G'Day!
Thanks so
much for the
great e-mail! I love reading them each week and enjoy hearing about all
the stuff you are doing back home. This past week was a fantastic one!
So the main news is obviously with Tommy and Tracey. Their wedding and
baptism did go through and it was perfect! Back on Thursday they asked
if I would baptize Tracey so I gladly accepted and it was an honor to do
so! It was the first time obviously that I'd ever baptized anyone
before so I was a bit nervous as well, but it went quite well and I
didn't mess up so I only had to do it once so that was good! So for the
wedding, it was supposed to start at 1 pm in the afternoon so Elder
Hirata and I, as well as Bishop Smith of the Pakenham ward, got there
around 11:30 to clean the chapel and set up the font for the baptism.
That didn't take too much time and we finished about 12:40. However, at
12:45 no one had shown up to the chapel yet and we started to get a
little worried! Was it at a different chapel? Did they
not want to go through with it anymore? But after frantically calling
all sorts of people we found out they were just on their way and were
just running late. According to some of the members, Samoan time runs
about an hour behind everyone else haha. So eventually everyone started
showing up. Tracey and Tommy eventually got here at 1:50 or so and then
the wedding commenced at 2:00. The wedding went really well and there
were heaps of people there, over 150. If you invite one member of Samoan
family, all the extended relatives and their friends come as well haha.
Immediately after the wedding was finished there was about a 25 minute
break where Tracey could get changed into baptismal clothes, as well as
myself. After that we came back and everyone took some pictures and then
the baptism service proceeded. They had some good speakers and then a
great musical number by some of the members. It was pretty funny though,
because since Tracey is now the only
member in her family there were a lot of non-members there and after
all the talks/musical numbers there would be a lot of clapping which
obviously isn't the typical procedure, but that's ok. Then we went and
had the actual baptism which as I mentioned before went really well!
There was an extra amount of clapping after I baptized Tracey haha. But
it was a really great experience and a very spiritual one as well. After
the baptism, we got changed back into regular clothes and then they had
the wedding reception. We wanted to stay for the big feed (meal)
because we felt that we'd earned it. However, we didn't expect it'd be
another hour before we actually got to even see any food. The parents of
Tommy and Tracey really had a lot to say when they were asked to speak
about them and the wedding and baptism haha. However, all of them, as
well as some of the other talks at the wedding and baptism service, were
in Samoan so Elder Hirata and I didn't understand
much! When we finally got the food though it was definitely worth it as
I feel like they took all of the food supplies that Australia had to
offer and put it on a table! There was sooo much food, a lot of it I'd
never even heard before. But we had all sorts of Samoan food, such as
Tauro, Chop Suey, Green Banana, and Elder Hirata even ate Octupus brain
without even knowing it haha. It was all pretty good though (except the
Octupus brain according to Elder Hirata) and we were quite stuffed by
the time we'd left after they'd served dessert as well. So that was
definitely the most special event of the week and I definitely will
never forget that experience! I wish I'd taken a few more pictures
though (I'll include some) but in the moment you don't think about it
too much! However, other than the baptism there were quite a few other
miracles as well. Hopefully I'll have time to list off a few. One just
little one is that last Sunday we'd met someone and left
a Restoration pamphlet (which kind of summarizes the message of the
Restoration of the Gospel) with them and said we'd come back by next
week. He didn't seem very interested though. And yesterday (Sunday
again) we were going around and trying to see all of the new contacts
we'd gotten and when we got to this one guys house he told us that he'd
read the pamphlet and he really enjoyed it and said it opened up his
eyes a lot! He said that it helped him a lot so he actually gave it to
one of his mates to read as well! He said he wasn't quite ready to have
us teach him yet though, which is ok, but he said in a little time he
might feel ready. I think because he came from saying he wasn't
religious at all last week he still has to take it all in a little bit
from what he read. Another amazing and humbling miracle from this past
week happened with a less-active couple. In order to tell the story
though I have to back up a little bit. We were going to
teach Brother and Sister Willmott that day (Bro. Willmott is a member,
and Sis Willmot isn't. I think I mentioned them sometime before?) and
they've basically been taught everything twice over. So sometimes it's
difficult to think of what to teach them. So as I was pondering on what
to teach them I felt like we should just watched a certain Mormon
Message entitled "In the Spirit of Thanksgiving" and then just discuss
it with them. So we had that lesson without any trouble and nothing was
out of the ordinary. We then went to this less-active couple's house for
a lesson that night and we had prepared a lesson to share with them but
as we talked with them at the beginning the man asked why they needed
to go to church if they didn't take the sacrament (this man had a word
of wisdom problem thus not wanting to take the sacrament unworthily) and
then mentioned how he'd been experience heaps of trials since they've
been coming back to church the past few
weeks, such as their car breaking down completely twice! And I remember
looking at their old teaching record and seeing that they'd had similar
questions about coming to church before so Elder Hirata and I just did
our best to share scriptures, quotes, and our own thoughts and
testimonies about the importance of coming to church no matter what and
after all of that he said that he did feel like he should be going to
church anyway. Then I had the impression to share the same Mormon
Message that we'd watched with the Willmotts earlier with the couple
now. So i suggested that we do so and as we watched it I was astonished
at the complete relevance that it had to the man and his questions and
he said after we watched it that there was no way we'd watched it
earlier that day. He said that he'd definitely be at church on Sunday
(which he did!) and that if we hadn't come and shared that then he might
have gone inactive again. So Elder Hirata and I thought that
was pretty amazing because we wouldn't have shared that video if we
hadn't watched it earlier and it wasn't still fresh in our minds. So
unfortunately I'm running out of time so that will be all I can share
for this week, but as you can see we had such an incredible week and
we're looking forward to this next one! So thanks again for the e-mail
and all of your continued love and support and prayers! I've definitely
felt extremely blessed on my mission thus far and I know that such
feelings will only continue as time goes on. I hope you have a wonderful
week as well and feel Heavenly Father's blessings in your lives! Talk
to you again soon!
Love,
Elder Hopkins
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