G'day!
Thanks
heaps for the e-mail this week! That phrase is really repetitive from
me but it's true each time I say it! I'm glad everything is going well
back home. First off, in completely unrelated gospel or mission work
terms I heard from a member this past week that there is a new series of
24 coming out in May. How exciting is that! A proof that serving
missions brings blessings. Haha just kidding, but I thought you might
like to know that as well. Back to church related news not associated
with my mission, I'm not sure if you've heard about the member of the
church who is getting drafted into the NBA this year? Once again, all
this I heard from several members so hopefully it's all accurate, but
essentially there is a member who is going to play for the NBA, and
supposedly predicted to be drafted pretty high, and the Church and the
NBA have reached an agreement with each other that he will be able to be
a proselyting missionary at the same time! So wherever he is drafted is
where he will serve a mission. So he will still play in all the games
and participate in the practices and road trips, but whenever he isn't
doing that he will be out knocking doors and teaching the Gospel. They
said his companion will be sitting on the bench with the players in full
proselyting clothes and the Church was able to get the NBA to agree
that in each game they will get 2 screenshots of the companion on the
bench. I thought that was awesome! I'm sure you could find out more
information about it since you have access to the 'worldly' web, haha.
So anyway, I'm sure you would like to hear about our week as well.
Amazing that it's already up to the last week of the transfer! Time is
just disappearing more rapidly with each passing week. We had a pretty
good week and saw some great miracles. This past week we didn't have as
many lessons since we are starting mostly fresh but we were able to
start teaching a part-member family who moved into the ward not long
ago. It's the son of a less-active member who we visit who's just come
back to church and his wife and kids who aren't members (the kids are
still under 8 though). They're really nice and we were able to see them
twice last week. They have a lot they have to work through at the
moment, but we have great hope and faith that they can make the
necessary improvements in their lives and hopefully the wife can accept
the gospel. Another cool experience this past week was we were tracting
and we came across quite an interesting fellow. He just got out of
prison not too long ago after being in there for 18 years. His crimes
were very serious and was only let out early for good behavior. He
doesn't like religion but we talked to him on the doorstep for a little
while and eventually were able to give him a pamphlet and promise him
some blessings. He didn't ask us to come back or anything but hopefully
he reads it and it brings him a bit closer to Christ than he is at the
moment. We also had interviews with President Maxwell this past week and
those were good as always. It seems like everyone got told about their
upcoming transfers or non-transfers except Elder Suan and I, which is
quite unfortunate! So we will have to wait patiently to receive the news
on Saturday like the other normal folk. Some other great news is that
the other girl from the family that was recently baptized is going to be
baptized by Elder Suan this Saturday, which will be great. Also, we
have someone who has a baptismal date for next month on the 10th which
we hope they are able to progress towards that day. The returning
less-active member that I mentioned before who is receiving the
Priesthood also has a friend from work that he has invited over to his
house this coming weekend to meet with us because he was asking him
questions about the purpose of life. So that is really exciting since it
is very rare (at least here in Melbourne) that missionaries get those
opportunities where members bring people to their homes ready to be
taught. Conference of course was fantastic as well! I won't list heaps
of quotes like I've done in the past because this conference instead of
just writing good quotes verbatim to what was said, I tried to focus
more on what the Spirit told me personally from the messages that were
shared. But of course I had some favorite talks! Elder Holland's was
great to start off the conference and set the tone. I enjoyed both of
President Uchtdorf's talks. Randall L. Ridd's I thought was fantastic.
And I also really thought Elder Oak's in priesthood was very pertinent
as well seeing as that topic has been a bit of a problem lately. My
personal feelings are that this conference might be President Packar's
last, partly because of his health but also because the theme of his
talk was the most important things he's learned in his life. Obviously
as a missionary you don't quite know the situation of normal life at the
moment, but from the overarching theme of this conference it's safe to
say that things will become very tough in the near future for members of
the church. So many talks were about challenges and trials, but
especially about standing firm in the faith no matter what. One last
thing I'll share was something cool I learned from this mornings study.
Normally I don't e-mail my studies but this one I really liked this
morning. It was an analogy that I was able to get out of Alma chapter
51. This chapter is in the midst of the famous war chapters but the part
I marked was about contentions within the Nephites. As will all
scriptures there are things we can get out of them, with the help of the
Spirit, that apply directly to our own lives. The main verses of focus
are verses 2-5, 13, and 18. I won't describe them out but let you see
what you get out of them. But what I got out of them was a pretty
interesting analogy of the process of apostasy from the Gospel and
eventually to the point of becoming sons of perdition, or siding with
the adversary. It is amazing what small doubts or disagreements can
bring about if left unchecked or unresolved. If you are unable to find
anything from it you can ask me in about 7 weeks haha. Anyway,
everything is well here and Elder Suan sends a big 'thank you' for the
contents you included for him in the Easter package, as well as me! I
hope you have a great week and I love you heaps! Talk to you soon!
Love,
Elder Hopkins
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