Mission P-day Today!!!

Sorry this email is a bit later than usual. We've had a crazy amazing day. So 3 weeks ago the APs challenged us as a mission to find 250 new investigators and set 33 baptismal dates in 3 weeks, and if we did that, then we would be having a mission p-day. Most of us thought it was not really going to happen because 250 is heaps, but we found 296 new investigators and set 40 baptismal dates. It's amazing the things that can happen when you set your goals high AND have a reward for achieving said goals. So our day started at 6:30 where most of our zone met at a park and practiced our rugby skills. We did that until about 7:30 and then went home, showered and got ready, and then by 8:30 went to the shops to buy our zone uniforms. For the mission p-day there was an award for the best dressed zone and an award for overall winners of the 3 sports we played (rugby, basketball, and ultimate frisbee). So we went to buy our uniforms which were just pink polos and anything else pink that we could find to wear. I got some pink shoelaces for my converse, some got pink cowboy hats, we all had pink face paint like the stuff football players wear, it was mad. We ended up winning the best dressed zone, so at least we won something haha. It was really good just to see everybody though at the same time. It's pretty rare for the whole mission to get together somewhere, especially for something like this, so it was way fun. We did ok in the sports though, well in rugby anyways. We didn't lose a single rugby game, got 3rd place (out of 4) in basketball which I was the team captain for, and dead last in ultimate frisbee. I think out of the 4 or 5 games of frisbee that we played, we only scored once or twice haha. Good times though. I hope we get to do that again sometime.

This week has been really busy. Not only because we've been trying to find new investigators like crazy, but because of the planning of Angela's baptism. By the way, we found 5 new investigators this week, that's the highest we've ever found in a week in this area since I've been here, so we were pretty proud about that. In fact, I think for the last week of the challenge, as a mission we needed 102 new investigators and our zone alone found something like 58, so that was awesome.

We've been driving all over the place trying to get this baptism planned this week. As you know, she wants to be baptised in the ocean. So we've been driving all along the beaches around here to look for a place that would be private enough and that would be good for having a baptism. We found one place that we liked, but it's like 20 kms away. And when we told Angela about it she said that it wasn't the place she had in mind, so we had to drive back and try to find this place that she was describing to us and we couldn't find it anywhere. She couldn't even find it on the map so I don't know why we went and tried to look for it. It will probably end up being at the place we picked out but we have to go and see Ange tomorrow and finalise it. We'll probably have her go with us to the place or follow her to her place that she seems to know. Another complication that we've run into is that with the baptism being at 4:30 on a week day, nobody from the bishopric can be there, our ward mission leader can't be there, we finally ended up getting the High Priest group leader to be able to come, so he'll be the presiding authority at the baptism. We were talking to Brother Foot, our ward mission leader and he was saying that he's actually been to a couple of ocean baptisms and all that happens is probably just an opening prayer, a few remarks from... somebody, the performance of the baptism, then closing prayer and go home. We'll probably have Elder Murray say a few things since he's the one baptising her and he seems to be able to connect with her unlike any of us can. Overall, it looks like it should be an alright baptism, it's just the planning of that has been hectic. It's taken up a lot of our time this week, as well as reteaching Angela all of the lessons again. This week we taught her about prayer because we found out that she doesn't know how to say a proper prayer. And we also taught her about sabbath day observance because we found out that she goes to the markets after church on Sunday. It's amazing the things you find out a week before the baptism.

We finally got to see the Preedy's yesterday after almost 2 weeks of not being able to come over. Ever since they found out that she's pregnant again he's started working more, even picked up a night job, and so he's busy as. He says that he's going to drop the night job though. He wants more time to be able to spend with his family and with 2 jobs, he's just not getting it. It was good though seeing them last night. His sister has just recently moved in with them and she's a less active member, so we had a really good lesson with them about Helaman 5:12. Shay gave most of the lesson though, we just started talking about it and went into building our foundations upon Christ a little bit and then he pretty much took it away from there. His testimony is amazingly strong. They are so going to make it to the temple in April. He actually gave a talk in church yesterday and it was really good especially since he said that he didn't have any time to prepare it. He even got a bit emotional near the end when he was baring his testimony, which I've never seen him do. You could tell he was feeling the spirit. And he bore his testimony again when we were having that lesson with them last night. You could tell that Ruth even has a pretty good testimony for only being a member for 6 months now. She was trying to get her sister (who also lives with them) to participate in the lesson and was asking her questions and all that. She really wants her sister to know what she knows. Just a really good time last night. I can't wait for them to go to the temple in April, that will just help their testimonies that much more.

