Burns Lake Report

Well hello!

Well, it sounds like so far the trip to the holy land has gone well! I think it would be fascinating to see the Vatican and to explore all of it. The more you look at the Catholic church, the more bizarre it seems that so many people think it is the same church that Jesus established on the earth. It has none of the same ordinances or organization. They call their leader "the Pope", which comes from Papa, or Father, when Jesus specifically taught to call no man your Father save it be your Father in Heaven. Everything just seems a little off with that religion. It is a blessing to have the gift of the Spirit telling us what truth is, so that we can know when something is what God would want us to do! I wrote Jed a letter finally, and the post office was closed last time I tried to send something for her birthday, but I sent Jacey a package for her birthday. Hopefully they do not think that I have forgotten about them!

General Conference was amazing. You get a lot more out of it the more spiritually in tune you are. They say up here that General Conference is the missionaries' Super Bowl, but it's even better than that! Everybody up here loved President Monson's shout out to the Canada Vancouver mission. President Tilleman says that President Monson really loves "his Canadian missions". And I'm guessing that tens of thousands of life plans changed with the announcement that missionaries can leave on their missions at younger ages. It's certainly inspired. It will be awesome to have the increase in missionaries. More and more areas can open up inside of British Columbia, and so that will be a blessing in this mission. Now I will have an excuse when after 6 months the flow of letters starts to stop. "All the girls that would be writing me are on their own missions!" Ha ha. I figured that Amelia would immediately call her bishop after the announcement. It will be exciting to see where that takes her.

Well, the work in Burns Lake is going fantastic! We taught more lessons than Elder Epperson has on his entire mission, and he's been in areas like Victoria with hundreds of thousands of people in his area. The Lord has really blessed us. Vanessa is still going strong. She has been living the Word of Wisdom like a champion and is going to be baptized on October 20th! I hope that the white clothes that I brought will fit me! I should probably double check before the day of.

There were a couple experiences this week that really touched me. At the end of one of the really long, destitute roads on Southside, there is a clump of houses that we call the Morris reserve because all the people there have the last name of Morris. We taught one of the investigators there, and then we felt like we should visit one of the houses on the other side of the Reserve, even though me and Elder Neher had taught him and he hadn't been interested. We knock on the door, and the man yells for us to come inside. He's sitting on the couch with a Book of Mormon, and tells us that it is the "biggest joke he has ever read." Apparently, in the morning, his car wouldn't start and so he couldn't go anywhere, and so he just started reading the Book of Mormon we left with him weeks ago. He had read all day at his slow pace, and was in Word of Mormon when we knocked on the door. He thought that Joseph Smith had written the book as a story or something, and was about to burn it. We were able to explain to him what the Book of Mormon actually was, teach him about Priesthood authority, and he calmed down and is now investigating the gospel. He just needed a bit of guidance and direction right at the time we were able to be at his door, and it was miraculous that we were able to talk to him before he hardened his heart. If we were an hour or so later, he wouldn't have talked to us.

The other was an experience with a man named Jonathan Alec. We were knocking on doors looking for the apartment where an investigator moved to, and one man said that he had never heard of the person we were looking for. He asked us why on earth we were walking around in nice clothes in "the middle of the night" (it was like... 8:30) and we told him we were missionaries. He let us inside, and as we taught him part of the message of the Restoration. He said he would like to meet with us, but he was going into treatment to get him off of illegal drugs on the 7th of November. The Spirit told me to promise him he could quit using and be baptized on November 3rd, and he felt the Spirit witnessing it was true and agreed to be baptized. It was amazing. The Spirit literally put words in my mouth. We're meeting with him again today and we are very excited.

Well, life is going well here! That is about all I have time to write, but many miracles are happening here. I've got to try and upload pictures now, so hopefully that works out. I love and miss you all and hope everything is great at home and in... Egypt now?

Elder Blotter

PS- I found a charger for the camera!