Monday, June 27, 2016

Another week bites the dust!‏

This week went really well, a tiny bit stressful, we had 3 baptisms, each one was from a different family, so we had to coordinate and plan a lot to get it all to work out. It went well. The Spirit was strong, and they`re now members of the Church of Jesus Christ. These last few days I`ve been reviewing the Liahona from General Conference again, I know that each one of the leaders who spoke in that General Conference were called of God. The Spirit is so strong listening to them, and reading their words. I love finding new investigators who tell us (I don`t know what it is, but I feel at peace when we`re with you, what is it?) The Spirit is our constant companion as members of Christ`s Church, and the people can note that. Trust in the companionship of the Spirit as you do your best to serve God and lose yourself in the service of others. The Spirit will touch the hearts of your friends and loved ones and they we`ll receive the restored gospel. Never lose that hope. I appreciate all the letters of love and support and hope all is well for each and every one of you. Until next week! 
Love,
Elder Lohberg

Aaron: hi mom

Mom: Hey! Sorry I didn't see that you were on!
I've got about a half hour before I have to head out for the funeral
how are you?
sorry I was making breakfast for Sam & Kari - they are here visiting this week :)

Aaron: I`m good sorry mom I was reading your other letter. I`m good. I heard that Latu passed away, super sad to hear that. Must be super hard for Mosese, is he going to serve a mission?
I`m cool lets do it, I`m down to go to the temple and be temple worthy and worthy of the blessings. I`m not perfect still, but I`ll do my best effort always. 

Mom: ya it's super sad - I don't know if Mosese will serve or not - but Malaki wants to and I know Ma'ake does as well.  
Truly this experience has made me reaffirm my desires for an eternal family - doing whatever it takes for us to have that blessing.  I'm truly grateful for each of you kiddos who have grown into amazing young adults who love the Lord and want to serve Him!  Truly - it is the biggest blessing I could ever receive here on earth!!
Tell me about your week! I have about 10 minutes or so before i have to head out :(

Aaron: It was good we had 3 baptisms Saturday, super stressful getting it planned well, more than anything for the members haha but i found calm in it all. President was there, he gave me some good advice and left yesterday for the states.. he`s sick and needs to find out what he has and the doctors here don't know. 2 got confirmed Sunday, 1 next week and he`s a priest age young man.both his little brothers told me they want to be baptized now haha=D so he`ll probably baptize them this month, the moms still behind a bit, doesn`t feel ready. But in time in time. She invited her friend and her son to come, but they live like 30-40 minutes in bus from the church, so it`d be hard for us to visit them, but we`ll see if they get there! =D The work is progressing,I can`t complain. another guy came, he had gone 4 years straight with his family but he couldn`t get his divorce in Nicaragua to go through so that he could get married to his future wife who lives with him and all his kids.. so he and she went to church for 4 years every single week, but he got offended one Sunday and they had a whole year of not going and no one had visited them. Then we showed up=D And he finally went to church again, it was awesome. His family didn't this week but they all went 2 weeks ago without him.. Now I just need to see them all together! =D 

Mom: wow that is so cool!! Miracles can happen! You can be a part of that - you ARE a part of that! how cool to see people change in the gospel!! It's amazing how people can change and the joy that comes into their lives because of the light of Jesus Christ and the knowledge of the gospel.  
That's frightening about President - hopefully they will find out what is happening with him quickly.
i have to leave now - but if you reply - when I get down there I will message you from my phone until the meeting starts.  
LOVE YOU!!

Aaron: Don`t worry mom, I love you, say hi to them for me, and tell them I`m sorry for what`s happened, but remind them for me of the promise of eternal families. Elder Holland said ¨Some blessing come fast, some come slow, and some don`t come until heaven, but for those who keep the commandments of our Heavenly Father, they come.¨ I`m certain of that. Christ knows their pain, and suffering and He loves them, trust in Him. 

Monday, June 20, 2016

Sad and Happy.‏

Today officially marks the first day of my last change here in the Mission in Costa Rica. It`s a sad feeling but it has a little happiness underneath. I love being here, I love the people, I love sharing the gospel. I hope to learn everything I can while I`m here and find all the people the Lord wants me to find before I leave. 
I want to say thanks for all the support you`ve given me throughout my 2 years here. Hopefully my emails haven't been too annoying, especially with their bad subject titles haha. 
Thanks for everything,
Love, 
Elder Lohberg



Aaron: hi mom

Mom: Hey you!!  So....last transfer staying in Turrialba??????


