week 94

This week was good, but trying for sure.  We haven't had a new investigator all transfer.  We are finding loads of really cool people, but none of them hold out to turn into investigators.  But there it is, that's missionary work for ya!  Again, God wants me to learn something that I need to know.  I have learnt that lesson the most on my mission, there must be an opposition in all things. In order to know the good, we must know the bad. 

 

The Good!  Wayne got the priesthood and was ordained a priest!!!  So that was sooo amazing to be a part of!  He is beaming!  When I saw him he really did look brighter and glowing! It was awesome!  Its moments like that that make this work amazing.  We are in the business of saving lives, both spiritually and physically, and when people take the message we share on board, it changes their lives forever.  I feel so blessed to be involved in this work.  We have the opportunity to help people come unto Christ and change their lives.  Yes it may be challenging at times, and other times we might see loads of success, but no matter what happens we are helping people to return and live with their Father in Heaven. 

 

The zone leader's had a baptism on Saturday, but apparently the chap getting baptised didn't get the memo.  We had a ward party at the chapel and then the baptism right after, but when it came time, the guy just didn't show up.  It was really sad because he was doing soooo well. He was sooo happy!  I felt bad for the ZL's. 

 

This week will be good we have district meeting, and a trainers meeting and I'm going on exchange with the ZL's.  It should be a good week, hopefully we get a couple of teaches, and we have 5 DA's so that is always a plus!  Oh and we have sports night! 

 

There is about 2 weeks until the end of the transfer and then it is my last transfer. 

I have set goals and made plans and I'm going to work so hard and talk to everyone!  We are going to rely on the Lord and turn to him and as we work we will see his hand in our work and see miracles.  I'm sooo grateful for this chance I have had to serve.  It is an experience I will not forget.  I have had sooo many experiences that have shaped me and made me who I am today!  I love it!

week 93

Things here in Loughborough are doing great!  Time is just flying by though!  It's almost May! and the transfer ends in like 20 odd days!  Oh my days!! It's ridiculous!!  I'm really happy that I am able to stay in Loughborough.  I love it here sooo much! The members are amazing the area is amazing it is all just amazing and I wouldn't trade it for anything!!  

So some news of things going on here.  The zone leaders have a baptism on Saturday of a former investigator named Michael!  He is amazing and has changed so much!  We have a zone meeting in a couple of days so that will be good.  Oh my days here is one it has been soooooo sunny the past couple of days!!!! It has been awesome to roll around in a short sleeve shirt!  I'm loving it!  It might get sunny today not sure.  But things are good we have sports night again Thursday so hopefully we can get some people to that.  Things are good, we're getting fed, I'm dry, have a good companion, the ward is good.  Can't complain it's all good. 

Training is good-- I really do love it, but it does come with its challenges.  He is only 18! I wasn't even graduated yet in spring when I was 18! It's insane!!  So with that comes increased homesickness, more than I had and more than Elder Dutton had.  But he is a rock and he is pushing through.  We have level up'd on our comp unity, because he is a quiet one. We agreed that whenever a thought comes into our mind we will say it out loud so now there is much more talking than before.  All I can do is my best. I try to teach by example and words if needed and I do my best.  Sometimes Elder Steel struggles approaching people, but we are doing role plays and working on it.  He can talk to people it's just the initial stopping them that he struggles with, well fair play so do i hahaha.  It's always scary!  Elder Steel is awesome and is a better missionary than he thinks!  

Our finding has picked up a lot we get about 2 potentials a day with a couple of books but the hard part is turning those potentials into investigators.  We are just finding and excited to start teaching some of these awesome people we are finding.  We aren't teaching loads, but we do have 3 or 4 people we are working with so that is good.  Service is something we haven't been doing as much of to be fair, we will for sure start doing a lot more hours a week of service!  

 

“You are a part of this special generation.  It is not be chance that you are here at this important time in the history of the Lord’s work.  It is your opportunity to declare this message of the Restoration with greater force and effect than any of the previous generation. “--Elder L. Tom Perry

That is an amazing quote by Elder Perry!  It really lifts you up a bit!!  I'm excited to have the missionaries over for dinner and to go out with them and stuff when I get home!  I'll be an old fart and way smaller than both of them probably lol.  

week 92

So here is all the news. 

Elder Steel, Michael, Elder Dutton (Michael trained him several months ago) and Elder Dutton's new missionary.

