September 26 2011

Hello Everybody,

Sorry I didn't e-mail last week.  We had a P-day activity with some Elders in another area.  It is pretty different out here than in the Montana mission.  Every monday the elders in Missoula play basketball in the Stake Center.  In our mission, we are spread out a little bit more here.  In High Wycombe we are a 50 minute bus ride from the closest area.  So we don't do stuff together that often on P-day.  So today I have a little bit more time to do the stuff I need to do and to e-mail.  

Ya so a lot has happened the past couple of weeks.  I am still in High Wycombe, but my companion got transferred to an island in the English Channel called Guernsey.  My new companion is named Elder Corca, he is from Romania.  He comes from a city called Brashov, which is in Transylvania.  The real castle of Dracula is in his city.  But I am pretty sure he is not a vampire, at least I hope not.  He is a really good missionary and we have been doing some good work.  We are finding a lot of good people to teach.  We got three really good new investigators this week.  They are all from Sri Lanka, and they have been Catholic from birth.  Mohan and Shalin are a married couple with a little girl, and Asanka is their friend who lives with them.  Shalin is pronounced like Shah-leen, so it is kind of like Shalayne.  So that is pretty cool.  They are really good people and it is so awesome when we meet with them.  We are having first lessons with like 8 different people this week, so I am excited for that as well.  

I am excited for General Conference this week, and we are trying to get all of our investigators to come watch it with us.  It is at a weird time over here, because of the time difference.  So we are watching the Saturday morning session at 5 PM and the rest of them on Sunday.  Anyways all is well out here, I hope you all have a great week!

Love,

Elder Price

 

 

September 10th 2011: Elder Bednar and the past week.

Hello Everybody,

 

So this past week has been awesome.  I'll first let you know how the missionary work is going, then I will talk about Elder Bednar.  So the big news of this week is that we have a baptismal date, the investigator from Nigeria named Bukki is preparing for baptism on Oct 1.  Bukki is awesome, and we are excited to help her to prepare for baptism.  We also extended the invitation for baptism to Janos and Edmund from Trinidad, but they both wanted more time to read the Book of Mormon and to gain Faith before they commit to baptism.  Transfers are next Wednesday, so hopefully I will stay in High Wycombe and be able to keep working with Bukki, Janos and Edmund.

 

Now lets talk about Elder Bednar.  So the format of Elder Bednar's presentation was question and answer.  The first hour and a half of the meeting was focused on what we the missionaries had learned from studying three Elder Bednar talks that were assigned to us in preparation for the mission conference.  The three talks focused mainly on learning by faith and teaching with the spirit.   Elder Bednar focused on the idea, that as missionaries we need to help our investigators to become self-reliant and to gain there own testimonies.  The way we do that is we give them the basic principles of the lessons in Preach My Gospel, and then we invite them to learn for themselves through study, personal pondering and prayer, and other activities where they can act in faith such as baptism or telling their friends and family about the gospel.  He explained that this principle not only applies to missionary work, but also to raising children and instructing other members of the church in Priesthood Quorums/Relief Societies etc.  Some other things he talked about is how there are foolish and false traditions in our church that prevent us from learning by faith and teaching by the spirit.  This includes "taking copius notes" in meetings with general authorities, he said that because we need to record what the Holy Ghost teaches us personally rather than just writing down everything that is said in the meeting.  Another false tradition is writing Sacrament meeting talks word for word.  He said that this prevents us from teaching by the spirit to our ward, and therefore prevents the ward from learning by faith.  This is hard for me, because I usually write my talks word for word, but I am going to try to heed this council in the future. 

 

The second part of the meeting was an hour long period, where we could ask questions to Elder Bednar and to Gerard Causse a member of the Seventy who accompanied him to our meeting.  One of the questions was, "Why are there not as many prophecies from modern day prophets as there were in Old Testament or Book of Mormon times?"  Elder Bednar said that he would contend that prophecy is as "frequent and pointed" today as they were in the past.  He gave two examples of modern prophecy, the first is D&C 88 and the other is The Family: A Proclamation to the World.  He said that when the Proclamation was released in 1995, that the statement that "Marriage between a man and a woman is ordained of God" was generally accepted.  But now in 2011, anyone who believes that statement is deemed "bigoted" by society.  He said that President Hinckley released the Proclamation, knowing that in the future that it would be a strength to the members in a world with shaky family values.  This was a question that I had been wondering for a while, so I was really excited to hear what he had to say about it.  There were many great questions and many profound answers given.  At the end of the meeting, Elder Bednar stood to bear his testimony and he spoke with such great power.  I can say without a doubt that he has a knowledge that this is the gospel of Jesus Christ.  I know that Elder Bednar is called of God to represent Jesus Christ to the world.  It was an amazing privilage to witness an Apostle of the Lord. 

 

I've written alot, so I will end it here, but there is so much to talk about.  I hope you have a great week and gain a stronger testimony of Jesus Christ this week.  I love you all.

 

Elder Price

August 29th 2011

Hello Everybody,

 

This past week was pretty awesome.  We started teaching two investigators who are my favorite people ever.  We taught a guy named Janos on Friday.  He is from Hungary and he and his girlfriend are looking for a church to join. He is the nicest guy ever, he feeds us every time we go to his house and he came and played football with us and some Brazilian kids in our ward today.  Bukki is the second investigator, she is from Nigeria, and she is also looking for a church to join here in England.  We are trying to teach her that this is the true church, and not just a church to come to.  She told us she would be baptized, if she liked what we have to tell her.  So hopefully we have a baptismal date by the end of this week.

 

The members of our ward are awesome, there is a Brazilian family called the Miranda's.  They are awesome and they have us over to eat every Sunday.  They are much more lively than most English families.  They have a son, Brian, who is leaving on a mission next month.  So he has been teaching with us quite a lot.  There is another prospective missionary named Tyler and he is from Indiana.  He is a convert and he has a really good testimony.  He goes knocking with us and gets us into a lot of doors, because he is really outgoing and he talks about how he has been blessed since he listened to the missionaries.  About the only people who don't listen to Tyler are Muslims (there are a lot of Pakistani's here in High Wycombe).

 

Some other exciting news, is that this Saturday, Elder Bednar is coming to speak at a regional conference in Reading, England.  So he is speaking all the missionaries in my mission in the morning.  I am really excited to see and hear him in such an intimate setting.  I will talk more about that next week. 

 

One thing I learned this week, is the power of faith.  I have witnessed miracles while finding new investigators these past four weeks, and I know that they are a result of prayer and faith that our prayers will come true.  With enough faith, anything is possible.  I have little faith and I have seen amazing things so far.  Imagine what someone with a lot of faith could do.  Have a good week everybody!

 

Love,

Elder Price