Week 19: Cars & Guitars

 

The tri-companionship - Elder Joe & Elder Hewitt (in their car!!)

Well this week was not to bad! We gained a new comp! So Monday Was enjoyable we went home and cleaned our place and made it look neat and tidy again. Tuesday was a pretty good day! We had District Meeting and the Zone Leaders came down for it. We got to go on Zone Leader exchange that day. So i went with Elder Beyer! We tracted pretty much the whole day! But we found a ton of Potential Investigators. Tuesday Night we found out we were getting another comp! To join our companionship. So we also found out our area would be combined with Windsor East. So we also inherited a car too! I was so excited because I am the only one in our trio who can drive! Driving to Cambridge was awesome! I love the snowy weather as it reminds me so much of home and its fun to be driving in it. 

We got back late that night and went to drop by Becky. We had an awesome spiritual power house lesson. We talked about the Atonement and Baptism and how her life is going so crazy with so much going on that she needs to rely on Jesus Christ and had a come to Jesus moment. I love 3 Nephi 9: 13-14. " O all ye that are spared because ye were more righteous than they, will ye not now return unto me, and repent of your sins, and be converted, that I may heal you? Yea, verily I say unto you, if ye will come unto me ye shall have eternal life. Behold, mine arm of mercy is extended towards you, and whosoever will come, him will i receive; and blessed are those who come unto me." It was super awesome! Becky was now recommitted to keep the Word of Wisdom. 

We found 11 new investigators this week. They are Eiad, Thereiaz, Joseph, An arabic family that does not know any english haha so 5 of them, Saliem, and Pla! This whole week we have been trying to work two areas! We also were trying to hit standards in both. However we only had Becky at church. Well this past week we actually taught a Muslim women from Dubi! Named Caren. She actually accepted a Baptismal date and said she cannot wait! So we are super excited about that. We also found a family from Liberia. There names are Rose and Hawah. Hawah is super open and super receptive! She wants to come closer to Jesus Christ and be baptized again by the proper authority as she have come to know that the Authority of God is back on the earth today through that Restoration of the Priesthood through Joseph Smith. 

We have been loving having a car in this cold period of time! I love driving in Windsor. We turn on the tunes and jam church style. We also went to go met and teach some friends who were from China. Their names are Jimmy and Stella. They have no religious back ground and do not know if there is a God. So we sat down and talked about God and having the belief in him and his son Jesus Christ. We also taught them about prayer, reading scriptures, and the blessings of it. By the end of the lesson they asked to be baptized and we also had them pray at the end for us.In their prayers they asked God to help them follow him from now and forever. They were so happy after meeting with us and told us to come back again and again! It was so awesome! 

We had a good week. Well have an awesome week! It was fun and exciting and a joy. I love you all and hope you had an awesome week. It is crazy thinking how long I have been out already! My mind has been pre-occupied with a lot this past week but we have work our butts off and helped invite many people to come unto Christ! Well have an awesome week! Talk to you next week! 

The district

This is probably the first time he has held a guitar in 5 months.  Look at the grin on his face.

 

Dinner of champions?

Breakfast of champions

Week 17: Read-a-thon

 

Well another week in the Lovely City of Windsor. Well this week was not all to bad. Well this week was slow but good. We found 7 new investigators! I am having trouble walking due to some silly problems with my feet. Well i just keep on walking! So everyday this week we have walked down to Ouellette which is the far side of our area! So we have been getting calves of steal! 

So this week has been pretty cold outside. For some reason I am not able to keep myself warm with all the layers that I do wear. Time is honestly starting to fly by haha. I was walking with Elder Hewitt on Thursday thinking we had an appt with someone we had two days from then. The days are all melding together and it feels like I have been out so long yet only for a short while. All in all is is really enjoyable.

 Well this week quote is by Brigham Young. He wrote, " The greatest mystery a man ever learned is to know how to control the human mind and to bring even faculty and power into subjection to Jesus Christ, this is the greatest mystery we have to learn while in these tabernacles of clay. I really do love that quote because we are here to learn to control our passions, desires, and the natural, carnal, devilish self within. We can overcome fully only by the Atonement of Jesus Christ. 

We tracted into this part member family this past week the Wrightman's. They are super nice and awesome! We are going to try to help her come back to the Church and also teach her children too! We had dinner with them and then we walked all the way home. They invited us over to their restaurant they owned! Called El Patron! On New Years Eve we had the read-a-thon again from 12-9 pm. So we stayed inside all day. It was awesome we read so much and so fast. But i got so much out of it. It was a good District bonding time and it was snowing like crazy so it was nice to be inside. Wednesday and on we did a lot of tracking and contacting. We found a guy named Michael. He is an awesome black guy who is wanting to make changes in his life and bring the gospel into his life to help his family come closer together. We also found a couple Kim and Derek. Who are super nice and young. They just got a dog and we are going to help their marriage last after the grave. We found out that in one of our apartments we were tracking people were watching us a little to closely. So we are now not going back there for safety reasons. 

