He said that there was a funny moment as every so often they would focus on an individual companionship. At one point they focused on a companionship where one of the missionaries was playing on his phone. His companion realised they were on screen and tried to get his companion off of his phone.
Elder East enjoyed the messages. He said that some of the things that stood out to him were:
- Sister Nielson spoke about the Jaredite barges in Ether 8 and that the wind was always blowing the barges forward. So it is with us, the Lord is always trying to move us forward.
- Elder Nielson quoted one of the other brethren that "We didn't come this far, to come this far."
- Elder Stevenson spoke about accompanying President Nelson in scouting future Temple sites.
He also enjoyed the Zone Conference beforehand. Several missionaries are called up to present talks that each missionary has preprepared. One of the missionaries that was called up to talk was told that it was because it was his last Zone Conference, which he hadn't realized. He's an Australian who will be able to make it home. Apparently, there's also a Samoan sister who is getting close to finishing her mission. Because Samoa and many of the other islands aren't allowing people back into their borders, there is a discussion about whether she can be released into the custody of family members of hers that live in Australia.
Their investigator who they committed to baptism still seems to be doing well. He was sick on Sunday and wasn't able to come to church or have his second discussion, but, not wanting to miss out on Church, did Zoom in to Sunday School. Their third discussion with him was due for Wednesday evening, but Elder East would be at the temple, so Elder De Guzman would be teaching him with another Elder.
They don't have any other investigators that are progressing very strongly. They had six lessons scheduled for the previous day, but they all fell through, although a couple were rescheduled.
There are now 11 missionaries in their district. There is a new companionship that was transferred in. One of the Elders that were in Elder East's MTC group is now in the district. He wasn't meant to be going to Adelaide but was going to Samoa, but has now ended up in the AAM. Elder East found out a bit more about Elder Lwin, the missionary from Myanmar who transferred in recently. Apparently, there are only two branches of the Church in all of Myanmar. He's a bit worried about home as Myanmar is only just experiencing its first wave of the Covid pandemic.
Whilst he was out in public, somebody complimented him on his Star Wars tie. Somebody else made the comment that the missionaries looked like they were The Blues Brothers. Elder East was disappointed to learn that none of the other missionaries knew who the Blues Brothers were.
He went on trade-offs on Friday & Saturday last week and got to go teaching with Elder Roberts. They visited somebody who had been investigating the Church for a while. Elder Roberts felt prompted to invite the person to be baptised, but they declined, saying that they were unwilling to change. The investigator decided that he wasn't going to continue on with the discussions, but ended up supplying a bunch of referrals and giving the Elders $50. They did try to explain that they can't accept money but he insisted. They're trying to work out what to do with the money - likely donate it to the Branch Welfare fund to assist those in need. Elder East said that he also got to speak with Elder Reeves during trade-offs which he enjoyed.
He's still enjoying Church at the branch even though it's small. The Gospel Doctrine teacher was actually a former Mission President over the AAM. Edler east mentioned that they were visited by a counselor in the Stake Presidency. He knew Seth's Uncle and Auntie (Jon & Glenda East) when he lived in Sydney and figured that Seth was probably related to them.
We had a lot of talk about Elder East's preparation for the Temple. He was being picked up to get to the temple by 5:30pm for a 6pm start. We went through some of the things we'd discussed in our temple preparation classes
Some dot points on other things we discussed:
- One Elder spent all two years of his mission in the Adelaide City branch.
- They haven't been good in keeping up their running for exercise.
- They're ending up with more spare time on their hands due to limited finding opportunities, few members to be able to work with, and having gone through their area book. The only finding they're allowed to do at the moment is follow up on previous investigators from the area book that they haven't been able to contact yet, and via referrals. The lack of members in the branch is pretty much limiting the second option.
- We talked a little about recent world news. The actor who played the Black Panther in the MCU died. Brisbane has been chosen to host the AFL Grand Final.
- Jewel explained her Creative Captain proposal that she'd made at school, as well as some news on "social influencers."
- Elder East isn't writing in his journal much but is keeping a copy of the emails that he's sending out.
We mentioned how we saw the movie Tenet, and it's still a long time away, but we could see him quite enjoying it after his mission. He admitted that with the spare time he'd been having that he'd started a list of date ideas for post-mission, and brought out a paper towel that had a list of ideas written down on it. He read through a couple and Jewel thought they sounded really good. Maybe so, but it's a long time 'til you have to worry about dating, Elder East.
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