October 7, 2013

G'Day!

I loved your e-mail this week! It's always wonderful to hear from you! I'm glad you had a wonderful week and that's great about your new calling Dad! You will do great! It was also a great surprise to hear from Kate and Jay and Christopher as well! Thanks heaps for the e-mail and glad you are well and staying busy!  This week has been an okay one, there were quite a bit of difficulties and a lot of cancellations as well! Coral had a few trials come through but she is still going well, please continue to keep her in her prayers! It is always greatly appreciated when you do. One highlight to the week was on Monday, when during our P-Day time we went on a bush-trail about 15 minutes from our house. The nature was very beautiful there and we finally got to see some Kangaroos up here! So that was fun! So as I mentioned before there unfortunately weren't too many lessons this week due to cancellations, so I can't report too much on any of those! However, we have started teaching another one of the less-active members in the branch with Elder Laycock which is good. The Laycocks are doing great in helping out the branch as well as us! I don't know how I will cope if I'm not serving around a senior couple anymore, they are truly a blessing to the missionary efforts! We also were able to set up another family home evening with the Hickling family for tonight which we are excited about! The rest of the week was spent doing a lot of finding new people to teach, and in Wangaratta the only way you can really do that since it is not a busy town is through tracting (and of course working with the members, but in a branch there are only a limited number you can work with in a week). So we were occupied a good share of the time with that, but our efforts weren't in vain because we were blessed to be able to find 16 new people to go back and see. Some of them obviously seem more likely to progress than others but we were still very grateful to find that many people through our efforts. School holidays just ended here in Australia (which had been on for the past 2 weeks) so we think that might have an effect on the amount of appointments we are able to have now since many people were quite busy and also out of town during that time. Our investigator Kellyanne and her kids were at church again (this is the 3rd time for her family) and really loved it as always! We have an appointment with them tomorrow night in which we plan to talk more about baptism because they are progressing really well and we feel they are ready to make that first step in living the Gospel. Well I feel bad that I don't have too many stories or information this week, but it just wasn't the best of weeks for us! We know that if we keep working as we have been though that the Lord will bless us with success. We are very excited for General Conference here this coming weekend as always and look forward to receiving divine counsel from the Lord's mouthpieces that is specific to our time. The lesson at church on Sunday was on the importance of living prophets and one comment made that I liked was something along the lines of 'next to your standard works should be a copy of the most recent conference ensign because that is almost the most important scripture for us right now since it is very specifically for our day and time.' Thanks for everything you do in supporting me out here in Australia and I am grateful most of all for all of your prayers, especially on behalf of those we teach out here, I know that it makes all the difference in the world especially as we have faith that our prayers are heard and answered! I hope that you have another wonderful week this week and continue to have opportunities to share the light of the Gospel with those around you! I love you and miss you! Talk to you again soon!

Love,

Elder Hopkins

September 30, 2013

G'Day!

