The Lord promises to bless us and take care of us as we put him first and show our faith!

    Well, this has been a pretty eventful week with a lot of up's and some down's but to just let everyone know I have two new companions now - Elder Flood and Elder Evans because Elder Cowley went home. Not anything that he did wrong or anything he did not clear up before his mission but he was really struggling with his anxiety and it was really starting to effect him in the work and all aspects so he decided to go home to sort it out and plans on coming back. So, it has been an interesting last couple days sorting everything out and figuring out what I am going to be doing for the last 3 weeks of the transfer but it looks like I will be staying in Victoria with YSA Elders who pretty much cover the same area as me so it should work out good!

    

     So this week has been a little crazy to say the least but I am glad that we can just get back to a normal week! We did have some really cool things happen this week though! We found a new investigator named Jasem, he is from Iran, he has been here for a couple years and is a neuro scientist I think I talked about how we found him last week so if you remember back that far you will remember how awesome Jasem is! We were able to teach him a couple of times this week and it was really good but very different because he has no knowledge of Christianity at all so we have had to keep it pretty basic with him but he is very interested in it because he did not agree with many of the teachings that he grew up with and really wanted to learn more about Christ and then he ran into us so pretty much a miracle! We had some really good questions and things that he was wondering if we believed and pretty much everything he asked can be answered by the lessons we teach as missionaries. So he is doing really well and the rest of his family is moving over to Victoria this week so he wants us to meet his wife too! so that was pretty cool! We also found a couple this week too, named Farie and Fahrac (fa-rock) who are Ba hi but are really open to learning and listening and they have met missionaries before so they new a little bit but we where able to teach the restoration to them and they actually knew quite a bit of it and  want to learn more so we will see how that goes.

    Victoria has been amazing and it looks pretty likely that I will be finishing my mission here which I am not upset with at all! I have been able to learn a lot here just all of my areas but here in Victoria I have realized how little time we truly have our missions and how as we put Heavenly Father and what he has asked us to do first then everything will all workout and I guess it is a little easier on a mission but that is a principal that is applicable to everyone. What ever assignment we have been given. The Lord promises to bless us and take care of us as we put him first and show our faith! As we truly trust and Believe what we know to be true. As we believe the Lord when he says "I am bound when you do what I say but when you do not what I say ye have no promise" He is bound to bless us as we are obedient and fulfill and magnify our callings. He has to do it because he is bound to do what he says or he would cease to be God so its a pretty safe bet that he hold his end of the bargain as we do ours. I know, Believe and can testify that this is true that the Lord wants us to be blessed. He wants nothing more than to see us full of joy and happiness and that will happen as we put him first and do the things that will not only bless us but others as well through our service!

Love Elder Slack

The X Men Castle - it is the castle they used in the Xmen movie The new Squad!

New Companions Elder Flood and Elder Evans - a tripanionship once more

We did not even plan to be downtown at that time but we felt that we should go there

   This week was not quite the same as the previous. We where not able to see many of our investigators this week but we where still able to see Ryan and he is doing so good! We were also able to find some really cool potentials that we are going to be teaching this week!

    Ryan is still doing amazing and is still changing a ton! He set a goal to be fully clean by Sunday so we are really praying for him that he can do it! We had a really good lesson this week with him and we taught him about the temple and how we want to not only to be baptized but to also continue on and prepare to go to the temple and it was such a good lesson and he told us how he wants to do that and make it a goal and how he wants to be married and sealed there! It was so Legit!!! He has such a good testimony of the Gospel and how it can change peoples lives! He even brought his cousin to church yesterday! He is pretty much doing everything a member does except he is not baptized but he is a great missionary and pretty much the coolest thing since sliced bread. He is preparing to be baptized in August so I hope that I am still here when he does!

  We also went on an exchange with the YSA Elders this week and I was with Elder Evans in their area and We were in Downtown Victoria and while I was talking to someone another guy came up behind me and just stood there until I finished my conversation and then he just asked me what I was doing so I told him how I was a missionary and how we share a message of Jesus Chirst and then he told me how he wanted to learn more about Jesus Christ and that he had tried to contact a Catholic priest but he never got back to him and then someone told him that "those guys who walk around downtown in white shirts and ties teach people". He said that he did not believe the guy that told him it so he came to see if we really do that and once he saw that is what we were doing he came up and started to talk to me. It was so cool because before this we had been walking around for 35 minutes and had no luck and we did not even plan to be downtown at that time but we felt that we should go there and it was a Miracle! His name is Jasam and he is from Iran and we are going to see him tonight!

