Elder Corey Miles - Ethiopia Addis Ababa Mission: WK 35

WOOHOO goodbye 2013! Hellooo 2014! As they say, new year new me amiright?? It’s shaping up to be a good one already. For some reason Ethiopia is 7 years behind the rest of the world and their Calendar doesn't lineup with ours, but it was a party seeing all the celebrations. We got fed Linner (Dunch?) by one of the English teachers Eyobe and he made us eat so much I nearly popped.

Another important announcement: I can 100% testify that blessings do come as you serve a mission. It was made manifest this week in BYU'S victory over Utah in football.

Here's a little rundown of the people we are teaching:

We got a referral for a man named Patrick from Burundi (literally the first person I've met from there) who learned about the Church from his friend in Canada and is way solid.
We've started with a police officer named Tadese who was a part of a different religion before but has converted to Christianity recently and knows very little about Christ. We're really wanting to help him know more about who Christ was before we go too far. He brought his cop partner who isn't very interested and the duo are hilarious.
We got a referral from a member and she is one of his students. We traveled about 30 minutes away to visit them and it’s a group of Sudanese women, all taller than me, who frankly know next to nothing about Christ too. But we're pretty sure they want to learn more because they always read the scriptures we give them. We invited them to church and they came late because they completely overdressed for it. It looked like they were going to a wedding.

We've been really, really focusing on member work here in the Megenagna Zone and so we've met with two less active return missionaries in our area. It's been awesome to get to know them and their families, and their testimonies are so sincere, they just have little issues keeping them away. Showing love is all we're trying to do now.

One night we went all the way to visit one of them and he cancelled on us (turns out we weren't even in the right place) so we said a prayer for God to lead us where we needed to go. It was super late and we had no options to get home other than walking for an hour and a half. We started talking to this man and he offered us a ride home. Most people here don't have cars so it was a bit of a miracle.

Last and best: Robel and Gideon (Robel's best friend) were baptized on Sunday!! Even though I'm not teaching Robel anymore, the companionship that was offered to let me do the baptism! It's been awesome seeing Robel progress and grow in the Gospel. He started out basically atheist and ended up sincerely wanting to come closer to Christ.

This is a lengthy email already but spiritual thought: with it being the New Year here I've been reflecting on the past couple of years of my life as you do. Do you ever have those memories where you look back at yourself and just cringe and think "what in the world was I thinking?" Yeah. Me too. A lot. Some of you can probably name them. But in those memories, I've also been able to see how far I've come and how the Lord has led me to change. If you are faithfully looking to repent and follow the Savior, then through the Atonement we can learn from those times and become better.

እግዚአብሔር ይባርካችኋል

Elder Miles