Friday We had dinner with the Ogdons and found a couple more people. I went on an exchange with Elder Howlett from Alaska Friday to Saturday. It was rather nice. We talked to so many people. I have now officially talked to over 3100 people! I am quite proud of myself. This weekend we taught Becky to follow the Prophet and about President Monson. We watched the Mormon message  "In His Sacred Name". It was good! She believes he is a Prophet of God and also said that after she is baptized she will pay tithing! 

That evening we called every person we knew inviting them out to church. Unfortunately we came so close to standards! ERG! Once again so close but we will try again next week. So on Friday evening we actually had a super neat experience! Elder Howlett and I went tracting a street and we felt prompted to go to this one house in specific. We found a lady named Sherry who has in the last little while a lot of family pass away and just yesterday she has her brother pass away. She was super upset and was actually praying to God that he would give her a sign to give her comfort. So we showed up at her house and she let us in and we taught and testified of The Plan of Salvation! We power housed it and she accepted a baptismal date and it was awesome! The Spirit was sooooo strong :) it was a really cool experience of an answer to prayer! We also found some other people a man named Mike. On the Sunday the only person we had out at Church was Becky. But she brought Emma! I was so excited Emma came! But man i did not get anything out of the testimony meeting because i had to distract Emma and keep her still haha. I did it for a whole 30 mins by showing her pictures! It was a challenge but now i know that I can keep my own kids entertained! Well most of Sunday was snowing and the snow just poured down! It was crazy how much snow fell in so little amount of time but it keep going and did not stop till early this morning( Monday morning). We also trekked out to go teach someone later on that evening and we got another new investigator! It was a good, cold, freezing walk haha. 

Well this was my week. I am loving it but it is really cold at night! It is the only bad part about being outside is the cold! But I am excited for the summer! Well till next week I bide you all adieu! Becky is getting baptized this week on Sunday :) we are so excited to have helped her to this point. She is getting her interview on Friday so we hope it will go well! I will send pictures next week of her baptism :) It will be awesome! We cannot wait for that Sunday I might even get to baptize her! 

Week 18: He can make our burdens light

 

This week has been pretty decent. So my favourite passage of scriptures is Mosiah 24. It is the Chapter that talks about how people were put under oppression by the King at the time where they could not pray unto God. But instead of just praying they poured their hearts out to the Lord. He did indeed come to them in their afflictions and he did make their burdens become light. There is an awesome quote that I love, it goes " I've often wanted to say that Jesus Christ never lords over us but under us. He comes down and lifts from below." I know that when we come unto Christ we can be strengthened to face our trails and afflictions as the people of Alma. This week we had a super spiritual experience with Becky and this chapter. We have helped her to move forward from her stress and worries and re commit to be baptised on January 26. We are so excited for this date as it is the Sunday of transfer calls. I really do hope to see her enter the waters of baptism and start a new. Becky is doing awesome though. She has been reading and praying everyday. She is coming so far along and seeing the blessings of follow the Saviour's example in her life. 

This past week was Zone Training. It was pretty awesome. We got challenged to not let a single person walk by us for the rest of our mission! It will be hard but we have been doing awesome so far. We are to talk to at least 20 people a day now. We also received instruction on how to help people see the blessings of living commandments and helping them recognize the Spirit. As we know that the Spirit will speak to us in many ways. It can be a burning warm feeling, a still small voice, feelings of peace, joy, love, long-suffering, gentleness, and etc. The Spirit will also lead us to do good and help us become more focused. The spirit is amazing! If we do truly seek an answer we will receive it even if it is a feeling of a stupor of thought can be an answer to a prayer. Ask yourselves how have you felt the Spirit? How do you recognize it? Have you felt it? What helps you to feel it more? 

