G'Day!
Thanks for
another great e-mail this past week. As always I really loved reading
it and hearing about all the things that have gone on in the past week
back home. This past week was a great one and we were able to see a lot
of miracles happen. Cruiz and Chelsea were married this past Wednesday
night and it went really well. Originally they'd just planned on getting
married in Bishop's office with just them so they'd have it really low
key. But over time the ward heard about it and the Relief Society
decorated the chapel up for them and brought all sorts of refreshments
as well, so it ended up being definitely more than they expected! It was
well attended though and it was a fun evening for them. Their wedding
happened to be on Halloween as well which was pretty neat. As a result
of their wedding they were able to take the Sacrament for the first time
in a very long time this past Sunday so that was a wonderful blessing
for them. Back to Halloween for a second, it
definitely wasn't as festive as what I'm used to. Australia doesn't
really recognize Halloween as a holiday and only a very, very small
amount of people will go out trick or treating. So it just felt like a
normal day and nothing special, obviously for us it was the same as any
other day for missionaries but since we didn't see any decorations up or
anything it definitely felt plain haha. Another blessing that we
witnessed this week happened with one of Pakenham's long time
investigators Joan Willmott (the wife of recent convert Barry Willmott).
Since I've been here she's never been very keen on reading the Book of
Mormon or on praying to know if the church is true and what not. So
we've tried and tried but nothing has really seemed to spark much
interest in her. However, when we went to see them this past week she
told us that she'd made the decision she wants to read through the whole
Book of Mormon, cover to cover! We were quite stunned by that,
especially since it was her own decision to read and not an assignment
or something from us. We added our own encouragement to her after she
told us and then also invited her to pray about the Book of Mormon as
she reads. So it seems that the Spirit has been working in her and
hopefully we'll be able to see her receive her answer about the
truthfulness of the Gospel soon. Another pretty big miracle we had
happen as well this past Sunday was that 8 of the less active members
that we visit were able to attend church! So that was pretty great to
see and most of them stayed for all 3 hours of church as well, which
made it even more of a blessing! So that started off Sunday really well
for us, and it got even better because the Mission President's Fireside
was also this past Sunday night as well. The past couple of months we've
been unable to attend because either we had noone to go (you always
need to have either an investigator, recent convert, or less
active member you teach to come to it if you want to go) or the ride
for the people we did have to go had to cancel. So we finally got to go
to it again because we had the WIllmotts, Cruiz and Chelsea, and another
less-active couple Afa and Lisa attend the fireside so that was great.
The fireside itself was really good and spiritual and all those that
were able to come really loved it and said they'd love to be able to
attend the next month's fireside as well. So we definitely look forward
to that! The past week we were able to go much better with our teaching
appointments and not as many cancelled as the previous week which was a
miracle in itself. We also were able to continue to find heaps of people
who were keen to hear more about the Gospel. So we'll continue to be
busy this next week and we are constantly seeing the area progress and
are developing a greater love for those that we teach as well as the
people in Pakenham in general as we grow and
learn to be more like the Saviour. Well thanks again for the e-mail
this week and I look forward to talking to you again soon! Love you
heaps!
Love,
No comments:
Post a Comment