Hello my Kitchen Family!

How is everyone doing this week?! I'm sure all is good and your all doing great. I'm so glad you all enjoyed my letter last week and it was great to hear that you got a letter from my mission president. Its always nice to hear your all enjoying the weather and loving life. Its a blessing from God to me every time I hear your all happy, safe, and well. I know the Lord is protecting you and blessing my family while I'm away in his service.

Well things are going wonderful for me. I'm still having a very incredible life changing experience being a trainer out in the mission field. I love it and I know the Lord is blessing me to be able to do all my assignments. This week has been another great week of missionary work. Work work work is what missionary work is. We literally are so busy and work so hard during the day that when our heads hit the pillow at night I knock out right away. But I know we are qualifying for miracles and this is what the Lord expects of us. I always remember how much Jesus Christ has done for me and everything he went through and I know that what I am doing is only a small payback to him. I truly love the Lord and I'm so grateful I can be doing something he really wants me to do. I know we are gathering his lost sheep and giving people the chance to accept the gospel. I've never really gave you any stats of how a missionary week goes. This week for instance we taught 19 lessons, we had 7 investigators at sacrament meeting, we received 4 new investigators, we talked to 151 people this week (either by knocking on doors or street contacting) and we have 4 investigators set with a baptism date! Yup this week we had a incredible experience with setting Kylie for baptism!! (she was the one we met on our bikes). She truly was prepared by the Lord. She is what we call a golden investigator. She agreed to be baptized during the second lesson we ever had with her! Now that is a miracle. Lydia and Gerald's son is 8 years old and he will be baptized with them! Oh yeah we had a powerful lesson with Lydia and Gerald and taught them the Law of Chastity. We committed them to live it and they agreed to be married. So we are planning their marriage at the chapel on October 14 and then their baptism on October 16! Aw its just amazing watching people completely change their lives according to Gods will. We are definitely seeing more and more of Gods miracles everyday. Our other investigators are doing great. Anetta came to church yesterday for the first time! We were so excited. Timi is also doing really good, he is praying to know if the Book of Mormon is true. Our other investigators are all doing great. We were lead by the spirit to Steven and Crathie and we taught them a lesson. They both want to change their lives and turn to the Lord. I'm so excited to see how the progress.

Well my week was just great. Teaching a lot, talking to everyone, and trying to cry repentance to all the people I see. I'm becoming more bold and telling and warning people if the reject this incredible message. I'm not scared at all the talk to people on the street. Literally we talk to so many people. Some yell and freak out at us and others kindly say no. But it makes me feel bad for these people that reject the message because they don't even know what the gospel can do to their lives. Well my companion Elder 'Afa is doing great. He's loving his mission, its hard and its cold for him but he has such a strong desire to serve the Lord and he has a burning testimony that's on fire. He bore his testimony yesterday in fast and testimony meeting and the whole ward was literally in tears. Its sad because Elder 'Afa was the only one in his family that supported them financially and now he's on a mission. So his family is probably struggling but he said he had faith that if he served a mission then Lord would provide for his family. Now that is strong faith. Members of the church came to our flat last night and dropped off heaps of clothes, shoes, and tons of stuff for Elder 'Afa. It touched my heart....I truly am so grateful for what we have. We are so blessed and to often take what we have for granted. This mission has changed me in so many ways for the better. I know I'm a better person then when I came on my mission. I love it so much.

Well that's enough about me. There's probably lots more I could tell you but I don't have a whole lot of time. We have some other things to do today. I just found out that tomorrow I'm heading up to Auckland to go to some leadership training with our mission President because I'm a trainer. So I will be up there for like 2 1/2 days. All the crazy experiences on your mission eh. Aw sometimes....well always I just wish I could talk to you on the phone just like once a month or something just so I could tell you all the stuff about my mission. There is a lot that I never have time to e mail you about. But that's why I will have so many stories to tell you when I get home. And you know how I tell stories, so you better get the popcorn haha.

I really do miss all of you. I think about you a lot and pray for you all the time. I love you guys so very much. Oh yeah about General Conference I guess we are not watching it until next weekend. The reason why is they don't just broadcast it live is because its in the middle of the night here I guess. So they just send DVDs over the NZ and they all watch it at church. So I'm excited to watch it next week. Dad you asked about the weather...its starting to warm up a little but at night and in the mornings its still freezing. Mom you asked if I have confirmed anyone else. Yeah remember that family I baptized in Hamilton, well Danielle was the 16 year old girl. I confirmed her a member of the church.

Oh yeah thanks for the pictures. I got all of them...well I think. I got ones of you mom and Ryan, and others in the past e mails. Thanks I enjoyed them. Well I got to go now. Thanks for everything. I sure love and miss you guys. You really do mean everything to me. I love ya. Have a great week.


Love Elder Kitchen