Week Something....

Ahoy hoy mates! I cannot believe it is Monday again already... ok something really cool I realised this morning- this Thursday September 22 it will be 184 since Joseph Smith obtained the plates. Cool huh?! ... or is that only cool if you are a missionary? ... ha ha ha anyways this weekend was such a good weekend. We had so many crazy teaches oh my days. Ok so this week we have been teaching a lot of foreign people. That's what I love about serving in England. We get to teach not only English people but... everyone else too! ha ha Especially here in Exeter because it's like the third biggest University in England. I told you about that Polish chap- so this week we taught him again and it was so cool because we would just have him read the information in Polish and then ask him simple questions about his feelings- it was so neat to watch his face as he was reading through and seeing that he was feeling the spirit. So cool! There is an elder from Poland here so we call him everytime and let Krzyztof ask him questions and really make sure he understood. We are also teaching a Chinese girl and a Hungarian chap so... ya I think we are going to be starting a little bit of an English teaching class! That will be really cool. How are we going to do it? I have no idea!! With the spirit though that's for sure.. ha ha but it's so cool because a Chinese student just moved into the ward here and she has been a member of the church for 2 years and she sat next to me and asked if we were teaching any Chinese people and I told her about Route (pronounced zoot) and she asked if she could come help us teach her! Um yes you sure can!

 

So yesterday at church was amazing. They rearranged some of the leadership in the ward so the stake president was there but as he got up to speak he said that he wasn't supposed to be there conducting business that week- that his counselors could have done the Exeter ward business for him but he felt the spirit so strongly last week that he wanted to bring his wife and his daughter to the ward so his daughter could speak to US. He said he was worried because moves was last week and when he found out that we were both still here he said he was so grateful and felt that one of the reasons we both stayed was so we could talk to his daughter and share our excitement about being missionaries with her. You see Sister Fekete and I and our ward mission leader spoke in church last week and we talked about missionary work and so the stake president told us that he felt the spirit so strongly telling him that he needed to bring his daughter to talk to us. So as he was saying that Sister Fekete and I just looked at eachother like... well I guess we need to go talk to his daughter after sacrament meeting ha ha so we did. We talked to her and she asked us why we wanted to go on missions and what it was like because she has been thinking and praying about going and.... it was amazing. I remember when we went to the Salt Lake temple before I left for my mission and we met that sister missionary from Reading Stake here in England and I remember after talking to her just thinking that was exactly what I needed to hear. Well yesterday after talking with her she looked at us with tears in her eyes and told us that is exactly what she needed to hear. It is amazing that the Lord has put us here for the people that are ready to learn about the gospel but He has also put us here to help strengthen others as well. It's amazing how the Lord always puts us exactly where we need to be. Even if it's just to talk to one person! When she was leaving she was SO happy and SO excited and I loved it because I remember feeling like that as well before my mission everytime I would talk to a missionary or a returned missionary about going on a mission I was just absolutely on cloud 9!! I can't even believe that I'm actually here now, I'm a missionary! :) ha ha

 

Oh my goodness one thing that was so funny, yesterday we called a lady we are teaching to make sure she was coming to church and she was like "well I would come to church but I don't think I can leave my cat for that long" ..... and then a few minutes later she was like "well I would come but it's raining outside and I don't like to go out in the rain." ... Lady you live in England. It is ALWAYS raining. Ha ha ha oh my. I love it.

 

Random thoughts-

-The Blackham's are coming home on Wednesday!! :( Sister Blackham's mother just got diagnosed wth cancer and they have to go home and take care of her so they are leaving early. I am gutted. I have told you about the Blackham's before, they are serving in Newton Abbot and they were in charge of the YSA program for the stake. They are going to be greatly missed, they have done SO many wonderful things for the people here AND especially for the missionaries.

-Last week in the email you said that Erica Littlefield saw Travis as a missionary or something.. what were you talking about? Who is Travis?

-For pday today all the missionaries in the district and the zone leaders are coming to Exeter and we are going to get chalk and play 4 square. :D ha ha it's going to be like Mr. VanCott's 4th grade class all over again! 

Well the church is true. How could it not be? Until next week, Szeretlek! 

Week 19

Oh man. Can I just tell you that I love England. Do you want to know why? I'll give you just one little reason. Today as we were walking to the chapel we saw a man pushing a shopping cart down the middle of the street... with a ski-do on top of it. ha ha ha ha ha oh I wish we would have taken a picture of it. A post carrier walked past us right after we saw him and she was like what in the world was he pushing?! ha ha ha

 

Anywho I have the best news EVER for you all! First can I just say I am so happy. I love being a missionary. :) Secondly- GUESS WHAT?!

