Mother's Day

Date: Wed, 07 May 2008 11:18

Hey everyone!
Yet another week has gone by. I think the time here is starting to pick up a bit, which is both good and bad. I had a few things happen this week that were pretty great. We had Zone Conference on Thursday in Poole. It was kind of a long trip, but still really good. We talked a lot about how we can try to get a bigger effort from members to help the work. President Swinton even did "show and tell". He told us a story about a couple that he taught back when he was in England on his Mission. The guy is black and at the time he was being taught the blacks weren't allowed to have the priesthood. This guy's faith was too strong to worry about that. President told us about a prayer that the guy gave after they discussed the priesthood with him and he said something to the effect of "I am so thankful for the opportunity to be able to join your church and if I receive nothing else(meaning the priesthood). I am just happy to be able to be baptized a member." Shortly after President lost contact with him and just over a year ago the guy was able to find President and they met up for the first time in over 30 years. The guy had been very strong in the church, eventually received the priesthood, and had served in various callings. President even invited him to come speak at our Zone Conf. It was so spiritual to see the two of them crying out of joy together. It was a joy that I'm looking forward to have in 30 or so years.
After the Zone Conf., I exchanged with the ZL's in Southampton and worked with E. Cusick from Orem. We were able to teach a couple people. One of them was a lady I taught on my last exchange in Southampton so it was cool to see and teach her again. The ZL's have recently moved to a 4-man flat with the other 2 elders in Southampton so in the morning the 4 of us ran to a nearby cage and played football. It was a lot of fun. It felt good to play a little bit again. We got to see Emmanuel and Fallon again this week. Every time we go over there we have a good time. Emmanuel showed us a video clip of his sister's wedding in Ghana and on it we got to see a lot of his home. Ghana looks like a really cool place. On Sunday we had such a miracle happen. McConkie and I got to the Church about 5 min before it started and there was a new guy sitting with our Ward Mission Leader. We were quickly introduced to him and sat with him during the meeting. He was so cool. His name is Hayden and he's from Trinidad. He's engaged to a member who is currently in the Philippines and he's in the navy here in Portsmouth. They're getting married in June. He's going to pick her up from the Philippines then go to Trinidad to get married, but before he does he wants to get baptized first! He looked up our ward building online and everything. He even paid tithing!! How blessed are we?
We had a DA this past week with the Jones family. Sis Jones is American, from CA, and Bro Jones is English. They made us authentic fajitas. Wow, they were tasty. We had another one with E-man and Alison. McConkie and I made them Chinese curry which was pretty good as well. They're fun to visit and we're teaching Alison. Dean and Luke are coming along well for their baptism on Saturday. They've got it all planned out too. All McConkie and I have to do is say the opening and closing prayers, fill the font, and witness the baptism.
So Mother's day is Sunday. Yea! Because of the time difference here we've got to call in the evening here. I know everyone has church at different times, but I'll be calling around 7:30 my time so 12:30 your time. I hope you all can make it. If not, there's always Christmas in 6 months...:-) I'm looking forward to it. It'll be nice to talk to you all again. That's pretty much my week. I hope all is well and I'll talk to ya Sunday!

-Elder Kyle Warner