¡Que No Caiga más Nieve!

January 8, 2014

Hello all!

It is cold here in New York! And windy- I think the wind chill was
about -20 degrees yesterday. We went out knocking as a district and
about freezed to death, but it was fun! So yeah that's what is going
on here.

This past week was pretty good- we're still getting back into he
groove of things after the holidays but things are definitely going
up. There have been a couple of sicknesses that have slowed us down
(we usually switch things up and have somebody stay with the sick
person while the other two go out and work, so we've all been taking
our turns with that). Thursday it dumped snow- we got a good eight
inches worth. Got boots just in time. We went out before there was too
much on the ground but we were sliding around pretty good so we
decided to come back and stay in for the night. I'm getting some good
snow driving experiences. We spent some good time on Friday shoveling
snow, maybe enough to make up for my lack of doing such as a kid. This
past week we've started to do a district language study- there are two
companionships of Spanish missionaries and two of English and one of
an ASL/English zebra companionship. So anyways, we're teaching the
other guys some basic Spanish so that they can contact others and
we're all learning sign language from Elder Davenport. Sign language
is sweet- not too hard to pick up. We're having a good time with it
describing our daily activities (I chased some deer, that is crazy, I
teleport, hallelujah are among some of the things I can say at this
point). I love learning languages and I feel like it's a blessing I
have. We'll see what happens with sign language- I might come home
speaking Spanish, some sign language, some Italian and a little
Portuguese- that's be cool. I'm grateful for the gifts that God has
given me and for letting me discover them.

After being out for a little bit of time, the ruts come more often and
you have to keep things moving to not be stagnant or boring or just
routine. I guess the thing lately that has caught my attention a
little more lately is being like Christ. I haven't put to much thought
into that recently, but luckily Heavenly Father is looking out for me
and had led me to study and apply those principles. Trying to be like
Christ has been  an answer to many of my prayers and has been helping
me out a ton. Treating others with kindness and love, being obedient
and humble, having faith in God and being diligent are so important
when we're serving others and serving with others. On top of that, if
we expect to be joint heirs with Christ, we've got to be like Him- how
else would we be able to handle everything that is promised to us? I
know it's what God wants, us to be like His Son, and as we live the
gospel we can do exactly that.

Things are great and getting better! I look forward to a fruitful rest
of January. Thanks for the support and have a great week!

- Elder Griffiths

El Año Nuevo

January 1, 2014


Happy New Year everybody! 

We had a great night last night, celebrating by going to bed at 10:30. Haha we actually did not have to be in by 6:00, so we got to stay out and work. We were able to get in with a couple people so that worked in our favor. Woke up this morning to a new year and that was that. 

This past week was great! Christmas was great- we went caroling almost all day Christmas Eve and a little on Christmas as well. It was super fun and very fulfilling- we could see that we made a difference in people's days. Spending that time serving others was super satisfying and made for one of the best Christmas's I've ever had. The next couple of days weren't quite as satisfying- I got some sort of stomach flu that knocked me out. I did lose any sort of weight that I gained eating tons of unhealthy food for the holiday season. That was a good outcome I guess. Haha but that slowed things down a little but. Now we're bouncing back, getting back into the groove of things. Tomorrow it's supposed to snow a ton, though, so that might throw things off. We'll see! 

With the new year, I've thought about repentance and the importance of repentance in bringing about change. I challenge you to join in with me in taking specific steps to repent everyday of all the little and maybe big things we do and don't do everyday. We start that process as we recognize what it is that we lack in doing the will of God, then we stop doing that thing, and confess it to God and ask for His forgiveness. We then make restitution, fixing anything that we may have messed up. Keeping the commandments helps give us strength to do all those things and then we do the most important part of it all- recognize and give thanks to Christ for making such possible. It's only through His atonement that we can change and be forgiven. So do it! Everyday. That's what I'm resolved to do before anything else, just repent. That will help me put everything else in line. 

Thanks for he support and the packages and everything- I enjoyed it all. Hope you guys have a great week and a great start to this new year! - Elder Griffiths

Feliz Navidad!

December 23, 2013

Hello Everyone!

Merry Christmas Eve Eve!  Elder Wagner said that today is Christmas Adam because Adam comes before Eve.  He's a goofy guy.  Haha

Anyways, all is well here in Newburgh!  The work is going well- we picked up another person with a baptismal date- Jenny!  She is progressing well and is looking to be baptized in February.  Less actives are progressing well too- we had eight at church yesterday!  I counted the number of priesthood holders and potential priesthood holders there and if things keep on going as they're going, soon enough the branch could be a ward.  We'll see what God has in mind though.  Another thing that will help is that we got another car!  The other guys have a nice white 2014 Ford Fusion now, so that will help us to get around together without having to either depend on each other or the bikes.  We're hoping to move out of the city of Newburgh a little more, so we'll see what we can do!  Things are great!

