April 18, 2011

Yo Yo Yo What up?

 

 

So I`ll start off telling you guys about the highlight of the week which was Zone Conference with Elder Hinckley!! Him and his wife made the trip out on Monday I think and stayed until Friday. Wednesday we had our conference with him and it did not dissapoint. He was throwing out alot of compliments to our mission. I`m not sure if he does that on every mission tour, but it was fun to hear. He said we are the most organized he`s seen as far as goals. He loves our focus on families and priesthood aged men. He`s going to share our ideas in his meeting with the apostles. We also have the best Mission President in Central America if not the world haha

 

I loved listening to the conference because it was all in English so I didn`t have to concentrate much to listen. They hooked up all the latinos with headsets and a translator. Elder Hinckley gave us alot of advice and I walked away learning a ton. He said I hope if you get one thing out of this mission it`s learning how to work. My father loved to work and never took a vacation. Find joy and pleasure in working hard and accomplishing something everyday.

My comp got called on to do a role play, but I lucked out and just watched. Food was awesome there and I got together with buddies.

 

Friday we had the almost amazingly awesome experience. We came home from doing divisions Thursday and I was praying to see what we could do. Just then, the phone rang and it was the APs. They said Elder Hinckley was flying back to the states but wanted to go out with the missionaries for a bit first. They chose our area to come and meet with the Solano family. Here comes the sad part. We did everything we could to put an appointment with them, but they said sorry we can`t do it. Elder Vallejo and I were a little disapointed to say the least. Us and the Solanos both missed out on a sweeet oppurtunity. Oh well.

 

Their baptism didn`t end up happening on Saturday. She drank coffee in the morning, after a few days with out it. The good part is she said it made her sick and she`s never going to drink again. We`re going to do what we can to baptize them this week but they might be going out of town. This week is a huge holiday for the catholic religion or all of Costa Rica ha. Semana Santa it`s called.

We do have a set date for this Saturday with Jose Pavon though. A man we`ve been working with for a couple weeks.

 

Last week I believe, we were knocking doors and I contacted a woman named Cindy Lopez. She told us to come back Friday so we did. We had an awesome first lesson with her and she made it out to church and loved it. I was a little busy in church giving a talk and teaching gospel principles. The lesson went really well. Our 6 investigators and recent converts were talking about overcoming their challenges. At the end Cindy said I have question. What does coffee and tea have to do with anything? haha

We`ll explain that later I said. Gabriel, one of our recent converts also blessed the sacrament for the first time.

 

Well thanks for everything guys. Love you all.

 

 

Pura Vida

 

Elder Miller

 

 

March 28

Heyyy What's up guys! 

So I have a real excuse for not writing you on Monday. Write after internet last week I found out the zone was taking a temple trip today . Well, I`m writing you now so no worries haha. By the way next transfers are the 27th not 24th like I said. 

Who`s excited for conference??? This Elder definitely is. There is something about being a missionary that just makes conference so awesome. I can hardly wait. Hopefully I`ll score it in English again like I did last time. 

Like I said we went to the temple today. I guess we can only get scheduled in on Wednesdays. The last time I went was probably in October. Whoooh. The extended amount of wait definitely makes you appreciate the temple more, but hopefully I won`t have to wait so long to go again. 

After visting the temple we headed back to San Jose and got some "tico" burgers. Not in the slight bit close to real american hamburgers but it`s the best we could do. Costa Ricans should probably stick to rice and beans. They also gave us some tres leches for dessert. I was the first Elder to eat it and downed it pretty quick. Then, Elder Garcia next to me ate his. A little while afterwards, the other missionaries realized the dessert smelled way too much like alcohol. hahah ummm... That may explain my slight tipsyness and headache right now. oops Hope that doesn`t come up in my interview in a couple weeks. 

Well anyways now for the real news. La Campiña baptized two this week!! Yea Yeahh 
Esmeralda ended up getting baptized up north in Escazu because the water heater didn`t work out. Karla also got baptized sunday after church. A lot of the ward stayed and supported. Man I`ve got a lot more stories, but no time. We do internet together as a zone so I can`t extend my time. I love you all! Take care 


Pura Vida 

Elder Miller 

April 4

Buenas Dìas todos or Aloha to the vactioners out in Hawaii :) 

Hope all is well. I enjoyed seeing the baptism pictures of Brody. Congrats Primito. Hopefully I`ll get to baptize in a pool by the end of my mission or even the Ocean! 

Elder Vallejo and I are enjoying ourselves here. Pday in the morning usually calls for a couple of games of ping pong. In which I usually smash him in all. However, he`s picking it up pretty fast and managed to steal one from me today. 

Missionary work is good as well. We do do that too. haha We picked up a couple new investigators off of refrences and maybe we`ll make good on a couple. 3 made it out to conference and all enjoyed it. I really enjoyed conference as well. My favorites were : Elder Cook saturday morning (he gave a shout out to mission viejo and Laguna Niguel stakes yea yeah) I really liked that story. Plus it was a good talk on appreciating the sisters. Elder Andersen in Priesthood. Just a cool one that I enjoyed. Elder Scott Sunday afternoon. Very heartfelt tribute to his wife and sweet talk on Marriage. Of course I also liked the two from our Prophet. He`s an awesome man. 

The welfare aniversary theme made me think of a lady we are teching.  Her name is Ana Lucia and she was baptized 2 years ago. She actually gave us the reference 6 months ago for Esmeralda who was baptized last week. Since her baptism she`s left the church twice and this time she says she`s not going back. Both being for the reason of not recieving help from the members or Bishopbric when she was in sore need of help. She is a little crazy but I can see why she would be offended. We try telling people this phrase when things happen and they fall away. La Iglesia es perfecta pero los miembros no somos. The church is perfect but as members we are not. There`s no need to leave the church for something that a member has done. I`m really grateful for having the oppurtunity to listen to the prophets speak this weekend. They truly tell us what we need to hear. Well I love you all. Have an awesome week. 


Pura Vida 

Elder Miller