Hermana Miller

Yesterday we had district meeting. My district leader is going home this week, but if appears that he has dengue! So sad. He had to go to the hospital yesterday. It is sad. I wonder if he'll be able to go home or not. Anyway, at the district meeting, we found out transfers. Sister Summers, my companion is going to Mayaguez and is going to open an area there. We were sad to change companions, because we were awesome together. haha. That sounds really full of myself, but mostly it is just that I really liked her. And I like to think that she really liked me too. :)

Anyway. My new companion was going to be...Hermana Palmer! Yes. The very same! The one with I was with in the CCM. But why is that sentence in the past tense? you might ask. Well. On the way to transfers today, we got a call informing us that Hermana Beltran was coming back within a couple days and that I would be with her again. So, Hermana Palmer is staying where she was and I have a mini-missionary for a couple days until Herman Beltran arrives. So, after 4 companions in 6 weeks, I will settle down with just Hermana Beltran and we'll work together in Guaynabo.

As far as the work goes, we are still working really hard here to find people to teach. We visited Tony this week and talked about Joseph Smith and The Book of Mormon and he said he would come to church, but he didn't make it. Also, an investigator that we have been teaching since the first day we arrived here, Karina came to church on Sunday with her husband and her children. We kind of had given them a break for a while, but we are going to visit them tonight. I'm excited to help them, because they came to church! I was shocked when I heard they were coming.

That is really about all that is happening, and since we have only one computer, I am going to pass it over to my companion.

I love you! Have a great week!

Love,

Hermana Miller

Dear family,

This week has been great. We are working with a couple investigators and several menos activos.

One investigator is Ana. Ana found us in the Library two preparation days ago. She attended the church in Florida for a while. She is already reading the Book of Mormon and has been to church twice. She is difficult to understand because she likes to talk to us in "basic English", as she describes it, and I have no idea what she is saying. We have respectfully requested she speak to us in Spanish because we can't understand her in English, but she hasn't really changed. She also likes to try to speak to the members in English, even though she is Puerto Rican. She likes to talk a lot and can't really focus in the lessons. So, I feel confused about her because she frustrates us a lot, but she is also the most agent-like investigator I have had my entire mission; she had no ride to church and she still got there...twice, and she is reading the Book of Mormon. We are trying to develop patience. Although I feel frustrated with her, I also feel Heavenly Father's love for her.

We are also trying to teach Tony, who is also reading the Book of Mormon. He declares that it is true, but is impossible to have a cita with him. He thinks Joseph Smith was a prophet, but wants to know more about him to be sure. We've testified to him of the power of prayer, but he insists on learning more about Joseph Smith. He is cool and has been to church once.

Olga is a menos activo that we have been working with for several weeks...basically since we got here, and she is rather consistently coming to church and has started to read the Book of Mormon from the beginning. She is really excited about her reading and likes the story and the things she can learn from it. It is wonderful to see her really growing in the gospel. She bore her testimony last week in fast and testimony meeting, which I thought was a wonderful demonstration of her progress.

Last week we went to Old San Juan again. It was cool. There are two main castle there; el morro (where we went the first time, when I was with Sister Thoms), and San Cristobal, which is where we went this time. It was cool. There was a really long tunnel and that was my favorite part. We also took a picture in the Christopher Columbus plaza, because it was the day after Columbus day. How appropriate! It was loads of fun.

Olga lives in the campo, but not super campo. There is a hill by her house that we drove up and we could see all of San Juan and the Ocean and Old San Juan and everything. It was a really cool "scenic overlook." and free! We took some pictures, but as always, our lame Point-and-shoot cameras just can't really capture the beauty of this island.

I love you so much! Thanks for everything!

Sincerely,
Hermana Miller

Dear family,

I loved the pictures you sent, but felt sad that I wasn't in them. Thank you for sending them to me and writing to me to let me know what is going on. Amanda looks pregnant. ! Especially from the side. :) That is good though. And expected at this stage.

