Love surprise photos!!
Received this photo last week with a message.."Enjoying a banana split. Miss you mom"❤😊❤
Dec. 19, 2016 Drum Rollllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll !!!!
Well I guess I will start off with the good news! Drum Rollllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll !!!!
Johnathan got permission from his parents to get baptized !!!!! Boom! We still need to get them to sign his form and then we will get him interviewed and we will be seeing a white Christmas! I've been dreaming of it for a while now haha. I am super excited for that and want to thank all of you for your prayers! It payed off.
The sisters in our ward had a baptism this week as well. It was really good. She had been in investigating for almost as long as Johnathan has. And she asked Elder Phillips and I to stand in the circle when she was confirmed which is always a neat experience. We also had a non-member show up to church on Sunday. We contacted him at our booth on Palomar campus and gave him a card and he showed up. I don't remember him so I don't think it was me. But he came anyways and seems pretty interested. We will start teaching him hopefully sometime this week.
So info for skyping: I have church that starts at 11:30 and we are only having sacrament. The family that is feeding us is going to be at 2. So there isn't going to be much time between that. I will probably be calling around 4 to talk to you guys. So be on skype ready for a call.
Well I guess I will talk to you on Sunday! Write down a list of questions that you want to ask so that we have stuff to talk about.
Love you!
Elder Ethan Miles
Johnathan got permission from his parents to get baptized !!!!! Boom! We still need to get them to sign his form and then we will get him interviewed and we will be seeing a white Christmas! I've been dreaming of it for a while now haha. I am super excited for that and want to thank all of you for your prayers! It payed off.
The sisters in our ward had a baptism this week as well. It was really good. She had been in investigating for almost as long as Johnathan has. And she asked Elder Phillips and I to stand in the circle when she was confirmed which is always a neat experience. We also had a non-member show up to church on Sunday. We contacted him at our booth on Palomar campus and gave him a card and he showed up. I don't remember him so I don't think it was me. But he came anyways and seems pretty interested. We will start teaching him hopefully sometime this week.
So info for skyping: I have church that starts at 11:30 and we are only having sacrament. The family that is feeding us is going to be at 2. So there isn't going to be much time between that. I will probably be calling around 4 to talk to you guys. So be on skype ready for a call.
Well I guess I will talk to you on Sunday! Write down a list of questions that you want to ask so that we have stuff to talk about.
Love you!
Elder Ethan Miles
An object lesson....??
This photo came from Brandon Hernandez from the Palomar YSA. Brother Hernandez serves as the Elders Quorum President. He said Elder Miles wanted to try on his helmet before class started....looks like a great object lesson.😊 The Priesthood can SHEILD you like a HELMET!! Brother Hernandez was very sweet to say, "Your son is a great Missionary! You raised him well"😄
Family Home Evening Festivities!!
Elder Phillips makes a mean gingerbread house!!
Elder Miles
is in complete awe!!:)
Dec 12, 2016 We'll be praying for a Christmas Miracle for Johnathan!!
Sorry I don't have any time to email this week. We have had to run a ton of errands today and still have more to run. So I will give a brief update.
Well, I am not getting transferred, which means I will be in Palomar YSA for 6 months! Just like Vista. I will have 6 months left by the time I leave which is also crazy!
On monday for FHE we went to the temple! Took some pretty cool pics there. Johnathan is going to ask his mom to be baptized for his Christmas present. Fingers are crossed!
I am doing good, just wishing we had more people to teach. I will hit my 17 month mark this week. Don't know where the time has gone. Every month gets faster and faster. And that's about it.
Glad to hear things are going well back home! Love you all!
Elder Ethan Miles
On monday for FHE we went to the temple! Took some pretty cool pics there. Johnathan is going to ask his mom to be baptized for his Christmas present. Fingers are crossed!
I am doing good, just wishing we had more people to teach. I will hit my 17 month mark this week. Don't know where the time has gone. Every month gets faster and faster. And that's about it.
Glad to hear things are going well back home! Love you all!
Elder Ethan Miles
Christmas Zone Training Meeting
😄 H A P P I N E S S 😄
This is Liam Armour. We introduced the Christmas initiative to him and then took some pics from his house.
Dec. 5, 2016 "...not just different, but BETTER..."
Man this week was a pretty good week. It was awesome to see how much of an impact the #LIGHTtheWORLD has made on social media down here. There have been a ton of non-members "liking" and "sharing" the videos and posts. We haven't got any referrals yet but hopefully they are on their way soon! So I hope you all are doing your part as well. You never know who you can impact.
