Christmas Multi-Zone Conference in Lima

Normally, our mission president holds six multi-zone conferences each transfer cycle, three in the provinces (up in the mountains of Peru) and three in Lima. But this transfer cycle fell near Christmas, so he held one in the provinces (which we did not attend) and this one in Lima.

All the sisters and elders in Lima and Chosica met in a Lima chapel for hymns, testimonies, and talks. Beverly and Scott both bore their testimonies. It was Beverly's first impromptu testimony in Spanish.

The sister missionaries always sit in the front.

After the meetings, we had lunch. Beverly dishes up applesauce while Sister Bocanegra waits to pass out the food.

Here are the plates of food---rice, mashed potatoes (yellow), turkey, and applesauce---waiting for the missionaries to come and pick them up. It was quite a task to feed 140 missionaries.

Here's one of the two sister missionary tables.

The missionaries filled the entire cultural hall.

Elders at the luncheon pose for the camera.

The sister missionaries pose with "Papa Noel" (played by Elder Birdsall) as he is called here in Peru.

The mission gift (donated by our Obra Maravillosa Foundation) was a "polo," a tee shirt with all of the missionaries names on it. Sister Leyva asked everyone to line up by height so she could pass out the shirts. This picture shows the short elders and all the sisters from shortest to tallest.

Here are the three tallest elders in the mission: Elder Rogers, Elder Smith, and Elder Spendlove. Elder Spendlove, on the right, is 6 foot 7 inches.

The missionaries pose for a picture with their tee shirts. Pres. Leyva and his two daughters (Stephani and Brenda) and his son Juanito are right behind Beverly and Elder and Sister Goede.

Scott and Beverly pose with their tee shirts.
To top off the activities at the church, the missionaries put on skits. Here the "Ghost of Missionary Present" appears to Elder Scrooge, a trunky, lazy missionary.

In this skit, the tallest and shortest elders (Elder Spendlove and Elder Espinal) team up for a skit about getting missionary contacts. Here they talk to a guy (Elder Hernandez) who is dancing to music on his iPod. They dance a little with him and then count him as a contact.


In this skit, angels sing to announce the birth of Christ.

The funniest skit was the pantomime to the music Carol of the Bells.

In this clever skit, Papa Noel is Laban, with his servants all around him. Nephi, Sam, Laman and Lemuel try to get the brass gifts from him.

In the evening, the missionaries (but not Scott and Beverly) went Christmas carolling at a local mall. It was a wonderful day.