Zone Conference

This past week was good for us. For our mission leadership council with Elder Zivic, we focused on making sure that our investigators are prepared before they get baptized so they don't fall into inactivity. It breaks my heart to have a convert fall away from the church. One way we can avoid this is by teaching our people more about the Book of Mormon and helping them gain a testimony of it. If they receive a powerful experience of feeling the spirit while reading the book of Mormon they will have a long and joyful conversion and stay! I really enjoyed Zone Conference. I learned a lot about Justice and Mercy and Immutable Laws vs. the Laws of God. God obeys all law, that's what makes him God, because he is perfectly Obedient. If not, He would cease to be God! I will look upon my notes for quite sometime and ponder on the things that were taught so that I can become a better teacher, leader, and son of God!

Well General Conference is this weekend... so I challenge all of you to write down your personal questions and the things you feel prompted to. I testify that all your questions will be answered as you listen to the spirit and the inspired words that the Brethren will say!

I love you all - take care!
Elder Hill

The Spirit Guides

    I definitely love serving here in Georgetown! The people here are the Best! I can't even begin to describe my love for them. I would love so much for you all to meet them, they make me so so so happy when ever I am around them. It feels as if I knew them all before this life in the pre-existence. Ahhh… it feels so great to be exactly where the lord wants you to be!

    I have been trying my hardest to find time throughout the day to pray more and speak with my Father in Heaven. It is helping a lot with my spiritual well being. I've noticed that my thoughts don't drift away to pointlessness. And I have caught myself thinking of the Gospel which is a big change for me. I feel that my faith is increased and I don't worry as much. I'm grateful for the Gospel in my life! I'm so glad I came on a mission to serve the Lord. Two years may be long but man o' man I'm loving it. I miss home sure, but serving the Lord is the Best feeling anyone could ever receive.

    I love being able to help the Lord and have him trust me enough to let me teach these wonderful people. It makes me feel like such an instrument in His hands, like it talks about in the book of Mosiah (Ch27:36). When we are diligent and exactly obedient we will be granted the spirit of prophecy and revelation and we will be able to teach with the most important thing... the Spirit!

    We were able to have 3 Baptisms on Saturday...the newest members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Georgetown.

Weeks Are Flying By!

    Well everyone... another week has flown by!  I can't believe how fast that one went.. I feel it went faster than the one before. haha There was so much going on I really can't remember half... I'm behind for the first time in my journal, because I'm so exhausted at night I just want to sleep. But it is all good. I love being a zone leader. I love leading missionaries and teaching by example. I Love the feelings I get through the Spirit.

    I had a great time working in our area and seeing a daughter of God enter the waters of baptism. A---- is 11 years old. We have also been working with her Mom. I was amazed at the spirit I felt at the Baptism. It was definitely one worth writing down and keeping in my memory book forever.

Always the Rainy Season

I told Aaron how much rain we've been having here, and he sent me a few pictures of the rain in Georgetown.

Trip to Suriname

Hello everyone! It is very hot here about 34 degrees C (94 °F) plus the humidity, so I'm really trying to stay hydrated and not get any heat exhaustion... it freaking sucks to be biking your guts out and then be expected to sit downk... yes they add a k to that word here... and to teach a full lesson with out sweating... it just can't be done! haha

I got my driving permit a few weeks ago. Since I'm not a citizen of Guyana I can only qualify for a drivers license for a month... then I have to go renew it for another month.. until I leave Guyana. This past week I actually got to drive to Suriname. It took simply put... FOREVER! We left at 2:30 in the morning... so like a normal group of boys would do.. lets just pull an all nighter and just not go to sleep. So Elder Larson, Strong, Dom, and myself stayed up all night long and then left for Suriname at 2:30 am. Haha not a good Idea.. I realize now how much dad wants to sleep when we go on long trips after he didn't get a lot of sleep... so props to you dad because that was a difficulty level of like 20 out of 10... :) I will never do that again. We got there about 7:00 am and then took a big ferry over the river and got our passports stamped so that we can stay in Guyana for another 3 months. Then we drove back... tired as crap... so we got back in Georgetown at 6:00 pm, so it was a long day for me... and I was sacked out in a lesson and didn't even notice. haha E. Smith thought it was pretty funny.

Well we have really been pushing the area hard! We had about 25 lessons this week, which I feel is really good because we started from the bottom of the teaching pool. We have about 12 new investigators that are super cool. We really enjoy teaching them. And they all live fairly close to one another, which makes teaching really nice.

Yesterday we had 110 at church which is super good! We have really been working hard trying to get the attendance up and I feel it is working! Interesting how if you love the lord... you will love the people and it is just automatic how things start to work in your area. 

Stuck in the Muck!