Aaron: yup, sorry i was reading everything 
Hmm. This week it appears we have 3 baptisms.. hopefully everything goes out well=) 
I got sick last night, and today i woke up pretty sick with fever and everythin 
so today we probably wont do anything.. i might buy parts to fix our shower head. i have 5 months to shower in cold water.. i got used to it but now it`s cld in the morning and i`m sick so i might fix it hehe. 
This Saturday baptisms are Jose Luis he`s a wood worker, he makes tables and stuff like that, he`s 62 years old
Romario, he`s the soccer player, 20 years old he`s cool
Rolando he`s 16 he`s part of a group of 4 people we`re teaching a mom and her 3 kids.. he told us he wanted to get baptized.. setting the goal for his fam and he`ll probably end up baptizing the rest of his family next month but not 100 percent sure 

Mom: oh I'm so sorry you are sick :/  Cool about the baptisms - and how cool would it be for this kid to be able to baptize his family! I'm sorry you aren't feeling well :(  Will the mission pay to fix the shower? or do you have to pay for it yourself? Or does Randall have to fix it? How does that work?

Aaron: Technically Randall i think would have to fix it, but he hasnt wanted to hehe because it makes the light bill a lot higher. I`ll use mission money to buy the part, it only costs like 2 mil 4 bucks to fix it i think.. not too bad. And I`m going to fix it. 

Mom: well for sure do that - why take a cold shower in cold weather if you don't have too!! 
So - do you still have a fever now you think? do you feel achy? 

Aaron: yea i have a fever.. my teeth ache and my body and my eyes
 and im congested and the cough is starting SATAN GO AWAY heehe 

Mom: I'm so sorry :(  No chance for any sort of flu meds there I'm sure :( so drink plenty of fluids so you can get stuff out of your system.  Chicken broth would be good too and rest - lots of rest!  I'm sorry you're not well.  Glad you aren't having changes with feeling yucky! small blessings :)

Aaron:  i love being here, I love it. I`m going to cry a ton I think when I leave, or if not I`ll go into denial and cry a ton in the house haha. 

Mom: so I talked to the realtor here in Washington today (the one who is selling our house) and we are going to list the house I think August 18th - so just before we head out to Utah - She said if we need to push it out a few days because we don't want to deal with the house being shown while we are still here that would be fine too.  
I'm going to start packing up books and stuff that I can easily do without for a while and get things ready I guess.
I can't remember if I ever sent you any pictures of the house and what it will look like?  I can send you pictures from the model home - we will have a similar look but with some differences as we wont put in all the options they did.
I can also send you a map of where it will sort of be located as well if you are interested.  but no worries if not as there is PLENTY of time for you to see all of this :)

Aaron: send the pictures I have 15 minutes still!! 

Mom: Not sure if you can go to this link or not?  Try it - this is the model home - again - we won't have all the finishes this has - but some of it for sure!! we will not have a fireplace - and obviously we will have garage doors where they have the office now.
could you read the book pages I sent to you?? not sure if you are able to open them or not?

Aaron: im going to print them out. 
It`s a pretty nice huse, but it doesn't have a garage or anything? And with windows so big couldn`t people break in pretty easily??? How much square feet is it? 

Mom: it will have a 3 car garage - so like how this does but this one has windows where the garage door is because that's the model home office :p
Jessie says hi!! I'm on the phone with her right now!
It's actually 2650 finished square footage and if we do the basement it would be 4400 square feet

Aaron: HI JESSs. HEY THANKS FOR REMINDING ME. HaPPY BIRTHDAY JESSIE!!! MAN ALL WEEK REMEMBERING AND I GET HERE AND I FORGET!!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESSIE!!! 
gotta go mom love you bye! Have a good week! 

Mom: ok Aaron - hope you feel better soon!! best of luck with the baptisms on Saturday!! LOVE YOU!!


**SIDE NOTE: Randall messaged me on Facebook and this is his account of the choking from last week:
Hey Kim!!! How have you and the family been? 😊

Good! How are you guys doing?
Thank you for saving Aaron's life 😉 he told me about choking! How frightening!
We're fine thanks!!! You're welcome... I don't know but that night i went to help em with a rat trap (we having some little problems with those disgusting animals by the way..) because i felt like a kind of impression to do it... It was weird... At the beginning i thought it was coughing normally but then i could see that he wasn't breathing... To be honest i was scared... Thank God he came back... Of course he was very scared...