Well that is all the time I have but Victoria is about the most beautiful place in BC and I am really loving it here sooo talk to you next week!

Love Elder Slack

{7/11/16} Final Farewell to Elder Kelly

This week has been really different from most in Victoria but still really good! Saturday was transfer calls and both Elder Cowley and I are staying here in Victoria. Which I am really excited about because we have some really good Investigators that we are working with and I really did not want to leave. We were not able to teach as many of our investigators this week but we where able to set up quite a bit of lessons for next week.

  Ryan is still doing really well and is progressing towards his Baptism in July! He came to church yesterday and brought one of his friends with him so it was really sweet! He is already doing missionary work even before his Baptism. We also had a lesson in priesthood about the Temple and about how important is is and we told Ryan a little more about the temple because he was pretty confused and we told him that our hope is and what we want to prepare him for is to not only to get baptized but to also go to the temple and he told us how he wanted to make that a goal to go to the temple after he is baptized! He is so awesome and has changed so much since when I first met him. The Gospel has truly changed him for the better and has seen how much joy it has brought him! I am really excited to be here for his baptism and it is going to be so Cool!

  We also have found some new investigators that we are working with and we have a lesson with a family that Elder Cowley and I found at the beginning of last month but they went out of town for the month and just got back so we are going to be seeing them this week and they are really cool! We met that dad and his name is Kyle and when we first met him he told us how he was really interested in what we believed and they just started to go to a new church but are not too sure if they want to stay there so we hopefully can get them to come to ours! We also have a guy named Doug that has met with Missionaries a few years ago and we just re connected with him and since we first saw him a couple of weeks ago he has read all of first and second Nephi and told us how much he has enjoyed reading the Book of Mormon and feels that he has received an Answer that the Book of Mormon is true and that Joseph Smith is a prophet of God! It was really cool and he is really been prepared since the last time that he met missionaries!

  The last eventful thing that is happening is the Elder Kelly is going home! This is his last couple of days in the Canada Vancouver Mission. If you do not know, Elder Kelly was my trainer and we were together 21 months ago! It is crazy to think that it has been that long since I got to Canada! It has been Amazing and I am really glad that I still have 3 months left to serve the people here in BC!

Elder Kelly and Will

Just another great week in Victoria!

  This week was just another great week in Victoria! It was not a normal week especially with Canada Day and there was a lot of things going on and Downtown Victoria was just a huge party but we were still able to get some missionary work done!

   Ryan is still doing great! We were able to go to a baptism for some of the missionaries in our zone with him and it was really good. He had a lot of questions about it and said it got him excited for his own Baptism which is happening this month! He also was finally able to come to all three hours of church and really enjoyed priesthood and it was really cool because the whole lesson was on the Priesthood and that is what a lot of his questions were about after the baptism. He is still doing so good and on track! We have seen such a big change in him over the last couple months that we have taught him and he is progressing so well! 

  We were also able to finally see Matti and Cameron. Matti is the member that owns La Belle Patate and his son Cameron is 10 and not baptized so we have been trying to help him get baptized and we had a really good lesson on Friday and Matti just told Cameron how important baptism was and how they need to start to come to church more and it was such a good lesson. It is really looking promising with them!

   We also have had some good lessons with some other investigators and we are finally getting some referrals so the work here is going good! This month they gave us money for bus passes on our mission fund card so we may or may not be getting our car taken away. We are not sure, hopefully the latter.

  Sadly, I can not remember too much else about what we did this week but it was good.

 Elder Cowley and I are doing great! He is really getting used to being a missionary and he is getting a lot more confident and out going so it has been really good!