We had MLC (Mission Leadership Conference) this week with President and the "First Lady", the AP's, ZL's and the STL's. It was super good. We have had a little bit of a slip in obedience over the last few months. Not just the little stuff. So we discussed what we thought might be the causes of all of it. And after like 2 hours of discussion we decided that we need to go "Back to the Basics." We have become too "relaxed" with everything. The way we talk and act. Which doesn't seem to do much, but in the long run it makes a huge difference. Think of how long it takes to build up to have a healthy body. By missing a day or two leads to weeks then months of not working out. And before you know it, you are back to the way you were before. And in our case, the people we were before our mission. Which isn't really bad. But not the way a mission should affect you. You should come out mentally and physically different. Well not just different, but BETTER. So we need to go back to the basics of the little things. So Elder Phillips and I are going to prepare a training on this for our Zone Training Meeting for this Thursday. Should be good.
The Christmas Devotional was awesome. The music was sweet! I loved President Eyring's talk. I don't have my notes, sooo I can't really remember all that he talked about. But I thought it was good.
Well, some of you asked if it was cold here in California. YES IT IS! I have calculated the temperature that I can't handle and need to put on a jacket or sweater. 65 degrees. Yes. 65 degrees is when I start shivering. When it drops below 50, I dread getting out of the warm car to go knock on doors haha. That's only happened a few times though. I don't know what I am going to do when I go home and it drops below 50 during the summer haha. We will just have to see!
Well, I gotta get running now but I love you all and will talk to you next week!
Elder Ethan Miles
Big "thumbs up" from
Elder Phillips & Elder Miles😊
San Diego Temple - SERVICE
Doing some service on the Temple grounds before Elder Nokes transferred. ..Thanks to Johnathan @nitehawk92027 for the photos!
Hanging Christmas lights!!🎄
This photo captures Elder Miles'
boyish grin, a sure favorite....😊
Nov. 28, 2016 "We help people feel the spirit and want to change..."
WELL there is so much that has happened since I have been able to send off an actual email! So I will try to remember what has happened over the last two weeks.
First big thing: November 19th, 2016 I was able to meet with Elder Dallin H. Oaks of the Quorum of the Twelve of The Church of JESUS CHRIST of Latter-Day Saints!!! Woah! I shook his hand! It was kind of cool. He talked about a lot of stuff. One thing that he said that most of the missions do around the world baptize just to baptize. But our mission does a really good job at baptizing converts. People are converted to the gospel before they are baptized. And that our retention rates are above average. And we are good at it because we teach repentance. We help people feel the spirit and want to change. Then he told us some things that we can work on. But it was really good.
For Thanksgiving we had two appointments for dinner. The first one was with the Marlors. He is in the bishopric. It was a little different just because there were a lot of people there and we just felt like we didn't really fit into the group. And they barely ate any food. But they wouldn't let us stop eating. Even after they were done they told us to keep eating. Even after we told them we had another dinner. And we were late to it because it took forever to get out of their house. So we show up to our next appointment, and he loads our plates with food. I maybe ate half of it. Barely. Then had to lay on the ground because my stomach hurt, haha. Then I felt like he was shoving pie down my throat. He made it himself and told us we had to finish. Then at 6 we were supposed to leave, but he again wouldn't let us leave. So we just sat there and had small talk until 7. Then we were just exhausted the rest of the night. That was my Thanksgiving experience haha. Kinda rough but I know I won't forget it!
Johnathan is still doing well. Douglas surprisingly came to church two weeks ago. But didn't come this week. Our bishop is a little hesitant for us to keep teaching him, just because he would have to be babysat if he was going to be active. And we can't set him up for failure. So we will see. We dropped Anthony. He doesn't respond to us. And we are still looking for some new people.
So Maycee will hit home with this one. Doc McStuffins, the cartoon of the black girl and she fixes her toys and pretends to be a doctor? The voice of the girl lives in one of the wards in Murrieta. She's a member..... and she's white haha, thought that was kind of funny.
Other than that, not a lot has changed.
https://www.lds.org/media-library/video/2016-03-0019-being-an-agent-to-act?lang=eng
Thought this video was a good one. Worthy to share. Anyways I will talk to you all next week! SEE YA
Elder Ethan Miles
Elder Miles & Elder Phillips (photo courtesy of @nitehawk92027)
Palomar Mountain
"Picture with the view...You can see the sun reflecting off of the ocean about 30 miles away!!"😮
Also, Elder Miles was excited about being out in nature & properly shows his manners to his new companion... "I saw deer poop!!! It's been a long time. So I picked it up and threw it at Elder Phillips!"
Nov 14, 2016 "The Lord prepares them..."
Well the week was pretty good. Elder Phillips and I get along really well. We don't really have anything in common other than our personalities. But we do have a lot of fun together.
This morning we played football with our zone and the San Marcos zone. It was a blast. We got a lot of athletic greenies this transfer. So we will be trying to get more football in on pdays.
