Zooin

(written May 22, 2017)

Perfect length.

Wazzzup. This has been a pretty solid week. I'll tell ya some highlights. (: We had exchanges with the zone leaders! I went with ya boy elder chicken (Kitchen). He's a true homie. We had a good time cruisin around preachin them gospels. We met one kid who was pretty solid, but gave us the wrong address for our appointment the next day. So that was lame. We tried by this former investigator of theirs. Oh. My. Days. She talked for 30 minutes without taking a breath. We literally didn't get a single opportunity to say a word. So that was a fun time.

Cruisin

😂 That night we had a lil campfire again and cooked hot dogs and smores. It was a real good time. (: good stuff. Here's a little tale for yous. I was walking out of the zone lords flat over to the fire when all a sudden a wild e Kitch jumped outta nowhere and sprayed me with a fire extinguisher. Haha it was hilarious except for the fact that he sprayed it in my mouth. It was gross. So then I chased him down and we wrestled for a bit, me trying to get the fire extinguisher from him. I finally got him and sprayed the heck outta him. It was the best of times. Elder kitchen regretted it afterwards. I didn't. 😇

Me and Elder Kitchen had a standoff of intimidation.

We were finally able to teach Sergio this week! And it was amazing! Sergios heart has been softened so much since the last time we taught him. We taught the restoration and he loved it. We invited him to be baptised for the second time, and this time he accepted. So that was major solid. (: we have him on date for the 3rd of June. Such a good kid. We met with him later in the week and taught the plan of salvation. Smooth sailing. It's different teaching him, because he's the first person I've taught who isn't so good with their English. I really enjoy it though! Forces us to keep it simple which is muchas good. Great lad that Sergio. (:

Most intimidating.

We found a couple of solid potential investigators this week, and found a super great girl named Sophie! We had a really great conversation about how God really does love us, and the atonement of Jesus Christ, on her doorstep and she loved it. She said we could come back the next day and unfortunately wasn't there, but it's all good. We will hopefully be able to see her again soon. We met loads of solid people last night! It was amazing, we got let in and talked loads about the Book of Mormon to a family, we got approached by a dude who wants to study with us about our church, and I talked to the bus driver while on the bus home haha and he was so great. I was telling him about the Book of Mormon and he was like, I've got one. What people don't understand is that the Book of Mormon doesn't replace the bible but goes parallel with it. I was like yoooo exactly that. He was the best. Killer night! (:

How to giraffe.

We hit up the zoo today! It was killer. This week Ive been thinking a lot about me, in the scheme of eternity. I know there's a lot of pressure sometimes to not be yourself. I was thinking about how all of us are the literal spirit children of our heavenly parents. And we existed before we came here, and had the same personalities. I've been me, a stinkin long time before I came here to earth. Ive been learning and growing and improving, but it doesn't change the fact that I'm still me. And that I love to have a laugh. It just really hit home for me this week that I'm a son of God, and he loves me for who I am. And that goes for all of us. 

To me that is a really nice thought. (: I hope you all have an amazing week! Love you all! (:

-Elder Edwards

There's a red panda but I'm more interested in my fidget spinner.

A week in the life

Hey! This week included, all sorts o stuff... so yeah. I'm getting tired of these day by day thingy emails so imma try to just do some highlights. (:

Tuesday we had a multi zone conference! It was ultimately good. Got a lot of spiritual insight on how we can move the work along. It was super good I loved it, something that really stood out to me, was how our faith as missionaries can affect other people being converted. Obviously they still have agency, but in a talk we watched, Neil Anderson was speaking. There was a super good quote that went something like "there is a power that can cause things to happen that need to happen. There is a power that can stir something in people's souls. My faith can cause somebody's soul, that is dormant but good, to awaken unto God." That really stood out to me. I realized while it may not always be the case, my faith can enable the spirit to stir somebody's soul. So I have really been working on increasing my faith. Good stuff. (: I love missionary work. At the multizone I also got to see all the homies, which was super fun. 