Love Elder Slack

Climbing trees while hiking in Victoria on P-Day

"So we were just tracting in the city, not even a rural area, and we saw this deer eating someone's flowers"

Share the Gift

     This week has been a really good one! We have been working with Ryan and he is making some really good progress and he is continuing to move forward to his baptismal date of July 22nd. We were able to teach him the law of tithing and he told us how he did not like giving his money to churches but that this church is different and that he would live the law of tithing and that he wanted to pay his tithing from when he first started to come to church six weeks ago! We have seen so much progress with him and he is doing so well! He really is becoming converted to the Gospel of Jesus Christ and is gaining a strong testimony of the restored Gospel! He is so solid and it is just another testimony of member work because he was brought to church by a friend and he had talked to missionaries before and they had invited him to church but he never came but since his friend brought him to church and it was someone he knew it was different and since then he has been progressing so much and has been doing so good!

      Elder Cowley and I have been able to do a lot of teaching this week and have been able to see some really cool miracles this week one with that referral from the Merretts and we were finally able to see him this week! His name is Peter and he is so Cool! He used to be a financier for the Canadian Government and used to travel all over the world with the Prime Minster and finance projects that they were doing. Anyways he has been retired for a few years because he is confined to a wheel chair and could not travel anymore but when we met with him he told us how he had met a lot of members of our church and he had always been impressed by how we live and how we seem to be good people. He really wanted to know why, so we told him about how we follow the example of Jesus Christ and believe in living what we preach and how we believe it is very important to live the life that we learn about. He is very interested because he grew up Catholic but left it because they told him how asking questions was bad and they would not answer the questions he had but he does still have that belief in Christ and God. He is very interested in learning more and finding out for himself. 

      It is really cool to see how people seem to notice what we do and how we as members do live our lives and that is definitely doing missionary work but if no one would have talked to Peter that work might not have yielded all the fruit it could have. I have seen a lot how important it is not only to live what we teach and doing our best because we will not be perfect and then talking to people and trying to share the Gospel in any way we can, not being crazy weird or pushy, but just sharing what we know has changed and blessed our lives, kind of like how we tell people about a good movie or a good place to eat!

  Well I gotta go so talk you next week!!

Love Elder Slack

It was so cool to see how Heavenly father does truly prepare his children to hear the restored Gospel!

 Well I do not have too much time today but this week has been great! We have been able to teach so much and have had a lot of success in finding too! We found three new people to teach this week by knocking on their door and them just letting us in! It was so legit!! We have seen so many miracles! One of the people that we knocked in to is Clark and we were able to teach him the restoration and when we got to the first vision and the Book of Mormon he was so shocked. He told us how he had never been taught that before and wondered why no one else taught about there being another prophet on the earth. It was so cool to see how Heavenly father does truly prepare his children to hear the restored Gospel!

   We also had some really good lessons with Ryan who is down to 2 cigarettes a day at the most! He had been coming to church every week and has been reading the Book of mormon like crazy! He even started to read the gospel principles book to and he is really loving it!

 Well I have to go but thanks to everyone for all the Birthday wishes!

Love Elder Slack


Yep, you read that right...it's this missionary's birthday! He's finally hit the big 2-0! Crazy! How did this boy...

Get to be so old, where has the time gone...but, just look at him now...a mom couldn't be prouder. What a wonderful young man he has become. 

I am always amazed at how many miracles and blessings we see as missionaries

This week has been really great! Elder Cowley and I are really getting into a good grove now with teaching! Elder Cowley is starting to get used to the schedule and everything now! We had some really good lessons! The weather here this week was pretty crazy which I have come to know is usual for Victoria. It was 33 degrees at the beginning of the week and by the end it was 19 so it fluctuated a lot and it can never seem to decide what it wants to do but overall it has been good and having a car makes a lot less important if the weather changes.

   We were able to have a few lessons this week with Ryan and Mike. We got the whole apartment thing figured out with Mike and we are going with Mike to check it out on Wednesday! Mike told us if it works out he will set a day to be baptized on then! So we are really hoping and praying that it does work out for him because this is something that he has been waiting for for a long time and now it is finally here so we will be focusing a lot on that this week to see if there is any way that we could help out and continue to support and motivate Mike! We also saw Ryan and he is doing so good! He came to church yesterday even though he got off work late and did not get to have any sleep but he told us that he really wanted to come so he did, even though he was tired. He has really been cutting down on his smoking and is down to 5 a day at the most! It has been so great to teach and work with him because he is someone that I have seen the Gospel change and he has been doing the change by himself! He is changing things as he learns with out reminding or telling him. He has just seen how the Gospel has changed him and how much it has helped him in his life! He is doing so good and is working hard to be baptized on July 22nd! We have seen some really cool miracles this transfer and a lot of good progression from those that we are working with!