This week we killed it we found 10 new investigators! We tracked into a Philippino lady named Lani. She is so awesome she loved the idea of the Book of Mormon and thought that every nation back then should have a record of Holy Writings such as this Book and the Bible.  She is going to come to Church next Sunday which will be awesome! We also met a guy named David! He was so funny. While we were teaching him he was like wow can we actually do that! Can God and Jesus Christ actually appear. He told us after we finished teaching that he wants to be baptised and wants to be a real Christian. He also wants to join an Orchestra! So we set him with a date however we found out his phone had been shut off so he missed church this Sunday :(. We were quite upset about that but oh well. Next Sunday! So after coming back from Zone Training we actually only had an hour to go tracting so we knocked around a little and then got let in and taught a family of 5! It was awesome! We set them with Baptismal dates and then hurried over to our dinner appts. we are having so much fun teaching people. I will say I am not a fan of finding but I love when we get to teach! Well this week was fun but not to much happened.  Well we also found a lot of other people but we are waiting to see if they will progress so their names are Michael, Megan, Steph, Greg, Albert, Bashar, Christina, Emmon, and Sherry. Still doing great and enjoying the lovely cold weather we are having out here! We are getting so fit! I have lost a lot of weight haha. From walking and all that. Well this is all :) have an awesome week ! Cya all later!

Week 15: Christmas and Craziness

Well there went week 2 of the transfer. It is crazy how fast the weeks are starting to fly by. This past week we found 4 new investigators and actually several more. We met a man named Manuel who speaks only Arabic! But is working towards baptism and is striving to learn english and the gospel at the same time haha. It is awful trying to teach people who have a language barrier. I wish i could speak Arabic!

Read-a-thon

Tuesday we did the read-a-thon which I talked about last week. It was so long but awesome! I have now a better mind set on time frame and understanding of the gospels even though we had to read each page in 2.5 mins haha. We got pizza for this special occasion and celebrated Christmas Eve with pizza and egg-nog. For Christmas we went to the Read-a-thon and then back home to head back out to the Thompsons. They are an awesome family! We had a big Christmas feast and enjoyed ourselves quite well. We were feed good and got chocolate and all. It was so weird to see my family and hear them haha. But it was super nice to see them. Christmas was made by skyping them and talking to my Dad on the phone! This Thursday we went to Bro. Ianni, an Italian in our ward. He is an amazing cook! He made us some delicious lamb! Then we went back and planned for the day. We also had some other lessons with people we got let into and all that good stuff. Elder Hewitt and I have been trekking downtown every day walking about 10 km+ it is crazy my legs are going to be jacked haha. We always walk so fast haha.

Friday we went up to Skills and Interviews. I was so excited because I got to get my Christmas presents and letters! We had an awesome Training instruction. I had to bear my testimony on missionary work. It was awesome! I started with Proverbs and power housed the rest of it by being lead by the Spirit. This work is amazing and it is not our work but the Lords work. He could do it all without us but he has entrusted us to help teach and help people come unto Christ by helping them receive the restored Gospel. It is truly amazing! I am going to learn so much these 2 years! We did a fun role-play today where we practiced contacting missionaries and tried to get there cards. We received a commitment to never let any person get by us on the street and to find 2 new investigators every week! So we are doing to try to keep to that! After Interviews we got our packages and letters! I had a lot it was nice to see that I am loved haha. Thank you to all who sent me letters and packages! But man the ride back home from London was so long! It takes 2 and a half hours and plus Elder Johnson almost killed us!

We also had an interesting experience with tracking. We had an appt with Jeremy a referral from other missionaries we went to that address and this women answered and said that she was Jeremy but not the one we were talking to haha we were super confused! But it was interesting because she was actually a man. Elder Johnson and I were like oh my gosh! What just happened type moment. It was different thats for sure.

 So Saturday was not bad but we did a lot of tracting and contacting! We have found 4 investigators alone on Saturday. They are all set with dates and working towards those dates. We have actually been let in so much recent! So we are teaching a lot! I love teaching so much more than finding haha. It is never fun knocking on door after door. But Becky is doing awesome! She now officially passes all the Baptismal interview questions and just needs to learn about tithing! :) We are so excited as her baptism is coming up! She is the only one who came to Church on Sunday. Sunday, Elder Adams, and Elder Harlot, and I all went up to do a special musically number be still my soul! It was pretty awesome and enjoyable that's for sure! Becky now has every Sunday off in the New Year to come to Church which is an awesome miracle!

the new GPS he bought for Christmas.  Apparently the streets "don't make sense there"

Well this was our week! I love you all and Hope you have an awesome New Years Eve! Cya all in 2014! May this new year bring much success and may you find much joy in it as well.