Anthony and Douglas both had no shows at church this week. If either of them don't show any progression we will probably end up dropping them. To allow the Lord to prepare them in his own time. That's something I've learned is that there really isn't anything that I do that help people come closer to Christ. The Lord prepares them in all sorts of different ways, and I just happen to have been GIVEN to harvest. Even though I have had only 1 baptism on my mission, I know that I have done what I can with what I have been given to help in the preparation of all of the people I have taught throughout my mission. And that is enough. Even if I never baptize again, the fruits of my labors will go far beyond what I will see in just these two short years.
We also went down to the temple again on Saturday to finish putting up the lights. They are going to look way good. Not as good as Temple Square, but still good. We will be able to go down and see them at night when our ward goes for FHE! Way excited for that.
Well that's about it for this week. Love ya!
Elder Ethan Miles
Elder Work & Elder Play😄😂😄...new companion Elder Phillips
Nov. 7, 2016 Short & Sweet😊
Well, Elder Nokes is getting transfered. My new companion's name is Elder Phillips. He is from Tampa, Florida. Pretty cool guy. I served around him when I was in Vista the first time. He was there my first two transfers. So I'm excited to be with him.
Sorry I don't have any time to email this week. Our day today is packed because of transfers tomorrow and stuff. So I will give a brief update.
Johnathan: Still the same basically.
Anthony: We met with him this week one time. He invited his girlfriend to take the discussions as well and she accepted. He didn't make it to church yesterday though. So that is what we will focus on with him this week when we meet up with him.
Douglas: We met with him twice this week. We just can't figure out whether or not we should just hand him off to the family ward missionaries. And try to get his family to take the lessons with him. We found out he has autism, so it would be better if he was able to do that. To have the support coming from his family as well.
I watched these videos a few weeks back and thought that they would be good to share with you all! We always need a reminder on Sabbath Day Observance!
Well I love you all. And can't wait to tell you how my first week with my new companion goes!
Love,
Elder Miles
Double Peak Hike....& new bike😆🚲
We had better get Elder Miles a new basket for his bike!! It's looking pretty worn out😄
Oct 31, 2016 Temple, Ocean & In-N-Out
Well this week was pretty good. We were able to go to the temple on Tuesday. That's always a neat experience. It's crazy to think that I only have 2 more temple trips left on my mission! Dang time flies by. Then we were able to stop by the beach on the way home and get to breathe in some of that "ocean breeze." Haha it really just smells like fishy water. But it is a nice fresh feeling. We also stopped to eat at In-N-Out on the way back. And while we were there I realized that I have eaten at In-N-Out at least once a week on my mission. Not even joking. Everybody eats it here. We also get to go back to the temple on Saturday to help put up the Christmas lights for the holidays. Should be fun.
Johnathan is still doing good. He still hasn't gotten permission from his step dad. They aren't on very good terms and he doesn't want to meet with us. But we are still able to meet with Johnathan at least. He has an assignment to help out with the activities in the ward now.
We met with Douglas a few times this week. We are still trying to figure out how accountable he is. It's hard to tell. He also didn't come to church yesterday. So if we don't see any progression with him this next week we will probably have to drop him.
We picked up a new guy named Anthony. He has been taught by the missionaries before and wasn't very ready at that time. But he seems like it now! We were able to explain some of the things he didn't understand from before and he looked really excited. He is a little nervous to commit to coming to church. But is reading and praying. So if he keeps that up, naturally he will want to come with us to church.
Well it is HALLOWEEN!!!!! I am excited for today. Elder Nokes and I have planned this out for a couple weeks and we have the day packed. Our Pday is also for the whole day, just because we aren't allowed to proselyte on Halloween. So we have a Murder Mystery planned with lunch and games. We started off today with the sunrise on top of Double Peak! It was beautiful. I will try to take a lot of pictures. But that's about it. Love you guys!
Elder Ethan Miles
Oh! Also Elder Dallin H. Oaks will be visiting us on November 19th! So that will be cool.
CALIFORNIA COAST - Moonlight Beach
Elder Miles suggested we all take a few minutes to read or listen to this...
"Satan’s perfect lie takes one simple truth, 'Be ye perfect, even as I am,' and twists it until we’re convinced that we need to live a life trying to be equal to Christ.
Satan tells us we must be more, do more, have more. But on our own, could anything we put next to ourselves ever equal Christ? No!
And here’s where Satan gets even more tricky. Once he has dialed us into this math equation of me plus more equals Christlike, he takes Christ out of the equation completely.
And before you know it, often without even realizing it, these alternative equations suck the life out of us and suffocate the Savior out of our lives.