 We also did some finding and on Wednesday we found a really cool family this week when we went by a referral who was not home so we decided to stay in the area and knock on some of the houses next to this referral and we talked to a guy named Kyle who just recently had a baby and he and his wife just started to go to a new church but he was really interested in what we were doing and why we were doing it so we talked about what we do and about the restoration and how we have come out to share this message with others because it has helped and changed our lives. We talked to him for a while and he told us to come by on Tuesday and gave us his number and told us to text him to confirm and we did last night and it is all set up! It was such a cool miracle to see that we went there for a reason! 

   I am always amazed at how many miracles and blessings we see as missionaries and how prevalent the hand of God is in our lives and I am sure that it was just a prevalent in my life before my mission but being on a mission has helped me to recognize it more! I have learned how much God does truly love all of us no matter where we have come from or what we have done he loves us no matter what that is the first great truth!

Love Elder Slack

I just really like being a missionary even though it is easily the hardest thing that I have had to do

This week has been pretty crazy mostly because of transfers which always makes a normal week very unknown because of all the things that happen with transfers especially this week with what happened on Saturday which will actually affect this coming week more than last week. So we got transfer calls and found out that Elder Ringheim is going to Delta, which is right next to where I was when I was in Surrey, and that I am going to be training a new missionary. Which means I will have no companion for two days and have to ferry to Vancouver to go pick him up so I am not sure what this week is going to look like but it should be exciting!

  Back to this last week which was really good and we have been able to see a lot of progression in some of our investigators. Ryan who we have been meeting with for the last 4 weeks has been doing really good! He has gone from smoking 40 cigarettes a day to 5! which is amazing and he has been coming to church every week! He has been doing so good and told us he wants to be Baptized and he set a date for July 22 just so he has time to completely quit smoking and so he can be ready to be baptized and he is doing really great and he has been reading the Book of Mormon and has really been applying what he learns, like he started to cut down his smoking even before we taught him the Word of Wisdom because he felt that was something he needed to do before he is Baptized so he is Pretty Awesome!! We are also working with a guy named Lief. Lief, who we met a couple weeks ago and he is doing good he came to church for the first time last week and really liked it and when we met with him after he told us he feels like he should be baptized so we set a date with him as well for June 25th! He really wants to be baptized so he is progressing to it!

  Elder Ringheim and I have really been able to see a lot of cool miracles this transfer and I am really sad to see him leave but it has been a good time and I got to learn a little bit of Danish but I can not pronounce anything right so it probably will not be much help but it sounds cool! I am really excited to stay here in Victoria! The weather here is Amazing and the people we are working with are doing really good. I just really like being a missionary even though it is easily the hardest thing that I have had to do and it has made me change a lot but it has been a good change and that change really comes from applying the Gospel of Jesus Christ into our lives and seeing the miracles that can happen from it. Sometimes that change is really hard and is something that we do not think we can do and that's probably right if it was just us but its not we have Christ on our side and through Christ anything that we are asked to do can be done! I have learned that personally and am still learning it everyday that I have to go talk to people on the street in Downtown Victoria but some how each day I do it and it is because Christ is there every step of the way through anything!

Love Elder Slack

Coolest experience of my mission to see how big of a help members are to this work

     This week has been really amazing and as you can see by the subject line, which I usually never use, but I felt it was appropriate for this occasion. So I will start this story with last Sunday. So we went to visit a couple, The Merretts, and we followed up on someone that they had talked about at a cottage meeting we had my first Sunday here where they talked about a guy in their building named Peter. They told us how they had been talking to Peter and had told him a little about the church; about how they just returned from a mission in England. As we were talking to them and how they could help Peter more they told us how they had planned to have us over for dinner the next Sunday; so they told us that they would invite Peter to come as well and they did!! On Sunday we went over for dinner and Peter and his wife came and we were able to talk a lot about the church and what we believe and what we, as missionaries, do and it was great! At the end of the meeting Brother Merrett asked if we could come visit them again and they said yes so we got their phone number and are going to be seeing them this week or next week! It was one of the coolest experience that I have had on my mission and to see how big of a help members are to this work because they know people and talk to people that we never could as missionaries and people can see members and see how they are just normal people. It also helped me see that I need to do that when I get home, to continue to be a missionary even though I do not have the nametag anymore.

