Letter #67 from Australia

October 30, 2016

Dear Family & Friends,

          This week started off pretty slow cause Elder Wilson was really sick. He got the flu and it isn't just the common, quick passing flu. It is a long lasting and hard-hitting one. So our days on Tuesday and Wednesday consisted of us staying home for the majority of the day. It was all right at first, but got really boring fast. I spent most of the free time by studying the scriptures some more, writing letters to family and loved ones, and taking naps. Haha. I am glad that it is over though cause it wasn't fun at all. He is doing better though and we were off to the work as soon as he was up to par. Thursday we had a huge miracle happen and it was amazing! Although we had a couple of days that we were out of commission, the days that we did spend out and about working hard, we were blessed with a lot of miracles!

          On Thursday we taught Moni, who is one of our investigators from Nepal. Teaching him is very hard and interesting because of the language barrier. The only Nepalese materials that we have are the pamphlets for the first 2 lessons and that is it. Not even The Book of Mormon is Nepalese. So it is tough to say the least. How we teach him is by short English phrases about the lesson that we are teaching. He usually understands those pretty well, but to make sure, we use a translator on his IPhone. After teaching him that sentence and the doctrine that is in it, we type the English sentence in his translator and it translates it into Nepalese. It works out really well and he loves learning about the Church. Well the miracle was, while we were teaching him, his wife came home and she sat down and wanted to learn too. We taught them both about the Plan of Salvation and then invited them both to be baptized. They said yes and agreed to be baptized on December 3! (Not a bad day if I do say so myself;)) But the only problem is them coming to church. So that date might have to be moved back a little bit, but we will have to see how it all plays out!:) 

          We were able to catch up with one of the part member families this past week and began teaching their non-member son. He would like to be baptized, but the only problem is his Mum would like him to be baptized in Samoa, in 2018, at their family reunion. So, there isn't really too much control that we have over that, but we are still teaching him so that he can begin to learn the lessons and come to church. We have been working with a less-active family for the past couple of weeks though and they came to church on Sunday! It is the Fuentas family, they are a Spanish family, but have lived here in Australia for their entire life. They have four really cute kids and want to start to come back to church so that they can be sealed. We have been helping them to prepare for the temple and they came to a ward trunk-or-treat activity on Wednesday and then they came to church on Sunday! We were really happy to see them and they had a great experience. 

          I hope that all of you have a great week and have a Happy Halloween! Don't eat all of the lollies that you get and be safe while you are out trick-or-treating. I know that this is the greatest work that we can all be engaged in and I am so happy that I am where I am at right now! I love you all and hope that you are happy, healthy and remembering to say your prayers!

Love,

Elder Wheeler

We did our weekly planning at a park this week cause it was really great weather!

Here is a picture of us with the Wharemate family at the Naea families
(another family in our ward that are helping to fellowship the Wharemate family) house yesterday for Sunday lunch!