 

Item of business number 1: We did an exhange this week with the sisters in Weston-super-Mare and I got to go to Weston to serve on Wednesday and Thursday- it was so cool!! Oh my goodness  miracles happen on exchanges! Sister Barton came here to Exeter with Sister Fekete and I went to Weston with Sister Sebald, my MTC companion! So it was so fun to serve with her again! While I was there we went and taught this guy called Darren they are teaching and I guess he had just had a problem with the fact that this is the one true church- so he voiced that concern with us at the beginning of the teach and we were able to read some scriptures but more than anything we were just able to bare our testimonies of the truthfulness of this gospel and it was amazing to see his face- his whole countenance changed from the beginning of the teach to the end. By the end he just smiled and he was like "I know it. I know this is the one true church. We need to say a prayer, I need to thank Heavenly Father for helping me realize this!!" ha ha it was so cool. I know without a doubt this is the one true church on the earth because it is Jesus Christ's church. What an amazing thing to know and what an amazing thing for Darren to realize! I feel so blessed that I was able to be there with him when he came to that realization. When we left Sister Sebald was just like THAT was the miracle of the exhange for us, we have been teaching him for 1 1/2 months and that has always been his concern and now he knows!! Well that night as we were calling Exeter they had some miracles as well! There is an investigator that we have been teaching and she would not pray in front of us at all but the sisters went and taught her and they asked her to pray and she hesitated but in the end she said the prayer out loud! Hallelujah!! AND they went and saw a family that is less active that we have been going to see that just did not want to come to church and they went and taught them and had an amazing experience with them and they were all like we want to come to church- we will be there! :) So cool!

 

Well a little bit about Weston-super-Mare, it's a beach resort type city and it was absolutely beautiful!! The flat is right by the sea and it was so weird because we just walked everywhere- in Exeter we have to take the bus 20 minutes to get anywhere, it was so different to just be able to walk to the chapel for a teach in 3 minutes! Oh man it was so pretty.

 

Ok Item of business number 2: are you ready for this one? So on Saturday we are going up to Reading for a mission conference and guess who is speaking at our mission conference? .....Elder Bednar!! He is going to speak to us and then he is going to have a question and answer session with all of us and he said he only wants doctrinal questions.. OHHHHHHHHH! Oh my gosh we are so excited. We will have to get up well early though because we have to be there for 9, at 9:30 church security is going to lock all the doors so if you aren't there in your seat by then too bad so sad (seriously that would be SOO sad) so then we will be in there with him from 9:30 until 1. :O and THENNNNNNN we have to leave right after because we have to get home because Damian is getting baptised on Saturday night! YAYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my goodness. There is nothing more beautiful than seeing a family come closer to Christ. :) (Damian is Andrew's dad, the boy who got baptised a few months ago. The one that talks to Tanner on facebook! ha ha)

 

Oh man.... can you tell I'm excited? ha ha oh it's going to be so cool.

 

Ok wait so Emily said Bryson is going to Long Beach California Spanish speaking?! Is that correct? .. or is that where MIchael Bell is going?! Either way- CONGRATULATIONS!!!! Oh that is so exciting!

 

Well.... these are a few of my favorite things:

*Teaching Jehovah's Witnesses that don't want to bible bash with you. What?! I know we were surprised too. We went there expecting to be yelled at and everything but they ended up being lovely! They just honestly want to learn more about our church. So cool.

*Dartmoor! We went for pday yesterday with the Blackhams and the Newton Abbot elders and it is absolutely gorgeous. We went and saw these huge rocks that someone carved the 10 commandments into- so cool

*Being called mum by random little children. That's right it happened to me twice this week. ha ha ha one little girl I said hello to that was sitting behind us on the train on our way to Exmouth and when we got off the train she took my hand and started walking with us ha ha but because of these little kids their dads started laughing and talking to us and we are going back to teach one of them this week!

*Midnight snacks (... ok 10 pm snacks mainly nutella toast with bananas on top mmmm)

*Teaching out in the garden in the POURING rain (that happened in weston-super-mare and we were completely soaked afterwards even though we had all of our rain gear on ha ha

*2 minute powernaps on the train- train rides are so relaxing, it's like a lullaby!

*Finlay Poulter (4 year old boy) asking Sister Fekete why she is wearing a wig. ha ha ha

 

Ok well I feel like this is a little bit random today, I guess I just have so much on my mind that I want to share! I'm going to send a few pictures right now as well but don't you dare forget- I love you all! And I love this gospel and I love being a missionary! :)

 

XxOooXxoO (Nacho Libre style ;)) Love, Sister Mills!