"Jesus is my best friend man! ".....week 42

So this was a awesome week! we worked hard and were able to do so much. We found 6 new investigators this week and all of them seem like they will be baptized. I have felt the Spirit so much this week. Our mission president came out with a new key indicator, which is the different things we report on at the end of the week, like lessons taught and things like that. But the new key indicator was proselyting hours.  He said he expected each companionship to be out working 55-60 hours a week. So from 10am till 9:30pm everyday with an hour for lunch and dinner. So we decided that we would meet that goal even though we had to drive for hours each day and driving doesnt count for that. But we did it and smashed the work.

Our first new investigator is actually the son of a recent convert. He is about 40 and is a really awesome man. He still lives with his dad. We went over there on thursday and went in and chatted for a while. We asked the normal questions to see where he was at and then we led into the restoration lesson. I just love that lesson so much! It's so powerful. I love the first vision, because we lead up to it by teaching about the apostasy and how everything was taken from the earth. And then we get to tell them that its back- that a young man named Joseph Smith prayed with faith and that the heavens were opened.  That a pillar of light descended down from the sky and Heavenly Father and Jesus Christ appeared to Joseph Smith and called him as a prophet and that the true church is back on the earth again. We taught him the first vision bit and then i bore testimony of it and he was just like, wow its amazing you guys can know and have such faith in this. We went on with the lesson and he accepted everything.  He was feeling the Spirit so strongly and he knew it. We invited him to follow the example of Jesus Christ and be baptized by someone who holds the authority and power of God. He said that he would be baptized! then at the end we were committing him to pray that night to ask God if it was true and i felt prompted to promise him a direct answer from God. So i said to him I promise you in the name of Jesus Christ that you will receive a answer to your prayer tonight. He looked at me and began to cry and just said thank you. the Spirit was so strong and my companion was able to testify of Jesus Christ again and promise him this was true. After the lesson he opened up to us and began telling us things he had been dealing with for a while. he has come a long way and is such a great man.

On friday we were out finding and we went to this one house of an aboriginal family. they let us in and man it reminded me of home haha. So there are 5 kids but they actually live with there uncle cause of some legal things but they are 6 8 10 12 and 14, the oldest is a girl and the rest are boys and man the are crazy! they wrestle and punch and refuse to cry haha the all tried to take me on but i still got my moves haha. But we talked to the uncle about what we do and he said he isnt really interested in learning but if the kids wanted to it was up to them. They all wanna learn and so we go over there every tuesday night now. we will start with a lesson and then go play footy or soccer with them they are so fun haha.

And then we went out one night to a resturant for dinner and there was a pool table there and my companion wanted to play so we put a 2 dollar coin in and started playing. while we were playing this guy came up and he was all covered in tattoos and he said "pardon my ignorance but what does your nametag say?" and so we showed him and he was like ohhhhhhh Jesus is my best friend man! and we began talking and he is a sailor but is on shore leave for 4 weeks and he kinda told us his back story and said he would be interested in us comming around teach him more about what we do and about our church! we should play pool more often haha.

All around its been a great week though sunday was crazy like always. Like man- all the branches up here are in a district and the district leaders are really worried about our branch.  There are only 2 or 3 melchezidek preisthood holders left. and one of them just decided to take some time off from church so things arent looking to good. But there really are some amazing people in the branch. we are just trying to help them all out.

Well, love you all!

           Elder White

this This is our chuch property.  There are always kangaroos. We meet in like an old mexican style looking house

he The country is so pretty.  It's up on this massive mountain and its just rolling hills of farmland

we went bowling on p day with this less active family

**Conner just admitted to me that he dropped his camera a few weeks into his mission and shattered his screen, so he really can never see what he's taking pictures of!  I think I know what to send him for Christmas:)