The Zone Visit and This week in Service

We wanted everyone to hear about the zone visit that we got to attend here in Costa Rica. Its a special Assembly only had in countrys outside the united states about every four years or so. Last sunday our congregation had to all ride in a bus to attend the assembly. This was under the direction of the Costa Rica Branch since the entire country of witnesses was invited to attended this one day assembly they felt the only way they could get that many people in such a concentrated area was to have everyone bused in and then bused out the same day. So you can imagine this was a pretty long day for many of our brothers and sisters across the entire country. Some had been transported in from as far as 6 to 8 hrs one way. We only had a 5 hr ride so our day started at 3am when our congregation all met at the kingdom hall and we piled into two buses and headed for the Zone Visit. Amber and Tinisa (a need greater sister from Michigan) were up the night before 2 o'clock in the afternoon until 10 at night making breakfast burritos in homemade tortillas for our entire congregation.


This assembly was held at a HUGE soccer stadium just outside of the capital of costa rica near San Jose. This assembly focuses on the needs of the entire country it was quite a seen, there were over 14,500 of our brothers and sisters packed into the stadium in anticipation of Brother Loosch of the governing body to give his wonderful talk. There was total silence when he got on stage, just the sound of the strong wind. This was only half of the country. It was really amazing that how in one day they had the entire country enjoy this very special visit. Half the country enjoyed the program Sunday morning (we were in the morning) and the other half of the country enjoyed the program in the afternoon. The program was 3 hrs long and consisted of a summary of the Watchtower and 2 talks that focused first (this talk was givin by brother Dilinger one of the secretary's of the Governing Body)on "praising God with our thoughts, words and actions. And the concluding talk was givin by brother Losch which was titled "Do you have the evangilizing spirit". These talks were all givin in spanish so David did his best to translate them in english by taking notes and every once in a while handing them to me so I could understand what was being said since I only get every ten words or so. A couple of the points that we really appreciated from the visit were first in brother Dilingers talk he mentioned Psalm 139:1,2 about how we can praise Jehovah even with our thoughts. Sometimes we think praising Jeh is all about our acions or what we do in service but what a nice reminder. Another point that we appreciated in brother Looschs talk was how he opened by mentioning that there is no greater work that we can be doing than the preaching work to glorify Jeh and that by declaring the goodnews we actually are following the example of Jeh (Gal 3:8)since he also declared the goodnews. He also focused on specific needs like using house to house records. Our congregation elders are setting a fine example in following the direction of this need because since Tuesday the first day in the ministy since the Zone visit each morning in service they have been handing out the slips and explaining how to use them. Hard to believe this has not been a regular part of there ministry here. So you can imagine how dificult this could be since most roads dont have names and most houses dont have addresses. It was truly an amazing experience to be here for this wonderful event.





We also wanted you to here about some more of our experiences in the ministy. Amber conducted her first bible study in spanish this week! She went back to a young mothers home named Naudel who we had placed the bible teach book with the week before. Amber took a Tica sister named Marilynn with her who assisted her with the study. The nice thing about ticos is that they are very patient when it comes to foreigners trying to speak their language. The sister and her householder patiently allowed Amber to fumble around with the language while she attempted to read the questions for each paragraph. They were able to cover the first subheading and made arrangements for Amber to return next week! That same day she went to another call (Maria)in spanish all by herself who she started a study with last saturday. She did not intend on going alone however the sister who was with her on the call had to return to the car because there was a horse on the trail that leads up to the home. This sister looks at horses the way Amber looks at bridges. She is deathly afraid of them. So Amber went to the home and rescheduled the bible study for next week. Somehow she was able to communicate that the other sister was afraid of horses and that she needed to reschedule the study. It was really good for Amber to be thrown into that situation to give her the confidence that she can communicate with the people here. I am very proud of her. We are very anxious to return to Maria because all three visits we have had up to this point seem to be very good and Amber has a real good connection with her.

I'm also very excited about a couple calls I made this week. The first was Tuesday morning in an area called San Fernando. I went back to a call that had previously excepted a study but who I hadnt found home for a few weeks. His name is Geraldo. I took a sister who is fluent in spanish with me and she was able to help me conduct the study. When we were about to begin the study the sister (Arianna) mentioned to Geraldo that we always start with a prayer. So I looked at her and said you want me to say the prayer in spanish dont you? She of course said yes and so I did it. I cant remember being so nervous to say a prayer in quite a long time. I got thru it and the rest of the study went really well. Geraldo wanted to know what the bible says about why there is so much badness in the world and why people lie so much. so we studied the first subheading in chapter 11 of the teach book titled "Why God allows suffering?". It went really well, his answers were really good and I look forward to going back next week. (this experience has givin me the confidence to say prayers in spanish now and so when I was asked to say prayer the next day for the service group I told the brother I could do it albeit not very good)The other call was with a man named Luis who is from Nicaragua. He lives in a Bodega behind one of the local Hotels in Samara. He works 7 days a week and is very difficult to find home. I was able to reach him on Tuesday and of course he was working as well and so I left the April special watchtower with him on Jesus and made arrangements to have a study with him next Wedensday at 2:00 oclock. Each time I call on him he seems to really express alot of interest but it's just so hard to get him when he is not working.

We finally feel like we're developing some nice calls and making some real progress with them. After being here for over 3 month now we are really starting to feel connected with our congregation as well. We look forward to coming home but sad to leave our friends here.