Semana 42 y un gran cambio‏

Hello Family and friends,

I hope this letter finds you all well wherever you may be. Thanks as always for your support, I really feel your love and support, faith and prayers all the way here in Costa Rica. I love you all with all of my heart. This week was absolutely amazing, just like the rest. I participated in something that forever changed my mission and my life. The week started off with divisions where I went to an area called PorVenir while my companion went to a leadership training meeting. I was with Elder Constantino from Idaho, he only had 1 and a half weeks in the mission, I knew and sympathized for him and what he was going through. We had a great divisions, even though I was the missionary with a lot of time, he taught me a bunch of things that I had forgotten along the way. We worked so hard, and were doing everything we can to help the work of the Lord increase in Costa Rica. I truly felt influenced by His spirit, led by His hands, and effective as a missionary, it was a truly great experience. After I arrived home after the divisions and recieved a call and a special assignment. I was to head down on more divisions with Elder Hoyt my zone leader from Texas, we were to go to Puntarenas and all that was told to us is that we were going to help translate for a bunch of gringos on a boat. We met with more missionaries in the mission office in San Jose, there was about 12 gringos.

The US navy, united with a charity group from the Church and a charity health group called Project Hope, they were making a mission to central and south america offering free health services from dental to optometry to physical therapy they had everything, the only thing was they didnt speak any spanish, so who better than the missionaries to do the job, haha. Costa Rica was the 8th country on this mission. So we headed to Barranca, Puntarenas about an hour out of San Jose, I saw the ocean for the first time in 9 months, but that wasnt what took my breath away. As I stood there seeing all these people working so hard and not receiving a dime for their efforts, I realized that everyone was running on pure love. I witnessed pure love in action. It was absolutely beautiful, there is no other words to describe it. I loved being an instrument in the hands of my God, even though we were not allowed to preach, people saw our examples and knew and recognized us as representatives of Jesus Christ.

I spent the first day in General Medicine, translating to find out more about the pacients cheif complaint. It was seriously life changing and mission changing, I felt like I was seeing life through the eyes of our Heavenly Father, I experienced an immensely deep love for all of the people who came, those from Puntarenas, those from San Jose, from the United States, Nicaragua, Jamaica, Ecuador, Peru from all over the world. It was truly a humbling experience. I cant quite put it into words how I felt, but I know that I felt good and I felt the influence of the spirit. My second day was spent outside filling out forms and admitting pacients, that was different than the first day but it was just as amazing. I loved everything about my experience in Puntarenas, I was supposed to go today, tomorrow, and Wednesday, but I didnt go today and we will see about the rest of the week.

My spanish shot through the roof, and I recieved an even stronger testimony of the gift of tongues!! I know that this was a blessing from the Lord, everyone from every different walk of life came together for one purpose and the driving influence was love, and that was the biggest lesson learned. Love is the meaning, love is the ending and the beginning, love is the left and the right and its what keeps us going, we nothing without love and charity, the pure love of Christ.

Another one of the great experiences was the change to eat a real MRE, meal ready to eat, that was such a great experience as well, and didnt taste as bad as I thought it would! It was an awesome experience, one that I will take with me for the rest of my life, I will never forget the faces of those who are sick thank me as I helped in this Gods work. I know that Love is what the world needs, and I know it starts with our desire to serve God. I know that the work that I am doing is true, I know its from God and I know its the most important thing I could be doing at this point in time. I learned so mcuh in just a few short days, I forever thank my Heavenly Father for allowing me to serve a mission. This experience is one that I would never trade or take back for the rest of my life. I hope you all know that I love you with all my heart and I think of you often, you are all in my prayers and I love you very much!

con mucho amor, Elder Falor