Elder Joe Sopal -Toronto Canada Mission: Transfer 7 Week 2: Sunsets and Sauble Beach

Hey y'all,

I am so excited in about two weeks-ish we will have a new mission President, President Clayton. President and Sis Scott. Have been so awesome! I have loved being able to get to know them both really well! its cool how I have only met them a few times but I feel like they are my mission parents! I only wonder how the mission dynamic will change with a new President! Oh the mysteries that lie ahead. So I must apologzie for the last two weeks and explain as to why my letters were so short. Well the first Preparation Day as you have all maybe seen or if you have not email me and I will send you the waterfall pictures! We have created a new Preparation day activity, waterfall hunting. So that is what we did all day on preparation day but we had to drive up to Hamilton. We were gone till 430 pm and than we went to the church to exchange pictures and we had to get back to St Cats for a dinner haha. So we only had 5 mins to let our family know at least we were alive. The last preparation day. The computers here were not working so great and so we just gave up and went shopping haha. Today they are working great so you will be able to have a nice report on my week.

So for the past two weeks I have been enjoying being a District leader. As a District leader you get a bit more responsibilities. It is nice to have such a small district and only have to call and follow up on the other companionship in my district invs. So in my district we have Elder Tinney, Sister Waals, and Sister Noker. We have the smallest district but yet the biggest areas to cover! We only get to hold a district meeting once a month! So this past Tuesday was my first District Meeting. I wanted to focus it on our zone goal of getting member present lessons. So with the help of the Spirit we discussed and I instructed on how we can prepare our members for teaching in our member present lessons. i was so nervous doing this for the first time but than I got a little help from the Spirit and it went great! For all you members out there who are reading this! I would encourage you first off to go teaching with the missionaries! Let them know your schedule and go out teaching with them or tracting! My next tip is to study and learn about the lessons missionaries share. get yourself a copy of Preach My Gospel! It is going to be my job when i get back home to find you ( you being my friends and family) who do not have one and get you one! Study these lessons and pray about how the Spirit can help you teach about these principles! Than be that amazing fellow shipper! be there for the invs whether is be offering them a ride or exchanging numbers to answer any questions about what they are learning. I know this will help us to keep up to our Heavenly Father who is hastening the work every day! We just need to keep up! Any how this area has had problems with MP and getting close to Standards! But I am pleased to inform you that our district is hitting standards together! We are helping and working hard to make this area successful and become more stronger. We are finding more people and teaching more people every week! We have built up some awesome momentum and hope to continue to move it forward!

this is all who attended my first District meeting. The senior couple is Elder and Sister Leinonen, Elder Williams is from Cardston AB and is our Zone Leader, Elder Legault is our other Zone leader and is from Edmonton AB, Sis Noker is from Nebraska, and Sis Waals is from Norway!

Our area is sooooooo big! It is crazy we cover from Collingwood drawing a line straight across to port Elgin and that is our area! There is parts of this area that missionaries have never even touched haha. I will say this though this area is beautiful! This past week we got to be in Wiarton, port Elgin, and Sauble Beach. the beaches here are white and sandy and some of the beaches even have clear blue water. We enjoy going contacting on the beach and walking the shore line. I have been getting some awesome pictures of the land here. We have been able to work hard and work smart. My comp elder Tinney has been having some back problems and other health issues which cause us to loss work time by going to the doctors or ER but when we do have time we work our butts off and he is usually dead by time 930 rolls around haha. I have gained a new appreciation for the ER and am beginning to possible think about going into med school. but than i am reminded about the crazy hours and the long schooling and so I think I will stick to my Dentistry.

Well as for the work and some of the great blessings we have seen are that Aaron our most golden invs ever! Is getting baptized this coming week! He has also know made it a goal to serve a mission! It is sooo sweet. Than our other invs from Portugal is Aldu and her family! she has been sharing the gospel So now she is bringing a whole bunch of people to church with her next week! So we hope to be able to baptize this wonderful Portuguese family! We have a couple of awesome potential invs set up for the coming week so we hope those go well!

Even canada has nice beaches!

As for the other aspect of missionary work! I have now learned how to build a house! Some of the jobs being framing, shingling, insulating, flooring, wiring, and a few other odd jobs haha. We have been having a lot of fun! We are enjoying all this service we get to do as we get a nice little break from door knocking. ya haha the service projects we do is great! lol by the time i leave this area i will know how to build my own house from the ground up haha. I have now done framing, shingles, wiring, dry walling, insulation and more :P. haha I have also been working on my tan! I am slowly starting to get my tan back! Also because of this service and the physical exertion it takes, we have been able to keep off the weight we would have put on as this area is another awesome one for food! the members love feeding the missionaries here!

Well there is a few updates on How I am doing, the work is doing, the members are doing, and ya haha I think that is everything for now! So now i will just let it go and be one with the wind and snow haha.

Love you all have an awesome week,

Elder Sopal