Thanks as always for the e-mail this week! That should be really fun going up to Idaho and seeing all the extended family! Just to start off I wanted to quickly mention that just recently I kind of went through all my suitcases and stuff to see what all I had and I found heaps of supplies and what not that I didn't realize I had before! So I just wanted to say that I don't need any extra supplies for quite some time (contact solution, toothpaste, etc.) which is good for you so you don't have to worry about rushing any packages off! So anyway, this past week was an alright one, it unfortunately wasn't as busy as the others as of recent times. There were quite a few cancellations and rescheduling appointments so we weren't as busy as we originally were hoping for. I guess we couldn't be having perfect weeks forever! But it was still relatively good and we did still see quite a few miracles as always. Coral is still going excellent and is loving her membership in the church. She continues to soak everything up well and has been able to feel the Spirit much more since her baptism. She will hopefully have some sort of calling/responsibility in the branch soon to help her continue to be involved and busy. One funny thing was they announced there was a new cleaning roster on the bulletin board at church and when we had a lesson with her at the Laycocks later on in the day she was asking if she was included on the roster and how many times she was allowed to come and help out with the cleaning. Its very rare to even see long-time very active members of the church jumping up and down at the chance to clean the chapel haha. Also, good news with one of our less-active members we are teaching, Nathan, who I mentioned last week we would like to receive the Melchizedek Priesthood by the District Conference coming up soon, who accepted the invitation this past week to prepare to receive this ordination. That would be wonderful to have another Melchizedek Priesthood holder in the branch since there aren't too many of them here. Also we were able to start teaching another less-active family in the branch as well with Elder and Sister Laycok this past Thursday who haven't been to church in quite some time but if they became active again heaps of others would start to come back as well because they have heaps of relatives around Wangaratta who are also less-active members. One cool experience that we had this past week was we were trying to go and visit one of the investigators that we have and when we went there this investigator's friend was the one who came to the door and said that our investigator wasn't able to talk at the moment. But as we were talking to the friend she asked if we knew a certain couple in the branch (the Hicklings, who are also less-active but we have been teaching them lately) and said that she was the aunt of Sister Hickling. So after talking with her for a few minutes we found out where she lived and then on Saturday we went and did some service for her in her garden because she is a bit older and can't do all these things herself now. So she was very appreciative of that and we hopefully will begin to be able to teach her, although it might be difficult because she told us that she is Pagan, and there would be a big change there if she were to accept the Gospel. Another cool experience that we had this past week was while we were having a lesson with Coral at the Key's home (a member family in the branch) the Key's already had a non-member friend there who agreed to stay and listen to the lesson as well! It was on Temples but since this friend has a very strong religious background and since we just taught the basic, simple doctrines about Temples and family history work it turned out very well for both the friend and Coral. So hopefully that experience will have planted some great seeds in the friend's heart because she is in her 80s and isn't too likely to change anything at the moment, so if it doesn't happen during the rest of her time in this life, she will definitely have this experience to remember in the Spirit World. On Sunday we had a fairly good attendance at church again, a bit of it due to relatives visiting for the baby blessing of the newest member of the branch, which was very nice! Well, as I said before it wasn't a week full of appointments (just heaps of tracting and finding!) so that is the main news that I have for you! Everything is still going great overall though and there are some very exciting things coming up in the month of October! Thanks for all of your love and prayers! I pray for you as well all the time! I hope you have a wonderful week and see many miracles. I love you heaps and I'll talk to you again soon!

Love,

Elder Hopkins

September 23, 2013

G'Day!

Thanks as always for a wonderful e-mail this week! It might be a bit of a quick e-mail this week due to how the time schedule worked out. First off I'll just quickly mention that I did get the package with all the contacts! Thanks so much for sending that so soon, it was just in time! I counted it up (and I'm sure you did too) and it will be enough in there to last me the remainder of my mission, which is helpful not to have to worry about that now. So I guess the most important news is the transfer news! Well Elder Gabignaud is.......staying! And Elder Hopkins........is also staying! So this will be the 3rd transfer together! I'm really excited to be staying another transfer because as I said in the last e-mail I really love the people and the area here, so I know we will enjoy this next transfer as much or even more so than the previous 2. In fact, in the whole Wangaratta Zone (about 26 missionaries) only 3 missionaries are leaving, and they are putting 3 new missionaries in! So this transfer there will be a total of almost 30 missionaries in the Zone! Which makes it the biggest Zone in the mission by a big margin! Everything is continuing to go really well for the area, and we are seeing miracles every day! One of the biggest miracles for the week was one of the less-actives of the branch, Nathan, who we've been working with essentially since we got here in Wangaratta, finally came to church for the first time on Sunday! It'd been several years since he had attended church and he even helped pass the Sacrament. So that was wonderful and all the branch members gave him a very warm reception since most of them knew him from before. So we hope to have him there every week now because the District Conference is coming up soon at the end of October and we would really like to prepare him to receive the Melchizedek priesthood by then (he is a priest right now). Also our investigator family Kellyanne and her kids came to church again and are loving it all! It was funny when one of the members dropped her and her kids off after church the little boy (who is about 5 or 6) didn't want to get out of the car but wanted to go back to church! We have another teaching appointment we them on Friday and we feel very confident that they will be able to reach baptism very soon and within this transfer! Which would be wonderful! We also were able to gain a few new solid investigators this past week and have appointments with all of them this coming week as well, so we are continuing to stay very busy here which is good. There also was one of the member families in the branch who invited one of their friends to dinner and a lesson which was great and it went very well. We hope to be able to begin teaching the friend as well. Well Elder Gabignaud and I are very excited for this transfer and know we will be able to accomplish heaps! It is a bit of an interesting transfer because I believe it is only a 5 week transfer, which seems very short even though it is just one week less than normal! But we will make the most of it nonetheless. I'm grateful for all of your love and support and especially prayers! I hope you have a wonderful week ahead this week and see many miracles of your own. I love you and I'll talk to you again next Monday!

