June 22, 2014

Hello!

It is great to hear from you guys again. So for this week I will be
staying in the Mt. Albert area for another 6 weeks with Elder Rogers.
It is going to be awesome. We have some good investigators planned
this week and we are looking forwards to inviting a few people to be
baptized this week.

Well for this week we had Specialized Training with President and
Sister Lekias. It was a wonderful training and I really enjoyed it.
President and Siter Lekias are going to be returning home after their
3 years of Service in the NZ Auckland Mission. I have to say that I am
a bit dissappointed. I really do like President and Sister Lekias,
They have set an awesome pace in my mission, and have gotten it off to
a good start. They give have given wonderful council to al of us. But
we have President and Sister Balli coming in. They should be awesome,
and I am looking forwards to meeting them.

This week we found a new investigator. Her name is Veronica. She is a
Samoan lady of about 30 years of age. She has some interesting back
ground. Her family are members of a very staunch Catholic Family. She
is considered a Black Sheep in a sense that she does not attend the
Catholic church. Veronica explained explained to us how she doesn't
like how the church is run. how they pray to Mary in particular. One
thing I thought was wonderful was how she told us that she prays every
where she goes, in her car, in her home, at work. It was awesome
because we shared a bit of Alma 32 and 33, which talks a lot about a
people who where denied the opportunity to pray because they where to
poor. Alma in those Chapters teaches that we should pray everywhere we
go and in all that we do. We shared this with her and she seemed to
really enjoy it. Veronica also has many Friends that are members, but
in particular has a brother that is a member who has really been able
to open her up to the church. We should be meeting with her later
today and have an awesome lesson similar to Fa's last week.

Speaking of Fa, we haven't had any contact with him other than with
his girl friends family. He seems to be doing well and we are looking
forwards to another opportunity to teach him this coming Thursday. We
are planning on inviting him to be baptized, so it should be another
awesome lesson.

Nari unfortunately we have had limited contact with. We aren't to sure
where she stands. We are going to keep on trying to contact her and
have another lesson with her.

So for this week I read a bit in Alma 42. It talks a lot about Justice
and Mercy. The Chapter paints a really good picture as to why there
must be justice, and why there must be consequences to those who do
wrong. But is also talks about mercy and how it allows us to over come
justice. I had a real good read in there. I also read through the Book
of Mormon once again. I started April 1st and finished June 20th. Now
that I have read through it again I pick out different things,
sometimes I understand things in a different way, and other times I
get a good chuckle out of my old notes that I made sometimes...

It's going good. Elder Rogers and I are working hard at talking with
people on the street and improving or conversation skills. It can be a
bit tough. Sometimes people pretend your not there and walk by...can't
really do to much about that. Other times people will listen but are
just simply say there not interested. Every so often we bump into
someone that is islamic and they will teach us about islam. So you
could say that I have a pretty good understanding of their faith...
They actually try to prove how there are scientific truths in their
"Holy Quran", and how they have now been "proven" by modern science. I
think it's there way of trying to persuade people to believe. I find
interesting how they try to prove, when we teach that we must pray to
know. Anyways we are doing good. We also have a car now! they happened
to have one on hand and they gave it to Elder Rogers and so we could
use it. Our area is a bit big, but to be honest we where managing just
fine on bikes. But we will be using it the best we can for sure.


Well I think that is about it for this week. Love you all!

-Love Elder Ward

I realized that the picture of the Bird didn't go through so we sent that.

We taught and investigator named Joana this week. She is a bit
different, a bit of a Tom Boy, has had a rough childhood, and also has
raised a pigeon since it was young. It loved flying in on the lesson,
it got a bit annoying, but it certainly liked sitting on our heads. I
was a bit grossed out though, simply because it was a pigeon.