Wednesday 31 July 2013

One Direction in Australia?!? :))


Finally caught up to date!!

This is his last week email to me:) Im finally caught up on this blog! I promise all the future post will be way better and I will put more time into them! And maybe put some pictures up too! I hope you all are enjoying hearing about his experiences this far! I know he loves it down there, and I know this is where he is suppose to be. He loves all of you and only wants the best for you! From here on out,  I will post weekly unless something cool happens like new pictures or a cool letter or something else! Thanks everyone!
July 28 2013:
Hey Amery,
I can at least get back to you now, I just had to email the mission president and also I emailed back home, and they all seem to be doing really well :) My week to start was great, on Thursday I had one of the best days on my mission so far, and I was able to teach lesson after lesson after lesson, rushing around from appointment tot appointment, one of our investigators really progressed and that was Clinton, he has been studying witht the Jehovah Witnesses for over a year, but since meeting with us, he loves the message we are sharing we have taught him 3 lessons and last lesson went super well, he said he would deff be baptized 100% when he finds out what we are teaching is ture, he has so much faith and has really been thinking about Baptism, each lesson i have committed him to be baptized and he wants to be he just needs to get his answer, but it was a great experience i could see the change in his face as i testified his face lit up :) We got another baptism date for the 25th of August with our investigators however we got a text from her saying she wanted to continue learning, but we are not given up and are going to see her tomorrow and hopefully work with her to help progress her towards baptism and help her take that leap of faith. And are other investigator with the baptismal date of the 25th of August, we are trying to see a few times this week. The work here is going really well though and the members have been of great help to us. We went to our ward activitiy on Saturday night and it was lip sync so members signing to songs, they played One Direction 'That's what makes you Beautiful' Also after that played Justin Bieber 'One Time' I heard about the new one Direction song yesterday at church haahah :) some one told me about it because I'm from England :P I wonder if it really is the best song ever ;) It has a lot to live up to :P I will just have to wait a while to hear it :P Also i saw my first Kangaroo the other day ;) I will have to show you the picture. :) I hope you have a great rest of your week :) Love, Sam xxx

Almost got killed.... But dont worry! The Lord is looking out for his missionaries:)

He had a few shorter emails for a few weeks so I just combined them into this one post, hope you all like it! July 15 & July 23rd:
Spokane is definitely a lot warmer the Brisbane at the moment for sure! The weather here on the Gold Coast is so on and off at the moment one day it will be warm, but not that hot like today, then the next day will be pouring down! It gets really cold here, i have 3 blankets on my bed and I still wake up freezing some mornings!!!! Some other crazy things happened this week, This guy threatened to kill us and shot us and run us over, he was going so crazy, it was scary we had to hide behind this wall and said a quick prayer it was an intense moment!!!! but obviously all is well hahaha!!!!!!! So serving with my companion is going well :) every week we having a bit more succeeds then the last, we had to drop out baptismal date, as it is all happening to fast for her, however that same night I asked our investigator Alana who is 60 to be baptized and she said Yes :) So at the moment we are preparing her for baptism on the 18th of August :) I had another cool experience this week and on the last door we knocked on this 70yr old woman from Austria came out and said she wants to come to our church and she is coming this Sunday and i started telling her and testifying to her about the Book of Mormon and how i know it to be true and she was like that makes so much sense, i know it is true :) It was awesome!!!!! and just now on the Train back from Brisbane to the Gold Coast there were 20 of us missionaries in the group traveling and she came up to us and started crying, she is 18 and less active and has not been to church for a while, after she spoke with us, she rang someone up to arrange a ride for her to get to church this coming Sunday, so that was awesome, just to see how much of a desire that she had to want to come back to church and how she approached us, getting a person back to church and active again, is definitely just as important as bringing someone into the church!

email from his companion Elder Carswell!

