Pictures

Elder Williams and I (my old companion), Omar and

I at his baptism, and Elder Toledo and I

Week of June 15th-21th

Nalhujooy familia!

Taajunashelh?! haha. Thats, "Hi family, how are you?" in nibacle, the native language of my new companion! I was wrong last week, its written nibacle, and its pronounced (KNEE BAH CLAY). As you can see, I am learning his language. So this week was truly awesome, I LOVE training. I was with the zone leaders until wednesday, and then I went to resistencia and picked up my new missionary! As you know, the missionary that I am training is a native indian from Paraguay, from the tribe nibacle. His name is Elder Toledo. He is 22 years old. He comes from a family of 7. He and 4 other new missionaries are some of the first people to serve missions from their tribe. They are super super special humble people. They are incredible. Really humble, excited to learn. The speak very little spanish, but my companion actually speaks pretty alright! The tribe nibacle is a tribe in northern Paraguay. Like 20 years ago 2 missionaries baptized the tribe leader, and all the members of the tribe always follow what the leader does, so they all got baptized too. Its like a book of mormon story, right?!.. Anyway, my companion loves to play soccer, he worked a lot of construction with his dad before the mission. He is quiet, humble, always super happy. They dont have books of mormon in his language, so hes never read the Book of Mormon before. I actually really love teaching him because we are starting from the very basics, and I have to explain everything in really basic terms, which really helps me understand things a lot better and it helps me learn how to teach in a more simple way. He speaks pretty good spanish, he can communicate himself pretty good. A lot better than the missionaries from the U.S. when they are new. Its interesting that he thinks in nibacle..I think in english.. And we both meet half way in spanish. All day long I am like, "hey, how do you say this in nibacle?!" And he says, "hey, how do you say this in english?!" haha. We are loving it. All week we have just been focusing on basics.. How to explain things really simple in order that he can talk in the lessons too. He is really good at bearing his testimony, he always is so happy to tell the people that he knows the lesson is true. It amazes me their desire to serve the Lord, even when they have never read all the way through the Book of Mormon for themselves or dont understand everything completely. They are AWESOME. He is learning really fast. 

This week we contacted all week and we found 2 new investigators. Gerarldo, who almost was baptized a year ago but had a few obstacles and the missionaries stopped visiting him, and now we have found him again and he is excited to come to church. He wants to change his life and he really likes to learn. He is about 30 years old, he is going to have a baby in a few months. We also found Juan, a grandpa that likes to listen to us and wants to come to church. And we are working with Juliana, the investigator that we found last week. She is really catholic but she likes to learn about what we believe and she wants to see what the church is like. So thats what we were able to do this week. I know that God is helping us every step of the way find the people that he is preparing.. Almost everyday this week when all our plans fell through, we decided to contact and we ended up finding new investigators. Things are going really well, I am loving training and I love being companions with Elder Toledo.

This week we are going to try hard to help Elder Toledo talk more in the lessons and have confidence in his ability to explain and teach. I am really excited to train him. I hope that everything is going well for you guys and I hope that you have a great week! Thank you for your emails! Pictures attached: The baptism of Omar last week with all the members, Elder Morrin and I, and Omar with Brother Goytia right after he was baptized. More pictures will be attached in another email!

Elder T. Miles

June 8th - 14th

Hey friends, family!

I hope that everyone is doing awesome. We had a week for the books. Super solid. Elder Williams and I finished well. First of all, Omar got baptized this saturday! WOOO! He passed his baptismal interview on thursday and was able to get baptized on saturday and confirmed sunday. His baptism was really special, we had to organize everything and invite everyone really last minute, but the members really came through for us and we had a great attendance to his baptism. A member named Ulises baptized him, he is an awesome guy. The branch president made a lot of refreshments and it was a great activity where all the members came together. I felt the spirit so strongly in his baptism, I really felt God´s love for me. I am glad that I was able to an instrument in the Lord´s in bringing a soul unto him, it makes me want to work harder and do everything I can to help more people come unto Christ. Omar is such a good kid, I know that we will be good friends forever. It makes me so happy to see him take a positive path in his life, there are so many bad influences that surround him and I am glad that he has choosen to follow Jesus Christ in his life. So that was a really happy day. 