The Christmas Phone Call - written by Mom

So the afternoon started out a little stressful!  I had checked everything out with Skype earlier in the week and it was all working fine.  Ironically enough when I sat down 2 hours prior to Elder Joe's call nothing was working!!!  Yikes.  I started freaking out.  There were a few tears, my husband had to rub my shoulders and hold my hand while I vented at the computer. 
The Lord seems to work in mysterious ways because Elder Joe didn't call at his pre-scheduled time of 2:00... He called much later at 4:30.  I feel blessed because it took that much time to get things sorted out with the computer and skype.  I got to see my boy, talk to him and just enjoy his wonderful smile.  Anya (Elder Joe's sister) is happy again and all is well. 
It was a wonderful conversation and we caught up on everything from here and there.  Too bad his packages won't get to him until this weekend (they were delayed in London with the Zone Leaders) but he didn't seem to mind.  
What an amazing young man.  He is awesome.  So happy to talk to my wonderful missionary.
Merry Christmas, my son. 

 

Week 15: Christmas Short and Sweet

Just joking.  The new companion is fantastic!

Hey everyone!

Sorry for no weekly letter last week! I do apologize. The computers were down all day so we were unable to email. It is good to finally be able to email again! Well That past week was not bad. It was Elder Koceja last week with me in Windsor. He is now in Brampton North. I have gotten a new companion named Elder Hewitt. He is English with a killer accent. He is an awesome missionary. He is super bold and just an all around good guy. He is eating me out of house and home though haha. 

Oh well. 

So it has been snowing a lot in Windsor. We had reports of freezing rain storms occurring but we dodge them down here in Windsor. There has been some super cold days and some actually pretty nice days. All the snow is gone now and it is beautiful outside. We have been doing a lot of tracting this past week. We have found a lot of new people to teach and help come unto Christ. We tracted some of my first apartment buildings which was a different and scary experience. Usually all good rejection stories of missionaries come from tracting/proselyting in them. 

In our teaching pool we have Becky.  It has been cool to have found her my second week here and then be with her till now. She is awesome! She is preparing for baptism on January 12 and is planning her on baptism. She has given up coffee and smoking and is striving to keep the word of Wisdom! It is so cool to see the changes people make in their life through the Atonement. I have loved teaching Becky and I am excited to see her get baptized.

 Next is Matt. He is a Part member family. He has been investigating the church since 2004. He has lost some of his desire to know if what we share is true or not. But we are going to help him come to a knowledge of what we share. He is being a little stubborn because he is denying himself the blessing of an eternal family and marriage because of his lack of desire. It gets me going erg. haha He is a super nice guy though. 

Then we have a member in our ward Shawna, who referred us her Bro. We had a lesson with him this past week and he is super prepared. He is seeking for the greater truth and knowledge this gospel can bring and has agreed to be baptized! His only concern is his mom as he is under age. But we will pray for her heart to be softened. 

Then we have Manuel who we OYM into and he is super kind and is Arabic. He is Christian and has studied a lot of religion. He was super exciting to met with us! He is preparing for baptism too this transfer. He was so happy we did not believe in the trinity that he gave us 7 -up! haha 

Next we got another referral from a member in Leamington. So last night we went to go stop by and his name is Wayne. He was super surprised at how soon we came. He let us right in and we talked for awhile and we taught him about the saviors atonement and introduced the Book of Mormon. It was a power house spiritual lesson. We have had some awesome blessings of finding some super cool and nice people well opening our mouths on the streets and all. We have been blessed down here in Windsor North for sure! I am loving missionary work :) it is a blast! I encourage all to share the joy and blessing they have seen and had with all their friends! 

Well that is my week. It is short sweet and simple :). I will say this that some people are super nice in Windsor. But some people can be very rude. So my mission is testing my temperament and helping me develop greater Christ-like attributes. I would never trade my mission for anything. I love the people of Windsor! We are going to tear it up down here. Elder Hewitt and I have been growing on one another and sometimes I feel like I am slipping into a english accent haha. I will miss Elder Koceja but it has been swell! Well till next week! Merry Christmas! And a Happy New year! 

Love, 

Elder Sopal!

Week 13: Santa and silly in the snow

Well Merry Christmas to all! And to all a Good Afternoon. 

Well this week it has definitely gotten colder. There is snow that stuck on the ground from yestorday! It is so much fun ridding our bikes across the City in sub zero/ sub freezing temperatures. We bundled up to the nine yards yestorday to go out riding in the blizzard! I am not really saying I am excited for transfer but I am. I really do want to go into a car area! I do not care if it is in Windsor or not but a car would be awesome! This week is the last week before transfer calls this Sunday! This transfer has gone by so fast(six weeks). I feel like just yesteday it started! I feel like its been so long since I have been in Alberta! 

To start off this week we had P-day. We got hair cuts. Elder Koceja got his hair fixed because I made his hair look different haha I took 2 inches off the back whoops! So a wonderful Sister in the ward fixed it for him. Well we all got hair cuts I played with their super cute daughter and Elder Bullock joined in and we played tea party haha. After that we had to drive all the way up to London for Zone Conference in Guelph. We stayed in London with the Elders in London 3rd and Chinese Elders. It was awesome! We did not sleep one little bit! It was an aweful sleeping night! In the morning we went to Mcds and Elder T was ordering and almost ordered a cappuccino. We had to quickly stop him and correct him nicely! 