Nowhere in the scriptures does Christ say that our efforts are inadequate. Never does He say, “If you don’t work hard enough, you’ll never be enough.”
No. His truth and His invitation is 'Come unto me, for my grace is sufficient.' "
The Perfect Lie - Tiffany Webster
October 19, 2016
https://www.lds.org/blog/the-perfect-lie?cid=HP_FR_21-10-2016_dOCS_fBLOG_xLIDyL2-1_
The California Skyline🌇🌆🌅
"This is the hightest point in our misson. The one picture you can see the ocean from where we are from. Vista, Oceanside, Carslbad. Then if we turned to the south you could see all the way to downtown San Diego. We could also see the temple."
This is exchanges with Elder Banana. And we are on top of Double Peak in San Marcos.
P-day Hike
Elder Miles & Nokes took a hike through Elfin Forest with Elders Boden, Allen, Dressman, & Banana 🍌😃👟🌲
Elder Miles says, "This is Elder Boden. He's from Idaho. Cool guy. We are gonna go duck hunting with him after the mission!"
This is Johnathan!!!😁 Investigator.... Friend.... Brother
We received a text last night saying, "My name is Johnathan. Your son has been teaching me....we have a lot of fun together... you have a great son he has shown me the importance of the gospel in my life!
Elder Miles...or shall we say Mr. Pose & his "photo shoot"...😂😃
We got these photos sent to us last night. They were taken by Johnathan, their investigator!!😁
Oct. 24, 2016 "...moving in the right direction"
Well to be honest this week was hard. It wasn't bad, but hard.
We weren't able to see anybody. Nobody was home and all of our appointments fell through. Pretty rough. We were able to teach Johnathan after church yesterday. But other than that, nothin'.
Adonis ended up dropping us. He's so dang hard on himself and has a way hard time letting things go. We showed up at his house on Wednesday for a lesson and he didn't answer. So we left and texted him later that day. He said that he wanted to take a break from meeting with us. We will still keep in touch. We just won't push him. Sometimes investigators need a temporary drop to see what it's like without the gospel. And then, if they are elect, they come back even more ready than they were before. I'm sure that will be the case with him!
Johnathan is still going strong! His fellowshipper was able to talk to his step dad this week about him. And Johnathan feels like he is becoming more ok with everything. Still not all the way there yet but moving in the right direction.
We did teach a new guy last night. His name is Douglas. He was a referral from a set of sisters in our zone. They apparently contacted him a few days ago. So we call him to set up a time to meet. And all he gives us are these one word answers. Super weird too. So we show up to his house, which by the way is way out in the middle of nowhere. We didn't even know that anybody even lived out there. So we knock on his door and he answers. And instantly we realize that he's such an awkward chicken. He won't even look at us haha. So he comes out of his house and closes his door behind him, and in my mind I'm thinking, "Alright, what are we getting ourselves into?" And again, he is only giving us one word answers. "Soooo, whats up man?"..."Nothin." haha, "What have you been up to lately?"... "Just reading the Bible." "Sweet man...well what made you want us to come and teach you?"... "Jesus." "Cool man haha. Well would it be alright if we went inside?"... "Yeah." haha so it was just super weird. So we went in. The member we brought with us was able to share some stories and stuff and eventually he opened up a little bit. He is still pretty weird. But seems sincere. He wants to join a church. So we are still trying to figure out if he's completely accountable. We have another appointment for Wednesday. So we will see.
Well thats about it for this week. Because of halloween we are going to go find some "haunted" places in our zone. We are going to this forest today that apparently has wild children that live there haha. Should be fun. I will send pics of that later today.
Love,
Elder Miles
Can he lift it??!! YES HE CAN!!!🎃💪
Elder Miles thought for sure this pumpkin weighed AT LEAST 170 LBS!!😄🎃😄
Oct. 17, 2016 Pues pues pues, que tenemos aqui?
I had a funny experience this morning. So we went and played soccer with all of the elders in our zone. And we ended up having to hop a few fences to get into the place where we wanted to play. It was an arena field. Meaning it had like walls and stuff. The size of an indoor field. We played for about an hour and a half, then this guy came and told us we had to leave. He was a pretty nice guy. Then asked us if we love soccer. We all said that we liked it. And he laughed and said, "Yeah, I grew up in Argentina. And I remember breaking into fields to play as well. I love soccer. But you still have to leave." Haha so that was pretty funny.
Jonathan: His mom said that she doesn't care if he get's baptized! But then his step dad said no. So we need to call President Thomas to see what the rules are. Because we can probably get his mom's signature to allow him to be baptized. So we will see. Our bishop gave him an assignment to help with the FHE committee also. He's basically an active non member.
