Times and Seasons

To whom it may concern,

Effective Wednesday I'll be serving in Slave Lake. When President called yesterday he told me he was sending me to the Honey Pot of all Honey Pots. They have twelve investigators on date for baptism at the moment. Should be exiting! But no mountains.

Elder Jenson will be getting follow-up trained by the same guy who follow-up trained me back in Sherwood Park. None other than Elder Parker. There is a very slight chance that it is someone else but I doubt it. We didn't get along well. So I hope that this area continues to progress when I'm gone. We've really worked hard and the area is in better shape than when I found it.

We've been in very good contact with one of our investigators this week and she is planning to go to Alaska for a month. Her health has made it difficult to meet as often as we would like but She is really solid. She says she will be bringing her copy of the Book of Mormon with her! She thanked me so much this morning for helping her to explore the church and learn for herself about these truths. She sent us a Text on Monday to tell us that she has embraced the doctrine of pre-earth life as a beautiful part of her salvation! We are so happy with her progress and she has told us that she can see where this is leading her - meaning membership in the church. She just wants to make sure she knows everything first haha! I'll certainly be in touch with her.  

There is a girl in the ward who announced that she has received her mission call to the Philippines! So I've gone over to her house for supper two nights in-a-row and helped her to learn some of the language. Making good progress! 

Well, that's all I've got for today! Next email will be from Slave Lake! Have a good week!

love,

Elder Higginson 

 

Jaspa yo!

Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope you had a great St. Patty's day... because we really didn't do anything special up here. This week has been alright for missionary work but we definitely would say that Jasper was the Highlight. To kick it off we met a family with the name of Higginson this week! They're all Jehovah Witnesses haha. Very nice folks, we may be related by a common ancestor in England.

The church has begun with the new #Hallelujah initiative as of the 13th and it's becoming a wonderful finding and teaching tool! We are giving out the Cards for it all over the place, from Rocky Mountain House to Jasper! We have gotten such a positive response from almost everyone we talk to, even if they aren't really interested in taking the lessons. With the exception of the first guy we talked to about it. He said he'd knock me in the head if I didn't stop talking. Your loss gramps! Anyways we had a good week of lots of finding and this week we hope to do a fair bit of teaching! We think this is my last week here so we've been giving people a sense of urgency to meet with us this week. I think it's working. 

I went on exchanges last Wednesday with Elder Pollard. He's from Australia! we had a good time and went out to find people out in Nordegg. We ran into one of the leaders in the community who gave us a heads up about where most of the houses were across the highway. Also he'll keep us in the loop if there are community service opportunities out there. Might be useful for holidays in the future. At the end of the exchange we had a really good lesson with our recent convert about teaching and learning in the church. She has been teaching gospel principles and it's been a little rough but she's been getting better. We helped her to realize that she is teaching by the spirit. When we pointed some good experiences that had been had in her lessons we helped to build her confidence in herself and perhaps encourage her to put in more preparation in order to have better lessons. 

And of course, Jasper was awesome. We left Rocky a little after 8:00 and drove through a beautiful stretch of mountains to get to the main sites in the Park. The road we took  goes over the Alberta line so I've officially been to British Columbia haha. And the norther park boundaries of Banf. The McBride drove about 750 kilometers that day. These mountains make the Wasatch Front look like foot hills. The pictures I sent wont quite do it justice. Evidently it was Gay pride week in Jasper, hence the rainbow flags in the pictures. Not too many actual gay people that we saw though so thank goodness. We met a lady who was there for the festivities in a gift shop and we talked with her for a bit. We shared a #HALLELUJAH card with her and she said she'd watch it and was very positive. We checked out the Columbia Ice fields, Maligne canyon, Maligne lake and everything in between. The McBrides also fed us like kings. I felt ashamed to be a Higginson after the restaurants and after eating all the goodies. It's just what the members do for us up here. 

I hope you all have a fantastic week! Have fun in California and wherever you may be roaming!

Impossible  

Love, 

Elder Higginson 

The Work

Sorry I don't have any time to write this week! We don't have P-day this week because we are taking Saturday off to go to Jasper! I'll send a few picture to substitute for the lack of words haha.

 Have a great week everybody! 
 - Elder Higginson

  Encountered seven deer whilst tracting and contacting potentials.
Not an uncommon thing here. Also everyone has nice trucks up here.

 

 one of our less active friends who is deaf. Ran into him while
tracting and took some pictures.

 

Greeny is still pretty green. Just in time for st. Patrick's Day too.

                            Finally found our long lost Canadian relatives. They weren't home
                                                            but we'll try again.

 

 Some guy had a budist shrine. Claims that he's been budist since
before he was born.

Sut Rydych Chi?

Not a bad week in the Work folks! Some highlights would include learning the Welsh National Anthem (in Welsh), getting the cops called on us while doing service, Checking out a sweet gun shop and teaching a few good people! I'll elaborate.

There is a women in our ward, about 85 years old who is from Wales. She is such a tease and full of life and we all love her to pieces. She gives us Welsh cakes from time to time and I thought I'd ask her if she had ever been to the fortress of Harlech and she loaded me up with some Welsh Folk Music and more recently she has been giving me some really old books about the rudiments of the Welsh language, so I've been learning a little in my spare time haha! I can say a few words and I know the National anthem! There is a strange letter in the alphabet that has no similarities with any in English and is listed as "ll" you put your tongue on the back of your front teach and blow out a hissing noise. Evidently I wasn't very good at first because sister Stevens told me "I'm doing it better than you and even with false teeth!" We get such a kick out of her.