The Christmas season has been a delight!  We're planning on caroling tomorrow and Christmas when we have free time (we didn't do a whole lot last year on Christmas when we had down time, so I'm excited to get out there and serve in that way with the free time that we do have).  Christmas eve is a lot bigger of a deal in Spanish culture, so we've got some good stuff going on tomorrow evening, and then Wednesday for lunch we're going to Paul's house with almost the whole district (the sisters have something else going on).  Being a missionary during Christmas time is great!  And I've been blessed to be able to look back and see how my mindset in regards to Christmas has changed.  I'm grateful to have had experiences to know that giving is so much more fulfilling that getting.  I don't have a lot of physical means for giving, but I've been blessed with the opportunity to give of my full time and service as a missionary.  I love caroling and I think its because it is a giving service and helps everybody listen to and feel Christmas through music.  I look forward to doing that tomorrow and Wednesday.  I challenge you to look for someway you can go out of the way and serve somebody else, out of the norm, and see what you feel like.  If you want to get some nice baked cookies, go give somebody some nice baked cookies and see how you feel.  It's great!

Thanks for the well wishes and everything.  Hope you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

-Elder Griffiths

No time for a letter...

December 11, 2013

We had a zone activity today and it left me with not a lot of time to write. All is well though! Having a good time and great things are happening! I'll have more time next week for sure. Hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you next week!

 (This is why I was too busy to write)

Some Christmas fun!

Fall Pictures from New York

December 4, 2013

Abril's Baptism!

Claudia's Baptism!

Our district at the West Point Military Academy

A view of the Hudson River from West Point

A cool tree in Highland Falls

Thanksgiving Dinner!

A view from above at West Point

Pretty scenery on our way to church

Elder Griffiths with Cadet John Colton from John's Creek Georgia

Fancy Thanksgiving decorations :-)

Un Feliz Diciembre

Hello All!

Happy December!  Things are great here!  A little chilly, but that just means we get more hot chocolate out of pity.  Especially when we're on bikes.  I'll just give you a little rundown from this past week...

Wednesday- We drove down to Highland Falls to visit a less active family down there- they've made a ton of progress and are super excited about the Gospel- it's great to see God guiding people to the truth like that.  Things took a lot longer than we had anticipated there, so that was it for the night.

Thursday- we normally do weekly planning Thursday so that's what we did for the first chunk of the day after which we took off to have Thanksgiving dinner at an active member's house down in Monroe, towards the southern part of our area.  It was a great dinner!  They had family over from all around, and actually they had a cousin that lives in Norcross, GA (they're all originally from Ecuador).  Anyways, some of the relatives were super good cooks, so we were treated with a delightful meal.  We went to another member's house after that who ended up feeding us as well- another good meal.  That family is Mexican and so I got to eat jalapenos with my mashed potatoes- not too shabby!  Haha it was a good day all in all.

Friday- I had to go to a meeting down in Scarsdale- it was good- we talked a lot about how things are going with the iPads, they had some announcements and things, and good training on being good leaders and stuff.  I think I got out of it that we should always strive to be an answer to someone's prayers as we listen to the Holy Ghost, as we love those around us and as we teach true doctrine in what we say and do.  I know that we can make the difference for somebody else as we do those things consistently.  After that, we had a couple good lessons with some less active members and went home for the night!

Saturday- We decided to take a break from the iPads and just get out and look people up and talk to people on the streets and stuff, so that's what we did!  We had some good success in finding a new investigator and setting up some other good stuff.  It was just nice taking that break from the iPads- they can be a little draining.  At night, we went to Paul's house and had a good dinner and a good time there.

Sunday- Church!  It was great- it always fills me up seeing all the people there that I love.  We had a good turn out.  Afterwards we went to a late Thanksgiving dinner with a member to which they brought some friends that we started teaching- they seemed to appreciate the message and we got a return appointment for the coming week.  Afterwards, we went around looking for people- we had another lesson with an investigator and then wrapped up the night, riding our bikes home and having the zone leaders come up behind us in their car, taking pictures and videos of us.

Monday- Zone meeting followed by an exchange with the West Point branch missionaries- I went there and it was great!  The members over there are solid and supportive, and it's fun going to be in the English program for a day.  I liked that and had a good time.

Tuesday- We unsplit in the middle of the day and cranked out some lessons.  We went knocking as a district (not all together- just in the same neighborhood) and then we had a good night of more lessons.  Nothing too crazy happened, but things are going well!