One day we were out tracting this slightly countryside road, it was a beautiful day but it was just a kind of boring day haha. Nobody was answering and the couple people who were answering weren't interested. We knocked and street contacted for ages. We finally met this man who was acting really funny, he seemed like he wanted to rage at us or give us a hug at the same time. Maybe both. Anyways We just started saying something, can't remember what, and he invited us in. He is a major gospel scholar. He's got like a finity bibles and such. We talked for ages about Christ and the Book of Mormon stuff. He's definitely got some potential. We're going to have to show him through the bible though that the trinity is not true doctrine. Haha should be fun. All you gotta do is read your bible, it tells us that god and Jesus Christ are separate being. Anyways he's a great man and I'm looking forward to seeing him again. (: 

This dude was so nice. Crazy good at guitar as well.
Met him today in Chester. So sick.

We met loads of new people this week and it was really great. We also met some people who were trying to wreck us. Haha we had a born again man come up to us and start tryna tear us apart. He pulled a DVD out of his bag to give to me. "Out of the kindness of my heart I will give this to your for no price." Cheers buddy. 😂 haha it was an anti DVD and I was like nah mate. Then his buddy came up and was filming us. He was asking me why I was a Mormon. I was like I'm not going to talk to you while your filming me just trying to attack me and my faith, if you actually want to talk you can put away the video camera and we can talk. He didn't know what to say but he put away the camera. 😂 we peaced outta there. They definitely weren't interested. Good times though. (:

Also, that's Elder Godfrey if there's any confusion as to who is my new companion. 😂
We got some haircuts as well today. (:

Also we met with a girl named Bianca! We taught her the restoration and she seemed to really like it, she promised to read the Book of Mormon and pray about it so that's good stuff.

I had a great experience for me this week! A couple weeks into being here in Chester I got on a bus and felt like I should talk to this man. I sat in front of him cause it was the only seat. Satan was really working on me to get me to not talk to this man, so I put it off and put it off. When I was about to turn around and talk to him he got off the bus. I felt absolutely terrible that I hadn't talked to him. The prompting had kept getting stronger and stronger while I was on the bus as well. To say the least I felt bad. So this week! We got on a bus and there was this man! I was like no way I gotta talk to him. The only seat available was behind him. So I sat behind him. Satan must've really not wanted me to talk to him because all the doubts and fears came back. (Sharing the gospel can still be scary sometimes 😜) he had headphones in. The prompting kept getting stronger and stronger as well. So finally I just tapped his shoulder and we started talking. So nice and super funny. We didn't have much time but we had a good chat about god. Got his number and he peaced out. Happy to have gotten that second chance. (: it must have been really important for me to talk to him, because Satan was trying as hard as he could to get me to not talk to this man. So yeah, good stuff. (:

Me and Stiff.

Also the delivery dads Elders Stiff and Cowdrey were in the area on Friday so they came over and had tea with us. So good to see them. Legends. (: me and elder Stiff were rockin some wheelies.

That's some of my week! It's been a good one! Me and elder Godfrey are loving it here in Chester and working hard! Love you all! Thanks for the support! Have a great week!

-Elder Edwards

Stiff popping them wheelys in the flat like a legend.

Oh my days so blesssssssssssssssed

(written April 30, 2017)

Hey! It's been another week, in which has been pretty good. So ya... Monday! Was a pretty good p-day. Hit up some castles with the zone lords. It was a good time cruisin around. After that we just went and chilled out a the chapel. We had a tea appointment but they forgot about it so we snagged some quick fish n chips. It was pretty good. I think in Rhyl I wore myself out of fish n chips because it's not as good as it used to be. Still good. 😜 but know, you can have too much fish n chips. 😜 we tracted a street with a pretty killer name that night. Dinghouse Wood. Straight up. Hahaha best street ever! Well the name is, the people weren't so interested but that's alright. 😜

Tuesday was district meeting. It was great. I really enjoy being able to plan those and conduct them. It's a really good time. Not sure if conduct is the right word but whatever. After that we visited a couple members, had a tea appointment which was solid, and tracted. Nobody was much interested then either. We called Dale to confirm for our appointment Wednesday. He was great, was looking forward to it and planning on it.

This man is legendary on a guitar. Forealz.

