What an amazing week!

April 11 2016

Hey there everyone this week was a great week for me and Elder Cottrell. I have really enjoyed serving here with elder Cottrell. And the best thing is this week was transfers and I am staying here in Sheffield with Elder Cottrell, and I couldn't be happier, I love serving with this kid, and I can’t wait to see what happens this next transfer, because for some reason this transfer is a 7 week transfer so I get extra-long with Elder Cottrell here. But let’s go into the week here shall we.

First things first we had a great miracle this past week. Now there is a lady named C......., now let me tell you a little bit about C........, she comes from a very hard core Catholic family and that has been her life for the longest time, she even worked in the Church as something that I don't quite remember. But what actually happened is because she worked there, she started to ask a lot of questions and the preacher guy couldn't answer the questions, and he couldn't back them up in the bible either, so she knew that she needed to find some answers. So because Heavenly Father is so great, of course some Mormon missionaries show up on her door, offering her some answers. She has been taught since December I think. She must have a lot of questions right!? Anyways she set her date for baptism to be May 28th! LIKE 5 MONTHS AWAY!!! Me and Elder Cottrell have been teaching her a ton, and she comes to church like every week, and she reads and she does everything, sometimes I think better than some members would do. Anyways we tried to convince her to move her baptism up, but she said no because of her husband, who is a Buddhist. Nevertheless! She texted us this past week and said, "Is it possible to move my baptism up a little bit!" We didn't hesitate at all, but we still knew that it would be far away! THEN............. "could I be baptized next Sunday!?" YYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYAAAAAAAAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYYYY!!!!! It was the greatest news ever. A Family is coming to the church! She has two kids, and they are both really young so they will be able to grow up into the church! But C.......... is getting baptized next week and I soooo beyond excited for her, because this is exactly what she needs in her life. Best news ever!! So this week will be busy planning out her baptism! So yeah there that's!

Now we are going to go into a little teaching moment here. so this past week we as missionaries have been in a lot of meetings, and a lot of this meetings have been all about home teaching, along with visiting teaching and their importance. All of you back home in Utah-  if you think that home teaching or visiting teaching is hard, you remember this as you walk to your families home to teach, down the road. These members here have an average number of 5 families to visit each month. Not only that, but their ward boundaries alone are about the same size as 3 stakes over in Utah! It’s massive! So next time you think about complaining about having to walk down the street to talk to your neighbors think again okay.  Count your blessings and know that with those assignments you are bringing people closer to Christ and that's what matters, it’s not about you, it’s about them. Sorry I don't want this to be a cranking session here, but it kinda is! Do you home/visiting teaching with a smile on, and with the desire to help people come unto Christ.

my awesome flatmates! 

The last thing that I want to talk about here is the great amazing Elder Holland's talk in Conference. I had to go download his talk because you can’t read elder Holland's talk you need to watch it. What an amazing talk to end Conference! So funny first off, but also the message that he has shared with us. We need not fear tomorrow, because tomorrow will bring us more opportunities to become closer to Christ, and to feel of the spirit! What an amazing talk that was given. I still haven't read all of conference yet, but I am so excited to, and I know that it is such an amazing opportunity to have prophets and apostles here on the earth today!!  I love being a missionary, I love having a prophet on the earth today, may we all sustain him everyday, by our actions, and show our Heavenly Father our gratefulness for what we will do tomorrow. Because "for tomorrow, the lord will work wonders among you!!"

Love you All!!

Elder Hanks

                              Typical English person walking 5 dogs!                                    

My new UT companion!

So as you all know this week was the sad departure of my previous companion elder Chen. And well,  I will be quite honest with all of you, that little chinese Elder became my new best friend, he was the older,  but smaller chinese brother I never thought I wanted ! haha! He was the greatest companion that I will ever have on my mission I am sure of it and I loved every single day I had with him. But now I am on to a new chapter on the mission. My new Companions name is Elder Von Cannon. Yes elder Von Cannon is from Clearfield, Utah,  like 10 minutes away from my house!  He is a very interesting kid and has a lot of things he likes to do. He is very very very very smart -  his favorite thing to do back at home was read Wikipedia for fun, he doesn't like sports and doesn't have much love for my sarcasm. But hey we are working through it! He is a great kid, and a good missionary, you can tell he really loves the gospel. He is a shy kid thats for sure, and we dont have much to talk about but thats okay, because I just sing songs, and quote movies and he just looks at me ! But hey its good, now I get to learn from him. I guess my training ended early for me, because well my trainer left, and elder Von Cannon has never trained before and didn't know what to do, so we just joke around and say that president forgot I was a new missionary!! 

But this week had some challenges and some good things too. The bad things first-  with it being christmas time there seems to be a lack of chinese people around here. Normally we go to the university area to find our chinese friends, well,  now with the university on Christmas break, we don't know where to find them, they seemed to disappear! Ether they all went back to china or they are staying in the flats trying to avoid the cold. So we havent found any chinese people yet, but thats okay because we know they are here somewhere ! -  we just got to go find them. It's like the biggest game of hide and go seek! But its all good, because when you do the lords work, he provides a way so I know he will take care of us.

Ward Talent / Christmas party

Some good things that happened this week. Our ward had a christmas party and that was really good, we got 3 investigators to come out to it and they had fun (I believe)  so that was really good! And they did a talent show so that was fun, some people do some interesting things here in england but I thought it was very fun and entertaining!  The next thing is well,  the ward here is so incredibly nice to the missionaries, we have so many tea appointments this month, that I think we don't even need to buy food this month, but along with that, we have been receiving a whole bunch of gifts from people in the ward and that has been so so nice! So missionaries here are well taken care of!  Thank so you much members of York! You are awesome! 

And then the last good thing and the best thing is, hopefully this week we will be having a BAPTISM!!!!!!! His name is A......., he is a business chinese student and we have been teaching him for some time now, and well he looks set up to be baptized this Saturday!! SO hopefully this will occur and I am soooo incredibly excited, he has his interview tonight and i know he will pass, so its looking good for us!! If so this will be my very first baptism!!!!! And not only that but his name is the same someone in my family -  sooo how cool is that !!

going on my first legit English train!

me and my Finnish friend that got transferred,  elder Mikkola! 

Anyways this week has been full of ups and downs, but thats okay because thats the life of a missionary!! 

I love you all, and the Church is true!!

The more you study the more you realize how amazing it is!!

Love Elder Hanks