My new missionary's name is Elder Steel.  He is one of the 18 year olds. He is from Gooding, Idaho.  He has 2 sisters and 2 brothers.  It was a rough week I won't lie. Not only am I training a new boy but I'm district leader as well.  hahaha what is happening?

Michael and Elder QB

I was with Elder Quackenbush for 4 1/2 months and I really loved being with him. We got along great and totally knew each other and it was a little bit of a shell shock to go to someone completely new.  

Elder Steel is is a quiet kid which is also hard because Elder QB never stopped talking hahaha but I've realised that this is life and we get comfortable and like being with someone and then everything changes and we are kind of frazzled.  So thats all. I'm doing well, I just pray and read the scriptures and just try and talk and laugh a lot. 

We had a moment last night. I hit breakthrough and we talked about not being perfect and how we can't expect to reach it in the mission.  We will always make mistakes and he was saying how he just thinks he can do better and we just talked about it. It was good. He needs to relax, have fun, and enjoy being here.  So we're good. 

But I'm still in Loughborough, which means I will finish my mission here in Loughborough.  That will make it 9 months hahaha sooooooo long but I wouldn't have it any other way.
The ward is amazing, the area is amazing! IT is just AWESOME!!!

Yesterday the ZL's came and worked with us for a bit and we gave out 14 Books of Mormon and got about 11 potential investigators!!!!  It was an amazing day!  So that helped us alot with building our teaching pool so now we just hope they hold and we can get at least 1 new investigator from it.  So things are good here. 

Yep, my  hurts a bit but it is soooo much better, I haven't been on the bike in forever and I've been wearing my saddle bag for ages. The doctor still is saying take it easy and no biking but we have found loads of people anyway, that's one thing I love about our area, you really could walk it all the time it's gonna take time but you could.  It takes about 1 hour to get to church and that's about the farthest we would walk.  

Things here are good. I'm excited to be here but I won't lie its hard knowing i dont have long left.  I want more than anything to finish strong, I've worked hard my whole mission I can't just stop now!

Michael and some of the elders (except probably the one in the middle) 

week 91

I loved conference! I loved Quentin L Cook's talk and L. Tom Perry's talk.  I love how you only get as much out of conference as you put into it.  It was really cool!  We caught a lift with the Zone Leaders and drove to the Stake Centre in Leicester, Evington, and we watched it there.  Donnella was in Utah watching conference and Wayne watched it at a member's home and he really enjoyed it.  He said it was a "revelating experience" hahaha he is awesome. He is preparing to recieve the priesthood next week. 

Transfers are on Wednesday. But p-days will always be on Monday, no matter what, so that's quite nice!  We find out tonight what will be happening. But this is what I do know. Last Monday evening I got a call from President Rasmussen and he has asked me to train.  I said yes, so my last two transfers I will be training. I do not know where I will be training, but I hope I stay in Loughborough!  I'm soooo excited and nervous and all sorts of feelings hahaha it's weird.  So I went to the trainer's meeting on Friday and in the room were 31 trainers because this group coming in has 31 lol and the next group has 31 and the next group has 31 hahaha that is 93 new missionaries in the next 4 1/2 months! INSANE!!!  Also I saw Elder Dutton at the meeting! He is training!!! Hahaha it's awesome!!

 

Things here are going well, we are finding and having success and seeing miracles.  We have some good potentials that are turning into investigators and our investigators are progressing.  The Lord is really blessing us here. 

 

Thursday we had sports night and I hurt my back, but don't worry I'm fine. I'm quite mad at myself for doing it because it's my last 3 months and I want to work hard and I'm getting a boy in 2 days but this won't stop me. I'm going to be smart and effective and work hard but relax and heal as well. This simply means we will have to work smart and with members to get referrals.  Last night I had a thought that there must be an opposition in all things.  But IF we are OBEDIENT THEN we are blessed.    

I'm so excited for the next couple of days and what will happen.  I'm going to do what I can do and trust in God to take care of the rest. I have an obvious weakness now but that hasn't stopped God in the past from turning it into a strength so I'm excited to see what my new companion, God, and I can accomplish this upcoming transfer!

week 90

Our easter was good.  We spent a nice easter meal with the richeys!
It was awesome.  I love them so much!