July 7th 2013:
I got an email from his companion that week! It was so sweet of him, and I want to share it with you guys!
Hey Amery
It's Elder King's companion here. Just writing to tell you how things are going. Elder King suggested that i should write to you and tell you a bit about what's happening. When seeing Elder King for the first time at Brisbane at the mission home, i was excited as he seemed super cool and funny.
 We have had the best time over the last 6 weeks together. he is an amazing missionary with an incredible story. I know he has touched the lives of many on his mission and he can relate to people that a lot of missionaries would struggle to. He is really funny and great to be around, however at the same time he takes the work very seriously and i commented to him that i had never seen a new missionary so dedicated and apt to the work as he is. He seems to talk about you a lot so i know that you are really special to him. I can tell that he misses you a lot. The ward loves Elder King and they are captivated by his personality not to mention his Englsih accent ahaha. He has shared his story with a number of members in the ward and i can really see the respect that they have for him. For myself i have loved being with him, his story definitely inspired me and when he told me it on the way back from the mission home in the car, i was in amazement. He has truly sacrificed a lot to be out here and i really admire his dedication. I think that the word 'passion' most accurately describes his missionary work. When we go out and knock on doors/teach investigators he does it with a passion and a real sound resolve. I just wanted to let you know that he is doing great on his mission and that he is safe here in Australia. He loves the people here and he gets along with anyone ! It's crazy, i look up to him
I hope all is well
Elder Carswell

A lot to say this week!

June 30th 2013:
So this week!!! Has been great! Every week here has been getting better and better and it will be the same with this week! So We have met some really cool people this week and we were cycling by and this women stopped us on the street she was mid 20's and told us to come by sometime, so a few days later we went back to find her, we end up not finding her, so we are walking back and i say we need to try there and my companion was like if you think we should we will and we went to this random door and we knocked on it and this women in her 60's came out she used to be on channel 9 weather and and big show in America, something like 'Hey, hey it's Saturday' and she was a model champion 3 years in a row i can't remember the years though! so seemed pretty interesting and she nearly started crying as when she saw us she was like you have made my day you have made my day over and over, like she was expecting us and she could barely talk she was so happy! We felt amazing, she knew she felt the spirit strong and so did we! We have not had a chance to teach her yet but I'm going to set a baptismal date straight up, I already have asked 2 other people this week to be baptized, they are just praying about the book of Mormon and we will see what we can do :) Hopefully all will go well, I know it will just have to have faith, something i have been trying to work on a lot more lately! Then we tracked in a guy named Vince just over a week ago, he is solid, unfortunately a family member passed away and he has gone away for a month but he will phone us when he comes back :) We are also working with a guy called Tony, he is just the nicest guy! Gave me a raincoat when it was pouring down, by the way it has been so cold here and we have had non stop torrential rain, but cycling in it was fun and i got a potential we are seeing tomorrow called Wendy who must be in her 60's i just went hard at the door was bold asked her some straight up questions and she was excited for us to come back! I also went on Trade offs this week and i went out with the Zone Leader which was great and we had a good, day, got a few more potentials and all we will see!!! Then the other day we were door knocking and i walked in the gate and my companion was waiting at the gate, i checked around the corner and all was clear and then i hear this growling and this huge dogs starts chasing me i just bolt it and get out of there fast, i literally just made it! Then later we decided to go back, i know stupid right, i go in again and this time it comes back, and i get out of there just in the last sec, it was even closer then the first time! but then that alerted then owner who came out and we got a potential out of it so we will see her in the next week or so! She has a family :) I'm going to commit Tony to baptism this week I think Wednesday :) Then Saturday we has a dessert eating competition, that was awesome  :)  and yesterday I gave a talk in church about Missionary work which i loved :) It went really well this is my second talk in 3 weeks ;) I Actually want to do another :) Then after church yesterday We had dinner with a family, then I watched the Broadcast :) I loved it I can't tell you how much i have already learned here!!!! My scripture knowledge has increased like crazy already and I'm remembering many scriptures of by heart and it's all just going well! Later tonight we are teaching this girl and she came church yesterday as they guy she was with invited her, she started asking him a lot of questions so her brought her along to church yesterday, she got to see me talk yesterday which was good, his family have invited us for dinner tonight to teach her, they are 16, so after this email we are going to play basketball and meet Locke and see what we can do to help he come into the church, if all goes well we are setting a baptism date straight up, for 4th of August!

First few days in Brisbane Australia!