In other news we were helping out one of the members who is in Edmonton for most of the week with pooling water on her back porch. Things are starting to melt and she asked us to go and use her floor-vac to suck u the water so it doesn't flood into her house. So we go over to do it and we'd been going for about 20 minutes when we see a cop coming around the corner who started talking to us. I was like "really!? somebody saw us doing service and called the cops!?" Stuuupiiid. Then another cop came from the back and they basically surrounded us. Didn't escalate from there once we gave them all our information and the number of the lady who owns the house. Just some attentive neighbors who called it in. I hope my info doesn't go anywhere and prevent me from being allowed back into Canada after my mission. 

Our recent convert who got baptized a few weeks after I got here will be getting her patriarchal blessings soon! Things have been so good for her since she joined the Church back in December. She gave a great talk and she's been doing well to fulfill her calling as the assistant gospel principals teacher. She would kind of be dressed a little inappropriately in the early stages of her membership, but a couple weeks ago she walked into the chapel in a full length skirt and totally modest! The rest of her family hasn't joined the church but they support her. I think the Patriarchal blessing will do her a lot of good at this time in her life. And she is down to come out and teach with us! We were able to meet with one of our favorite investigators this week. She has been really busy all winter but things are slowing down and we have another appointment this Thursday with her! She has so many great friends in the church and evidently she told one of them after our visit that she has a great time with us and that she was excited to meet again this week! Our Filipino man on date is still doing well and we will hopefully be able to get in touch with his family this week. 

We were able to meet with our investigator who has cancer again on Friday and we taught the plan of Salvation. We figured she had a lot of questions from when she attended church. She has a Lutheran background so things about pre-mortal existence, and the sequence of the spirit world and judgement. She calmed down a lot as we shared some scriptures with her about it though. It really was a wonderful experience. as we shared scriptures she was saying "well I be darned, there it is right there in the bible." We are sending her reminders to read from the Book of Mormon each day and we are hoping she get's an answer! 

Well that pretty much sums up our crazy week! We are establishing the church in the tops of the mountains. And God will teach us his ways and we shall walk his paths. I hope you all have a great week! 

Love,

Elder Higginson

Let no man shirk!

We had another great week here in Rocky Mountain House!!! Lots of great people who are keeping there commitments! And we got to see President Manion and his Wife at Zone Conference which was nice. The Ward is really getting involved in the Work and I expect we'll have a lot of good things happen in my last few weeks here! 

For Zone Conference we were asked to study what we learned in the Worldwide training from the First presidency and come prepared to talk about it. I looked over my notes and called on my memory and received a little inspiration and what I should talk about in the meeting. The theme of the worldwide training was teach repentance and baptize converts. But I realized that what we ought to do and what the Lord wants us to do is prepare people to meet the requirements listed in Doctrine and Covenants 20:37. It's more than about just reviewing the missionary lessons they need to be taught in order to be baptized. It's about really getting them ready by helping them to repent and become humble before God and come forth with broken hearts and contrite spirits. It's about them having a desire to endure to the End. When we got to Zone Conference and were in the meeting, President Manion talked about the Doctrine and Covenants 20:37 and it really helped me realize that I was on the right page and that the things which I learned were communicated to me by the Holy Ghost.

We had interviews with President afterwards. There will only be one more after this before he and Sister Manion leave the mission. The two of us have become good friends and I really trust him. I cannot express in words how much I love and respect him and his wife. They've helped me through so much difficulty and I'll be forever in their debt. I told him to send me wherever next transfer and jokingly told him to put me in a Mandarin speaking assignment haha. I can handle just about anything at this point.

We were able to meet with all of our solid investigators this week! We did a split with the Tagalog Elders and taught Jess in a members home. Afterwards the Ward Mission Leader took him over to the Church and he was able to meet the Bishop and many others and check out the Chapel and Baptisimal Font. He really enjoyed that and he is really serious about getting baptized on the 26th of March. I thought I would have just left the area, but we will be having a seven week transfer due to extension of MTC time! An answer to a prayer that I have had for some time, If he is totally ready by that date. And he came to Church!!! After the services he said he just felt happy. He also told us he has 8 kids, ages 1-14, and a wife in Manila. He wants to bring them here and bring them into the church! We'll see if we cant get the family taught over there by some Elders. 

 We met with the Native family as well, and things are moving along! They have been reading the Book of Mormon as a family! There was a little concern when we invited them to be baptized, because they already have been, but I think if we can get them to come to church (when Hockey is done. My least favorite false God people worship up here) That concern will fade away. We have a member up here who is half Native and involved in Teaching People on one of the Reserves north of Rocky. She will be coming to our next lesson. 

We continue to find new people to teach and we are getting the members involved! Things will be changing in Ward Council and elsewhere and the members are increasing in excitement to do missionary work! I can indeed say that I will be leaving this place better than I found it. I hope you all have a wonderful week! 

Love, 

Elder Higginson