Elder Thorpe hit his year mark!

Hello family and Friends! This week was my year mark, it is weird to think about it and how fast the year has gone by but there is still one more to go and this is the time to buckle down and keep on going. It has been a remarkable year being out here in New Zealand and being among all the Islanders! So many stories and many more to be coming. On Friday the sisters and the Elders in our district gave us a surprise one year mark birthday song. You could say that the singing was not quite as good at the Mormon Tabernacle, but it was a good try on their part. While they were singing us the song our zone leaders also showed up at our flat joining in with the fun. It was Elder Halls idea to get the district together to sing the song. 

The start of our week my companion and the zone leaders and another pair of elders had to drive all the way down to Auckland on Tuesday night to make it to a Leadership meeting. No I'm not in a leadership position but my companion is, which meant that I went for a car ride, so I thought. It was a great road trip that we had a head of us because the car ride was about three hours from where we were. It felt like a group of missionaries taking a road trip from Utah to California. Yes there was some lip singing going on in the car but most of it was coming from the two zone leaders. After using up all the extra energy that we had in the car we were able to show up to the flat that was used by a couple of different missionaries. We got in about ten o'clock at night and surprised those elders by giving them a little scare. There were ten missionaries total under one roof. That night we didn't get much sleep because there was more singing and pranks going on. We got up the next morning around five to get ready and be off to our meeting with all the leaders in the Auckland mission and. to meet with the president. The companion not in a leadership role were also involved in the meeting with the mission president. Something that President Balli talked about during our nine hour meeting was knowing how to set our person goals that will not seem to high or too low but goals that we can reach and push ourselves to our limits. He put in a perspective of how our life should be, because in life we all set goals. Some goals are goals that we want to reach and some goals are goals we all wanted when we were kids. I thought about this, started thinking of my goals and life and I had none. I didn't realize how important it is to know our goals in life and how they lay out the path of our lives. Then President Balli talked about "planning" and how planning is essential to reaching our goals. We returned to our flats at nine at night and said a prayer and began our planing for the next day. This didn't hit me until president Balli talked about planning and how every night as we plan we are taking our time each night to really think hard and look at the tools we have in order to figure out where Heavenly Father wants us to work in his vineyard. For myself I was never the planner, I just went with the flow and did things as they came. Sometimes it worked but most of the time it was not as successful as it would have been if I would have taken the time to use what heavenly father has given us to ponder prayerfully what he wants us to do. It really goes along with doing "his will" not ours. We may think we are doing the right thing but we sometimes get in Heavenly Fathers way in helping us get those blessing we need in order to reach our goal. We should be asking not what we want but rather what is it that he wants us to do for us to be able to fulfill those blessing and promises that he made to us. It takes a prayer and a willing heart to have Heavenly Father help us to reach our goals and to help us plan for those goals. It was a great meeting. I was able to leave with an impression of working on my goals and what I need to do so that Heavenly Father can help me.

This Sunday I was able to reflect on my patriarchal blessing to see what I need to do in order to have those blessing come true. I was able to read a part of it that said "become ACQUAINTED with your heavenly father". I was pondering and I have read my patriarchal blessing many, many, many times and that little verse I skipped and never really took the time to read and ponder what that meant. After reading that I went and read a book that is from President Joseph Fielding Smith. He said that he got acquainted with the Lord by studying and expanding his knowledge about the gospel by reading the Book of Mormon and the Bible and other church materials. I was about to pray to ask what I needed to do in order to get closer to Him to help me on fulfilling the blessing and promises that he promised me and that was to study about the gospel more and expand my knowledge of him. It was great because we were able to go to church and listen to our teachers talking about doing the Lords will and how we can do that. We were able to also see the primary program which made my companion and I laugh and reflect back on how that used to be us singing and how our voices were really, really high pitched back then. All the members had a great time and were able to laugh and just help the primary kids. They sure do love us Elders in the ward, the primary kids love us and it is great to hear that the parents can trust us. 

We didn't get much work done in our area this week because my companion and I were in Auckland. When we got back I went on a trade off with another pair of elders in our district and then the next day we went on another trade off. I was in the other area helping Elder Christensen while his companion was with mine. On the good side my companion was able to see some miracles on the trades off's with the other elders! He was able to see an older investigator of ours on the street and was able to catch up with him and invite him to our ward beach party. We were able to see him there at the ward party and see him surrounded with the members making him feel welcome. It was a beautiful day to have a party on the beach. We were able to be there to enjoy the day with the members.

Sterling our investigator is going through a hard time right now but we have the faith and the members to help us. We aren't sure if he will be ready by Friday. He will be ready when he is ready. Keep him in your prayers. Other than that, he is doing great in the church and still having fun! It is important to us is that he is enjoying the church!

Thank you all for the prayers! One more year left!! Always from your friend, Elder Thorpe!

Have a great week! Remember to smile!

The district leader bought him a happy meal because he is SO happy all of the time.