   My week was good. We really had some quality lessons this week and we got some new investigators. Our zone is doing really well which I'm happy about. We were at church yesterday and E. Poulson came up to us and said "I just struck gold for you two." He told us a woman named Sister C---- called him this morning and said she has two 11 year old daughters that want to get baptized. So we look at each other and said alright! Haha so we went over after church and met them and they are a less active family and want to start coming back to church. So we will have at least two baptisms this transfer... a little miracle from the Lord resulting from our diligence and obedience!

   A funny thing happened to me on Friday Night. Elder Smith and I were going to an appointment to a boy named C----. He's 14 years old and has been coming to church for the past 5 weeks. He has not been taught by the missionaries before, so he is really excited that we are starting to come over on a regular basis. Before we had the lesson with him we were standing on the street discussing what we were going to cover with him then we called inside. He came out and we talked for a few minutes... now my foot placement is not too good at this moment, because I'm standing on basically a two by four that is keeping me above a nasty trench that smells like decaying bodies. Elder Smith is in front of me and makes it safely over and doesn't look back to see if I make it. Well little did I know I was standing on the edge and my foot slipped off and my foot went straight into the goop about 3 inches. My sock and shoe was full of nasty black water.

   I gained my balance a little and then tried to pull myself up but my foot formed a vacuum and it pulled me back down a foot and a half in the worst smelling mud in the world! Now you don't want to know what happens in those trenches ... I guess you could use your imagination and you'll hit the nail right on the head. haha.... I sent out a pretty loud squeal and said "Elder We're going home." It was about 7pm and I wasn't doing anything smelling like that... so we clicked a few pictures and then left so I could wash off. We went back to talk to C---- for our 8:00 appointment. The bummer is that he has been discouraged by his family and told us that he is too young to get baptized. We were pretty disappointed about that. It's hard when you can see what the potential is of someone and they choose not to accept the gospel. I hope that if he doesn't accept it now he will later in his life. He still comes to church every week...

I love teaching the gospel and sharing what I know. It is the greatest feeling and I would not trade this experience for anything in the world! I love it that much!

I love you all and miss you tons...Love Elder Hill

Capitol of Guyana - Georgetown is HUGE !

Well Hello everyone back home in Murika!!!! :)

I'm doing well here and I am absolutely loving Georgetown and being with E. Smith, which makes missionary work sooo much easier. We are working hard and really getting to know the area good and finding new people to teach.

   I really enjoy my apartment! It it really nice because it has HOT WATER!!! It's pretty small in size but makes up for it in comfort... we live below the Poulsons and they are great by the way!
As zone leaders, we get to deal with the problems of the missionaries in the two districts we are over. It's a really fun job, we get to have a lot of conferences over skype and then this next week or so I will be flying to Trinidad for a Zone Leader conference which will be super fun! It will be about 4 days long so I'm excited to do that!

   There are 400 members but only 100 show up to church. There are two districts and we serve in the biggest district and the biggest area in Guyana... so that means lots of less actives to find and reactivate. I won't get bored here... tons of stuff to do and lots' of people to see! haha

   Something that I love about Guyana ... Everyone is big into sports... mostly Cricket and Football (Futball) but they are always playing on the street! So Elder Smith and I saw some older kids like 16 and 17. We decided to play a game of soccer to 3 goals - if we win they have to come to church and if we loose we give them copies of the Book of Mormon. They agreed! we won! ... against kids that do this everyday. 3-1! haha its funny... the sad thing is they didn't come to church but we did get everyone's phone number and address to go teach them and their families!   So it was a pretty fun finding activity. ☺

 Georgetown - Population 240,000

Baptisms and Transfer Week

  Well everyone, I made it another week! I love it here! I am so freaking tired that my eyes just want to shut right now from exhaustion. We set some pretty freaking hard goals last week and were dead set to reach them all. Well after a week of disappointment after disappointment... the lord carried us through and lifted us... we met all of our goals on Sunday night. It was a tender mercy from the Lord letting us set inspired goals and then helping us all the way through to accomplish them! 

  The baptisms of A---- and Bro C---- was a really cool experience! Because of District Conference on Sunday, we got to confirm them right after the baptism which made it so much less stressful! It was such a tender mercy.

  Well everyone... I am going to be in a new area on Wednesday... With a new companion! At Zone Conference President Mehr called me by name and said, "Elder Hill, you are going to be a Zone Leader with Elder Colby Smith... You have a lot of work to do but I love and trust you!" That was the most peace I have ever felt in my life. It was so Crazy... So I'm going to start my duties as a Zone Leader, with my friend from Grenada, which I'm really excited about! I can't wait! Its going to be a really cool adventure that is for sure.

So Long Elder Hardy...Keep Up The Good Work!

