Week 51

We had a wonderful week, as always. It was a week, however, full of meetings, and not too much proselyting. On Tuesday, we had district meeting, and the Assistants bussed in to do exchanges with us in the late evening. However, we realized that night, that we would have to leave the next day at 5:30ish to get to Singapore at a reasonable hour (we went a day early for Elder Fabiano to get a bump in his knee checked out), so our exchange was pretty short. However, we did get some good possibilities for malls to do family history booths at. Thursday was our first MLC, or Mission Leadership Conference. It is a long meeting that together with Pre-MLC, goes from 3-9:30 with only one short break (30 minutes). Miracle of the week: I stayed awake the whole time! It was a very spiritually uplifting meeting, with the mission president guiding discussions on how to improve the mission. One theme of this month's conference was how we can get investigators progressing. Another particularly inspiring point was "the miracle model", showing how in the Lord's work, we don't need to rely solely on our own skills, but on the Lord, who can and will preform miracles through us. On Friday, we got an x-ray for Elder Fabiano (nothing to fear), and we went back to Johor Bahru just minutes before President Mains and his wife did interviews and a housing check. One on one time with the mission president is always uplifting and valuable. He's an incredible man, with an incredibly busy schedule. It's crazy he knows so much about each missionary. After that, we had more meetings, with English class (about a dozen new students suddenly) and our weekly correlation meeting. The weekend was the same, with weekly planning, and three two hour sessions of district conference. The theme of it all was Hastening the Work of Salvation, and I feel very motivated to work with members. I remember feeling that I had few opportunities to share the gospel back in Utah, but I'm determined to come back and be a great member missionary. I'd encourage you all to heed Elder Ballard's counsel on sharing the gospel, even if it is just once a quarter. This week looks to be less full of meetings and more full of preaching. I'm excited. We also get to do another zone training tomorrow, which is a fun experience. We will be talking about consecrating ourselves and "going the extra mile". There's always a little more that each of us can do to follow our Savior. There's something more that we can offer to him. I know that the Lord is watching out for each of us, and that if we decide we would rather rely on his infinite power and wisdom than our own limited abilities, we will be blessed so much. I hope you all have an amazing week! Love, Elder Earl