Adonis: He has been slowly progressing. We are still working with him with his past and stuff. He was doubting himself. And struggling to have patience with God. But church was good for him. Some of the things that were said meant a lot to him. We wil see how he is doing on wednesday.
We found a few more people to teach this week as well. But we haven't been able to contact them after our first lessons. So we don't know what is going on with them. We will keep trying though. We assume some of them are just busy with work and school.
Well that's about it this week! Love you all!
Elder Ethan Miles
Thanks Jeana Skinner for sending these!!
It's so fun to get random messages with photos!! Jeana Skinner took a photo of Elder Miles doing some serious pumpkin carving!!🎃🎃🎃 Elder Miles & Elder Nokes we're also able to do a family history video with her help & it is hilarious!! I'll try to move it to the blog...
Family History....DO IT!!!😃
🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃
Carving a work of art.....
🎃🎃🎃 Angel Moroni 🎃🎃🎃
Welcome Escondido Zone🎃👻
Our Zone Training Meeting decorations. President and Sister Thomas said that they were very impressed haha. So we gave ourselves a pat on the back.🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻🎃👻
Oct. 11, 2016 "We need to do things that are going to stretch ourselves..."
Well not a whole lot happened this week. It was kind of slow. But it was good none the less.
Updates on Johnathan. His mom doesn't really talk to him at all. And doesn't respond to anything via phone. So we still haven't got an OK for baptism. But he is still doing very well.
Adonis. I think I mentioned him last week. The really excited guy. He is way cool. He is pretty hard on himself because of his past. So far he has also had a pretty tough life, with friends and family. We met with him twice this week and both times we went pretty deeply into repentance and shared some good videos with him. About forgiving himself and others. They are on mormonchannel.org if you want to check them out. "The Savior Wants to Forgive," and "Step 6" in the 12 steps to change program. We gave him the 12 steps to change booklet and he is starting that as well. He truly has a desire and its awesome to see that.
This week we had Zone Training Meeting. It went super good! For our training we focused on setting goals. We looked over our numbers for our zone and saw that they have been flat. Which is good because we aren't going down. But we aren't going up. So we talked and came to the agreement that when we set goals for our Key Indicators (weekly and daily numbers that we set for our area) they often rely on the agency of our investigators and other non-members and members. There isn't a whole lot that we can individually do to achieve them except work hard. Which is discouraging when we don't hit them. So we came to the conclusion that we need to do things that are going to stretch ourselves. By finding the things we each struggle with individually. And not just service concerns. Like waking up on time. Or not studying. Or not talking to everyone. We wanted the root problem that caused us to do those things. Examples: homesickness, thinking about girls/guys too much, not getting along with your companion. And even those things can be caused by other things. But we wanted to find the root problem. We saw great success come from it.
Anyways my laptop is about to die so I gotta get running. But I love you all and glad to hear everything is going great!
Elder Miles
Zone Training Meeting
Oct 3, 2016 "Because missionary work is great, and fun, and brings the spirit into your lives"
Man oh man what a great week! Well I remember it being great. But I don't remember what all happened haha. Gosh there was so much. Ok
First off. FHE on Monday. Super solid. It started off with a spiritual thought by the sisters in our ward. Then once they finished, Jonathan raised his hand and said that he had something to say. So he got up in front of the whole ward and gave his own spiritual thought. He shared the same scripture that he texted us last week and bore his testimony. He really surprised us. Then bishop said that he probably reads the Book of Mormon more than anybody in the ward. Which is probably true knowing that he reads about and hour to and hour and a half every day. This sunday we will be fasting for his mom to soften her heart.
Then we ended up wrecking everybody in 4 square! I haven't played that game since like elementary school. It is way fun.
Also our Ward Mission Leader, Chris Sanches, is a DJ/Producer for music. And he is really good. He threw together elder hollands talk from april conference with one of his EDM style songs.
Wayyyyyyyyy cool! It was a pump up for conference this last weekend and he did a good job doing it.
Then we met this new guy named Adonis. He is 19 and very energetic. It was funny. When we began our lesson with him he was just saying, "Yes yes yes yes yes yes yeah yeah yes yes yeah yeah yeah yeah yes yes yes yes yes!" Haha he was super stoked about everything. We have another lesson with him this week.
We went on a hike this morning and almost fell off of a 20 ft cliff with Elder Quinney on my shoulders. That was scary haha. Then almost kicked a coyote in the face. But it was too fast. It was a big one too. Then we went and got doughnuts after. They were pretty good.
