June 27, 2016

Dear Family,

I am back in New Brunswick and Maine. For the first time on my whole mission I know how long I'm going to be in a area for. I will be in St. Stephen for 6 weeks definitely. Leaving Sackville was hard for me. I reached my highest peak on my mission in Sackville. My social skills were at an all time high and I took on a type of leadership role with Elder Goeders. 

In my first couple of days in St. Stephen I have been asking the Lord "How can I make an impact on St. Stephen for 6 weeks?" 6 weeks isn't long to be in an area and it's not a lot of time to get close to people. But I still want to be able to contribute something to this area. A focus for me this transfer is giving everything I have to each missionary activity. I want to have a sense of urgency. I want to be so focused on everybody that I'm not even thinking about myself or my limitations. One of the most painful symptoms of autism is self-awareness. Sometimes I feel trapped inside my own body. There was an incident last week that I felt so stuck inside my body mentally and I couldn't get out. 

Thursday: It was transfer day. We woke up at 5:30 am. The St. Stephen Elders picked me up at 1 from St. John and got to St. Stephen at 3. When I got to St. Stephen we knocked into a former who let us right in. They were an older couple. We had a quick 20 minute Restoration lesson because they were about to have dinner. I met a less active that evening.

Friday: We helped move a piano for one of our investigators. Then we had correlation meeting with the ward mission leader here Brother Murray. We also went out to a little town called St. Andrews and did some knocking.

Saturday: We stopped by a member referral that we got from Bro. Murray and picked them up as new investigators. Then we helped paint a house for one of the investigators that the St. Stephen Sisters are teaching. Then we had dinner with a recent convert. She got baptized last November. She is a very nice lady but she has Word of Wisdom issues so we needed to correct her on that.

Sunday: We had Church. I bore my testimony. The St. Stephen ward only has about 60 people. Mostly older people. They are going on a big temple trip on July 16th. So the talks were mainly based on temples. After Church we took a young man out with us. He is 17 years old and loves hanging out with missionaries.

It has been nice to have Filipino companion. Part of their culture is cooking food so Elder Belmonte is a good cook and has made us some good food. Haha.

Have a good week!

Love,

Elder O'Brien (the older)