Love,

Elder Hopkins

September 16, 2013

G'Day!

Thanks so much for your e-mail! Glad you had such a wonderful and busy week! Time goes by so quickly when you are able to stay busy with things. I got one of your packages this week (it had contact solution, some lollies, a shirt, and some other things as well), so thank you so much for that! Hopefully I will get the contacts soon as well since I am currently wearing my last pair! So this past week has been incredibly busy as well! We have been blessed with so many things to do and had heaps of success during the week. The most important and special piece of news from the past week is that Coral was baptized and confirmed a member of the church! It went wonderful and the was great support from the branch here through the whole event. There were even some of the people she knew from back in the ward she was going to a few years ago in Melbourne that came up and participated in the program! So that was great and Coral really loved it and felt really good throughout the whole thing. She will be a great member of the church and a blessing to the members and others here. There was actually kind of a miracle within a miracle from the baptism and confirmation. The past few days she had been feeling quite sick but still went through with the baptism and everything on Saturday, however, on Saturday night it got much worse and she had to go into emergency! When she finally got out of emergency at 5 a.m. (after having to wait in the waiting room for like 5 or so hours!) we found out it was a viral infection that she had. So she didn't get home until really, really late and hardly had any sleep, but somehow managed to get up and ready for church so she could be there for her confirmation (and her house is a fair way away from the chapel)! So that was really great to be able to see her commitment to the gospel through something like that, and even though she was very crook (which is Australian for 'sick') she still felt really good and at peace through it all. So that was definitely the highlight of our time here in Wangaratta so far! I attached a few pictures from the baptism, the first one being just Elder Gabignaud, Coral, and I, and the second is with Elder and Sister Laycock as well. So the rest of the week was excellent as well! We were able to have 17 lessons for the week, which was the most we have had since being in Wangaratta. So our teaching has been increasing which is wonderful, since teaching the gospel is our purpose as missionaries! Church was another bright spot in this past week as well, since we were able to have record attendance at church! There were 45 people who attended church on Sunday which was a huge miracle since in the past there were at most about 32 or so that came (and that happened rarely). And the amazing thing was there were still a few people that weren't there that normally would be because they were out of town! So the branch is getting stronger in Wangaratta which is a tremendous blessing. We were able to have an investigator family there at church for the first time which was great as well. There is a mom and her 3 kids, the oldest is 10 years old. She really enjoyed it and the kids especially loved primary, so she is really keen to come again next week. So there have been heaps of great things happening in our area, and we know that with just one more week in this transfer there will continue to be many miracles that we see! The Elder Pearson mission conference this past Thursday was fantastic as well! He is such a great and powerful speaker and really helped the mission through his comments. I really enjoyed it but didn't get as much enjoyment as I could have out of it because for most of the meeting I had a migraine! So that part of it wasn't too fun but I still took in most of what was said. Well it is so hard to believe that the transfer is almost over! It went by too quickly but we really enjoyed it and saw a great amount of miracles in all aspects of the work. I have really loved serving in Wangaratta and I hope that if I am blessed enough that I will continue to have the opportunity to serve here. Well this email wont be quite as long as the past few weeks due to our schedule for today, even though this past week had so many things happening! Thanks so much for all of your love, support and prayers! I would be nowhere without all of that! I hope that you have a great and miracle-filled week this week. I love you and I'll talk to you again soon!

Love,

Elder Hopkins

 Elder Gabignaud, new member Coral, and Elder Hopkins

 The Laycocks, new member Coral, Elder Hopkins, and Elder Gabignaud

September 9, 2013

G'Day!