General Conference was "steezy" and Elder Nokes and I like to say. A word we made up. I really liked Elder Oaks and Anderson's talks on missionary work. Y'all should re-read them. Because missionary work is great, and fun, and brings the spirit into your lives. Think of it this way. You have a general (God). And he gives us weapons. There are different levels in the battle field, and we all are familiar with the term "front lines" which means you are face to face with the enemy. Hand to hand combat. If you are a medic or some other guy that just runs around behind the lines he isn't going to give you very big weapons. Maybe a pistol or maybe even just a knife. But if you are on the front lines, he will give you his biggest, best, most powerful weapons so that you will be protected and feel confident. Being on the front lines here in the world is doing missionary work! Reading your scriptures will bring you the spirit. Saying your prayers will bring you the spirit. Going to church will bring you the spirit. But doing missionary work will bring the spirit even more than all of those combined. Return missionaries think this all the time, "Why don't I feel the spirit like I used to on my mission? I say my prayers, go to church, read my scriptures, fulfill my calling. What is it?" It's because they aren't doing missionary work! They aren't on the front lines of taking the devil out of people and shooting them in the heart with the HOLY GHOST!!!!!! So just saying, if you want the spirit all the time. Always be looking for opportunities to share the gospel. And God will give you his most powerful weapons. I can promise that.
Well I'm gonna get running right now but I love you all!
Elder Miles
Love the surprise messages out of the blue!!
A member sent these photos this past week of Elder Miles, Elder Nokes & the Sisters...
"I manage a senior community and all my lady residents wanted to take pictures with them."
A familiar face😄....
Elder Miles went to school with Abby Edmunds. She is staying with family in Carlsbad & has been going on splits with the Sister missionaries. When they found out Abby was from the same area as Elder Miles they were able to get permission to meet for lunch!!
Old comp Elder Trounce was also there😆
Sept. 26, 2016 "Johnathan, you were just taught by the Spirit."
Family,
Not getting transferred. Chilling in the dirty dido for another transfer! Keeping the Dido dirty.....
Not really much else is exciting. A missionary jacked his face up ice skating last week. He started slipping and then locked his legs and just face planted into the ice. He got some stitches but he is doing better. It really sucked for him. But he is super dark and brooding (or so he tries to be). He basically wants to be batman. So he has actually been happier lately because his face has been jacked up. Pretty funny.
We have a few investigators right now. A lot of them are super busy with school and stuff so it is hard to meet up with them, but we have 2 that could become super solid.
Our investigator, Johnathan, that wants to get baptized is not being able to because his mom said he can't until his bday in April, but we are going to have a fast for his mom in 2 weeks.
Johnathan sent us a scripture this morning from 1 Nephi 22:26: And because of the righteousness of his people, Satan has no power; wherefore, he cannot be loosed for the space of many years; for he hath no power over the hearts of the people, for they dwell in righteousness, and the Holy One of Israel reigneth."
He said "To me it means that no matter how hard Satan attackes you, you will always be able to overcome it. It really stuck out to me because I have many forms of evil attack me everyday but the power of the gospel never lets it hurt me."
"Johnathan, you were just taught by the Spirit."
That was really cool. It just goes to show how powerful the Book of Mormon really is and how it doesn't matter where you are at or what verse you are reading that you can still receive revelation from it. Further witnesses along with my own that the Book of Mormon is true.
Otherwise, we are going to make some baptisms happen this transfer!!! BOOM!
Elder Miles
Dinner at the Rush home💗😊👍
Yep. Luckily it isn't my bike....
So this is what happened: (we were on exchanges). I was with another missionary (my grandson, elder Urey) driving home at night with our bikes on our bike rack. We were driving on the highway and we heard a "woosh." I looked back and said to the other missionary, "Woah, is your bike gone?." We pull off at the next exit and then a car behind us flags us down and says to us, "You guys just lost a bike" and drives off. So we flip around and look for it and find it in this state. Apparently it got run over by a car too. Bahahahahaha. Shredded.
Luckily, it wasn't mine....
Sept 19, 2016 "The cool part is you're not just preparing just for your mission....you are preparing for your life"
Whats up everybodyyyy?
It was awesome to hear that everybody is doing good back home! Hayden tearing it up in football and making most of the playing time that he got. Then Miranda BEAST MODING against North Summit in volleyball. Letting 'em know that SSHS don't go down easy! That really made me happy. And good job to Maycee for leading out in FHE! It's definitely important that we prepare for our missions starting young. There are too many people that start their mission unprepared and it takes them 6 months to finally figure it out. Start now! And you can start harvesting even before your mission! Something I wish I would have done. And the cool part is you're not just preparing just for your mission. But you are preparing for your life. The habits you make now (scripture reading, praying morning, throughout the day, and at night, family home evening, participating in church/seminary, and sharing the gospel with others) will affect you the rest of your life. That's why we need to start young. So good job Maycee!