Today- We're just having a relaxed day- Elder Wagner is in the choir for a mission devotional we have this week, so he actually had to go to a rehearsal there, so I'm with Elder Picoli whose companion is doing the same.  We're just emailing, then maybe playing some basketball or something.  We'll see.  And then we have a good night planned for tonight!

Things are well!  Thanks for the love and support!  I hope you have a great week!

-Elder Griffiths

El Agradecimiento

Hello all,

Happy Thanksgiving! Time is flying, as always, and Christmas will be
here in no time.

Things are going well! We had a great week.  We've been having some
good experiences together- seeing The Lord guide us to where He needs
us to be. One instance in particular occurred on Thursday- it was our
turn to be on the bikes. We were riding around without a ton of
success- things haven't been working out as we had planned out. We
were contemplating what to do when I realized that had to go to the
bathroom pretty badly. For whatever reason the Alvarez family came to
mind, so we set off on the two minute bike ride to get there. Upon
arrival we found Javier, a less active who we had planned to see that
day, along with the rest of the family. It turns out that the dad of
the family had recently been admitted to a nursing home because he's
going downhill after being diagnosed with Alzheimer's. The mom was
feeling pretty down after that and so we were able to share a lesson
about living the Gospel of Jesus Christ, which helped Javier and
Hermana Alvarez a lot. We also got some good hot chocolate and sweet
bread after not having a dinner and I was able to use the bathroom!
The Lord worked in a mysterious way that night and just killed four
birds with one stone. I love seeing that and I testify that this
really is His work!

And with Thanksgiving coming up, I've been thinking about gratitude a
lot. One of the lessons that God has been teaching me on the mission
is gratitude- I was not at all good about expressing gratitude and
being grateful before the mission. Now I've come to realize that the
times when I am happiest is when I'm focusing on what I've been
blessed with and expressing gratitude to those around me. Doctrine and
Covenants 78:19 says "And he who receiveth all things with
thankfulness shall be made glorious; and the things of this earth
shall be added unto him, even an hundred fold, yea, more." So be
grateful! If you're ever down, write a list of twenty things that you
love about life and then thank God and anybody else involved in that
list and then see how you feel. I can promise that you'll feel better
almost immediately. Don't save your gratitude for tomorrow and leave
it for the next year's turkey day. Develop an attitude of gratitude
and live will always be good.

So yep, happy thanksgiving! Hope you have a good one tomorrow and a
good week to come!

-Elder Griffiths

Sent from my iPad

La tecnología es genial!

Hello all!

I am writing this letter in the car on my iPad. How cool is that? I can't remember if I said it or not but we were going to get iPads and now we have them! We got them and were trained on them last Friday. It's all part of hastening the work- I'm super excited to see where this technology takes us. Basically we now have our planners on here which sets out what we're going to do each day and stuff. It also has our area books, which contain the records of all that we teach to the people with whom we work. It's nice and offers a lot of things that are going to help us to help others come closer to Christ in an even more effective and efficient way. Tracie Watson, a head hancho big whig guy in the missionary department came and trained us on the iPads and he told us that revelation is based on information, and so now with this much information more accessible in a nice organized manner, we should be able to move forward with that much more guidance from the Lord too. We also use the iPads for Facebook, to use the scriptures and pamphlets in lessons, to have access to pretty much anything the church has ever put out to study (manuals, magazines, etc.), to skype for lessons, to stay on top everything and other things I'm sure. It's great! Now I'm probably going to want an iPad mini when I get home. We'll see!

Alrighty now I'm actually on the computer typing.  This week was pretty good.  We're adjusting to changes all around- switching up companions, respliting the area, using iPads, and just hunkering down for a shorter cycle (five weeks so that transfers is not on Christmas).  It's going to fly because next week is Thanksgiving, the next week is our mission Christmas Devotional, and then the next week is when we find out where we're going, and then that's it.  Should be good though!  We're just going to be focusing on getting both areas up and running independently again, making sure that both areas have a good, consistent teaching pool.  We have seen a ton of progress here in Newburgh.  As a branch we've had a convert baptism every month since September, our weekly sacrament attendance has increased from mid 50s to upper 70s since just this summer, and I've seen the members all become a little more missionary minded.  I think everybody is realizing that the Lord is indeed hastening His work, and they're doing their part to move things forward in this neck of the woods.

A couple sweet things from this past week- Abril got baptized!  We had a lesson with her a week ago, and she bore a powerful testimony, which gave evidence of her true conversion.  The services went great and she came out clean so that was awesome!  I think I was tagged in some pictures from the baptism on facebook, so check out my facebook profile for such.  Saturday we were looking for a referral (turns out the address didn't exist) when we saw somebody who was bringing some groceries in.  We jumped on it and helped them to take what they had and then the father of the household came out and started talking to us.  He talked a lot and we just sort of listened, occasionally chiming in.  Eventually we were able to bring up the Restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and we placed a copy of The Book of Mormon with him.  He accepted it and a return visit Saturday so that was great!  When we are willing to do good for others, God always blesses us.  It was just a great week all in all.