President's interviews went well, he was asking me what I wanted to accomplish
in these last two transfers and I froze. Because the way he phrased it was scary.
But I said I wanted to accomplish whatever the Lord asks of me and I want to put my
all into doing it.  I'm excited!!!  I have no idea what is going to happen this transfer all
I know is that 31 missionaries are coming in this one and the one after that and the one
after that hahaha so that will be in the next 4 1/2 months 93 missionaries coming in!!!
Absolutely crazy!  So transfers are on the 10th of April.

This week has been good.  It has definitely been a finding week.  We have probably
tracted 3 streets a day, if not more.  It's been good.  We have seen miracles and we got
8 potentials this week. It has been amazing!  The Lord is truly blessing us for our work.
We were doing some tracting and we met a Scottish Muslim. He offered to give me a koran, the english translation and i was like yea! and he laughed and we got a return appointment--it was awesome!!!

We found this guy a couple weeks back and we taught him this week and he became
a new investigator and he came to church on Sunday!!!  He enjoyed it and said he felt
the spirit so that was good.

We went to this village, Normanton which is along the River Soar and so we head off and
take the canal paths because it will be quicker, well we get to this point where the path
turns into a trodden over a section of a field hahaha so we are walking our bikes through it
and it is muddy as!  It was so bad. Well we get to the village....just one problem, its on the
other side of the river hahaha. Well no worries, we will cross the bridge, oh wait there isn't one!
There were only ferries but they weren't running. So we walked back and it was soooo dark
so we took a wrong turn but we saw some lights above a football pitch so we just walked toward
that and ended up by the ZLs flat, we were like what the heck!  How did we get over here!

This week has been good!  We have seen the Lord's hand in our work and we have truly been
blessed.  I am excited for this week! We are going to finish the transfer strong, since this is the
last full week.  We will see miracles this week I know it!

Above--This is Kebab--basically it's donner meat which is supposed to be lamb, but nobody really knows.  Sounds good right, well you get it on chips with a ketchup and garlic mayo sauce.  It's quite good, but you can feel your arteries clogging.

Below--Jenga Tower

week 89

Wayne was a former investigator and when I first got here we taught him a couple of times but he flogged(cancelled or didnt show up) us 14 times so we dropped him.  Then we picked him back up with QB and taught a couple of times and then the same story; and he really wanted to be baptised before Christmas but he wasn't keeping commitments like church, reading, and praying. But he called us one day and said he would like us to come over and he was keeping appointments but not commitments and we were wondering what Wayne needed to progress. So after some time we set him with a date and told him here, this is your date--the 13th of april.  If you want to be baptised on that date, prove it.  And off he went . He came to church and he was reading, really well, and he was keeping commitments and over those two weeks Wayne changed so much.  He wasn't even the same. He embraced the gospel and allowed it to change him. It was amazing teaching Wayne because of the change we saw in him. It was awesome.  So we prayed and discussed and felt we needed to move his date forward because he was progressing and ready, so we moved it to the 23rd of March and he was soooo excited!  He continued to progress and keep commitments, so on Wednesday after district meeting President came down and interviewed Wayne for baptism, and he passed!!! 

Then on Thursday and Friday it snowed alot. Which was amazing and beautiful....

But, the baptism was supposed to be Saturday after the ward party so everyone could be there.  But the ward party got cancelled because of the snow.  So Saturday morning at 8 o'clock we got a call saying the party was cancelled, and we went into missionary extreme planning.  We called people to come to the baptism, got to the church and filled the font, shoveled the car park so there was no snow, and called people to bring cakes.  And on Saturday, 23 March at 11:00 Wayne was baptised into the church!!!!! 

It was a crazy amazing day! I asked him how he felt after the baptism and he said, I feel different.  I feel good and I about cried. It was awesome to see this man completely turn around and now is a member of the church.   Then on sunday we only had sacrament meeting because of the snow and Wayne was given the gift of the Holy Ghost and sustained andwelcomed into the church and the ward. 

Things here are going great, we are doing loads of finding because now we have one less investigator so we are trying to build our teaching pool.  We have a couple of potential investigators that could turn into something. We will see what happens and this time I promise to keep you updated on it. hahaha  We had sweet dinners this last week with members! i love the members here! I would not mind finishing my mission in Loughborough!  It would be cool and long (lol) we will see, we have interviews on Thursday so I will most likely speak to president about it and see what he thinks. 

 

Here is the quote of the week for you, this one is from Brigham Young.

"Salvation is an individual operation."   Good huh? I liked it.