At Zone Conference President Scott, Sister Scott, and the assistants were there it was awesome!  The spirit there was very strong.  One funny thing was that at one point the asked a few missionaries to come up and bear their testimony of the savior.  When the called my name I was like what?... So luckily they only needed to be like 1-2minutes long.  I was so confused and nervous as I went up there! I really wanted to just bear a strong testimony. I thought it was alright. At least the Spirit was strong but i said nothing I wanted too! Next time I will kill it. I think I will be more prepared for next time! It was an awesome Zone Conference! I met three people from Alberta. An Elder from Cardston, Sterling, and Calgray. It was cool to met different missionaries and get to talk to some more people then just our district. 

Anyway it was good. At the zone conference for one of the Christmas presents we got was a temple recommend holder that has a picture of Christ in a field of wheat looking at Toronto.  It was done by Simon Dewy just for our mission (because his son is on a mission here) limited edition temple recommend holders, oh, ya. So that was pretty much our Tuesday and then we drove back for 3 and a half hours to Windsor! Oh ya in London they had huge snow banks! It is crazy how Windsor has no snow and London had soooo much. 

When we got back Wednesday Elder Koceja spent the whole day in our area and then Friday and Saturday he left to go to Chatham and Windsor West area. So I was in our area the whole weak by myself left to fend. Wednesday we had to fix my bike because an Elder broke my tube haha. So we did that and then went and dropped by a ton of people but no one would let us teach them! We went over to Bro. Ulriches for pizza! It was awesome and we got into some deep doctrine again! The quotes we got this week is, "Your future is as bright your faith." He also gave us a sheet of quotes to ponder and have! They are so deep! I will send one every week. So we went and tracted today and found a guy named Jeef who was super nice, He is about 35ish and is a PSW. He has a family and is struggling with his teenagers. He is a bible believing Christian. He is super interested about what our message is and wanted to know more about the Book of Mormon. It was cool experience meeting him! We have yet to met him but we will soon! 

Well we had one interesting Tracting expericence where a house full of college people decided to greet us. We explained who we were and they then mooned us. It was the weirdest/ crasizest experience ever! Elder Bullock and I laughed and walked away! We have so many crazy tracting stories! 

Come Thrusday we did weekly planning and enjoyed the lovely snowy cold weather outside! After we switched I was with Elder Tinney in my area! Everybody bombed us that day :( and the next day with Elder Bullock! So those two days were spent calling formers and tracting. It was pretty cold outside. 

Friday we helped a member move and moved his whole house in a hour and a half! It was one of the quickest moves we ever did. On friday with Elder Tinnie we taught Becky! Bro Hanna our acting Ward Mission leader came with us. It was an awesome lesson! Becky is a single mother for those of you who do not know. She works at a pizza place and is a PSW too! She loves her daughter and is super close with her. Her daughter Emma is well behaved sometimes but shows off for us whenever we come over. She has been coming to Church and the activities. We had a Ward Christmas Party and she came out to it and loved it! She made some new friends and loved meeting so nice people in her own words. She also joined right in helping clean up like she was apart of the ward! It was awesome to see her enjoying herself! Anyways back to our lesson she believes in God and Jesus Christ and loves the Atonement. She prayed asking about our message whether it was true or not. She asked us if she had to bring a question to church in her heart if she already received an answer! We were like what! She knows our message is true and is working towards baptism on Dec 29! She is loving the Book of Mormon and she is really changing her life around. It is amazing to feel the Spirit of her home now and feel the difference then from the beginning when we first went in. I love teaching Becky. So other then Becky we have had no one come out to church. It is hard getting people to commit to come out. We are striving everyday to try to invite more people but  agency is always getting in the way! Silly agency!  

Sunday we had fun at church and then after we went home and made Cookies. It was delicious! Elder Koceja and I are great cooks haha. Then we had to bike half way across town in a crazy blizzard and froze our butts off. But Bro. Ianni gave us a ride back home. It was a good night. Then we got to go to the Christmas Devotional. I love Christmas time. People just show more of the love! It was sad to not put up a  tree though but oh well. 

This week i have now memorized and can quote word for word, the Living Christ! I am so proud of myself. I encourage all to read it and ponder, this Christmas season, what you can give to Christ? 

Well I bide all farewell! Till next week! 

Love Elder Sopal! 

Christmas just isn't the same without a nativity scene.