Wednesday. Had a street display. It was great. I love street displays. Been a while since we've done one. After the street display we were gonna meet with Dale. He didn't show up and hasn't answered his phone since. It was a bit disappointing but it's all good. Just how it goes. We're going to keep calling him and hopefully he will answer at some point. We snagged some Macky's. Always great. (: That night we tried by James again the 9 year old legend. We chatted for a while then had a great lesson on baptism and the Holy Ghost. James loved it and really wants to get baptised. We set a date for the 20th of may. He was super excited. We're super excited as well but I'm not so sure how it'll work out. Since James is 9 he's completely dependent on his parents for coming to church. And his parents are completely 100% not interested. His dad has said for the past 2 weeks that he will bring him but he didn't come either time. So James might have to wait till he's a bit older. We will definitely keep trying with him though. He's a great kid.

Thursday we had an appointment all the way out in Chester. We didn't think the kid was gonna show up but thought we better go anyways just in case he did show up. It's hard to know. He didn't show, Then when we were trying to cruise to Flint the bus driver man ignored us and drove by so we were waiting ages. So it took 5ever. The rest of the day was super slow. None of our investigators were in and nobody was interested. It was all good though.

My boy.

Friday. We tried by and saw a couple people which was good. Had tea with the Twogoods which was great. Saw John on the bus that night. 'Twas good to see him. Talked a lot about Jesus Christ and it really seemed to sink in. Talked a lot about motorcycles as well. 😜

Saturday we had a street display which went pretty good. Elder Godfrey got the heck bashed outta him twice. By two grumps. Poor elder Godfrey. Good lad. I met some nice people in the street display. One was Nick who's from Australia. We had a great conversation talking about loads of stuff. He started out our conversation by saying I don't believe in anything you believe in. 😂 haha but I explained a bunch a stuff using the bible in a non bashing way 😜 and he ended up taking a Book of Mormon so that was great. We will hopefully meet up soon. We saw Dave that night which was a good time. He's great.

Church was pretty great. Not much to report about Sunday, it was pretty average. Today we got to go to the temple. Ah it was amazing. It had been way too long so it was a really good time. So peaceful. I love the temple so much.

So yeah. Not crazy lots to report about this week but we keep on keeping on. I love this work! Thanks for all you all do for me! Love you all! Have a great week!

-Elder Edwards

So much missionary

(written April 24, 2017)

Hey all! It has been one killer week. My new comp Elder Godfrey, what a legend. He's in Elder Stiff's group so he's been out for about 5 months. Great man, he's here to work hard, he's got his priorities set straight, and knows why he's out here. So that's good stuff. (:

The old district.

Monday was pretty killer. We hit up the mini golf place for the last day with the boys. It was a good time. Did some shopping and I got a dank new tie. My fav tie of all time. So I was pretty pumped about that. That night the Mounchers had us over for tea. It was good to hang with them for a bit, they are such a great family. After that me and Elder Stiff bumped on over to the man himself Dave. We had such a nice time with him. The three of us seriously got so close. Dave expressed to us some stuff he was struggling with and we were able to share some stuff that really helped him. The spirit was so strong. I love moments like that. Dave was sad to see elder Stiff go. It was a nice night.

Dave. Legend.

Tuesday morning we hit up Maccy's brekky. (translation: McDonald's for breakfast) 'Twas good. Then we drove with the zone leaders over to Manchester. We went to the delivery elders flat to drop stiff off. We chilled with them for a bit. Elder Stiff is companions with Elder Cowdrey now as the delivery elders. Elder Cowdrey. What a legend. That delivery elder life looks pretty killer. 😜 then me and Elders Van Dyken cruised over to pick up Elder Beck and drop off Elder Van Dyken. It was super sad to see Elder Stiff and Van Dyken go. We had such good times together. Then we cruised on over and picked up my comp elder Godfrey. I saw Elder Korth as well! So nice to see him. He's a legend. We cruised on back to Chester, did some shopping, then did some missionary work. Got dropped by a couple of people so that's fun. 😜

Wednesday! We got to see Sergio again! Super good kid. He loves to ask all the hard questions. 😜 Haha we spent the whole time sharing our testimonies and answering his questions. Haha so that was really good. We also saw Luke for a bit one of our investigators. There wasn't really anything else eventful that day. We had ward coordination that night which was good.

We're worried about elder trunky. He has a drinking problem.

