March 2, 2015 - Bridgewater, Nova Scotia

Dear Family,

It has been a interesting week. There were no snowstorms this week but it has still been snowing, then warming and then freezing. Yesterday was really icy. Both me and Elder Nielsen took our share of tumbles. It's hard to believe that general conference is only a month away. It doesn't feel like that long ago I was listening to last conference. Maybe by then all the snow will be gone. One can hope at least. We're supposed to get more snow today and Wednesday.

Tuesday, we went to Lockeport with Brother Gidney because he had to do some home-teaching and we go out there rarely. So we went and helped him home teach a less active couple. Then we finally met with Launie (our investigator that's hard to get a hold of). He has been reading the Book of Mormon and Gospel Principles manual. He has a issue with modern-day prophets adding on to what bible prophets and Joseph have already written. So we committed him to read and pray about the Book of Mormon to see if it's true. All we can do there is just encourage him to pray about it himself. Then Brother Gidney drove us back to his house in Liverpool. Liverpool is an hour away from Lockeport and 45 mins away from Bridgewater so it was a day trip. He fed us dinner at his house and then we had another dinner appointment in Bridgewater with the Harlows after. 2 dinner appointments in one day. I was really full by the end. Brother and Sister Gidney are a really great couple. They are so nice and funny.

Wednesday, we went to district meeting in Sackville. The zone leaders and STL's were there so it was a full house. It was another district meeting on following up. This time it was about following up with commitments we leave investigators. How following up shows that we care about that person. Most of the time we don't follow up it's because we're lazy as President Leavitt put it. After district meeting I went on a exchange in Kentville with Elder Funa. Elder Funa has been out for 10 months. He is from Lethbridge and went to Winston Churchill. He is polynesian. He played high school basketball for Winston. He says he's 99 percent sure he's seen me at basketball games before back when they played in Stirling's league. He also says he remembers playing Bradee Perrett and him being a "handful to deal with." He graduated in 2013 as well. Anyway so we went to Windsor and gave a less active a blessing before her surgery. Her and her husband have an issue with the Church's home-teaching program. Then we visited one of their new investigators. He knows that there is a God and wants to know more.

Thursday, I was still on the exchange. We volunteered at the Food Bank in the morning. Then we met with Brother Collet at McDonald's for Lunch. He was excited to see me again. I could tell he really liked me. Then we helped shovel Sister Redden's driveway. After that we visited the older Bond's. They were also excited to see me again. After that we met with a former Investigator and helped shovel his driveway as well. He is more into the philosophical part of the gospel; he's not into the spiritual side of it. We had dinner at the Beckwith's in Windsor. They said "Welcome back." It was bittersweet going back to Kentville. I very much enjoyed seeing all these old faces and some new ones.

Saturday, we met with David again. We gave him a large Book of Mormon and he told us that he would try and read it. He didn't give us a definite for sure I'm going to read it. So that's a bit discouraging. He wasn't at church yesterday as well and he usually comes every week. We also met with Damon. He has had a very good week since he went to church. He asked for a blessing so Elder Nielsen did that. He feels good that the church is part of his life again.

The theme of testimony meeting was the beauty of the earth. Quite a few people talked about how underneath all the snow there is flowers waiting to blossom and grass waiting to turn green. They related it to our blessings and the love the Lord has for us. It was a beautiful metaphor. We picked up two new investigators in the afternoon. Burland is a former investigator and Jazmine is his wife. They actually had us over for dinner. They both seem very interested in what Mormons believe in. They met online. Jazmine is from Turkey and Burland is from Nova Scotia. They have a 2 year old son named Jason. So that was exciting. We're going to see them again this Sunday. We taught them about the Word of Wisdom because they were curious why we don't drink tea or coffee. Then we gave Sister Donaldson the Sacrament. She is doing much better. She is now 6 weeks ahead of schedule on her foot since I gave her the blessing. She was very thankful for that. It was very humbling.

Have a great week!

Love,

Elder O'Brien