This is COSTCO!!  So we went and we couldn't get in! Elder Hansen didnt have the right number, so we tried buying one and they said we couldn't because we were not employed, so we were like can we at least get a hot dog and they were like no sorry we only sell to members!  STUPID. 

This is the funniest little 3 wheel truck hahaha we saw it and I was like yes I must have a picture of that!

week 88

So I have a long list I've been writing out this week of things I want to tell you.

1. So I feel bad about this one, I have totally forgotten to tell you.  So do you remember Wayne?  Well we started working with Wayne again a couple months back and told him how it is and went through a process, but a couple weeks back we invited him to be baptised on the 23 of March!  Well that's this Saturday!!  I have loved working with Wayne because when he started taking the gospel seriously, it changed him and I have seen it work on him and shape him and he isn't even the same person as when I first met him.  I'm serious, he is completely different.  Well he is so ready and excited for Saturday!  He is reading, praying and coming to church and well integrated with the ward, it's perfect.  So yes Wayne is getting all ready and he is praying about who he wants to baptise him.  He is amazing and I'm so glad I have had the privilege to work with him. So yay! Exciting times in Loughborough!

 

2. Donnella is going to Utah tomorrow with one of the American YSA girls.  They are taking a tour of the west coast and will be gone for 4 weeks because it's half term for uni students. So they get 4 weeks off.  She is going to Utah, California, Oregon, and Arizona and they are going to go to the Confernce Centre to see General Conference!  She is totally loving being in the church she is just soaking up every opportunity that she can!  

 

3. We started a sports night at the chapel every Thursday night at 7 and we had 8 people there last time and we should have a couple more, there is this kid we met on the street.  He is way cool and he loves basketball so he said he would come and bring his friends so we are doing a creative finding way. 

 

4. This kid named Ethan just returned from his mission and Sunday was his homecoming. He served in the Athens, Greece Mission.  I thought my mission was hard.  But he seems like a good kid, we are excited to get him out teaching with us. It should be good.

 

5. Elder Hansen, one of the ZLs possibly has a Costco card, he's checking with his parents today but if he does then that means we can go to Costco in Leicester!  They are so rare to have and we have the chance to go!  I'm sooo excited!  It will be awesome. 

 

6. Things here are doing well.  We have had some good finding hours this week and got a couple of potentials and some new investigators! It's exciting!  We have a couple of potentials that could turn into something so we will see.  We were teaching one of our former investigators and she gave us a referral, which is one more than we usually get so we were so grateful!  It was just a number and a name, so we called him up and told him we had met with this friend of his and she had said you might need some help and we told him we love to serve and we share a message of Jesus Christ that can bless our lives and would he be interested and he said come over Saturday morning!  MIRACLE!!  It was amazing!  We were so excited, he seemed really nice so there is some potential there.  The Lord is blessing us really, that's all it comes down to, everyone we are working with is a miracle that God has given us.  It is amazing to be in this area because we notice the little miracles every day.  That's something I have been working on--noticing all the tiny miracles, like yesterday my feet were dry.  Awesome. 

 

The new area and the ZLs are doing great they are just finding and finding and finding. We gave them a couple streets to knock and some people to stop by to see so we hope that they get something from that.  They are good guys and good missionaries and they are seeing miracles as well so it's good.

 

The ward is doing well.  We have a dinner appointment everyday but Saturday and the other elders I think have the same and they are all separate.  President doesn't want us doing 4 man DAs so they are all 2 man so its quite impressive that the ward is stepping up and the Lord is blessing them for their efforts. 

 

It has been cold here and it randomly freak snow storms.  It's nuts like it's alright weather then BOOM blizzard hahaha.  It's like BYU-I but the snow doesn't stick so that's good.  It's crazy though!  It has been bitter cold the last couple of days but oh well its England and I'm quite used to this by now hahaha.

 

"Courage is when you kept pushing on and not giving up when everyone would understand why you fell."

 

I love this quote. like in Finding Nemo, just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming swimming swimming.  

 

One last thing--the 6 nations rugby match was the other day. Basically it determines who is the champion at rugby and it was the defending champions, WALES vs ENGLAND hahaha and guess who won.......WALES!  LOL I was loving it hahaha!  Elders Quorum the next day was a bit tense hahaha maybe becuase i wore my IWales socks hahahaha it had to be done. 

Happy St. Patrick's Day!