Wonderful to hear from you this week! We had a pretty busy week this past week, as it always is! We continue to be very blessed here in Wangaratta by the hand of the Lord in the work. And for the first time in several weeks nothing too drastic or major happened right after e-mails last Monday! Which was sort of a relief. But we did have a great Family Home Evening at the Laycocks with the less-active family I've been mentioning. That family is still continuing to progress well, and we were meant to have another family home evening tonight with them but they have to reschedule for another time this week because the father got called to stay at work longer today. One good thing though is that the Laycocks and us have been the ones taking charge of the Family Home Evenings with them so far (with like activities and lessons) but after the last one the family said they would like to take charge of it this week, which is great! That was kind of our goal from the start is to help them be able to do it themselves as a family, so this is a good start to that. On Tuesday (which is kind of our lesson day, because we always seem to have more appointments that day than any other) we saw some great miracles as well. Chantelle, the investigator I mentioned last week who came to the fireside at the Laycocks, is progressing really well. We were able to teach her with Elder and Sister Laycock and set a date for her to be baptized on October 5th, which would be wonderful! She is really soaking up everything really well and said herself in the lesson this last week that she can feel a change of heart happening in her, and that her faith has grown heaps from when we first met her. On Wednesday we had an exchange with the missionaries serving in Benalla (which is like 30 minutes from us, the closest of the missionaries in the zone to us). I was with Elder Huakau (from Tonga) and Elder Gabignaud was with Elder Sasulu (from Sydney). It was just a 4 hour long exchange but it was still a good experience and we were able to help them with a lot of things while we were there. The exchange was good preparation for Elder Gabignaud because on Thursday afternoon I went with the Zone Leaders down to Melbourne for the leadership meeting while Elder Gabignaud stayed with the Benalla elders. It was good for Elder Gabignaud to kind of come out of his shell more because both missionaries are islanders and Elder Gabignaud hadn't like ever seen an islander (Tongan, Samoan, etc.) in his life haha. If you don't know many islanders than you wouldn't understand why this would be an interesting experience for him. So with the meeting, the Zone Leaders and I traveled down and arrived in Melbourne Thursday night at like 10 and then just stayed at another missionary flat before leaving for the meeting the next morning. And unfortunately because the Zone Leaders had already been driving like 7 hours that day I got chosen to be the driver down to Melboune! Not that I don't like driving, just I appreciate a rest from it every now and again since Elder Gabignaud can't drive. So at the meeting it was all the District and Zone Leaders for the mission, even the ones from Tasmania who never get to come to anything! It was a great meeting, simply just teaching us how to be better leaders, how to conduct meetings, and how to work with different sorts of missionaries. I learned heaps from it and will try to start applying as much as I can! It was also good to see some of my previous companions who were there as well. So the meeting finished at about 3 but because of some other tasks that had to be done while we were down there we didn't end up getting back into Wangaratta (after picking up Elder Gabignaud of course) until about 9! So I was very tired! On Saturday the Benalla missionaries had a baptism which was held at our chapel, since they don't have a font in their building there, so our morning was spent helping get everything ready for it and also interviewing their baptismal candidate. And the rest of the afternoon we went out finding and contacting since we hadn't had any opportunity to do so in the week so far. We were able to see some great success from that and got some promising new investigators to teach. And I guess I will update you on Coral as well! She is still going excellent! We were able to have 3 lessons with her this past week and she has been remaining strong in living the word of wisdom which has been a wonderful miracle! We see her again tonight at another family home evening at a member's home. We have full faith and confidence that she will make it to this Saturday for her baptism and she is really excited for it! The branch is also very excited since they haven't had very many baptisms here in the past, with the most recent baptisms coming in April but before that there hadn't been any for several years! She will be a very strong member of the church! So this next week will be another extremely busy one with heaps of appointments and another trip to Melbourne! This time Elder Gabignaud gets to come as well though which will be good. It is a mission conference (so the whole entire mission will be there! except Tasmania....poor guys) held by Elder Pearson of the Quorum of the Seventy. If you remember he spoke to us earlier in the year in January and is a fabulous speaker and one of my favorite general authorities, so we are really looking forward to that, which will be on Thursday. So everything continues to go well here in Wangaratta! Thanks so much as always for your prayers! Hard to believe only 2 weeks left in the transfer! I hope you have a fantastic week this week and continue to see heaps of miracles as well. I love you and I'll talk to you again soon!

Love,

Elder Hopkins

September 2, 2013

G'Day!