Haha At first this week elder Godfrey wasn't quite sure what to make of me hahaha, his last companion was pretty straight laced no jokes sorta dude, and here's me who's not quite so serious. But we're bros already and elder Godfrey is really funny. So it's been nothin but good times. 😎

At it again.

Thursday! Weekly planning that morning. I despise weekly planning. Haha just wanna get outta the flat and go do stuff. Oh well I managed to get through it though. 😜 that afternoon we hit up Penyfordd to try by a couple of people. We were tracting by this less actives house and we met this man who was very much not interested. We talked for a couple minutes but it was obvious that he wasn't interested. He was like oh you should talk to my son, so he was like James get over here
and talk to these Jesus Christ people. Haha this 9 year old kid came over and so we started talking to him about spongebob (my fav show) and stuff. Then we started talking about gospel stuff. Elder Godfrey was like what's your favorite bible story? James was like hmmm... when Jesus gets baptised! Haha we were like heck yeah, asked him if he wanted to get baptised. He was super excited and was nodding his head loads. His dad said they were going to get him christened but the pastor wouldn't let James because his parents didn't believe in god. We were like he can get baptised at our church. James said he wanted to. 😂 haha so we haven't been able to see him since then but we've got a 9 year old friend now who really wants to get baptised. That's what I'm talking about. (:

We met a dude named Connor who was interested and invited us to come back and to talk to him and his girlfriend. So that's solid as well. We met a super funny member who hasn't been able to make it out to church as of late. Her name is Pauline. We talked to her on her doorstep for a while. Haha she was hilarious. I said Uchtdorf in a scouse accent and she was laughing for like a solid 5 minute. If you want to hear the scouse accent look it up on YouTube, scouser saying chicken, or something along those lines. It's hilarious. (:

Throwback to the good ole days

Enjoying the sunshine.😎

Friday. Julie the lady who came to church dropped us. That was really lame. We were going out to an investigators house that morning, it was a super long walk. We were just cruising along, enjoying the sunshine when there was this dude walking towards us and I knew I should talk to him. So I started talking to him. He was a super nice dude, really deep thinker, we ended up talking for about an hour, we shared so much with him and there was a really strong spirit the entire time. It was so solid. It was really refreshing to meet Dale. He was seriously so good. He ate up everything we told him. We are seeing him Wednesday. A problem so many missionaries have is people not following through with their appointments then you never see them again. I was really excited about Dale and really didn't want him to be another one that just drops off the planet so I fasted for him. Fasted that he wouldn't change his mind, and that we'd be able to meet with him. I'm really hoping our appointment on Wednesday actually happens.

Elder Godfrey at the baptism.

Saturday! Saturday we cruised on over to Southport because Elder Godfrey was having a baptism there. It was such a nice service. I got to see elder Schoonover from my group. He's a legend as well. That afternoon the weather was so nice. Very much enjoyable. We saw Doreen which was hilarious as usual then we cruised on over and had tea with Dave. Dave is seriously one of my fav people. We did some service for him after tea.

Sunday was great! Martin came to church, and we had quite a few less active families we've been working with come out to church. So it was a good day. (: Sunday afternoon we had a couple appointments fall through and there wasn't really anything else eventful.

So yeah! There's my week! Elder Godfrey is pretty sick. I'm looking forward to this transfer. Love you all!

-Elder Edwards

Transfers!

(Laurel here... Ack! I totally forgot to post last weeks letter!!)
written April 17, 2017:

Hey all! Sorry I'm feeling super lazy so this email isn't going to be super long, I will just try to make some highlights. (:

The broken golf club.

This week has been pretty crazy. We had loads of appointments all over the place, and Elder Stiff lost our phone. Missionary work is surprisingly hard without a phone. 😂 Haha especially when your mission president is trying to reach you about transfer calls. Anyway we tried our best to make do. 

Our investigator Ken that we met in Halkyn last week, we drove out there with Bro Mouncher and he dropped us. Fun stuff. 😜 Most of our appointments this week fell through. 

Elder Trunky is the best man to ever exist. He cooks our eggs.

On Thursday we traveled down to Wrexham for a baptismal interview for the sisters. The girl's name is Ebony. She was super nice, and I really enjoyed the interview. Her baptism was on Saturday. I wanted to go, so we met with an investigator who said she could come out to the baptism. So we arranged a lift. On Saturday 5 minutes before our lift arrived Julia (the investigator) cancelled. |: so we weren't able to go. 

