你好 from Sydney! : Love the Lord and serve Him hard!

It's been 4 weeks since we met on transfer day!

More Malaysian food with Sister Weiss

I feel like I was just getting really excited about hitting 6 months, and now I'm at 7!

Today is the start of an 8 week transfer. I can't believe I've already been in Newcastle for 4 weeks. It's been absolutely amazing. Sister Weiss and I were reflecting on this past transfer and it's been full of miracles!!! I know I say this every week, but it's so true. I learned a lot in this last transfer, such as how to become a more consecrated missionary, how to become a more Christlike missionary, and how to trust Heavenly Father.

Me, Sandy and Lyla. They're from the City! Sandy was baptised in Newcastle. She just finished a mini-mission!

I also learned the importance in creating a vision, setting goals, making plans, and actually doing them. Exactly one month ago, Sister Weiss and I sat down and created our vision, made goals and plans, and tried our best to accomplish them. With full faith, consecration, diligence, and obedience, we were able to achieve ALL of our goals, which were:

setting baptismal dates for eternigators,

start teaching less-active part-member families, and

adding solid people to the teaching pool and help them prepare for baptism.

(Names and specific details have been omitted for privacy reasons.)

Honestly, there were times where we doubted these goals, but we knew that they were inspired by Heavenly Father because he knows that this is the way to help bring His children back home.

A big theme for our companionship this week is found in 1 Nephi 3:7 - Heavenly Father won't give us anything we can't handle or accomplish. We just need to go and do the things which we are commanded to do because we have the ability to do so. We received revelation to set these goals and Heavenly Father knew that we could do them. Sister Weiss and I actually memorized this scripture in Chinese and we've been sharing it with everyone we meet because it's super applicable to everyone's situation.

Also, something that has been a major theme this week is aligning ourselves with God's will. We were talking about Repentance (a hot topic in life....) and what the word means. We came to a conclusion that it's the process of change to align ourselves with God's will. Heavenly Father knows what's best for us, and it's important for us to realise that and act in the way that he would have us act so that He can bless us! The blessings we have in store are incredible, but we'll only get them if we're obedient to His commandments.

Some other great scriptures that were highlighted throughout the work this week

Luke 1:37 - With God, all things are possible

D&C 6:36 - When we direct our thoughts towards God, we don't need to doubt or fear

Alma 26:10 - Pride is a terrible sin, but we need to be confident that we can do all things through Christ, our Lord

We had a great training by Elder Fowler on Ezra Taft Benson's talk, Beware of Pride. It's perfectly rebuking and makes you want to try harder to be more humble. It's great. Go read it! :)

Elder Fowler and I served in Sydney for 1 transfer and Newcastle for 1 transfer.

Sister Lew, Sister Weiss and Elder Bardsley

Elder Fowler got transferred to Ryde (the Mandarin speaking ward) to be a district leader over there, and Elder Bardsley finishes his mission today. So in our district we have 2 new elders and 1 new sister. This transfer, 19 missionaries are going home!! Including Sister Tseng and Sister Cluff :( I'm excited for all of them though. They have big things coming their way.