Talmage's Back to the Homeland Mission: Council, Cakes and Coughs‏

So we had a zone interview training and we were able to see the new mission plan for 2016. It looks super good. I am excited to be part of it. We will also be having a world wide Missionary broadcast (missionaries ONLY) pretty serious stuff. Probably just telling us that the second coming is going to come in a couple weeks.

While we were at the training Elder Powell and I gave instruction on how to teach people not lessons. It turned out pretty good. I am glad the spirit helped us out with it because I was pretty nervous. We started out talking about one of Boyd K Packers Analogies he used when he was a mission president. He was in a zone conference with a beautiful cake and he asked some elders if they wanted some. They readily accepted his offer. President Packer went up to the cake, grabbed a big piece with his bare hands and dropped into the elders hand. He then taught how we might have the greatest message ever but if we don't present it in a good way people won't be interested and they will lose their appetite. Elder Packer is a master teacher so we didn't come close to how well he explained it, but we did our best and I hope someone got something out of it.

It was kind of a hard week. Elder Powell and I have been pretty sick and we have been coughing like it is nobodies business. We had 3 people with a baptismal date drop us so we are pretty low. We can see that the adversary is trying to stop us from this work because it is the most important thing ever. He is so mad when he see's us get out of bed on time and it's just a pain him to see us keep trying. The more we keep trying the more worried he gets. He knows that sooner or later we will be able to help more people. So I am not the one worried when things aren't going my way because I know soon enough blessing will get poured out on us for our diligence. Satan should be the one who is worried because the blessings will be coming soon :]

I spoke in sacrament on sunday about how we feel the spirit. It was fun to be able to go through my journal and see some of the stories of when I have had the spirit tell me something. I would Highly encourage everyone to write down their experience every time they receive revelation. From my journal I can see how I have seen how I feel the spirit. It is the coolest thing ever to see.

I hope you all know I love you. I have loved this mission. I have loved the good times and I love the lessons from the bad times. I hope that we can all see the hope that comes from this gospel. I will see yous later :]

Elder Thayne