Dear Dad, Mom, Reece, and Remi,
Thank you for your emails! Wow, this new gmail format for myldsmail is great! It's fast, reliable, and really gets the job done. I am grateful they finally changed it!!
To answer your questions... yes, I think Rockland would be a nice place to stay again, but I haven't really seen any other places so I am not sure. I hink a four man apartment would be really good - Reece and I, Elder Henz, and someone else from my mission who's going to the I because there is a ton of us (unless Reece has some friends who are going to BYU-I as well?)
Please let me know if you hear anything from or about Grandpa getting my package. I am curious to know if he got it and what was done with it. I will continue to pray for him. :)
The weather is warming up now and it feels great! Although I think today it is going to rain.
Elder Henz is at Disney World right now having fun with a recent convert from the Orlando Portuguese ward and some other Brazilian missionaries. He served a great mission and he says thanks for your good wishes and support from last week. This morning I was filling out my new six week planner and had a startling realization. I only have four transfers left starting today. This was surprising to me because I remember when Elder Palmer only had 4 transfers left and it didn't seem like that long! I am going to make the best of the time that I have left because it only comes once in a lifetime.
It was hard to say goodbye to Elder Henz because he was a great companion but I know that I will probably get to see him this fall. A lot of members gave him gifts and great dinners due to his departure, including the B. family treating us to a dinner at Texas Roadhouse: very tasty steak!
Thank you for all your recent letters! I apologize that I haven't been able to send my reply letters yet, I should finish them today and send them out along with pictures and some other things. :) I will do my best to get those to you soon.
I am glad that you got an e-mail from the W. family! I am excited for the family whom we took the picture with because we have a teaching appointment and dinner set up with them for Friday. They have a lot of children (3 others that were not in the picture) and are very positive about the church. They know lots of members like the W. family and definitely have the potential to be baptized! Their oldest son is already a member (baptized maybe a year ago). Please pray for them that their hearts will be touched by our message and that they will want to be baptized.
The Baptism of Brother C. went very well on Saturday! He is such an amazing man. I am so happy to have been involved with his progression towards baptism. The G. family is the family that has fellowshipped him the most. Brother G. is Brother C.'s dentist and has been there for him every step of the way. In fact, do you remember the scenario that President Hinkley described of members being the finders and fellowshippers and missionaries being the teachers. Well, this is a perfect example of that! Bro. C.'s hometeachers both attended the baptism and both of them said many great things about him in their talks. He is now the oldest member of the Viera ward and the eldest of the high priest group! The G. family will be sending you pictures of the baptism soon and I am excited for you because Bro G. is also a professional photographer!
I want to share an awesome experience with you that I had this week: After the baptism and our appointments on Saturday afternoon, Elder Henz and I went to Ross so he could get some final things before his departure. My initial thoughts on this trip were ones of frustration because I wanted to be out tracting or teaching someone, not making last minute shopping trips. But the Lord definitely wanted us there that day because he needed us to teach four lessons in the store and He put us right where he needed us. The first people we talked to while Elder Henz was unsuccessfully looking for a backpack was the G. family [different "G." family]! Of all the people in Viera we ran into this member referral from the J. family in our ward. We had a nice conversation and invited them to come to church which was going to be Elder Henz's last Sunday. They said they would try and we continued on our way. Then we talked to a man in Spanish whom we had never met before, but he was from Honduras and his son was a member. We taught him a little more about the church and missionary work and left him with a pass a long card and our personal information. He was really nice. The most important person we talked to in that store was another member referral from the J. family. As I was walking to the counter to pay for some gold toe socks that I found for 2.99 (great deal! :)) I ran into Vilma coming into the store. She and her family are from Venezuela and they are very nice. They have already been coming to church for the past three weeks and they are great friends with 5 very solid families from the ward. We had only met once but she new who I was before I remembered who she was. She said do you remember me? I said yes because I remembered her face even though at first I couldn't remember her name. As we spoke she immediately began to express some questions and concerns that had been pressing on her mind and I helped answer each of the questions she had about the church. Elder Henz came over after he saw me talking with her and we ended up teaching to her needs for over an hour in the store, standing in the women's sweater aisle. She shared with us a number of spiritual experiences and promptings that she has had lately and without our prompting she realized that they were from God and were all pointing towards joining the Chruch of Jesus Christ of Latter-day saints. I felt the spirit so strong as we spoke and yet we were standing in the middle of Ross! As we were answering a question she had about why we do not use the cross on our buildings (she is formerly catholic) a minister of another faith came over and surprisingly joined our conversation and confirmed what we were already saying. I'm glad he was nice. Vilma invited us for dinner on Thursday and to share with her family the missionary lessons. She said she had realized that all her spiritual experiences were pointing towards her and her family joining the church. We are going to set a baptismal date with her family then and I know that the Lord places others in our path to help them learn of the restored gospel. This was a great last day of full-time missionary work for Elder Henz and I am so grateful to be a missionary!
This week I was able to go to the temple with the Linton family and it was a very nice visit. I had a lot of questions answered and learned a lot! They even took us out to 5 Guys burger joint afterwards. The Lintons are another one of my favorite families in the ward. There is a lot of favorite families that I have in this ward because the ward is so awesome!
I don't have my new apartment address because we haven't moved yet but when I get it I will let you know. We may not move until later, it just depends on what the mission office wants to do.
My new companion is Elder Derek Devine from Washington and he has been out as long as elder Shepherd and I because we all flew out on the same plane together from the MTC. He will arrive here tomorrow morning. This will be Elder Devine's first time as a zone leader so I will be training him on zone leader responsibilities. I know him a little bit also because he was district leader in the Deland Zone when I was there as zone leader a few transfers back. I am excited for the new elders and sisters coming into our zone and pray that it will help bring more fire and excitement so we can work harder towards reaching our zone goals.
We are working as a zone to accomplish our goals of extending the Lord's invitation for baptism daily and role playing it in our companionship study daily. This has helped us increase in the number of new investigators from 3 per week per companionship to 6! Another goal that has helped is President's challenge to take 30 minute lunches. This allows us more time to focus on the work and investigators. I am looking forward to the new transfer. I will do my best to show Elder Devine the role of a zone leader by example and help the Cocoa zone to reach our baptismal goals. I know it is possible through the Lord's help. Thank you for all your support!
Mom, I hope work at the Library continues to go well! Dad, it was awesome to hear about your teaching seminary on Friday and I am excited for your to finish the house! Reece, I am so happy for you being accepted to BYU-I and BYU (I know prayers are answered!) and I hope you feel better! Remi, I hope school is going well and that you are having fun with your brother! Roxy and Truman- meow, meow. bark, bark! Hope you each have an awesome week!
Love,
Elder Miller
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment