Letter home January 25th

Hello family and friends, 

Its seems to me that there are always lessons to be learned, even if we are not seeking them. There are lessons that our Father in Heaven wants us to learn on how to improve. My new area is great! Full of Samoans, Tongans, and Maori people. It is not in the city, city of Auckland but it is the same as my first area when I started my mission. The community is great, they know us as "brothers" or in other words that is what they like to call us when we bike by in the streets. My companion and I do not have a car which is okay because being in a car you don't get to see as much as you would on a bike. For example, having little girls that are seven to eight years old (these are some of the members daughters) who can barely fit on the bike but they somehow manage to reach the pedals and start going the distance which is not far for my companion and I to catch them as if we are running. Yeah, so being on a bike is beyond more exciting than being in a car. It is much easier to get out and talk to people rather than randomly parking the car on the side of the road and getting out of the car where it might seem a little scary for some people have two young men getting out of the car with white shirts and black name tags, just to talk to them. We missionaries are definitely not afraid of awkward moments that frequently happen to us. But that is okay, being weird means you are happy! 

Elder Fitzsimmons and I have had a great week of finding people to teach. Mostly the people we are finding is from just stopping on the side of the road and introducing ourselves to them. Most of the time they said "nahh all goods keep going" but sometimes they are "hey brothers, hot day to be riding on bikes, what are you two up today?" My companion is by far the funniest  person I have ever met who knows how to be down to earth to the Islanders we see.

We were able to find some of our less actives. We found an 18 year old named Loma, big Tongan kid who looks like he should be in his twenty's or thirty's but is diffidently not. Loma expressed to us how he hasn't been coming to church and shared with us how back when he was 15 he was motivated everyday to go but as the years went by things just started to change for him. We had one of the members out with us. Being a returned missionary he was able to help us with Loma. Loma expressed that he still wants to come to church and wants our help. The member was able to invite him to play a game of touch rugby on Monday with him and some of his buddies. With that invitation we could tell that Loma is just wanting help in his decisions in life. Later that week we went back and taught him a lesson about three things:

1.) Church

2.) Prayer

3.) Read

We used three cups and three knifes to teach this lesson.  We put the cups in a triangle formation. We told him to try to connect the knifes all together without having the knifes touching the opposite cups but somehow constructing them together so that the book could sit on the knifes in the middle so it doesn't fall. They tried all different ideas but just couldn't get it so that the book could be held. So we showed them, that when the knifes are all connected, overlapping each other at the end, the book did not fall through but was held by the knifes. We showed him that the cups represent church, prayer and reading scriptures and that when we miss one of those it is hard to be able to get back into that better routine of ours. He was able to see what he needed to work on, it was amazing to feel Heavenly Father using us as instruments in his work.

Later on in the week went by to see one of our investigators named Peter, a 16 year old who is giving up drinking and smoking. He has been sober and not smoking for the last eleven weeks. This is coming from someone who grew up around smoking heaps. Story...Peter's dad wanted to know where his grandfathers side came from because he had no clue where his dads family came from. We were able to show him the "My Family History" website. He logged on and through the my family history website, he was able to be lead by the spirit and found his dads side of the family. To be able to see the look on Bryan's face (Peter's dad) was very emotional. We could see the Lord softening his heart and seeing how he wasn't into the church that much to now being someone just wanting to find his family. It was amazing and absolutely unforgettable how that all came together just by talking about families and having an interest in finding who we are. 

That is something I have always wondered in my life, who I was, where did I come from and why am I here. It is a peaceful feeling to know from the gospel of Jesus Christ and His teachings that we are able to build a solid foundation for our families to be built on. Doctrine and teaching skills that can help every single one of us when we are all different and unique. In all my lessons this week, being patience and doing the will of our Heavenly Father more than doing what I want to do kept coming up. Patience is something we can develop but is very hard. One needs to go very deep in order to achieve this attribute. It is something I am working on. Sometimes I think, why isn't this happening, or why is this happening to me and I forget that the heavenly virtue of patience is needed. We may want things to happen faster than we want them to but it really comes on the Lords time. I love being who I am, I love being out on this mission and able to learn from each companion and the different areas, and most of all accepting Heavenly Father's will rather than my own will. He will not force us into doing something, he will guide us. It is just up to us to understand those feelings in our heart and to follow them. 

Thank you all for everything! Words cannot express how thankful I am! 

Remember to have fun, laugh and joke around cause that is what we do all day everyday.

From a.k.a Elder Thor have a fantastic week! :)

Elder Thorpe and his new companion