Speaking of temples, I saw on LDS.org that they just had the ground breaking ceremony for the Rome, Italy temple. How cool is that? I never thought I'd see the day that there would be a temple just down the road from the Vatican. That's how you know this church is growing all over the world. Even in Catholic central, they have enough members to need a temple. I just thought that was a nifty bit of information I'd share in case you all didn't already know, but you probably did.

I'm attaching some pictures from our Mission p-day, hope you enjoy them.

Much love! Have a fantastic week!

Elder Clark Tanner

Obedience brings about blessings, Exact obedience brings about miracles!

Well this week has been... kinda average I guess. We had a visit with Angela on Tuesday that did not go well. She started going off on about how it was wrong for her children to be baptised when and how they were. Mostly because of the way they are living now, she doesn't feel like they should have been baptised if they weren't going to commit to living the commandments. We tried to explain to her the principle of agency and how it's not the church's fault that they aren't living the way they should be. We actually found out that that's the main reason she doesn't want to be baptised in a font. Because her children were baptised there and they shouldn't have been, according to her. And if you knew Angela, you would know that once she has an opinion on something like this, it's nearly impossible to change that opinion. I've found that getting her to feel the spirit is actually really hard. However, towards the end of our conversation on Tuesday we started talking about conference and how she liked it. She said she loved it. She loved it because it felt like the speakers were talking directly to her and that they answered some of the questions that we haven't been able to fully answer for her. I know that she felt the spirit in that at least. She didn't come to church yesterday because she was feeling a bit sick, which was actually a pretty big bummer because bishop was going to talk to her about her baptism and try to convince her to be baptised in a font. I think bishop is pretty keen on not doing the ocean baptism. We only have 10 more days to plan this baptism too. We're probably going to just have bishop call her tonight and have a chat about it over the phone. That way when we go see her tomorrow hopefully she'll have had a change of heart. But we'll see. I am excited to see her tomorrow though. I'll be with my district leader on an exchange and maybe he'll be able to help her in ways Elder Jack and I can't think of. Mainly it's just trying to plan this baptism that's made this week a bit stressful. Every time I think about it, I'd rather just think about something else... but that won't help it get planned haha. After tomorrow though we should be able to get the planning rolling. After Bishop Chessel and Elder Foster have a chat with her that is.

Our teaching with Evelyn is actually going much better. This week we taught her about the Atonement and how she can pray to know that the things we have been teaching are true. I can't really say if she accepted the invitation to pray or not, but I know that her husband is going to strongly encourage her to do so. We can really see the spirit working on her slowly but surely though. She seems to understand a bit more every time. I don't think it will be as long as I originally though until she decides to get baptised. But we'll just have to see about that.

A new family moved into our ward this week and they are the best. Well, I don't know if they're family because they all have different last names, but they're Maori which pretty much means they're automatically family. They moved over from Brisbane for work and are staying for a year. Apparently there's going to be 9 people living in that house once all of them get here. 5 of them are members and 4 aren't. The 5 that are members (Brother Takairangi, Bro Makai, Bro Brown, Bro Taraungi, and another one I haven't met) are all keen on sharing the gospel with the 4 that aren't members. We haven't bet those 4 yet because they haven't arrived from Brisbane yet, but when they do arrive, they want us over to meet them. We really hope that they are keen on hearing the gospel, and maybe even coming to church with their housemates. I love meeting new people like this that automatically love the missionaries. They just got in past Tuesday. Found out our number somehow and had us come over by Friday. They wanted us to come over to give the the chapel and temple address and to bring some books of Mormon for their friends/brother/cousins/whatevertheyare. They even told us in church yesterday that if they ever need someone to come teaching with us, just give them a ring. I don't think I've ever had someone tell me that in this area. But yeah, we're super excited to have them in our area. We always need more strong members in this area. And the Lord just blessed us with 5 of them which is great.