We finally were able to see Sergio again! We've been having a hard time getting in contact with him since we lost the phone. He came to church as well. Really nice kid. I think he enjoyed it. 

A righteous cause.

Well there really isn't a lot to report. Oh yeah! Transfers! Elder Stiff will be leaving Chester and become the new delivery elder for the mission! He's pretty excited, should be good. I will be staying here and my new companion will be elder Godfrey. He's been out for like 4 months and that's about all I know about him. I'm excited! (: Well I will definitely give a better email next week! Thanks! Love you all!

-Elder Edwards

Birthdayin, golfin

Hey everyone! Been a pretty killer week over here in Wales. (: Last Monday we cruised on down to Rhyl and fixed up their bikes down there. Then we cruised on over to the bus station and learned we weren't even allowed to take bikes on the buses. /: so we left them in Rhyl haha. Then for the last little bit of p day we went and had tea with Sian and Rob in Mostyn! My 2 fav people in the UK. (: Sian fed us a delicious curry. So good to see them again. (:

Tuesday was district meeting. It was pretty good, we talked a lot about obtaining the spirit and following the promptings of the spirit. I enjoyed it. After that we had exchanges with the zone leaders. It was ultimately solid. I went with Elder Kitchen and we had a great time. Did lots of finding and were able to find a couple new people who were interested. Elder Kitchen is a good man, I really enjoyed the exchange. There was this house that has Elvis literally everywhere. They let us step in and look in the living room, where there was a couple massive Elvis statues, and just posters and records everywhere. Haha it was pretty mad. And dope. (: That night after we went in we had a fire on their back patio. It was really fun. Made some s'mores out of digestive biscuits. They were dang good. 😎 it was so nice to chill for a bit around the fire, super refreshing to the soul. (:

Wednesday we finished up our exchange, then Dave drove me and Elder Stiff out to Halkyn. We tracted all afternoon with NOTHING. Haha we decided to start tracting out a bit into the more countryside part of it where the houses are like 3 football fields away from each other. We met this man named Ken! He was super super solid. We talked for a while about the Restoration. Him and his wife have been going to loads of different churches for ages. Ken was so great and took a Book of Mormon. We are going back tomorrow... not sure exactly how we're going to get there haha. (: Dave picked us up then we went to a carvery and snagged some food. Dave is a homie. (: the rest of the night was just ward coordination.

Thursday we had weekly planning. ''Twas good". Not a lot to say about it. 😜 that afternoon we hit up Blacon and tried by some people and did some tracting. It was pretty good. We were able to talk to this lady Sadie who we met ages ago but never were able to get in contact. She was super solid still! She said she drove by the church and thought of us. She is so nice, and really wants to come to church. (: it'll be good to see her there. That night we had an appointment with a man named Mike. We met him in Flint but he lives in Buckley. He told us the name of his house. Lots of places here the houses have names and no numbers which makes it really hard to find a house. The street he lived on was ages long. So we walked all the way down it looking for the house pylpoxl. 45 minutes of walking looking for this stinkin house. Then we walked all the way back up the road looking for it. Needless to say we never found the house and missed our appointment. 😐 so that was pretty dumb haha.

Friday was super slow. Nobody was interested and nobody we tried by was in. Our appointments that day fell through as well. We were knocking one door and talking to a lady when all a sudden a wild man started screaming at us from the street, telling us not to knock and don't talk to this lady. So the conversation was cut short. The man was swearing at us like crazy and trying to hit us with his bike. Good stuff. 😁

Saturday. We went to Chester and tried by a former investigator James. He was super nice and we talked for a while. We are going back there tonight. Super nice dude. We saw a couple less active members which went good. We were waiting for our bus when a random dude stopped and offered us a lift. We hopped in. His name was Scott and he was super nice. We talked for a while and got his number and are going to go over some time. (: Saturday night was pretty slow.

