Emails are also something I look forward too every week. Sadly I wont be able to email again until September 15th I think. Next week is transfer week, so monday we dont get a p-day. We get our assignements on where we are moving to on wednesday and then thursday we move/get our p-day. So Ill write back then. If I am moved out of Helston I am going to be devastated. Im always tempted to pray to ask the Lord to keep me here but I try to remember that he might need me to do something else somewhere else. Wow that is really expensive. I hadn't really realized that. However, it was two meals as I payed for myself and Elder Simmons. He says thank you.
We really do have amazing investigators. This week Ken had a really rough week at work. He is like a bouncer at a pub in Falmouth and works 12-4 am every night. I guess he had a really hard night on saturday night, and he was way too tired to make the 30 min drive to church. He got home that night and couldn't sleep, and went on youtube and just watched mormon messages for like 2 hours and said it calmed him down and he was able to get to sleep. However, he also came across a couple of anti-mormon videos on youtube and had a lot of questions for us about polygamy and joseph smith and some other concerns. What was amazing was that he wasn't really shaken by these things at all. He said he could tell right away that the guy in the video he was watching just felt like a bad person. It was my first time meeting with anti material. It went totally fine though, he understood our explanations and his comment was 'I dont believe that a church that puts so much emphasis on strengthening families could ever be considered evil, regardless of whether or not it is true.' He has really felt the spirit strongly as we have taught him. He tells us of the warm/peaceful feelings he gets when we teach them and when he prays. He has started saying the closing prayer vocally when we go over there and he has a testimony even though he might not realize it yet. We have been talking a lot about baptism with them, and they seem to be warming to the idea. Toni also said her first vocal prayer this week, and was really nervous but said an amazing prayer and I could really feel the spirit as she stumbled through her first prayer in which all she did was give thanks. These people are those prepared people you are talking about (the elect). I wish my descriptions could do them justice or even that you could meet them.
We did find a couple new investigators this week. Joan and Leslie, probably in their 70's. They are devout Methodists, but invited us in and we have now met with them a few times. I don't know if they are just bored/lonely old people who just want to talk yet, but so far they have been keeping their commitments. When we assign them a chapter to read, they will usually read the 3 chapters before and after it as well. And they always pray about it. They haven't got an answer yet, but I know from my own experience that eventually they will.
Sean is such a stud. Im so excited for him to get on his mission. I would give anything for that guy to come to England London South.
I never knew you had the other side of heaven guy meet with you that much. Im sure he would have had some amazing experiences.
Our trip to Reading (pronounced Redding) was amazing. I was the only driver, so I had to do the 7 hour drive on friday and saturday without getting a nap or anything which was tough. Also, we picked up a couple of sister missionaries in Exeter and it was really weird talking to girls again. But the time we spent with Elder Bednar was amazing. It was just us, about 130 missionaries, and Elder Bednar and two members of the quorom of the seventy and all of their wives. And it wasn't like a normal talk. We had been assigned to read two of his talks and study them before saturday, and Elder Bendar just started by having us comment or ask questions about what we read in his talks. We would just stand up and talk to him and then he would answer our question or make a comment and expand on what was said or ask us a question. We then got to have a question and answer session with him. That was amazing, we got to ask an apostle any question we wanted. I had a couple of questions I wanted to ask, but over the course of what he said he answered them as he answered other questions. I would love to tell you everything that was said and everything I learned, but I wrote in down in my study journal which is back at the flat. He really had a few main points he kept on coming back to though. First of all, as we teach the gospel our job is not to teach, but to act as conduits of the spirit and then just get out of the way. Nothing in what we say or how we say it, or in how we look or act, should draw attention away from the spirit. He also kept saying 'this work isn't about you, and it isn't about me,' which really stood out to me. And his main point would have to be that the whole point of our existence is to act as agents and not objects. Agents act, and objects are acted upon. He also told us a lot more about priesthood keys than I have ever understood before. Another thing he kept saying is that this would probably be the last time in our lives we ever got this chance to meet with an apostle in such a small group. I guess the role of apostle is changing, and many of the things apostles used to do (like this confrence he gave here) will be taken over by members of the 70. Ill try to let you know next week if i think of anything else really interesting he said.
At the close of the meeting, when he bore his testimony, he was literally glowing. I was blinking and stuff because I thought I was just tired or my eyes were just playing tricks on me, but as he bore his testimony he looked like he was shining. There was a golden light around him. I cant really explain what it looked like to be honest. I think it was just pure glory/spirit/light. Regardles, it was amazing. This confrence really helped to strengthen my testimony, especially in the fact that we have living prophets on the earth today.
Thanks for the letter,
Love
Elder Steed
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