      We have also been working with a guy named Ryan and we have seen him four or five times and he has been coming to church and is really solid! We saw him on Thursday and we had planned to teach him about the word of wisdom and before we started to do anything he asked about the word of wisdom because he had heard about it a little bit at church and from members so we were able to teach him the word of wisdom and he took it so well! He told us how the blessings that come from the word of wisdom are exactly what he wants and he has already been trying to cut down on smoking and in the last 2 weeks he has gone from forty cigarettes a day to ten a day which is amazing especially for not even knowing about the word of wisdom! It was so amazing to see how prepared he is and how much he has changed by himself because he is reading the Book of Mormon daily and comes to church almost every week! He has changed so much since we have been meeting with him and it mostly has come from himself applying what he has been learning, which is something that we should all be doing. He has told us that he does want to be baptized and that he feels that this is where Gods is telling him to be and he has such a good testimony of the Book of Mormon so once he quits smoking he wants to be baptized! Also he was member referral from someone in the YSA so yeah member work is the way to go!

        We were able to teach quite a bit this week and have been seeing a lot of success and a lot of progression from the people that we are working with! Being on a mission has been a pretty amazing experience and I am very grateful that I still have some time to be here in Canada eh! I have really learned that as we share the Gospel our testimony grows and as we learn more about the gospel and apply it our desire to share the Gospel will increase!

Love Elder Slack

Sometimes we like to just have some poutine :)

Elder Ringheim is a pretty great cook! 

Look at our sweet new Car! runs pretty good:)

I also know that he calls the weak and the simple to perform great things

     This week we were able to see a lot of success in teaching! We were able to do a lot more teaching this week and find some really good people that we are going to meet with this week.

     Monday, after P-Day, started off pretty slow because we were supposed to have a lesson with one of our investigators and then go to a FHE with a family in the ward but we were not able to get a hold of our investigator and the wife in the family fell and had to go to the Hospital on Monday so our evening opened up real quick! So Elder Ringheim and I decided to pray to know where we should go and so after we prayed we felt like we should go by a former investigator that we have been trying to contact so we bused over there and went by him and he did not answer so we decided that there must be a reason that we should be over there so we were walking down the street and I felt like we should go and knock the house on the end of the street and a lady answered and so we talked to her for a little bit and she did not seem too interested until we started to talk about the plan of salvation and she was really intrigued by it and told us that she would invite us in but she had plans later that evening and she was really busy that we but that we could come by next week! So we are going to go by this week and teach her more! Then we kept walking and Elder Ringheim felt like we should knock a house that was across the street and so we did and it turned out to be a lady who was visiting her parents from Mexico and we felt like we should talk about the Plan of Salvation and how it blesses our families and it turned out she had a little daughter and so we talked to her about how we believe that families can be together forever. She told us that she would like to learn more but she was going back to Mexico on Wednesday morning so we told her that there was missionaries in Tijuana where she lived and told her to contact the missionaries there and she told us she would!! So it was so amazing to see how the spirit guides even though our initial thought did not work out there was a reason why we where there!

      Then our week just kept getting better! We were able to see Ryan a guy that the YSA elders passed to us and he is very prepared and he was telling us how since he has been reading the Book of Mormon it has really helped him, especially with his patience at work and he told us how his friends have told him that he has really changed over the last month that he has been meeting with missionaries and coming to church! He has been very prepared and is a very sincere and humble guy. He has been having great experiences with the Book of Mormon and has prayed about it and he has felt that he received an answer that it is true! I have seen so many times how the Book of Mormon changes people and it really is that way that people can come to know if Jesus Christ has restored his Church and brought the fullness of his Gospel back to the Earth! 

