Jan. 18

Zone 

District

Blog:
Hey! Another week living the dream being a missionary "in the greatest
mission on the earth's great face", as President Dayton puts it! This
week has been pretty stinking cold, low 40s, humid and windy, Perfect
weather for weather for missionary work! My companion is still getting
over being sick so he didn't appreciate the cold as much as I did. We
had a good week though and have two investigators who are getting
baptized on the 30th WOOOOOOOO!!!!! And one of them is an old Catalan
man, named Josep "Pepito" Bores, which is significant because Catalan
people are usually pretty stubborn and hate religion and missionaries.
To explain Catalan people are from the province of Catalunya in Spain,
they have their own language "Catalá" or Catalan, which is pretty much
a mix of French and kind of Spanish. All the schools are taught only
in Catalan and by law all the road signs MUST be in Catalan so yeah
that can be confusing at times haha. But everyone speaks Spanish here,
so yeah most official things are generally in Catalan but most people
on the street will speak in Spanish with the occasional old person
speaking in Catalan. So generally they are not super open to
missionaries, especially the older people, so it really is a miracle
this man is so nice and he always feeds us this SUPER bomb flan
whenever we come over, and is just such a sweet, humble man. He
currently is having a hard time praying, no matter how many times we
explain he can't get his mind wrapped around having a conversation
with God through prayer, but he'll figure it out soon enough! He has
prayed everyday, BUT his prayer consisted of reading out of the
Restoration Pamphlet on the part that explains how to pray so we're
working on that. He's grown up his life being forced Catholicism and
so that's all he really knows so it's all pretty new to him.
The first time we invited him to pray we got on our knees to pray,
closed our eyes and waited.....15 seconds went by in silence and I
looked up at my companion but he told me just to wait. We wait...30
seconds then a minute and my companion and I are trying to figure out
what to do because Pepito was just kneeling there with his eyes shut
and arms folded, so we didn't know if he was praying so we wait
another minute in silence and then I say, Can you say it out loud? And
he says, "Oh I forgot how to do it! I was confused haha". So we
explain again very clearly, and then pretty much tell him exactly what
to say to pray and it was just like a 5 year old praying. He finishes
and says "In the name of Jesus......I mean Heavenly Father....I mean
dang it! Elders what do I say?" And we tell him and he closes
correctly and man it was funny! He's soo great and we are sooo excited
to keep on teaching him and help him prepare for baptism! We're
bringing our Bishop to our next lesson with him so he should be able
to help out.
There are SOOO many prepared people everywhere we go. I truly know
that Lord prepares people to hear the Gospel and that as missionaries
we are here to harvest those people who are ready!
I love you all so much and want to bear my humble testimony to you in Spanish:
No sé muchas cosas, pero sé que Dios nos ama. Sé que porque Dios nos
ama, Dios nos ha dado Su Unigénito Hijo, Jesucristo, para sufrir y
permitirnos a regresar a él. También Dios nos ha dado El Libro de
Mormón, cuál es verdaderamente otro testamento de Jesucristo. Por
medio del Libro de Mormón podamos acercarnos más a Dios y aprender de
Su plan para nosotros. Sé que el Libro de Mormón es verdad y pueda
bendecir su vida si ustedes lo lean. He visto el Libro de Mormón
bendice las vidas de muchas personas y sé que el Libro de Mormón y la
Iglesia de Jesucristo de Los Santos de los Últimos Días les traerán
más felicidad y paz en sus vidas.
Os quiero mucho, espero que tengáis un semana maravillosa.
Con amor,
Elder Miller

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