Johnathan didn't end up getting baptized this week. He is still 17 and his mom wouldn't allow him to until he was 18. Which will be in April. He was really bummed that his mom wouldn't let him. He is a great guy. Us, and a few other members of our ward are going to have a group fast this week for his mom to soften her heart. We also weren't able to meet with Kyle this week. He has been pretty inconsistent with appointments and responding to texts and phone calls. But we did finally meet with a guy that we had been trying for a few weeks now. His name is Anthony. He seemed closed off at the beginning of our lesson, just by saying that he wouldn't ever come to church because of experiences in the past at other churches. But towards the end he opened up to us. Commited him to read and pray. He couldn't come this week just because of plans he had already made. But said he would this coming Sunday. We have another lesson this week so we will see how he is doing on praying and reading.
So because Elder Nokes and I are the ZL's we are asked to do a lot of administrative stuff. Like giving blessings to missionaries and members all over the stake. On Friday we were asked to give a blessing to a guy in the ER at the hospital. So we go in and this guy is getting released from the hospital. But doesn't have a ride. And doesn't want a blessing until he gets home. Which we later find out that it is like 35-40 miles north of the hospital. Which is still in our zone. But we never go out there. Simply it is just wayyy too far away. And nobody really lives out there, but he can't find a ride so we end up taking him. And the whole drive he was barfing. Luckily it was just water that he was throwing up. And he had a special bag that the hospital gave to him to throw up in. But it was making me dry heave as well just hearing him. Blahhhhh. Then we finally get out to where he lives and it's this run down trailer park. Like way run down. Like I could see people dying there and people would never know. Or even care. This was the boonies on steroids. Like this would be the perfect place to hide a body. Because nobody would ever find it! But we ended up giving him a blessing and leaving and almost running out of gas. But just barely made it to a gas station. That was crazy.
Well anyways. I enjoyed golf last week. I am waiting to get the pictures. I should be able to send them later today. Then we are going ice skating today with our zone. That will be fun! So I gotta get running now. But I love you all!
Elder Miles
Halloween is early for Elder Miles this year!!😄😂😄
Sept 12, 2016 "The gospel has already become a part of his life..."
Well I don't have a lot of time today. Today is Elder Nokes birthday. We are going to grill up some steaks then go play golf with San Marcos ZL's, Fallbrook ZL's, and the AP's. Should be fun.
Things that happened this week:
Well the highlight of this week was we went on exchanges with the AP's. They now serve in the Vista YSA ward. So I was able to go back to my first area for a day! We were able to see Lily Rodriguez. The girl Elder Wight and I baptized almost exactly a year ago. She seemed like she has kind of gone off the deep end over the last couple months. It was sad to see. But it was good to see her.
Johnathan is still working towards being baptized this Saturday. He was sick this whole week, so we weren't able to meet with his mom at all. So, just so it is fair for her, we might push his date to next week. But he is still 100% into it. We were able to finish everything that needs to be taught before his baptism last night. He already seems like a member. The gospel has already become a part of his life. He of course still has struggles but whenever he tell us things he pretty much just bares his testimony of Christ and how He is helping him with whatever is going on. It's pretty cool.
We also picked up this guy named Kyle last night. He has been going to a pretty well known Christian church, North Coast Church. Which in the past I personally have not had good experiences with. But he is actually willing to listen and to take our challenges. He told us that what his pastor told him about us was almost completely wrong. And that what we teach makes complete sense. We set him on date for the 31st of September. We are going to be meeting with him on Wednesday. So we will see how his is doing then.
Well that's about it for this week. Also Dallas Stanley will be coming home in about 3 weeks! We've been emailing off and on. I remember when he left! Time has gone by way fast! Anyways I gotta get going now. Love you all!
Elder Miles
Sept. 5, 2016 Reading, praying & coming to church...
Well what can I say? Another week in Escondido.
I guess the highlight of this week was that we had MLC (mission leadership council). Where the Zone Leaders and Sister Training Leaders meet with the AP's (ape's) and President and Sister Thomas. We discussed the new "Standard of Excellence" that we wanted to set for the new vision that President Thomas has for the mission. We wanted to set something that would stretch us all. The goal that we all agreed on was one baptism per companionship every month. There are a few other details that go along with that. But I am excited to see how the mission changes over the next few months. It should be pretty sweet.
We taught Jonathan a few times this week. He is still doing awesome with his Book of Mormon reading and praying and coming to church. And has a strong testimony. The only thing that we need to work on now is helping his mom feel comfortable about it. She feels like he's jumping into it too fast. He is still progressing towards the 17th though and can't wait. We will be meeting with his mom here in the next few days just so she can get to know us. We will see how it plays out.