We got to do some service this week that involved breaking down a wall and tearing up a roof. I felt kinda like we were cleaning up after an earthquake when we were picking up all the pieces. Just roof and wall scattered all over the place. It was pretty fun. I love doing service for people, aye. And we got to help the Terepais move which was fun because the Zone Leaders were on exchanges with the AP's which meant Elder Crawley was there. I hadn't seen him since I left my last area. He actually gave me some really exciting news. Because he's an AP now he knows a lot about what's going on around the mission. If you remember me talking about Trent Dashwood in my last area and how we were teaching him? Well I found out that he's getting baptised and he wants me to be there! Elder Crawley said he would get to me with all the details on when the baptism is, but I'm so excited. He said it's either at the end of October or early November. But I'll definitely be able to go. Woo! That was probably the highlight of my week right there. (That and finding out that OU is #1 in the BCS, woo!)

That's about it for this week. I love you all. Keep up all the amazing things that you do!

Elder Clark Tanner

General Conference was amazazing!

So we spent the last two days just watching conference at the chapel. All three Saturday sessions and both Sunday sessions. I'd have to say my favourites were Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon. Elder Holland gave such an inspiring talk on Saturday, as he usually does. President Uchtdorf also gave a really good talk in that same session I think. Talking about how we should slow down in life sometimes when the going gets tough. We don't want to overwhelm ourselves when bad stuff happens because that just makes it worse. I still can't believe I never used to watch the Saturday sessions back home, those always seem to be the best ones. I'm so thankful for our prophet though. You can definitely tell from the love that he has for each and every one of us reflects the love that God has for each and every one of us as well. You can hear it in his words and see it in his face.

This past week we taught Evelyn twice. The first time didn't go so well. Well it went well, but we learned that she has a lot of concerns and she's not anywhere close to baptism. We brought with us Caleb Simpkins who was able to talk to them in Tagalog. We found out that it's not only the language barrier that keeps her from talking to us, but she really is just super shy. I felt really useless in that lesson though because basically Caleb was just reteaching everything that we had already taught her in Tagalog. And then after the lesson he said that she just wasn't ready yet. We had been planning on committing her to baptism in that lesson as well. It's going to be awhile before that can happen. Caleb reckons if she keeps going to church and reading the Book of Mormon with Arturo and if we keep coming over to teach, she'll be ready someday down the road. And yesterday when we taught them again we saw that already starting to come true. Yesterday we finally got the Tagalog reading materials for her and so we went over the first part of the restoration. Starting with God is our loving heavenly father and teaching her all about Christ's earthly ministry and then the apostasy. We had her read the part about apostasy in her own language and I could finally see a light of understanding in her eyes. It was just amazing. I really hope that we can just keep that up and start to see great changes in her life. I really love Arturo and Evelyn and I think that's why I want to see her get baptised, because I know that would make Arturo so happy and I want that happiness for him. It's the happiness that comes from families being in and living the gospel. There's no other happiness in the world that can beat it or even match it.

We saw Angela this week and it looks like we're going to be doing her baptism in the ocean. She wouldn't budge on getting baptised in a font. We even talked to her about how the chapel is a dedicated house of the Lord and she would be able to have a really spiritual experience there, we tried to get her to feel the spirit in that, but we failed. Then we read Moroni 6:1-4 and talked about the requirements for baptism. Mainly being humbled and having a broken heart and contrite spirit. It's hard to tell if she's really ready for baptism, but I guess we'll find out when we have the baptismal interview in the next couple of weeks. And we just gotta keep teaching her and helping her to feel the spirit in the things we say.

We had a Zone meeting on Friday and it was really good. The Zone Leaders challenged the whole zone to tract every day at 4 o clock and begin with a prayer. So the first day we did that we didn't find any new investigators but we still had a really amazing experience. The first street that Elder Jack chose I told him that I didn't really feel good about that street so he chose another one and we decided to go to that one. The very first door that we knocked on somebody came to the door that we already knew. It was Loraine Brennan. I don't remember if I ever told you about her but she's way less active and she's really trying to get her life in order right now. But she was at this house and she was getting it shown to her by the Realtor. It was a really nice house too compared to what she was living in before. Her house before was basically falling apart. But basically if we hadn't knocked on that door on that precise day at that precise time, we probably would've never found her again because I think she's moving out tomorrow. I think with an experience like, you can't deny that the church is true and the we are not alone in this work.

I love being in the work of the Lord and I try to better myself in it every day. Some days can be harder than others but I always think of Christ on those days and know that he will help me. Even if I can't tell at the time, he will always help me.