Missionaries have transfers every 6 weeks, this means they can move areas or stay in the same area. For Sam's very first transfer he got sent to Gold Coast. It looks so beautiful there. I am so jealous! Also on Mondays are his P-days (preparation days) this is the day they can email, go shopping, play sports/games. get things they need to get done, and wear normal clothes! So I look forward to Mondays(Sundays for me) to hear from him:) Here are a few things he said just a few days after he arrived in Australia! 
June 16th 2013:
 Church for me was not bad at all the new ward is awesome :) and all is going well here on the Gold Coast :) Opening an area is interesting as there are not really a lot of members in are section so we are doing a lot of finding :) Some of the rejections we get are so crazy one guy came up to us and screamed at us 'Hail Satan' :p So weird. The people here though really friendly though :) Like just great people and I have only mainly met people from New Zealand and on the Gold Coast at least 60-70% of the popluation is from New Zealand :) I stopped this person on the street to talk to them as we do with every one she was around 20-25 from Brazil and was in Australia to learn more English i was telling her about our church and church attendance she said she is going to start coming to our church in surfers Paradise, not my area though, but still she is going to becoming to church and will hopefully end up getting baptized. We got all the details and passed them on :) So I'm going up to Brisbane again on Friday for some more missionary training! I'm going to a place called Karawatha. The Karwathta chapel is only a year old :) It is so nice you should check it out and you need to have a look at my chapel in Mudgeerba the Gold Coast Stake Center :) Also another place i cycled over is called Lake Orr. I have been working hard the last week and this week I'm going to work so hard as hard as i can! I love doing the work and I love the people! So i not noticed in the Old testament that the book of Samuel is right next to the book of 'Kings' so it is quite fitting that my name is Samuel King ;)

At the MTC!

For those of you who don't know, the MTC stands for Missionary Training Center. There are a few all over the world, but the main one is in Provo Utah. This is the one Sam went to. The spend a number of weeks, 3ish if they are speaking English language, and about 6 if they are learning a foreign language, in the MTC. Here they learn about the language/ and culture they will serve in, but most importantly about what and how they will teach the people of where they are going. They spend all day every day learning. They grow so much as a person here and also have a great time! I have only heard great things about the MTC. Elder King entered the MTC on May 20th 2013. There are over 50,000 missionaries currently in the MTC so they dont get a whole lot of email time because they are all fighting for it. I know he really loves the MTC because he wrote me a few letters just telling me how much fun he is having and how much he is growing as a person and in the gospel. Here are some things he wrote to me on his first email:
May 29th 2013
 So Amery, i just wanted to also say that yesterday was just incredible as i taught a guy from Chile for 45 minutes and went over the whole restoration nearly started cried it meant so much to me and i never want to cry as i try to hold it in all the time, like when i said goodbye to you!
So I can't wait to teach him again, we ended up hugging it out, it was a great experience and also yesterday in my district so classroom, everyone was pouring out there emotions about everything and then after i was able to give my first ever blessing to this sister as she asked me for one and it was for comfort and peace as there is something bad happened to her best friends mum!, that gave me more of a testimony of the power of the priesthood, if you ever need a blessing sometime for anything I'm your man ;) ! There are only 2 English people in the MTC and I'm one of them :D I'm the only international person in the whole of the MTC going to Australia Brisbane how awesome is that :D By the way i love being a missionary, but it is hard work i do 16 hour days in the classroom! but it is so worth it!!!! 

A little bit about me...

So I'm sure you are all wondering who I am. Well first, I am new to this whole blog thing so forgive me now! I live in Spokane, Washington and I am attending BYU- Idaho in September. I have grown up in the LDS church my whole life, and it has really blessed me. I have 5 brothers(4 younger, one older) and I am the only girl. My dad likes to call me the "Rose among the thorns".  I met Sam last August at EFY in Provo Utah. It honestly was the best week of my life and I will never be grateful enough to have met the friends that I have met, especially Sam. He has inspired me so much with his stores and personality. Ever since last August I'm pretty sure me and Sam have skyped every week, and getting closer to his mission, every day! One time we did an 8 hour skype session! which was pretty amazing because of the 8 hour time difference! I can honestly say he is my best friend, and I have never had a friend as good as him, even though he lives so far away. I cant wait till he gets to BYU-Idaho, but I know he is where he is suppose to be right now. I am really excited to do this blog for him and I hope many people read this and get inspired as much as I do! I also hope this will make the next two years go a little bit faster:) Thanks everyone! You can ask me anything you want. comment or add me on Facebook! Id love to meet all of Sams friends! 

Monday 29 July 2013

Welcome!

Hey everyone! My name is Amery Abel and I am going to blog for Elder King while he is in Australia. A few people have asked for a blog, so I asked him if  I could do one, and of course he said yes! Elder King is truly my best friend and I know he is doing the Lords work in Brisbane Australia! I know this is a little late so I will post some things about the past few months he has been out, then post weekly from the emails I get. I hope everyone enjoys this blog, and I am really excited to do this the next 2 years!
Love you all, Amery