Yes! I'm truly grateful! So frightening! I told him to be careful! He only has a few weeks left! So be careful so you can come back to me! Hopefully he will be careful 😉
You're right!! No worries!! He will be careful!! We will try to help him!!! 👍Yeap he only has a few weeks here!! We're going to miss this guy!! 😞

Monday, June 13, 2016

no general again :(

Aaron: Hey i don't understand, you bought a house? You walked into a house and said, this is the one! But then you said lot? I`m like what... is there a house or no? haha. That`s crazy, huge change of plans he? 

The areas going good.. WE had a baptism Saturday, and she got confirmed yesterday. The soccer player is set up for the 25th, and he could also MAYBE be accompanied by 1-5 more people, haha, we`re trying to see how they progress. We had 4 investigators in church, it was good! I talk to zach sometimes but i haven't asked him that. That`s cool with the schedule. I want to play soccer with my niece hehe!! not to excited about buying more gifts hehehe, i`ve always been bad for buying gifts. Okay yeah, send me the Other side of Heaven next Monday (Changes) I could have changes, we really never know. I don't think so but who knows. 

Mom: we bought a house :)  But it is going to be built - so we had to pick a lot and pay for that - so it's a new house basically and it will be built this year.  It's not what we had planned to do - we planned to just buy a house (already built) but buying a new home has advantages (like things don't have to be fixed, roof doesn't need replacing etc) but disadvantages are - the basement isn't finished and it takes time to build it.

Mom: That's AWESOME!! Was the baptism Saturday Josemaria's daughter??  Pretty cool about the other baptisms coming up too - hopefully those follow through :)  I'm so happy that you are enjoying these last few weeks as a missionary!!  
We are excited to move to Utah to be honest - to be closer to all of you guys - have a family dinner once in a while instead of once a year :p Will be great I think!!

Aaron: I`m not going to write a general mail today.. the comp is fetchin slower than slow. It`s going through a super slow phase right now and i don't have time to write. We`ve been killing rats in our house, I killed 3 already, the 4th one got away.. and we`ll see if we can kill more, who knows. Yeah jose marias daughter. I almost died on Saturday, we were trying to set a rat trap and Randall was with us, he felt something to go upstairs to our apartment, and we couldn't set it so i got mad, and he was trying and telling a joke while i drinking water, and i like laughed coughed drank or something,. and the water got stuck right in my throat it was a horrible painful feeling and I couldn`t breathe or swallow or anything and i felt like iwas dying it was a TERRIBLE feeling, to not be able to breath, and randall saw.. .my comp just stood their looking at me haha. so Randall came and started smacking my back and doing like the heimlich and everything, and i spit the rest of the water out.. passed the whole night with adrenaline in my body and shaking and stuff.. i actually thought i was going to die.. it was just horrible as a feeling. but the baptism was sick. we`ve been doing good, cant complain, cant complain. 

Mom: OH MY GOODNESS!! that is frightening!! I'm glad Randall could help you!!  
RATS?? YIKES!! 
You never told me - are you wearing your permathrin regularly?? I hope so!! Start if not as the Zika virus is pretty serious and you can be a carrier of it - dont' want your future children harmed :p
I understand about the general email - I may try to put some snippets from our little bit of chatting going back and forth together and send that - will see 

Aaron: I do use it, but i stick mosquito bites either way.. like 1-2 bites every day or every other day. 
Yeh. I thought I was going to die mom, haha scariest moment of my life, but i didn't feel like worried about dying just that I wanted to have a family some day hehe here on earth =) 
If i`ve got Zika diay.. oh wells.. I cant do anything about it.. the Moquitos keep biting me. Pray a ton 

Mom: well I'm going to call the CDC and see if we can get you in when you get home to be tested - I don't think they know how long it stays in the body at this point.
I'm glad Randall didn't message me Saturday about this - and I'm super glad I didn't get a call from President with bad news!! Wow how frightening!!  BE CAREFUL! you only have a few more weeks to go!! make it home to me bud!! I LOVE YOU!!

