Big 50

Malo Soifua!!!

Today on the Elder Hill Show:

 ** I set a new personal mission record for finding new people in a week, so that's kinda cool lol

 ** Went on an exchange with Elder Kasch in New Rochelle and it was so much fun and I learned a lot

 ** Saturday and Sunday were absolutely PACKED full of miracles

Shout out to my older bro Ben for being the og "Big 50" and inspiring my subject line 😂.

This week was crazy busy and we saw a ton of miracles. The first one is the most quantifiably obvious one, and that is that Elder Earl and I found 51 new people this week (some were referred to other areas, so we don't have to figure out how to teach them all haha), and that was wild. Perhaps the most amazing part was that on a couple of different days we didn't find as many as I we could have, so that just we gotta keep climbing. But yeah, I've never found more than 50 in a week, so that was a cool milestone to hit (and in Westchester no less). Good times.

In other news about miracles, we took a big hit on our progressing people, but then God stepped in and things started working out. I'll go person by person.

Danielle - Our most progressing person right now. She was feeling unprepared and rushed for her baptism, but we weren't sure yet when she wanted to be pushed back to (we wanted to keep it within May, but we didn't know). On Sunday she came early to the church, and we had a short lesson in the foyer with a recent convert and the bishop, who just happened to be passing by. We gave her a baptismal calendar that outlines everything we have to teach her and every last step to help her be ready by May 28th. We also taught her about the Word of Wisdom and the Law of Chastity, and our bishop bore a powerful testimony of the LoC. She agreed to live them both, and now she's excited to be baptized in the 28th!! 

Peter - More of a sad note, he was super willing to learn more and come to church, but his psychologist said he can't for the time being (not entirely sure why), so he can't get baptized anytime soon.

Ellen - We found her a week ago and she was down to get baptized! During the week, however, we had some weird back and forth contacting problems, and she got really mad at us for "calling sporadically" (tbh she put in the wrong time in her schedule and got mad at us for calling at the right time). We had actually marked her as stopped being taught, but we felt like sending her one last "hey how are you" kinda text on Sunday morning. She replied and said she was wanting to talk with us and discuss something she read in the BoM!! We immediately accepted and scheduled a call with her tonight. Hopefully we can get back on better terms and stay that way.

Pat - last but DEFINITELY not least, Pat is the sweetest little old lady who rides a bike that you've ever seen. Elder Earl found her originally a week or two ago, and he passed her info to the Spanish Elders because she speaks Spanish. They passed her back to us earlier this past week and said that she wants to learn and come to church in English! She has a BoM in both languages, and she absolutely LOVES reading it. She gushes about it every time we talk with her, talking at great length about how happy she is whenever she reads it. She has a testimony that it's true and that the church that espouses it is true! She's planning on being baptized the same day as Danielle, and she's SO excited. I love her so much and I'm so excited.

But yeah, crazy week with a lot of big miracles that happened. God is so good, guys. He really is.

In other news, I went in an exchange with Elder Kasch on Thursday, and it was a ton of fun. He's a doctrinal wizard and a spiritual giant, and I learned a lot just by being around him. He's the epitome of "there's a scripture for that" or a talk or a quote or a section of Preach My Gospel. He's a good teacher, and I was happy to learn. He was one of the Elders who landed in the mission the same day I did, so that was kind of fun reminiscing and talking (after hours) about where all of the missionaries who came out with us are now. He put a big emphasis for me on being an "agent" not an "object". He talked a lot about how there's a lot that God does for us, but there's still a lot that we can do to grow our faith and free will, while still waiting on the Lord (basically not being slothful servants). I took some notes, and made the promise to "walk away changed" from that exchange.

Mafaufauga faaleagaga: Captain Moroni. If any of you truly know me, you know that I flipping love Captain Moroni. He's always been one of my heroes, and I thought I'd share a few favorite verses out of the BoM to show you why.

Alma 43:23-25

Alma 48:7-18

Alma 60:28, 36

Here's the catch though, I'm not gonna tell y'all WHY those verses make me love Moroni. You'll have to go and read them yourself. Maybe send me a message or email and tell me what you found 👀🤓

Alofa tele lava atu ia outou uma,

Elder Hill

JLHill@missionary.org

Ata:

 - Found a government-issue vehicle in a parking lot

 - I found a puzzle in the mission office that had signatures from previous missionaries (pics of front and back)

 - Thought this hoodie homie was a real person haha

 - Found this coloring page of Pres & Sis Teuscher on the fridge of my ZLs apartment (brought a flood of memories back)

 - This is what my comp does while I conduct baptismal interviews

 - Man, I love sunsets