Thanksgiving is Good

I love you all so much! I miss you a ton, especially since it is the holiday season! But I know I need to be here! There have been moments where the spirit has told me so. And as much as I would love to be home with family and friends, someone, somewhere is praying for me, not just for the missionaries but praying for me. It is just a matter of finding them, that’s the tough part! But I am searching, no worries! So I ran into someone who knows Jordan, small world. His name is Ben Walters, he served in the Spain Bilbao Mission in 01 but went back to spain for school and lived in San Tan Der (Santander) I guess and he remembers Jordan and how he would receive his emails. I thought that was cool Man I love Australia! Australia is so diverse! You have no idea! I will explain later.

Answers:

1. My Preparation Day ( President Scruggs does not like abbreviations so we have to call it preparation day, district leader and so on and so forth) is on Monday last week was unique because we went to the Temple. Expect the letter on Monday, Your Sunday.
2. My companion is a life long member, oldest of four boys and one girl, has a brother going to Brazil on his mission I forget which one, and he has been out 20 months. We have nothing in common but I love him the same.
3. We meet in the Baulkham Hills Chapel along with two other wards, I forget which ones. And it is super diverse.
4. I have an hour to email you I can receive from immediate family, grandparents and other missionaries.
5. They feed us heaps here so it is good. I had curry the other day that was neat.
6. Received the Thanksgiving package my first day here, sorry I didn’t mention it. They do have peanut butter here and they have raisin bran here as well it is called sultana bran. But I loved the package mom. I made stuffing yesterday. It was easy I don’t know why you women complain about making a thanksgiving dinner! Just kidding I love you mom.


Jordan Zach Dalton and Caleb I love you all and would love to hear from you! I will be sending a package with some souvenirs! You will love it. It might be after Christmas but you will enjoy! So yeah hope that helps I love you all so much!

Keyora! That is hello in Moary (Maori). I love you all and miss you but Australia rocks! It has not been the most progressing week but still it was good. We are pretty much sifting through the wheat and the tares. We had to drop a few more investigators which was sad but hey it happens. We have not dropped Telly or Chloe. Telly will call us he said but we will see. He sounded interested but he wants his wife to be there and she sounds like she is not interested so we will see what happens. We are still waiting on Chloe and her family so right now is a waiting game. Teatawhie and Teremedia are so close to baptism but we are still waiting for the green light from their mom for baptism! Oh man they are so close! That is pretty much all that is going down with the work. We tract heaps and street contact but it is good because I am getting more and more comfortable with it! I love talking to people about the church!

So I hope you all have had a great Thanksgiving! I was very sad to miss it this year but we had a tender mercy this past week. On Monday Elder Vernon and I were about to leave when we received a text message. It was from President Scruggs and he invited us over for a Thanksgiving lunch featuring Pumpkin Pie! Holy Moly it was good. We live really close to the President's house so we were lucky enough to be invited it was amazing and it made my day! Just one of the many tender mercies of the Lord.

So I went on my first exchange this past week. I went to an area called Glennwood and it was with Elder Bybee. He is from Santa Clara, Utah and I love him. I would consider him my best friend on my mission (no worries Seth, Kevin, Mitch and G’s). But I loved the Exchange. He and I were constantly laughing and talking , of course we were still working but I had a blast tracting and getting doors slammed in my face. He made it enjoyable and he works flipping hard. I ran into my first Jehovah Witness with him so that was fun. We were talking and then all of a sudden he took a stab at us, not with a knife but with words, and immediately the spirit left. Bible bashing is no good, even though we would have smashed him, but that is not the point Bible bashing is no good! But overall the exchange went well and I learned a ton. It really fueled my fire to be out here and I just love being here!

So there is this prophesy flying around that all the missionaries and members are talking about. I guess Henry B. Eyring said that in the year 2010 that the church is going to explode, in a good way, in Australia. There are three things that will happen.

1.Missionaries will do priesthood ordinances everyday
2.We will have to schedule appointments weeks and sometimes months in advance
3.And there will be a change in the members hearts where they want to help the missionaries

I don’t know how true it is but I would not mind it happening! Plus I would be here for the bulk of it so that will be cool. Australia could be the next Brazil. Now that would be cool.

Some cool things about Australia:

• It is so diverse! I have met people from every continent a few times over. Samoa, Tonga, New Zealand, China, Korea, France, Germany, India, Sri Lanka, Russia, Estonia, Canada, The States, Sudan, Congo, Iraq, Iran, South Africa, Argentina. Chile, and Colombia just to name a few. It is so cool! I actually taught a Persian the first lesson on a street corner. The ward is also very diverse. In Correlation meeting there was one from India, Micronesia, Australia, Argentina, France, Germany and then the states. It is so awesome!
• Some funny words Heaps- A lot, Tip- Dump, Too Easy- Sounds good, and my favorite Fair dinkum- Legit. That is just to name a few.

Well I love you all and am excited to be here and I cant wait to be able to tell you all my crazy stories in 22.5 months. Haha! God Bless and you are all in my prayers!

Elder Landon Raphael Brough