Next big news. Are you all ready? As you know, transfers were on monday, and Elder Williams left. We had a great two weeks together and we had a lot of success, but the Lord has called him to a different area. Starting tomorrow, I will be a training!! Woohoo!! But, its not your normal training. President Franco called me and told me that I am going to be training 1 of the 4 new missionaries that are coming from Paraguay. These special 4 missionaries are indians, from the tribe nebucle. (Pronounced in english, NAY-BOO-CLAY). They dont speak spanish, and they dont speak the normal language in Paraguay (guarani) either. The speak nebucle. Its like an ancient extinct language from Paraguay. These 4 missionaries have never been in civilazation before, the MTC in Buenos Aires was their first taste of real city life. They had never seen running water before. We are going to stay in my area, Armenia 1. So that makes me feel better because I already know really well my area. I know that this will be really hard.. I have no idea how well they have learned to speak spanish in the MTC and I know that it will probably be a real culture shock for him, but I know that the Lord has called me to do this work. If the mission has taught me anything, it has taught me that the Lord qualifies who he calls. I know that the Lord would never give me a challenge I wouldnt be able to do, so I know that the Lord will be with me in ever step of this training. I am stoked to be a trainer, I have wanted to train for a long time now and I know that I am going to learn so much by training. Training a nebucle will be an experience that I think I will remember for the rest of my life, so I am super ready to get out there and start working hard with him. I am going to try hard to learn his language. How cool would that be?.. Anyway, I could really use all of your prayers this week to help me be able to give this new missionary a great training experience, I sure hope that I can help him enjoy the mission. 

Other news, my best friend, my zone leader Elder Morrin, went home on monday! He has put in his 2 years and now he is heading home. It was sad to see him leave, I am super grateful for all that he has taught me. Now we have a new zone leader with us, Elder Stout, he has 7 months in the mission and he is from Whoyming. I have been staying with them since Monday and I will leave to Resistencia tomorrow to pick up my new missionary, and then we will head back here to Armenia. ALSO, I complete 11 months in the mission today!! WOOO!! We are coming up on the year mark here. The mission has gone crazy fast and slow as molasses all at the same time. 

We didnt find any new investigators this week and we dont have any potential baptisms, so my new companion and I will be starting from scratch. AKA, a ton of door knocking. So I am super excited to get out there and start sharing the beauty of the message of the Restoration with people that are searching for the truth.

I would like to bare my testimony that I truly know that Jesus Christ loves and loves everyone of us. Words cant express the gratitude that I have for the Restoration of the gospel, it has changed me life and has given me a greater purpose. I promise that true happiness comes by following Jesus Christ by living his gospel. Thank you for all your emails and support, I am not sure how emailing is going to go with my new companion but I am sure that I will be able to write you guys like normal. I am excited to give you guys the updates next week of the beggingings of this great new adventure. I hope you all have a great week!!

P.S., I have a lot of photos from the baptism of Omar but the computer that I am using wont let me upload photos, so I will for sure send them next week when I am in a better cyber!

Elder T. Miles

Photos

Here is proof that I am eating and learning how to cook. The first is empenadas (argentine food, kind of like a sealed taco), the second is what I eat for breakfast everyday, its oatmeal with liquid yogurt with bananas and coconut and honey. Super good. And the last is homemade mac and cheese that Elder Herrera taught me how to make. 

Pictures

More photos!.. The first picture is Elder Herrera and I the day before he left in our Boca jerseys (one of the popular soccer teams here) and sombreros, the second one is us celebrating elder Herrera´s birthday witht the Navarro family, and third picture I took on the 20th of May. It is implied that you need to understand a little spanish. 

Week of June 1st-7th

Hola todos!