Love yous! Have a Tremendolishious week!

Elder Tanner

Finally!

I knew that this week would be the week that we finally set that baptismal date with Angela. It's going to be on October 28 and one of her favourite missionaries is going on home the 29th and he'll be doing the baptism. That would be a perfect way to end the mission I reckon. He's been really close with Angela ever since he served in this area a year ago, and now he gets to baptise her so he's way excited about that. She wants to be baptised in the ocean, so we're still seeing if we can get permission to do that. It's looking like it's not going to happen though. We don't know if she's opposed to getting baptised in a font or not, but we'll hopefully resolve that concern this week. The bishop said he thinks that if there is a font available you have to use it, but he wasn't sure about special requests or anything like that, so the Zone Leaders were going to ask President Cahoon for us. But anyways, we're really excited for the baptism, we just hope we can keep preparing her and make sure she doesn't fall away at the last minute or anything silly like that.

We weren't able to set the baptismal date with Evelyn this week. We were supposed to see her on Saturday. We even arranged for one of the members that could speak Tagalog from the other ward to come along and when we got there we found out that he was in Melbourne for the weekend. That would've been nice to know haha. We felt pretty bad about making Adam (the member that came with us) come with us just to have the appointment get cancelled. We didn't even have any other appointments or anything that he could come with us to. He did shout us some Maccas though which was cool. Maccas is Aussie for McDonald's for those that don't know. He actually had a really interesting story. He served in the Philippines 20 years ago then fell away from the church for awhile, he even got excommunicated at one time. Just recently he got re baptised and now he's like one of the strongest members in Rockingham ward. He was so keen to come teach with us even though he couldn't remember the language that well. We rescheduled the appointment for tonight though and he said he's still keen to come along. Hopefully now he's had time to study the language just a little bit so he can feel a bit more confident tonight when we go teach and get that baptismal date set! Then we'll have two baptisms scheduled for October. That would be mean!

We had a challenge this week that the zone that found the most new investigators would get to have an approved zone p-day. Apparently zone p-days aren't allowed anymore. But we could've gotten to have one. Unfortunately, even with our extra efforts, Elder Jack and I weren't able to find a single one. But we weren't the only ones in the zone that struggled with it. Even the zone leaders only found one I think. I think some of the other zones did really well. Warwick found like 25-30 or something like that. For some reason the people of Rockingham/Kwinana just have absolutely no interest in religion right now. Or maybe they never have. They just have really hard hearts and we're having a hard time finding those that have soft hearts. We know they're out there, we just haven't been able to find them. Even some of the people on our ward list have no interest in the gospel. We were on exchanges with the Zone Leaders on Saturday and I got to go with Elder Happel in my area and by 2pm we had run out of people to see and our set appointment wasn't until 6. We decided to visit some people on the ward list that we didn't know and nearly every door we knocked on we got a "sorry boys, I'm just not interested anymore". Or some doors we knocked on we actually got to go inside and have a chat with the person but it usually ended with "you're just not going to get me to come back to church anytime soon, sorry guys". It was pretty disappointing. I guess those are the people that get to taste the fruit of the tree but then they become ashamed because of what other people say and do and they fall away. And as missionaries there's not a whole lot we can do to help them come back. The last lady that we saw on Saturday was baptised 40 years ago or something. She was saying she doesn't know if there's a God and so we taught her that she can find out through prayer. She said she would give it a try and then we asked if we could say a prayer before leaving and she totally shut us down. Told us "what's the point of praying if I don't even believe?" So yeah, we don't think she's going to pray on her own, and if she does, I think she already has an answer in her head so she won't listen to the real answer. We'll still follow up with her sometime next week or something and see how it goes, if we're lucky, she'll have some amazing change of heart. But we'll see.

Sounds like conference was really good, as always. We're looking forward to watching it down here this coming weekend. Conference weekend on the mission is always one of the best weekends from what I remember from last time. I'm so excited. Hopefully something really good is said that will really help us in this mission to be able to find those that are searching for truth. I talked to Shay yesterday and he said he's already been watching some clips from conference on the Internet because he thought he missed it. He's the man. But I told him we watch them this weekend and he was relieved lol.

We'll pray for a great week this week. We even fasted to help us find those people, so it should be a superbulous week. Obedience is the key though!

Have a super week, love you all!

Elder Tanner