I am still in Guaynabo and still with Sister Summers. So, that craziest transfer ever has finally calmed down a bit. I will attach a picture of us together. There is a member that lives in the campo a little bit, and near her house there is this scenic overlook thing where you can look out and see all of San Juan all the way to the ocean, and all the city in between. It is beautiful! That is where that picture was taken. So, even though you can't tell, that is all of San Juan behind us. :)

We are really searching for less actives, and we found a really great family this week where the mother is the only member, but the husband and the children are wonderful. We shared a message from the family proclamation yesterday and plan to continue teaching from that a while to help them feel the necessity for the gospel in their family. The son recently spent 2 months in Virginia with his aunt and her active family, so he already has a wonderful base. We have found them twice at home this week, and from what we've heard about them (from members and they, themselves), they are never home, so it was really a miracle to find them home twice. We look forward to helping them.

We are still working with Tony, an investigator who came to church once. He is the one who dreamed about us. Naturally, we are really excited about him, but excitment is waning as appointments fall. He seems very busy and can't always receive us, but we asked him this week if he still has interest in our message. He responded by saying he is reading the Book of Mormon and is about halfway through. We asked him how he feels when he reads it and said, "Well, it's the truth," in a "Well, duh," voice. Ok. So, we set another appointment and are going to keep trying to visit him. He just always seems to have personal crises that prevent him from being able to recieve us, such as and inventory at work, or an exploding (or leaking?) fishtank (resulting in lots of water in his home), etc. We're going to try to be patient with him and continue calling and visiting.

We are learning a lot together, Hermana Summers and I and I must say enjoy each other's company. We studied a lot this week about the sacrament and are gaining a better understanding of that sacred ordinance. We also went to the General Relief Society broadcast on Sunday night, and it was really great! I loved all of the talks, basiclaly, and especially the one by President Monson about not judging others. I feel like that is something I can really improve on. I feel like as a missionary I judge others more, just because it comes naturally; you have to judge whether or not someone is serious about being interested in the gospel and such. So you have to use good judgement, but you shouldn't judge, and sometimes there is a line there that I cross. I like how he said that you can't ever know the true intent of their heart. Good to keep in mind. We are going to work on that.

I love you,

Hermana Janae

Dear family,

We've had another change! The three-some was dissolved and I am now in Guaynabo again, 100% with Hermana Summers. She is cool; a math teacher from Idaho. It is good to be completely dedicated to one area again, because I felt like I couldn't focus very well when we were covering the two areas; it was too many people to think about and keep track of. We don't know if she'll be here just to the end of the transfer, or until the end of the week or for a little longer. We'll see. Our president likes to switch things up and keep us on our toes.

Conference was so good! I loved it. I feel like it went really fast though! I don't know how two hours when you are a child can seem an eternity and two hours when you are a missionary (or and adult, I guess) can seem an instant. I loved basically all the talks. I liked the talks on faith, I liked the talks on agency, and the talks on Prophets. When President Monson was welcoming everyone to conference, it was the first time I really had the spirit testify to me of his call. I know that he is a prophet of God and that he talks to God face-to-face. And so, how interesting it is, I thought, that his message to us was on gratitude. It wasn't some intense doctrinal message or even a really heavy topic, it was about gratitude. I loved how he compared the attitudes of the disciples and Jesus Christ in the story when Christ fed the 4,000. We've already shared his message with 2 people this week. It is so important we are grateful for the many blessings we have, be they temporal or spiritual, we all have many blessings in our lives. I feel like the prophets and apostles are just so in-tune to what we need today, in the world. It is a wonderful experience to go to conference and listen to them share their testimonies and those things they feel are pertinent for us in our day.

We met a new investigator this week; Alejandro. He is young (25 or so) and can really relate to Jose Smith and his confusion about why there are so many different churches. He said he had stopped praying, but will start again to know the truth.

We are looking for less active families. There is a really good family that we have been trying to contact but who are a little resistant to missionaries right now. There is another family that we are going to look for where only the mother is a member, but it looks like around 2 years ago the missionaries were teaching the father and the children, so we've been trying to contact them this week.

I know that as Sister Summers and I really focus on our area we'll see miracles.

Love,

Hermana Miller