Author Archives: Carl Miner

Moved to Tai Tong

Hey all!

Alright so this last week has been pretty crazy! we had Transfers and our mission president finished his time here! I moved from xin zhuang down to the east coast in tai tong! its a sweet place and im loving every bit of it! ive only been here for about 3 days but its been a good time so far. My companion is now Elder Tang and he is a crazy guy but he’s a ton of fun! the fun thing about our area is that its not all city and also sometimes we work with missoinaries in the taizhong mission!! yeah!!! its great fun! The situation here actually isn’t that much different from my last area actually, we don’t have a lot of investigators and such. i really do have a beautiful area though so its not even a big deal πŸ™‚ I have met some amazing members and i know im here for a reason. I’ll just do my best and we will see what god has in store for me here! oh and here’s some pictures πŸ™‚

Elder Miner

-On the 5 hour train ride down here

-My companion Elder Tang

-The stuff we get to bike through every day πŸ™‚
-And just spiderman no biggy….haha πŸ˜‰

Finished training. I know you wish you were here!

Hey everyone!

So this week i finish training finally! ive been out 6 months already and im finally done with training! its because im a trouble maker πŸ˜‰ haha nah im excited though! This area has been hard im not going to lie. we haven’t had any super crazy success but i have seen the biggest miracles here and have had some growing experiences that i wouldn’t trade for anything! im going to miss my trainer and all the times we have had. The mission…. oh man i love the mission. ive learned things that i don’t think i could have learned anywhere else. i absolutely love the people here and their culture! Taiwan is a packed place but its a beautiful place in its own way πŸ™‚ this last week i helped huang hui ting accept baptism! the sisters taught her and they asked me to help! so i did! it was an awesome baptism and i didn’t mess up on the chinese… so yeah thats right!


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haha kidding it was a good experience! this past week we have had to bike in the pouring rain twice and its so much fun! ive learned you are wet from either sweat or rain there is no dry here for missionaries πŸ™‚ went on a super fun hike last monday which was beautiful!

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Love the mission, Love the Lord, i love chinese and the people here, i love the missionaries and the things they can teach me! life is soo good its unreal πŸ™‚ hope you all have a good week! πŸ™‚

i know you all wish you were here but im sure you’ll get over it πŸ˜‰ haha

Elder Miner

Taipei 101, girl flirting with Americans, saxophone-playing investigator

Hey everyone! so this week has been a good one!! ive got a funny story to start πŸ™‚ so last monday after emailing we had to go to this guy to see if he could fix my companions suit (don’t put your suit on a stove top….ever…) and he was talking to this guy and then this girl comes and talks to the guy too. then she has to wait while my comp talks to this guy, so she starts talking to me and i invite her to english class and do my missionary stuff and she wrote down her address and all this stuff! it was super sweet!! i was excited because its always fun to have some success! πŸ™‚ then after we leave my companion says to me after reading what she wrote "She wants to go biking and just do some fun things, she doesn’t want anything to do with our church…" haha so…. one day ill be able to tell if a girl is interested in the gospel or just some americans πŸ™‚ haha!

anyway for legit news. This last week we had some really good success. we had 2 investigators and 2 less actives at church! then we had some fun knocking fun the pouring rain, its great! πŸ™‚

We went hiking next to Taipei 101 super beautiful view even though it was a bit polluted!


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best investigator!! he came late to English class like right when we were walking out and he felt super bad so he played an epic song on his saxophone for us! πŸ™‚


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Had this super good Cheese Cake that i almost forgot to take a picture of…. so here is part of that cheese cake πŸ™‚ everything is so cheap here! its the best! πŸ™‚

I hope that you all are doing good and that you remember what a great life we all have! oh and i almost forgot! i am going to be baptizing the sisters in our area’s investigator this friday! pray that i don’t forget the chinese! πŸ™‚ haha love you all!

Elder Miner

Taipei 101, district bike ride, temple

Hey everyone this week was awesome! went to Taipei 101 and just had a blast this week! we had 2 investigators come to church and they seem to be progressing really well!


​Me at the top of Taipei 101!

couldn’t help myself, it was just there haha


​my district after biking to zone meeting for half an hour πŸ™‚


​just a super sweet view is all


​Beautiful temple!


​construction signs here have little asian hats πŸ™‚ πŸ™‚

My week was super good! hope yours was good! ill try and do better at keeping you all updated!

Elder Miner

Splits, two trainees! Feng as investigator, now two investigators!

From: Nathan Miner [mailto:nathan.miner@myldsmail.net]
Sent: Sunday, May 31, 2015 10:29 PM
To: NathanMissionary@thepickandshovel.com
Subject: [Elder Miner’s Missionary Mailing List] (no subject)

Hey everyone! so its been a crazy week! we haven’t gotten a ton of success but i know that what we are doing will have some sort of impact for sure! we went of exchanges this week it was me and elder King it was so fun because we are both training! it made me use my chinese which is slowly improving for sure! had a really good lesson and got a referal which ended up being a good new investigator! his name is feng and he’s super quiet but super solid! now we have a total of 2 investigators!!! hard work does pay off! πŸ™‚ Life is amazing i love it! this work is hard but worth it for sure! now picture time πŸ™‚

-an awesome sunset for the first time

-super good indian food πŸ™‚

-saw this on the sidewalk just chilling!

Not much this week…. sorry hope i can have more next week!

Elder Miner

Run in the rain. Fruit! Bicycle prayer and lesson.

Alright so….