  I encourage everyone to read 3rd Nephi and feel the spirit that is found in those inspired words. I just finished reading that book and had a very powerful experience with the spirit and I know that you can too if you commit yourself and just do it! I love the Book of Mormon so much and don't know what I would ever do if I didn't have it. I don't know how people live life without scripture.

Well I love you all and I'm excited to hear about some of your stories back home. Remember to study the scriptures everyday and Preach My Gospel along with it! I love you all!

Love Elder Hill

Blessings and Baptisms

Hey everyone! 

    I had a pretty good week! I loved it. For the 4th of July, the Poulsons (senior couple) invited us over to their house and we ate Hawaiian haystacks. YUM! and then they had an American flag cake.. haha Ah Merica! It was really fun.     

Diamond Branch

Missionary work here is a lot more laid back than the islands and Trinidad... which is not good... You can tell in the missionaries that they feel like they don't have to be as obedient to mission rules.. but man not me... We're baptizing, so rules are blessings. I wish the other missionaries could catch the fire of the work and start working like a busy little bee, because I'm working my bum off!   

Which reminds me.. I haven't really told you but we have been working with a young 15 year old boy named W----. He is great and has a strong desire to get baptized. He has a very sweet spirit about him...I can feel he will do great things in the future of the church. He lives in a little shack right by the rum distillery, but ya dude! I love him a lot! He is going to have Bro. Boyce (branch mission leader) baptize him on Saturday. 

   We had 8 investigators at church on Sunday!!! with 82 at sacrament! That's a lot! I thought that was really sweet! These people are just so prepared.  Hopefully we will have 2 more baptisms on the 26th. I think it is so cool being down here! 

   I never thought that I would love being on a mission so much.. but I really do! I thank Heavenly Father every night for letting me have all of these wonderful opportunities! I'm so grateful for all the blessings I'm receiving in my life and all of the blessings I can see happening in your lives back home! I know for a fact that if we listen to the prophet's voice and keep our covenants we will be blessed beyond reason! I love this gospel so much and I love these wonderful countries in the West Indies!

I love you all,
Elder Hill

Great Diamond Area

    Well everyone! This week went by blazing fast! E. Hardy had to leave me with a French missionary for a day and a half so that he could go renew his visa in Suriname so that he can stay legal in Guyana for a little longer. It was interesting being with a dude that can barely speak English for that long.. I had to speak by doing charades.. haha. But it was good. La Grange which is across the Demerara River is super bush... I saw a few gators in the trenches. :) I got packed away by mosquitos that night because my fan broke in the middle of the night and I had nothing to keep them off!

    Looks like you found Diamond! (thanks to Google Earth) The streets are layed out in a grid pattern and there are fields and fields of rice farms. It's actually pretty cool! I've only seen people harvesting once. They lay it on the side of the road to dry... so cars and trucks drive over it... then they put it in bags... so it just gives a really good excuse to wash your rice before you eat it... haha But yes you found it!   There is a lot of Sugar Cane too but mostly rice.

   My area is actually pretty sweet! I love the people hear already! The people are definitely more prepared to hear the Gospel! Very humble, humble homes and lots of people seeking for the true church. Reactivation is actually a huge deal here there are lots of members that don't come, so we focus a lot on finding them and reactivating them! It is sweet though... Lots of part member families to work with which in my opinion is like the best way to go! But The work is just going Mad here! the People are just so amazing! They are going to make me fat with their generosity... haha. They always offer you something to eat! I'm learning how to make curry and roti so you can try some when I return haha... it's soo good!

    This week is we started teaching a Family of 5!!! They are simply amazing! They are referrals from our Branch President Sobers. The entire family is of Baptism age from 10, 15, 19 and the mom and dad. Yesterday night we taught them the Restoration. It was so, so amazing that it was the most intense spirit I've felt in my mission so far teaching about Joseph Smith. It was so strong that I got the world renown Hill-bottom lip quiver and I started to cry.. haha First time for everything! I just love when the people you are teaching let you speak to them with out cutting you and just listen to what is being taught... not only by you but more importantly by what the Spirit is teaching them! It was simply amazing! I invited them to be baptized last night, and they replied "but we were already baptized.. So I told them we will discuss why I would ask that when we meet next! We left them to pray and ponder about what was shared. It was so so rich! I have always found it quite interesting that you can just tell if someone will enter the waters that first time you meet them! Well This family had that feeling! I love teaching Families... I wish I would have had the chance my entire mission... but sadly Families are hard to come by... that was the 2nd family I've taught.. 1st that were legally married!

    Well that was my week! haha That is all I have time for today... But just know That I'm doing well and that I'm loving it here serving on basically the equator.. haha in the country of Guyana in South America!!!

I love you all!
Elder Hill