Thanks so much for the fantastic e-mail this week! Glad that you had a fun and busy week! Our week was much the same, very busy again! So I guess I will start off with news about how Coral is going. So unfortunately her appointment to get her surgery was cancelled (like the 3rd time that has happened) so she was pretty upset about that. Also, during the week she still had a few struggles regarding the word of wisdom so the baptism as well wasn't able to go through this past weekend. However, we had a really powerful spirit-filled lesson Friday night at one of the member's homes with her and she was able to recommit to live the word of wisdom fully (she had gone 5 days perfect before so we are confident she can live it permanently this time) and she set a new date for herself which is the 14th of September. So we fasted for her this past weekend as well as the member family, and feel strongly she will be able to be baptized on that day. The rest of our progressing investigators are continuing to do well, and our church attendance is slowly increasing which is great! We had another fireside at Elder and Sister Laycock's last night (Sunday) which was on the word of wisdom. Another senior couple from a nearby city, Benalla, gave the presentation and it went really well. There was good attendance there from the branch and the best part was we had another investigator there named Chantelle. The miracle of that was we hadn't taught her the word of wisdom at all (or really any of the commandments yet for that matter) but afterwards she said she really enjoyed it and that she would start applying it in her life! The Spirit does marvelous things! This past week we also were able to start teaching several new people, investigators and less-actives. One investigator we have started teaching is half-papa new guinea and has 6 kids! She has been to practically every other church under the sun but had never heard of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. We were able to go with Elder Laycock twice to see her this past week and both times went great! She soaked everything up well and asked some great questions, and bonus-she kept her commitments! She said she will be at church this next Sunday and is keen to work towards baptism for her and her kids. Another person we've began teaching is a less-active man who hasn't been to church in about 10 years. He is a returned-missionary and has two kids out on missions at the moment, however, due to certain events and circumstances his testimony has dwindled a bit. He is a really friendly and great guy though and has agreed to let us come by on a fairly regular basis to help him regain his faith. He is also a Melchizedek Priesthood holder which the branch desperately needs more of. So that is exciting for us! One other cool experience with finding new people during the week was on Wednesday. We were at the library waiting to meet with Coral and her brother (who was up for the week from Melbourne) and just sitting in some chairs. One lady just walked up to us and asked if we were Mormon missionaries and after we said yes she asked if there was a church here and where it was. She said that she had lived in Melbourne and had some friends who were LDS and who were a very good influence on her so she had always had curiosities about the church. So we hope to be able to begin seeing her this week and teaching her more about the Gospel. So the power of example is true!  This past week we also had 2 exchanges, on Thursday and Friday. It was the week of Geelong exchanges because both times I was with Elders who I'd served around in Geelong. On Thursday we were with the Zone Leaders and it was just a 4 hour long exchange but still was a great experience. I was with Elder Hasson if you ever remember me mentioning him, who has just 1 transfer left after this one. And on Friday we exchanged with the Elders serving in Echuca. My companion for that exchange was Elder Matu'u! So that was a great experience to be able to serve as his companion again, even if it was just for a few hours. We saw some great miracles and were able to accomplish a lot during the exchange. I also was able to interview 2 kids that were being baptized on Saturday which was a cool experience since it was my first time doing that. They passed the interview excellently and did get baptized the next day which is great for Echuca! Even though the exchange on Friday was just about 5 hours it took the whole day because it was a 2 1/2 hour drive to get there and a 2 1/2 drive to get back! So we were pretty exhausted after being in a car so long haha. This next week is very busy as well and for the first time in 11 weeks I get to go to Melbourne again! We have a leadership training meeting on Friday that we get to go to in Melbourne so I will be going to that. Also, tonight is family home evening again at the Laycocks with the Hickling family, if you remember me talking about them 2 weeks ago who we had the family home evening with before. So we are staying busy which has been great, every missionary's dream is to be flat out every day with something scheduled every hour (at least I hope that is every missionary's dream!). Hard to believe the transfer is already half over, time goes so quickly! I am always grateful for all of your love, support, and prayers which help to keep me going strong and staying in good spirits day by day! I hope you have a fantastic week this week! I love you heaps and I'll talk to you again soon!

Love,

Elder Hopkins