This morning i woke up and went to run a track in the pouring rain because we can. then we came home and i had two big super amazing mangos for breakfast! πŸ™‚ the fruit here is the best by far! other then having the best food in general Taiwan is great! im continually learning and i have to force myself daily to make those changes which is a blast haha in all honesty though i do love Taiwan. the mission experience is something that you couldn’t help anyone understand unless they went through it themselves. i’ve had tough past couple weeks with little success if you look at our key indicators but i have had a ton of success in changing myself and becoming what i need to become in order to do gods work here. i think that this area or at least this past transfer was all for that reason. im thinking im going to be completely different when i get home, which is a good thing. ive had some very great moments that make everything all worth it and im going to keep having them i have no doubt! life is great and nothing can change that πŸ™‚

Funny little story! so we had this investigator that we met because we were saying a huge long prayer in front of his friends bike… haha he said he didn’t want to disturb us because we were really into it πŸ™‚ but then he said that we just prayed for a super long time…. so he came up and asked if we could move haha! it was funny but then we ended up teaching him the first lesson right there and he came to church yesterday! probably one of the biggest miracles that i have seen so far on my mission! it turns out though that he didn’t live in our area…. so we gave him to the other Elders in our apartment haha! its all good! he’s a super great investigator and as long as he’s taken care of im ok with that πŸ™‚ life is good! church is true and the atonement works!

Elder Miner

More pictures

-my cool new name tag!
-My trainer (Elder Jensen), Me, My Grandpa (Elder Willes), and my Uncle (Elder Tan)!
-This is a hotpot which for anyone that knows is just about the best thing on this planet!
-yes….just yes…

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Baptismal date, Buddhist water

Hey everyone!

alright so i wasn’t able to really email home this last week because of skyping home which was amazing so to be honest i don’t really feel that bad about it all πŸ™‚ haha anyway, this week has been good! its been kind of rough but its all good. my companion is struggling with some things about home but even through all that he has pushed through! we haven’t had many super crazy experiences or anything but hey missions aren’t always going to be like that! we did actually set up a baptismal date for next month the 11th! so im hopeful that they will keep it up and i think they are going to continue to keep their commitments and such! its awesome to see the improvement of those that we teach and what happens as they accept the gospel!

side note that is actually really funny! we were walking through the park and we saw this big set up of Buddhist things. we went over just to kind of check it out and as soon as we got close they came up to us and just started telling us about it and they wouldn’t stop! next thing i know we had blessed water in our hands and were walking on our way….. i wonder if that is something like what people feel when we come up and talk to them… haha πŸ™‚ lifes good i have no reason to complain! love a mission and would love to hear from everyone about how life is going! till next week!

Elder Miner

-This random family that wanted a picture with two strange Americans
-a super awesome member that makes my day πŸ™‚
-The blessed water that we got from the Buddhists… its was good… ba
-only the best job that you could ask for is all

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An incredible week and growing so much, listen to the Spirit

hey everyone!

so this week im sorry but i forgot the stuff i need to put pictures up…. so those of you reading this for the pictures can stop now don’t worry about it… πŸ˜‰ but i will do that next time!

so….this week has been and incredible learning experience! i have done so much growing and i have no doubt that im not done yet! again prayer is amazing and works everytime! and know that as you listen to the spirit you may not get a solid “do this or go there” answer sometimes you just have to go ahead with whatever you think is best and pray in your heart it works out! and i may be frustrating but i know it works!

We are going to a place called dan shui today and apparently it has amazing icecream and some really cool views! oh and it is pouring right now! its typhoon season and i can’t wait to go biking in that in a minute! haha πŸ™‚

The church is true and life is great! everything happens for a reason! Thanks for all you guys do!

Elder Miner

God hears and answers prayers

Hey everyone!

so this week has been so good! we had a very slow week if you look at what we were able to do and how many lessons we were able to teach but overall i feel like we did our best! i had many experiences where prayers were answered and where my testimony was strengthened. to start we started out on about thursday saying more prayers when we head out so that we rely more on the lord for everything. on friday we were saying a prayer to ask where we should go in order to find the people who were prepared on the street. the first time we didn’t really recieve a solid answer so…. so we prayed again! then right when we finished our prayer this guy jumps in and says “I love the book of mormon!!” in chinese of course. so we talk to him and end up setting up to meet with him again! it turns out that he’s a little crazy and we shouldn’t meet with him….. but! story two!

we were finding at this park and we again said two prayers as to where we should go then we ended up running into this guy who was with his family who was a past investigator and he said he wanted to come back to church so we got his name. he only told us his english name which was sam so we got that and his number than went on our way. met another super cool old guy that loves americans and then a less active let us in so we could talk with them! it was awesome! but thats not all!

Then on sunday we were finding and weren’t having luck at all…. so we said another prayer and we decided to go look for these less actives around the park. there were 4 of them so we said another prayer to see who we should meet. then we ended up choosing this cai dixiong. so we ended up going to his house and we got in there and this guy just invites us up and makes us feel right at home and the entire time im thinking “this guy is very nice for just meeting us this is strange and he looks soooo familiar” it turns out its the guy that we saw in the park and he didn’t tell us that he had been baptized so we thought he was just a past investigator! we taught him and his entire family it was so cool!!

From these experiences and a lot more little ones i can say that god hears and really does answer prayers! i have no doubt in my mind that these things would not have happened had we not asked and relied on the lord to help us do his work! i love you all and hope that you can have some experiences of your own!

have a great week!

Elder Miner

Oh a picture of some ward members and such! and a sweet museum!

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