Serving the Lord in England : Hello

Hello family,

Well I am trying to remember what even happened this week...I am currently almost in tears after hearing the news about one direction and seeing all the pictures from Bris trip to Disneyland...I am homesick for Disneyland...but I can go there next summer :)

Well the highlight of this week was probably Wednesday. We were able to go up to the temple because we didn't have to do anything for transfers. The Deans took us up and we got there early enough to do initiatories and a session. It was so nice to be back in the temple, I have missed it so much. As I was there I was reflecting a lot about the first time I went through the temple and how unfamiliar everything was to me, but how much I have grown since then. It is often hard to see your progress you have made by just looking day by day. I often think that I haven't changed at all yet, but looking back since then my testimony has grown so much. I now understand so much more. I read a quote or scripture or heard in a talk this week something that said that when you are obedient that is when you are able to learn more. Learning and gaining that knowledge is such an important part of this earthly life, because everything you learn here you will take on with you to the next life. So the more you learn, the better off you will be. Therefore, the more obedient you are here, the better off you will be in the next life. I have seen that in my life here as a missionary. I have learned so much out here, my understanding of the plan of salvation and of the importance of this gospel has increased so much. And it has been as I have strived to live every mission rule and be exactly obedient that I have learned the most. In study this week I have been reading Jesus the Christ. I am not tackling all of it, although I wish I could, but I am just reading about the last few days of the Saviors life. I have learned so much from that. I recently got done reading about the Last Supper and the betrayal. It amazes me everything Christ has done. He knew he was going to be betrayed, but he still went on with the Last Supper. I have learned a lot about Judas as well and the reasons behind why he betrayed Christ and everything that happened with him. You should read in Jesus the Christ this week, we can all learn a lot from it I believe. The church released a new video this week called Because He Lives. It is there new Easter video, if you haven't watched it yet, watch it. Those videos the church releases are such powerful missionary tools. Without a doubt every time I watch it I feel the spirit. I just can't wait until we have our Ipads in a few weeks and we can show videos on the street, that will be such a good tool! Well sorry to be preachy there, just thought I would share what’s been on my mind about what I have learned lately :)

This week we focused on our recent convert T a lot. We hadn't seen him all week until Friday night. We had a ward party that night, they watched The Legacy, so we invited him to that and he called us and asked if we were at the chapel, we were there eating dinner, so he said he was going to head over right now. We weren't sure what we were going to do because we had about 1.5 hours till the ward party started, but we ended up teaching him. Sisters have a hard time being bold with people sometimes, so the Elders (Elder Green and Elder Schulthies) told us they wanted to teach him. We were all there and had scheduled in street contacting, but T was there, so we thought we might as well teach him now. We had a really good lesson with him, but there is something holding him back. He would not open up to us about why he isn't coming to church, it has been 3 months since he has been now. So that lesson was okay, we felt good after it, the elders were really bold, but T said it is good to be bold with him sometimes. So we saw him again Saturday morning because that was the appointment we had set with him for the week. That lesson went well. He walked in and said "sister I have to tell you the truth, I haven't been reading the Book of Mormon" well, we figured he hadn't. He always said he was in Helaman or the end of Alma, but couldn't really explain what was going on. I just thought it was because he was in the war chapters, but he told us the truth. So that was good, and we had a good lesson with him where we just read a chapter, Alma 7, with him about Christ. We thought all was well. He told us he would be at church, when we committed him to come I told him that if he really wasn't going to come to just say no because we don't want to plan on him if he wasn't going to come. And he thought about it and said yes he will be there. Well Sunday rolls around and surprise surprise he wasn't there again. He texts us after church and says "This may sound strange, but I took the Sacrament at home today" concerning....so we text him back and ask how and he says he just googled how to bless and pass mormon sacrament and did it. So we call him and tell him we need to meet up, because obviously that is not okay to do. He comes to the chapel and we had a really good teach with him. We went into it with the idea that we were going to "drop"him, if you can drop a recent convert...but basically give him a few weeks to just think about everything and decide what he wants then we will get back to him. We were really bold with him, I even started crying. The Chinese Elders were listening into our teach and after they were just like man you guys were bold. But it was good. We got our point across and T opened up a lot. Turns out he has never lived the Word of Wisdom, it isn't just tea either, it is alcohol. He doesn't really believe in God or in Satan. So he doesn't have a testimony at all. There is a recent convert here who did a "mormon month" before he got baptized, where he lived all the commandments and the gospel fully to test it out to see if it is right, and 2 weeks into it he knew it was true. So we talked to T about doing that and he is going to do it. It will be hard for him, and a big task for us to keep him motivated to do it, but we have complete faith that as he does it Heavenly Father will bless him and he will gain a testimony of this gospel. We just keep praying that he will be sincere about it.

This week we also said goodbye to our eternal investigator M. I may have told you about him before. But he wasn't married so he couldn't get baptized. He moved up to Reeding this week, so we had our last teach with him. That was sad, he is cool.

This week street contacting it seemed like the only people we talked to were Muslims, so that was fun. I learned a lot about them and what they believe in.

Elder Green pointed out my grey hair yesterday...looks like it is time to dye it again. I guess I just had one sticking up in the back of my head and he made a joke about it, little did he know I have a whole head of grey hair, it is really bad. I think we are going to go get our hair done today.

The guy I met on the bus is doing really good. We have taught him the first 2 lessons and he is reading the book of mormon (which most investigators don't do right off the bat, AMAZING!) he has a baptismal date for May 9, it is far out there, but we don't know what he needs to sort out in his life to be baptized. Especially just getting out of jail, the first presidency may have to approve it depending on how serious the crime is. But he is good, only struggle with him is he travels every weekend so he can never come to church. We will get him though. And the other guy we called from the phone he has come to a few activities and things, but we have a hard time getting a hold of him. We are hoping to see him this week because he is really cool and has a lot of potential.

This week we were out street contacting on Monday by the pier because it was a gorgeous sunny day, and this guy walks up in the middle of a gospel discussion and says "listen to these guys they know what they are talking about" at first I thought great, this guy is making fun of us, we are never going to recover from this, but then he explains that he is from SLC here on holiday. It was that Alan Smith guy that called you mom. It was really nice and made my whole day that he took the time to say hi to us. You don't get many people here that recognize us or say hi, so it was really nice of him. Hope you enjoyed talking to him, I knew you would like getting a call like that :) Right after that we had a long conversation with a guy who was a witch, that was freaky. You could just see that there was some darkness in him, people are scary.

Well sorry this weeks letter was really random and unorganized, I will repent and do better. Today marks the start of the new transfer and we are going to hit the ground running. I am really excited to be with Sister G. for another transfer. We both grew a lot last transfer and had a lot of changing to do. We know each other really well now and know how to work with each other, we know it will be hard, but we are going to go out and find teach and baptize. I want so badly to Find Teach and Baptize someone before I leave Brighton, and if I want to do that, I am going to have to put so much more faith and trust in the Lord this week. I know that it is possible, but not by me. It is through the Lord that I will be able to do it, and I know the Lord has someone here who is prepared for us, we just have to go out and give it our all to find them.

Well I love you guys so much! Thank you for all the prayers, you guys are the best!

I love you all! Hope you have a fantastic week!

Sister Robison xxx