Sunday was Elder Stiff's birthday! We weren't expecting any investigators coming to church but right as it was about to start we saw Julie who we taught last week! And she brought one of her friends! It was so solid! It was fast and testimony meeting and talking to Julie and Louise afterwards they loved it! It was so great. They just said they felt so good and relaxed and peaceful. Solid. (: a lot of people bore testimony on the Book of Mormon, and afterwards I gave one to Louise because it was the first time we'd met her. She was like oh this is what everyone was talking about! It was so great to have them there. That night we had tea with the Santos family and they fed us a Phillipino meal. Chicken Adobe. It was stinking good. When we got to the flat last night we burned some cake for a birthday candle and ate some cake for Elder Stiffs birthday. It was a good time. (:

This morning we bought some 3 pound golf clubs then went to the driving range. Haha it was pretty fun. I broke my club. The club head went further then the ball did hahaha. Good times. (: that's my week! 

Love you all and have a good one!
-Elder Edwards

Bore da

Laurel here--finally posting last weeks letter!!
Also... "Bore da" is Welsh for good morning. :)

Hey all! It's been a pretty solid week! I hardly remember any of it but I'll try my best. 😜

Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday we did missionary work. It was really really slow and nobody wanted to hear anything we wanted to say and there's not a lot to report. Sooooo yeah. (: it was great! 😜 

We knocked anyways.

Thursday! We had a pretty killer weekly planning! We didn't really have any investigators to plan for because we dropped a ton of people because they just simply aren't progressing. So we tried to figure out other stuff to plan for. I was thinking about my ancestor John Edwards who lived in Wales, wondering if he lived in North Wales which is part of our mission. So I looked it up but he isn't in our mission so I was like dang we can't tract his town. 😜 

Downton Abbey or something.

Then I was thinking about Dan Jones. For those of you who don't know, Dan Jones is a Welshman who was a convert to the early church. He was actually with Joseph Smith in Carthage jail the night before Joseph and Hyrum were murdered. Joseph asked Dan if he was afraid to die. Dan said something like "engaged in this work, death would not have much terror" don't quote me because that wasn't quite what he said but it was something like that. 😜 Joseph then prophesied that Dan would serve a mission in his homeland of Wales and complete his life's work as the lord intends.

A couple years later Dan Jones served in Wales and played a key role in over 6 thousand people being baptised. I love the story of Dan Jones and wondered where in Wales he was born. I searched high and low to find it, but it's hard because the limited use of our iPads. But finally in the October 1987 friend I found an article that talked about Dan Jones. It said he was born in the little village of Halkyn, Wales. And that is in our area! We got super pumped and actually felt really good about going out and tracting this village. We are going on Wednesday and having Dave (a member) drive us out there. Haha so there's a bit of church history for yous. (: That afternoon we had a lesson with Julie! It went super super good. It was the first time she let us in her home. We took Brother Ron Sparks with us. We had a great lesson on the plan of salvation and Brother Sparks was just the perfect fellowshipper so that was great. (: Tracting that night we met a very kind lady named Jill. Jill's son died about a year ago and she has been searching for answers ever since then. We are going back there tomorrow and are very excited! (: She is a great woman. 

Friday we tracted in a town called Flint. The streets we tracted there was a castle right next to it! Literally a 2 minute walk haha. So we had lunch chillin in the castle courtyard which was pretty dope haha. (: That afternoon we found two new friends who are both really great! Cicilia and Mike. They are great people and I look forward to being able to work with them. 

That night we walked ages out to contact a media referral. His name is Sergio and we finally caught him in! He is from Luanda and has been in the U.K. For 2 months. While he has been in the U.K. his family in Luanda was baptised into the church. So his family sent him to us as a referral. Haha we got there and he already had everything his mom brought to him, Book of Mormon, all the pamphlets. He accepted the invite to be baptised which was amazing. (: not sure if he'll be baptised here or when he goes back to Luanda but I look forward to working with him. (:

We're in Rhyl right now and had to take the classic bathroom selfie.
Who remembers these?

Saturday and Sunday was basically just conference. I loved it! So good. I especially loved Ronald a Rasbands talk about being first responders to the spirit. And how if we don't respond the first time we are prompted it weakens our connection with the spirit. But if we always respond first, we will be so close with the spirit and be a strong tool in his hands. (:

So that's my week! It's been pretty killer! Thanks for all you all do for me. Love you all! (:

-Elder Edwards