I hope that everyone is doing well, this week was AWESOME for us. Alright, well, none of our investigators came to church, no surprises there, but we did find a lot of new promising investigators that we are teaching. Elder Williams is a great companion, I am loving being with him. We think a lot alike and we both like to include and try the ideas of one another. We are contacting A TON and really being exactly obedient, we are super good friends and we have a lot of unity, and that is all that I could really ask for. So I am super happy, things are going really well. It is just too bad that transfers are next week and its likely that we wont be together. Speaking of wish, P day next week will be on tuesday because of transfers, so I will be writing on tuesday next week. But anyway, I am going to really try to take advantage of the time that I have with Elder Williams in Armenia because we are doing good things here.

Omar´s baptism was going to be this past saturday, but he didnt pass a few questions on his baptismal interview, he has some problems with the Word of Wisdom that he didnt tell his about. That was a little disappointing but we helped him make some good goals and plans and he should be able to pass the interview this week and he will be baptized this saturday! We are really hoping that it goes through this time, to see him be bapitzed would make me so happy.

This week we found Aldo and Juliana. They are a young couple that recently had a baby. They both stronly believe in God and Jesus Christ but dont belong to any church. They accepted to listen to us and they really liked the message of the restoration. They had a lot of questions and were very willing to read the Book of Mormon. So we are really excited for them. We also found a new investigator named Claudia, she also recently had a baby and she really likes to listen to us. We are going to see this week if they are going to progress, I sure hope they do!

I cant believe we are already in June. Are you kidding me?! All my friends that were seniors this year graduated this week. It literally feels like yesterday that I was graduating. Thats weird!

There isnt too much else to say for this week. I am excited for transfers next week, I know that whatever happens will be the will of the Lord and I am willing to accept changes. This week I have been thinking a lot about the Atonement of Jesus Christ. I testify as a reprensentative of him that the atonement was the most important event in each one of our lives, even though it happened 2000 years ago. If we come unto Christ, he can make our hardest moments times of peace. It is truly the source of happiness in this life and a peace to our conscience. 

The picture that I attached is Elder Williams and I eating some awesome empenadas that we made with salad. MMMMMMM.

I hope that you all have a great week, thank you for your emails!

Elder Miles

Week ending June 1st

Hola hola!

This was a pretty interesting week. The highlight is that Omar came to church and we will now have his baptism this saturday! Yayy! I will for sure take some photos for you guys. In other news, we had an emergency transfer, and I am no longer with Elder Herrera. I am now with Elder Williams, from Maryland, U.S.A. Woohoo! My first american companion. But I am still in the same area, Armenia 1. Elder Williams has been in the office for 10 months, he was the finance secretary. His first area that he served in was Armenia 1, so he basically knows the area and all of the members already! haha. He has 18 months in the mission. Transfers are in 2 weeks, so we will see if this is a permanent change. But I am stoked to start to get to work, Elder Williams is a cool elder. I will send some pictures next P day. Today I traveled to Resistencia to the mission office with Elder Herrera, we said our goodbyes, and then I left with Elder Williams. We are currently writing in the library in Resistencia and then we are going to travel back to Corrientes. 

Cool spiritual experience: Today before leaving the apartment to travel to Resistencia, we were about to get in the taxi to leave and I had an impression to go back into the apartment to grab my missionary handbook, which has a photocopy of my passport tucked in the pages. Well, while in the taxi driving to resistencia, we got stopped by like a police barricade that checks cars and makes sure that the passengers have identification, especially foreigners. So they stopped us, and they asked me for identification. And luckily, miraculously, I had it. But if I hadnt have had that with me, they would had sent us back to corrientes, which would have been horrible. So, the spirit brought that thought to my mind to grab my missionary handbook right before we left! How lucky. 

But not too much new, for sure I will have a lot to write about next week! Changes are always hard especially so quick, but changes have happened so much that I have become used to changes. The more things change, the more things stay the same. I am so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life and for the Restoration, I know that I am so blessed in my life to have the knowledge of these things and I am so blessed to have the family that I do. I am super happy to be here preaching the gospel and helping other people change their life for better. The gospel brings peace to the mind, brings purpose. I hope you all have a great week, thank you for your emails!

Love,
Elder T. Miles