We were able to teach Day for the first time this week. He's a pretty cool guy. And he's black haha. We contacted him in a super nice apartment complex near our institute building. We aren't necessarily sure on how elect he is. Or whether he just doesn't understand what we are saying. He talks with a strong gangster slang so it's even hard for us to understand him too haha. So we are still trying to figure him out.
Well we gotta get headed out. I'll send some pics of Elder Nokes and I because Mom was complaining to me. Haha jk. Love ya!
Elder Miles
....authors note....I don't believe I've been "complaining" to Elder Miles😝, but in my defense, the only picture we received was this one from a nice member of the YSA Ward where he & Elder Nokes are serving
Christian Wallace from the YSA Ward in San Marcos, CA snapped this photo of our missionary...."I have had the awesome opportunity to be served by this great guy here. We all love having him around... rest assured that Elder Miles is alive & well!"
Aug. 29, 2016 The blessings of missionary work are infinite!
Man oh man, just another great week. I really forgot just how fun YSA work is! Literally a huge difference from family wards. Just non stop things to do.
This week we didn't have very many lessons with investigators, but we did have a couple. We were mainly able to get in with less-actives and recent converts. One of our recent converts name is Mike. He was baptized just about 3 weeks ago. He is so solid and shares the gospel like crazy. If there is an example of member missionary work it is him. We give him like 10 pass-along cards a week and he gives them out to anyone he feels inspired to. We haven't had any luck with it yet, but sooner or later we are bound to pick someone up from him.
Another less-active member we taught this week is Michael. He has been a member his whole life but went in-active around 18. He's 28 now. He called us up on Tuesday and asked to meet with us. When we met up with him he told us how he has been seeing the Lord's hand in his life lately. And how he needs to start coming back to church. How he was homeless and found a job and then somebody offered him free rent on a house, as long as he took care of the property. Then he found his Book of Mormon and said that that was a sign to him that God was allowing him to get back onto his feet just enough to make some decisions on his own. So he made the decision to call us. Good decision! He came to church this week and seems to be doing great.
We did have a couple lessons with Jonathan this week. He is still on date for the 17th of September. He is really progressing. He has an awesome comprehension of the Book of Mormon. We taught him the Gospel of Jesus Christ: faith, repentance, baptism, gift of the holy ghost, and enduring to the end. Then the Plan of Salvation, and then yesterday we just read a chapter of the Book of Mormon. 1 Nephi 4 or 5. I can't really remember. But he is doing super well. He is excited to be baptized. His fellowshipper is doing a great job. Reading the Book of Mormon with him.
This week we had Elder De Hoyos of the first quorum of the seventy visit our mission. We were able to have 4 meetings with him. One: Elder Nokes and I had an MLC (mission leadership council) meeting with him with the other leadership of the mission. We just basically taught him about how we run as a mission. That was Thursday. Then Friday we met in a Zone conference. It was our zone the Escondido zone, San Marcos Zone, Del Mar Zone, and Carlsbad Zone. He talked a lot about true conversion and how the Book of Mormon is key to it. How we need to read the Book of Mormon EVERY day. It is the key stone of our religion. He quoted Joseph Smith, "I told the brethren that the Book of Mormon was the MOST CORRECT of ANY book on earth, and the keystone of our religion, and that a man would get nearer to God by abiding by its precepts, than by any other book." And I was thinking, "Why wouldn't you read it every day? If it brings you closer to God. And if it is the only 100% correct book on the whole entire earth, why wouldn't you read it every, single, day." Then we also met with him at our Stake Conference. Our stake presidency was re-organized on Sunday. We had 2 general authorities there. Elder De Hoyos, and Elder Acosta. Both of the seventy. Elder De Hoyos talked about basically the same thing. Elder Acosta talked about the importance of member missionary work. How as missionaries we are called to teach and to baptize. But the members are to find people to teach for the missionaries. And I think both of those topics mesh together perfectly. If you read the Book of Mormon every day, and if you are truly converted to the Lord, you will WANT to share our message. If you don't, you simply are not converted. And that's the difference between missionaries and members. We read every day. Most members don't. And if you do, are you really taking in what you are learning and applying it? That is why missionary work is so easy for missionaries. We see the blessings of reading every day and we want to share it. Missionaries go home and just stop reading. That is why members are scared or uncomfortable sharing the gospel. But its there.
So I guess that's the challenge I want to leave with you guys. To read the Book of Mormon every single day. Then to have one gospel conversation a week with a non member. Even if you live in Utah. You all know one and the odds are you are thinking of one right now. Ask the missionaries for help if you need. I'm sure they will be more than happy to give you ideas. The blessings of missionary work are infinite! Well I gotta get going now. Talk to ya next week!
Love
Elder Miles
The house that ELVIS built!!!😆
Hard to believe, but apparently this is really someone's house. That is what is called "being a fan"!!!😃
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