Things are starting to get even more chilly (which makes bike riding fun).  Last night we actually went to Dunkin Doughnuts (there are tons of those out here) where a less active works and she hooked us up with some good hot chocolate.  But yeah things are going great!  Elder Wagner is great - full of faith and willing to work, so we're just going to have a great rest of the cycle together!

Thanks for the support and love!  I hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you next week!

-Elder Griffiths

Actuar... con Amor

November 13, 2013

Hello all!

I am limited on time- transfers always take up a good chunk of time- so I'll try to be brief.  Anyways, I am still here in Newburgh!  My new companion is Elder Wagner from Reno, Nevada and he's great!  He's been out for a few months and is coming from the Bronx, but a different ward in the Bronx than the one in which I served.  I'm looking forward to a good cycle or two with him!

This week was great!  I can't think of a lot that happened this week to be honest.  But it was a great week!  We had a good last hoorah as a trio, going around teaching people and we've seen great results!  The average attendance has gone up from about mid 50's to now being lower 70's!  We just need to get some more priesthood holders going!  We've got a baptism this weekend- Abril!  She's awesome- she's a fourteen year old who's family doesn't come to church too much but she and her older sister have been coming pretty much every Sunday lately.  She's got a great testimony and is really looking forward to the blessings that come from making covenants with God!

One of the bigger things that I feel like Heavenly Father has wanted to teach me on the mission is about acting with love.  A lot of times we're in a position where we can and even should tell somebody to do something, but it doesn't always work just to tell somebody what to do.  When we're in such a position we should be motivated by our love for others, for their well being and the well being of those around us.  When we act with love, we're able to say the words that motivate people, we're willing to give of ourselves and our resources to help others.  I've seen that a lot as a missionary- working with members, investigators and even other missionaries.  So yeah help others with love!  It's great!

Thanks for the love and support!  I hope you have a great week and I'll talk to you next week!

-Elder Griffiths

El Punto al Oeste

Hello Family!

Exactly one year ago (pretty much to the hour too), I touched down at the White Plains Airport here in New York. That's crazy to think about. Just don't blink because time is going faster every single day...

Anyways, things are great here in Newburgh! It's getting a little chilly, the bright leaves are fading away and thanks to day light savings, it's getting dark around 5:00/5:30. We're still in the trio, Elder Nelson, Elder Warner and myself, and it is great! I'm not going to lie, being in a trio in the MTC wasn't super easy for me, but out here it's been going great! I feel like we balance each other out pretty well, so that's been awesome.

This past week I've spent a good bit of time at West Point, and I love it there! I went on a split with Elder Berube there in the West Point brance on Friday and then with his companion Elder Holzer on Monday. On top of that, we had a tour of West Point on Wednesday and then there was a stake youth activity, a mini-Zone Conference that we went to Saturday (where I was made companions with Kevin, a West Point cadet from John's Creek- go Georgia!). Anyways, we aren't allowed to knock doors or contact people on base, so we just have to drive straight to planned appointments, so that's what we did. The branch members there are great- they come from all over and are very supportive of the Work. So yeah it was an enjoyable experience getting over there and interacting with the great people there at West Point!

Last Wednesday we had a miracle night- all four of the lessons we had planned along with the split we had planned cancelled (no worries, that's not the miracle!). We tried dropping by a couple of people and then at about 8:45, before heading home, Elder Warner felt like we should pray to see if God had anything else in mind for us before heading home. After praying, we felt as though we should drop by a less active with whom we have had very little contact. Upon knocking on the door, we were invited in to a room full of people- turns out it was this less active's birthday! We wished her a happy birthday, ate the cake that was offered to us (politely turned down the offer of coffee), and then shared a message about the importance of prayer as a family. They were all touched and expressed their appreciation. Thanks to Elder Warner being inspired and the merciful guidance of God, we were able to have that great contact.

Thursday, Halloween, we had to be in by 6:00 at the latest, so we went out and tried to do stuff during the day. We had lunch with Paul for his birthday, spent some good time working on facebook, then had a lesson with an investigators. Afterwards, we chugged through some planning then played some games with our Zone Leaders that live in the same complex as us.

The rest of the week went great! We've been having some really great lessons with people. It'll be hard for sure to leave Newburgh because the people here are so great! Hopefully I'll be here for at least another month or two. We'll see what God has planned!

Thanks for all the love and support! Hope you have a great week this week!

-Elder Griffiths