February 13, 2017 - Flying By!

So this week absolutely flew by. Just like everything on the mission though. overall our week was pretty focused on teaching Ronke and preparing her for baptism. We actually moved her date back a few days to the 21st instead of the 18th so that her husband can attend. She is still doing so well and is reading and praying everyday. Probably the biggest struggle right now is that we are not being able to find new investigators. We are doing the finding in its verb context but not much fruit has come yet. 

Tuesday was the day I emailed this week as mentioned last week because all of P-day was spent at Best Buy. (I am currently emailing on our new laptop though so it was so worth it. We also taught the Hamiltons and Ronke. Kyle Abbott came to that lesson. He is the best to have around because he leaves on a mission soon but is not working anymore so he has all the time in the world. Oh something i forgot to mention from this day is that it was the north zone Zone Conference. Since we went to the Zone Conferences in Saskatchewan we were asked by President to not come to the ones in Winnipeg so that we would actually Proselyte. He did however ask us to come for lunch so that we could see everyone. The food was so good! It was provided by one of the wards. Chicken with mushroom sauce, Pansit, Salad, And homemade Strawberry ice cream with Crem Brulet. 

Wednesday we went to the south Zone lunch during their Zone conference. Also amazing! That night we split with two members and I saw the Hamiltons and Elder Griffin went to see Peter Aidoghie. Also happy 19 months to Elder Griffin and I.

Thursday we had a lesson with Ronke, did a bunch of tracting and also had ward correlation. At ward correlation we got a bit reprimanded because I guess the members feel a disconnect with the missionaries. It is a super hard balance because a lot of members want the type of missionaries that will bake them cookies and play board games with them but that is just completely ineffective as far as our purpose as missionaries. This makes it difficult because we want to have god relations with the members but when the idea of good relations is different from the two parties that relationship becomes nearly impossible. We are working on it because members are key. For all who don't know (or for myself in the future) the perfect member is someone who will come to visits with you, give an occasional referral and feed you every other week. It is not necessary to try to entertain the missionaries. President Craig is really good at keeping our member relations appropriate. I have found that the members I have become the best friends with are those who are willing to help with missionary work, not those who just want to be friends and hang out.  

Friday was Brandon's Zone Conference but sadly we did not get to go there for lunch that day. We did some finding and taught the Hamiltons as well as had dinner at the Mcinnes'. They are the perfect members! They are coming to a lesson with Ronke on Wednesday! Having members at lessons is SO vital. That night we exchanged with the south zone leaders. 

Saturday I was with Elder Lee. It was so fun, he is serving with Elder Quinton and they are just a hilarious companionship. We did service helping a less active lady move. We also did a lot of finding, Taught Ronke and did some home teaching. It is genius how they have missionaries assigned to home teach now. We are assigned with a member as our companion. Ideally we would split with two members. Is that happening in Lethbridge? That night we just tracted forever. We met this guy who was like "I just got home from work, come back in 15 minutes and I would love to have you in". We went back but he was not there. It was pretty sad because we were Popsicles but it was a funny situation.\

Sunday we had church and Ronke came again! That is 3 out of 4 Sundays! She didn't come last week because here kids were sick. We had to catch up on some stuff and do some office work so our sunday was uneventful. 

This morning we played ball because now P-Day is 2 hours longer. It is super nice in the city but in Thompson that would just be 2 more hours to do nothing haha.

Love you all!

Elder Stewart

Elder Stewart and Kyle Abbott. Kyle is a member who went on lots of splits with the missionaries. He got his mission call to Portugual while Elder Stewart was in his ward. Kyle came to visit Lethbridge soon thereafter and we got to meet him before he left.