Monday, January 27, 2014

Weekly Update January 28, 2014

G'day everyone!

What a fast week this one has been! A lot of good things happened to Elder 'Iongi and myself this week.  We did more finding this week than we have done all transfer, so far.  However, we were able to find a couple really solid potentials we will be seeing this week.  We had a couple lessons with our investigator, Paul, this week.  The second time we visited him he told us that he had just been diagnosed as pre-diabetic, and may already have diabetes.  After a bit of conversation about nutrition and exercise and things along those lines, we introduced the Word of Wisdom to him.  As we read from D&C 89, he would have us stop and ask questions, or sometimes just comment that he agreed with what it said.  The thing that surprised me was when we mentioned drinking tea or coffee, he admitted that was good advice!  Paul is a religious coffee drinker!  He said he can see that being a good thing because then you "aren't chained to your morning coffee."

On Wednesday evening, we (the missionaries in the Sunshine Coast, Brisbane North, Brisbane, and Cleveland Stakes) were invited to attend a "cluster meeting" that President Henderson, the mission president, was speaking at.  The cluster meeting consists of the ward councils and bishoprics of multiple stakes, and are presided over by an area authority.  There was much talk about the missionaries and the members working together.  I really enjoyed the meeting, and we received a lot of really good information we can use when we go out to challenge our members to work with us in some way.  When President Henderson began his talk, a thunderstorm hit Brisbane, and when he started speaking, you could hear the thunder in the background!  It was really cool!  I really drove home the authority that man speaks with!  Ever since this meeting, Elder 'Iongi and I have been out committing the families in our area to form Family Mission plans.  We hope to be able to work with them to accomplish the goals they set as families.  I really feel this is going to help both members and missionaries to work effectively together.

This past Sunday was Australia Day.  Our ward had a barbie yesterday (Monday) to celebrate, since it was a public holiday.  Australia Day is the celebration of Captain Cook discovering Australia.  However, the indigenous community does not celebrate Australia Day.  They have a different name for it: Invasion Day.  I think that pretty much sums up their feelings on it all.  Just thought that would be a fun fact about Oz.

I love you all! Have a great week!

Elder Rosier

Monday, January 20, 2014

Weekly Update January 20, 2014

Hello everyone!

I am terribly sorry that there was no update last week.  I forgot to write it and when my time on the internet at the library had ended, it hit me that I failed to send one.

These last two weeks have been good  Not too much out of the ordinary. Missionary work as usual, I reckon.  Here are a few highlights for the week I failed to write you about:

Elder'Iongi and I went and followed up with a potential (investigator) we had.  We were most of the way through teaching the first discussion with him when his mum came out, Bible loaded. After a bit of a conversation where we were inclined to--as President Langeland always put it--correct their false doctrine, I was able to get a commitment from both of them to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it.  We went and followed up this past Saturday, only to discover that they hadn't done it, and the mum had told her son she didn't want him to investigate our church.

We had our second visit with Maria.  She is reading the Book of Mormon and praying. She didn't really feel like she's getting an answer yet, but will keep praying and reading.

This week was really good.  We visited with Paul a couple of times, and shared a message with him about keeping positive.  He recognizes the need to make prayer and scripture study a bigger part of his life.  We are encouraging him to read from the Book of Mormon.  He has nothing against it, bue he is afraid that his wife doesn't want him to read it.  We have tea with them tonight.  His wife's heart seems to be softening.  She is from Boston, and is really happy that there is a missionary from America coming to visit.

We taught Maria about the Plan of Salvation yesterday (Sunday(.  We first followed up about her reading and praying.  She said that she is feeling something different in her life since she began studying the Book of Mormon.  We also met her mum.  She said she is completely supportive of her to learn about the church, and get baptized if she wants to.  Apparently, her parents--Maria's grandparents--are members of the church.  Maria didn't know that until she told us!

I hope everyone has a great week!  Love you all!

Elder Rosier


The mission blog posted an article this week entitled "Flat Inspections and Interviews" and posted pictures of missionaries with the mission president and his wife. I noticed that the missionaries in Ross' zone, however, were taken in the church. Ross said that they got a call five minutes before expecting their arrival, for them to come to the church for their meetings. Ross was sort of disappointed because, "they had spent heaps of time cleaning their flat!" I'm thinking, that was probably a good thing!



Thursday, January 9, 2014

Weekly Update January 7, 2014

Happy New Year!

Hope everybody had a great new year's eve and day! As I mentioned in my last year's Eve, so I am starting 2014 in a new area.

The first week here was really good. I am enjoying serving with Elder 'Iongi. We spent much of this week finding people to teach, and visiting the less-active members in the ward. We have had much success this week with people who we have talked with on the street and at the bus station. Hopefully I'll have much to report on in the coming weeks regarding those whom we found.

We have two progressing investigators here. One is a man named Paul who is Catholic. His wife is from the states. He joined the Catholic church when he married his wife. When I met him for the first time this week, we had a rather long (and deep, I might add) discussion on the apostasy, how it started, what caused it, and how/why the restoration of the gospel occurred. Thank you, James E. Talmage, for teaching me about that subject in depth. Fortunately, that was really good for Paul, as I was able to address some of the concerns he had both about our church and the Catholic chruch. He was mostly concerned about the claim to authority by both churches. Elder 'Iongi feels that now that we're over that obstacle with him that we'll be able to help him progress.

Our other investigator is a girl named Maria. She has met with missionaries in the past. On Sunday we went over the restoration with her. She said she will get baptized if she gets a witness that he Book of Mormon is true. We are seeing her tomorrow, so hopefully we'll be able to set a date with her.

Well, that's us here in Capalaba. I hope everyone has a great week!

Elder Rosier