      We also had a great Lesson with Matti Lott and his kids and him and his son have come to church the last two weeks! We had dinner with them on Wednesday and were able to teach the Plan of Salvation and it was a really great lesson and Cameron was very interactive and asking a lot of questions so we hope that we can continue to work with them! Hopefully we can help them become fully active and help Cameron get Baptized!

       Then we had a Zone Meeting on Friday which was really good and we talked a lot about conversion but it was a little nerve racking for me because I had to give a training on Conversion in front of 25 people which was very interesting but it went well. I have seen on my mission how as we put in our effort to prepare, the spirit will guide us and help us to accomplish whatever the Lord has asked of us. I have also seen how since I have been on my mission that I have been able to overcome my fears more and put more trust in the Lord to help guide me because I don't think I could have given a training in front of a group that big at the beginning of my mission. I have been able to trust in the Lord and in myself more. 

     A lot of the things that we talked about were about conversion and about why we do things. Do we do it out of obligation or out of a love for the Lord and his Gospel? As we become converted to Christ and his Gospel our desires will be pure and righteous. As we do things out of a love for the Lord we will do them better because we have a pure motivation and the Lord will bless us for that and help us even more. I have been able to think about why I do the things I do and I would invite everyone to do that. I also learned that if we are doing this out of duty and obligation that it's much better than not doing it and God does not expect us to change right this second be he does expect us to be progressing. It is about eternal progression not instant perfection! So it is ok if we are not perfect yet God does not expect us to be but he does ask us to get a little closer everyday and to just get a little better than we were before and that is how we will become more converted!

     I am very grateful for the restoration of the Gospel of Jesus Christ and that he would love us enough to give his life for us! I know this Gospel is true and that this is His church restored to the earth once again! I also know that he calls the weak and the simple to perform great things and that we can accomplish anything that he gives us as we follow Him and our Saviour! Life was meant to be enjoyed and happy so make it that way and Pure Eternal Joy comes through our Saviour Jesus Chris so "look unto him in every thought. Doubt not fear not!" D&C 6:36

Love Elder Slack

Beautiful sunset in Victoria

Healthy living in Victoria

Peacocks in the park

A mission is definitely not what I expected or anticipated but it has been exactly what I needed

This week was good. It has been a little hard because lots of our investigators stopped meeting with us but we have really been blessed with some new people to teach. We were able to find a family this week and they are really cool. Their names are Troy and Joslynn and they have four kids. They are a really cool family that we tracted into and they let us in and we talked to them for 30 minutes and went over what we do as missionaries and went over how that message that we share is meant to bless families and how important the family is and they told us how they used to go to church but they felt like God was being taken out of church and that people were not living what they were preaching and they told us that the church they used to go to did not feel right and that something was missing. We told them a lot about our church and how we feel the spirit there. It is a place that we go to worship and fellowship. They really liked it and told us that we could come back after spring break because they would be really busy. It was such a great experience! We talked to them about how that spirit that is missing in other churches is in our church and that we believe that the church that Jesus Christ established is the same church that we attend now and it has been restored to the earth. It was really great to meet them because we have been doing a lot of tracting and going by people that met missionaries before and we have not had too much success but we met this family who have really been prepared to hear the Restored  Gospel. They have been missing something and This Gospel, the gospel of Jesus Christ in its fullness. We have been able to set up some lessons with other people that we met and with some people that met missionaries before so the work has been a lot better here and it is going good. 

   A mission is definitely not what I expected or anticipated but it has been exactly what I needed and I am very grateful that I still have some time to learn some more and to continue to share this Gospel that has blessed my life so much. Crazy thing is I didn't understand, and I am not sure that I still do completely, how much it has impacted my life and blessed me until I came on my mission. I have seen how it has changed others lives as well and given them that hope that it has given me. I have come to learn how real the Gospel is and how much it does help us with and how much Christ helps me with everyday, even things that are not directly related to the Gospel or things I thought were not related to the Gospel. I have also learned that life is not meant to be easy and it will never be easy. Something that President Burt says a lot is that there is not much growth in a comfort zone and there is not much comfort in a growing zone, that is a butchered paraphrasing but basically it means that hard things help us grow and learn and mold us into who God needs us to be.

Love Elder Slack