Aaron: Love you too mom, I was just reading about Zika it seems like it only stays in the blood for 6 months? Or idk hahahaha, fetch.. i`ll start putting repellent and see if it helps.. but it`s dumb because if i cover my legs where they bite me most, they bite my knees, or they end up biting me in other crazy places, like on my fingers and hands.. 
Gotta go! Tell everyone I love them!! Have a good week mom!!! =) Stay safe! 

Mom: I will!! LOVE YOU!! Be safe!! have a great week!! Will keep good thoughts going your way - hopefully your baptisms come through!! excited for you!!

Monday, June 6, 2016

Por Fin! Finally!‏

It´s been a few weeks since I´ve been able to write a general mail, but everything should be back to normal now. Today, we had a zone versus zone soccer game (We won 4 to 2) it was a lot of fun. We bought shirts and everything. We´ve been finding lots of new investigators in our area and I think one of the things I was most excited about is that we finally got our Liahonas of the general conference!! (We get them late in the country places haha) I love reading the words of the Prophet and his apostles.. I know that they are called of God, they are His chosen servants. I know that what they spoke and speak is exactly what God wants for us, for those who feel an emptiness in your life I invited you to fill it up, with the word of God. Elder Eyring explained like 4 times in the Saturday morning session that the word of God is the seed, the seed and grow and fill our emptiness with joy and happiness and with truth. Seek the truth, because the truth will set you free! 

Love,

Elder Lohberg


Aaron: Hey mom, the areas going well. today we had a zone versus zone soccer game, teams of 11 with changes and everything when we got tired. We won 4 to 2 officially and with the extra 20 minutes that we played after it would´ve ended 5 to 3, I didn't make any goals but I had two good assists for the goals as I was playing center and right and left laterals. The game was fun. Cartago versus the Paz we had shirts and everything in our zone. we have lots of investigators who are progressing and are close, they just have a Little bit left to change, a little bit left to prepare themselves.. I get along well with my comp.. he´s kind of like a young kid still but he´s funny and cool. Send it to Randall Wednesday!!! 


Mom: ok!! cool!! I'm glad you won your game!! How exciting!! yes I will send the picture to Randall :) Super exciting!!

Aaron: Yah, they´re going to send me pictures of before the game and after but who knows when. Everyone was like cheering us on haha because we were in Cartago walking around 20 missionaries with Cartago team shirts haha, it was cool=) 

Mom: awesome! I bet you were eating that up :)
So - are you at an internet place or are you wanting to send a general through me - and I promise to actually send it out this time

Aaron: I´m at an internet place in San Jose, I can send it.. then we´ll take a bus for our area. any luck with the house seach?? 

Mom: no not really - the crazy realtor didn't have a way to get into the houses so we came back home - she is supposed to be showing up to take us out now that she has keys - but I haven't heard anything from her - stupid!! 

Aaron: pfft what poop. gotta wait then? 

Mom: well we are heading out as soon as she gets here to look at homes - but ya basically a wasted day!!

Aaron: haha and what day do you go back to Washington?? 
Ben and I are planning to see if we can go on divisions with the missionaries the Saturday i get back to visit all our friends and see if we can then pass him in his car and me in mine for all the investigators that Sunday to take em to church. we´ll see haha.. Are you sure we don't need to renew my license?? 

Mom: we go back to Washington on Thursday after we've gotten to see Jessie's ultrasound on Wednesday :)  haha so wait - you are talking about here with Ben after you get home?  Cool if so.  I think you renew your license this year I believe when you turn 21??

Aaron: Are you sure, can you make sure?!?!?! It would suck to find out I cant drive haha or that I have to take the test again.. 

Aaron: Will I have to take the driving test again?? 

Mom: haha no you don't have to take the test again - your license shouldn't expire until you are 21 - so I think you renew in December actually - but you should be fine - when we get home though I will check your wallet :) but I'm PRETTY sure you are fine :)

Mom: You will drive again my son for sure :)

Aaron: Hey i saw that there´s home remedies to get rid of freckles, we´ll need to do that too! 

Aaron: When do i have to take the test again, sometimes you have too right??!?!?! 

Aaron: Gotta go mom, I love you!!! going to take the bus back to turrialba, have a good week! Hope you find a cool house, take care and we´ll talk next monday!! i think in the morning.. we dont have any plans that I know of. Love you and dad, bye!! 

Mom: love you Aaron!! Have a safe ride back - talk to you soon!!! LOVE YOU!! HUGS!!