50th celebratio​n

Hello eveyone,

 

This week we had our 50th celebration of Stockport chapel. The church was built 50 years ago, so we had a giant fireside and black tie event Saturday and Sunday nights. We went through our area book and called everyone in there and invited them to it. Some said it would be okay if we stopped by and dropped off a flier about the church and the celebrations. One of them was named Krazy Horse. His grandfather immigrated from Arizona to England. Krazy Horse is about 60 and has long white hair and looks like a Native American. It was really fasinating to get to know him alittle bit. He is a song writer and music player. So he thought it would be a great idea to come to the chapel and hear the music at the fireside. and he did come! It was great. Some missionaries, much more talented than me, sang. Also the young woman sang the youth song for 2014, Come Unto Christ. It is a really nice song.

We went to see our investigator Jason at his work this week. He works as a bike mechanic and we went to his shop. His business partner Biff was there and asked us a bunch of questions. Jason started to testify to Biff of all the stuff we were talking about. So Jason is retaining all that we teach him. We invited them to come to the 50th with us. Biff was happy and very interested in coming.

This week in church, we had two new elders there. One is brand new from Spain, and the other is Elder Evans from Brigham City Utah. They both are reallyl hard workers. Also Elder Maljanen gave his departing testimony. He left and I am staying. My new companion is Elder Sargent from Morgan Utah. He is great. Prisca was also asked to give her testimony as well. She has such a strong testimony already. She has only been a member for a month, but already undersands it well. In fact, she got a calling to be Relief Society Secretary! She bore such a powerful testimony of the Saviour and how through hard times, she was led to the church. And even though she is now a member, Satan is trying harder than ever to stray her away. It was wonderful to hear her testimony:)

We got a call from a member on Saturday saying they had a man walking into the church. So we rushed over to see the man. It was someone we had met on the street 2 months earlier. He always walks past the building, and wanted to come in and see. So when we got there, he was already taught about the restoration, plan of salvation, and given a Book of Mormon. It was great how much the members want to share the gosple.

It's hard to believe a year ago I received my mission call. It was last Friday the 21st! It is a day I will never forget and I can remember my feelings very well. I was so excited, yet nervous, it was something I had been waiting for a long time. Yet I didn't think it would come up this quickly. In 1 year I have changed so much! I have a much stronger testimony and understanding of my Saviour and redemeer Christ.

I love you all have a great week!

 

Love Elder Hammond

21714

Hello Everyone!

 

This week we taugt Chris Martin about the Restoration of the Priesthood. He is preparing to receive the Melkezidic, I can't spell, Priesthood. He is really going well. He is super good, he was taking notes as we taught him. And to be honest, I learned alot as well. His wife Kim, got her patrichel blessing yesterday. Kim has been super excited about it for awhile. And now she has that revelation from God about her life. It made me think about my patriachel blessing, and do I treasure it up as much as she has? I looked at mine again.

Tuesday we got a special training from our zone leaders. We are the only stake in the mission that got this training on family history. We learned how to find a family name in only 5 minutes. It is super easy it's only like 4 steps, then you found your great grandpa, or someone. So I tried it, I looked up my grandpa's dad, my great grandpa Schmitt. It didn't take more than 5 mintues to find him. family history is so easy!

That night, we went to our investigator Kyle's home. He invited us over for tea. As he was fixing it, we got a chance to talk with his partner and kids. They are 3 and 5 and have lots of energy:) The partner was telling us how she thinks it would be a good thing if her and Kyle got married. It would bring more structure to the home. So we explained about the Law of chasity, and they both were okay with it. They said if that's what I need to do to get baptised! Kyle has such a strong desire to get baptised! Now his partner is taking the discussions as well:) what a miracle.

To follow along with the theme of marriage, this week we were able to help in a marriage. There was a young lady, about 20's that got married on Wednesday. The wedding was suppose to start at 3, but she showed up a bit late. I bet the groom was getting a bit nervous ;) The wedding was super nice. It was small and they both were very happy with how it went. We helped  out on what they called the love treee. It was an idea Penny got off of pinterest. You put your thumb print on the tree and help it blossom.

Carrying along with that theme. Since Friday was Valentine's day, we decided to go finding with Law of Chastity pamphlets. It worked. We stopped this lady and asked her about families. She was a school teacher and had wondered about Mormons. She knew that Brandon Flowers, lead singer of the Killers, was a mormon. So we gave her a mormon. org card and challenged her to look it up. We also told her about some of the olympians that are mormons. She seemed very interested,

I got this brillent idea Thursday to make potato casserole. I followed the recipe exactly, but it didn't turn out anywhere close to what I am use to. My companion thought I was insane making something called potato casserole. He said it must be a typical Idaho thing;) I just laughed. Because I love it. Next Sunday we are celebrating the chapel being in Stockport 50 years! It will be a great opportunity for missionary work.

 

I love you all!

 

Love Elder Hammond

2/10/14

Hello Everyone!

Sorry I didn't email last week. I had some things going on. But I am back this week with exciting news! One of the people I was working with in Wrexham was baptised! He is called Bewick Butler:) I wasn't able to attend his baptism, but I heard that it went really well. Now his mom Naomi needs to get baptised ;)

So we are working with this lady that was taught by an Elder from Ashton. He is called Tyler Harringfeld. If anyone has his email, it would be really nice to get incontact with him:) She asks about him almost every week.

We have this miracle! The YSA missionaries taught this girl named Beth. They found out she is 17, so they refurred her to us to teach. She is so amazing:) In our lesson we taught about the plan of salvation, or God's plan of Happiness. We were able to have a really spiritual lesson. Then at the end we invited her to be baptised. She said when she prays and receives an answer she will be baptised:) How amazing is that!!

I heard that President Monson is being summoned over to the UK!? Does anyone know anything about that?

We taught a lesson to this less active sister. We watched the new mormon message the prodigals son with her. She really enjoyed it. and told us she wanted to come to church. She said she needs the blessings from taking the sacrament.

We also taught Jayden Martin. He is so good. He is a recent convert Kim and Chris's son. We talked about the Gosple of Jesus Christ. And he started going over the 4th article of faith! Jayden is great. He invited us to his football match tommow. and we should be going to that.

We had tea with this member sister brown. We did a role play with her to help her feel comfortable inviting a friend to our big 50th celebreation. The chapel in Stockport was built 50 years ago. On Sunday she came up to us and told us how it went. She said she had a nice gosple converstion with the girl and would give them a lift if they needed it. The members really are great in Stockport.

Kyle the man that came to church last week came again this week:) Kyle is amazing. We have taught him 3 times and he really has a strong desire to be baptised. We talked about the Plan of Salvation with him. He was like yeah I can understand that we lived with God before this life. Then in Elder's quoram yesterday, our lesson was on the Plan of Salvation. And he was answering all the questions. It was so good to see his excitement about the gosple. His 5 year old daughter wants to come to church as well :)

Prisca and Precious are doing really well. Pricsa is finding that peace she is looking for. We taught her on Friday, she asked if we could continue to teach her about the gosple. Then on Saturday she and her kids came and helped at the ward clean up party. We got the building looking really nice for the 50th.

Love You all,

Love Elder Hammond

We had hot dog stuffed crust pizza this week... It's weird

Elder Okey and I wearing the same tie :)