elders under my district stewardship. Elder Ovard is from Boise and Elder Taylor is from Sydney Australia! Isn't that awesome!!!!!!! The Sisters or Hermanas are Hermana Healey from Taylorsville UT, Hermana Elton from Eugene OR, Hermana Tollman from Vancouver Canada, and Hermana Phillips from Logan UT! I have to go rotate my laundry, I'll be back. haha Love you all!!!!

Ok Sorry!!! So anyways. I have learned more Spanish in the last week than i did the two years in high school combined!!! I can already pray and give a simple testimony completely in Spanish!!! We've already started teaching our first "investigator." We teach completely in Spanish. His name is Eric. He volunteers to be an investigator so we can practice teaching lessons. Not a single word of English is spoken. We've taught him 3 lessons already. The Preach My Gospel Manual is literally second only to the Book of Mormon and Bible. The entire thing is full of Spiritual principles that could not be explained better.

We had a devotional on sunday given by the director of public advertising or something for the church. He talked to us all about the "I'm a Mormon" campaign the Church has come out with and about LDS advertising in general. It was soooo cool. He also talked about the Book of Mormon Play that's big right now and how, despite the raunchiness of it, it has actually brought a lot of investigators because people go see it, get incredibly offended, and decide to see what the church's stance is on it. On Tuesday we had another devotional given by....THE Richard G. Scott of THE Quorum of the Twelve Apostles!!!! It was sooooo amazing! He talked all about the importance of talking to our Heavenly Father through prayer and the importance of actually praying out loud. He also talked about how important missionary work is. Before he gave his talk, the president of the MTC was reading an introduction for him so we could all know more about him. Towards the end of it, the president said, "And even though all of these things are important and fun to know about Richard G. Scott, he leaned over to me before I stood up here at the podium and said, Don't worry about all that stuff. Just tell them that I love my Heavenly Father." How awesome is that!!!!! The entire room full of the thousands of missionaries could barely breathe the entire time he was there because of how awesome it was and how strong the Spirit was. I sang in the MTC Choir and we sang Nearer My God To Thee right before he spoke. When he stood up the first thing he said was, "I've died and gone to Heaven. That was the most beautiful song I've ever heard." HOW AWESOME!!!!! Anyways, as you can tell, I am having a total blast.

Seth! You need to be careful with that head. One can only take so many concussions in a life ha ha. I'm glad you got to go to prom though. I hope it was a blast. Nathan, keep working on those hands. You'll be starting X receiver before you know it! Grantee!!!!! I hope you’re having fun in school!! Well guys my time is running out so I better go. I love you all. Use Dear Elder to send letters sometimes too. I get those right away then I can just send you letters back. Love you all!!! Thanks for writing me!!!!! 

Dad. Su Espanol es muy bueno. Keep it up haha!

Friday, April 12, 2013

Elder Hackleman's Excited

These were taken two days before Jaren entered

The Provo MTC.